Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Josh Hamilton's Bat Headed for the Hall of Fame
national policy and same-sex marriage
national policy and same-sex marriage, House Assistant Minority Leader James Clyburn (D-S.C.) said Monday that he believes same-sex marriage should be legal — and the No. 3 House Democrat appeared to go further than President Obama in suggesting that a national policy, rather than a state-by-state one, is needed on the issue.
Sarah Hyland: Had a Kidney Transplant
Sarah Hyland: Had a Kidney Transplant, “Modern Family’s” Haley Dunphy, reveals in the new issue of Seventeen magazine that she received a kidney from her father last month. The 21-year-old starlet opened up about her life-saving surgery. “You know that family is always going to be there for you, no matter what. My dad gave me a freakin’ kidney!” Sarah told the maggie. “I have a second chance at life, not a lot of people get that.”
Monday, May 14, 2012
10 Quick Fixes for a Bad Hair Day
10 Quick Fixes for a Bad Hair Day
Student loans -- for kindergarten?
Student loans -- for kindergarten?
It used to be that families first signed up for education loans when their children enrolled in college, but a growing number of parents are seeking tuition assistance as soon as kindergarten. Though data are scarce, private-school experts and the small number of lenders who provide loans for kindergarten through 12th grade say pre-college loans are becoming more popular. Your Tuition Solution, one of the largest lenders in this space, says demand for the upcoming year is already up. This month, the total dollar amount of loans families requested rose 10% compared with a year ago; at that pace, the company expects its total funding to rise to $20 million for 2012-13. Separately, First Marblehead, which exited the market in 2008, re-entered last year as demand for loans began to risMuch of this demand is coming from high-income families. Roughly 20% of families that applied for aid to pay for their children's kindergarten through 12th grade private school education had incomes of $150,000 or more, according to 2010-11 data, the latest from the National Association of Independent Schools. That's up from just 6% in 2002-03. Those who don't get approved for free aid, like grants, increasingly turn to loans, experts say.
For parents who sign up for pre-college loans, the risks can be significant. To begin with, they could be repaying the loans for a long time. Sallie Mae's and Your Tuition Solution's pre-college loans have repayment periods of up to three and seven years, respectively. Loans at the Hawken School in Chesterland, Ohio, don't have to be repaid until after the child graduates college. That means parents could be on the hook to repay K-12 and college loans simultaneously. Already, about one in six parents of college graduates have loans, and they're projected to owe nearly $34,000 on average this year, according to FinAid.org. Taking on loans before college leaves parents at risk of owing larger debts, experts say.
Schools are offering their own financing options as well. The Blake School in Hopkins, Minn., says 132 of its families signed up for its 10-month payment plan this year -- which charges an 8.5% fixed rate -- up 19% from the previous academic year. The Hawken School says it provides a small number of loans with a 6% rate. "These loans aren't as taboo as they once were -- there are a lot more schools that are much more willing now to present a loan program as an affordability option," says Kristen Power, the northeast regional director for the NAIS' School and Student Services, which processes families' financial aid applications to private schools.The rise in private school loans coincides with a rise in tuition. The average cost of private school is nearly $22,000 a year, up 4% from a year ago and up 26% from 2006-07, according to the NAIS. While schools increased their financial aid budgets, the gap between free aid and tuition costs is getting bigger for many parents. As a result, enrollment is dropping as fewer families can afford to pay. Total private school enrollment is projected at around 5.3 million this year, down 11% from 2007, according to the Department of Education.
The loans can also be expensive. The interest rates -- which can be fixed or variable -- range from around 4% to roughly 20%. (Lower rates are given to parents with higher credit scores.) And the loans can be large: The average loan given by Your Tuition Solution is $14,000. First Marblehead loans out up to $30,000 a year. At the Lake Trust Credit Union that's headquartered in Lansing, Mich., borrowers can have up to $40,000 outstanding in so-called K-12 education loans.
For those parents who are set on giving their children a private education, the hunt for an alternative way to fill the gap has intensified, says Brian Fisher, a partner at AdmissionsQuest, which provides consulting to families whose children attend private boarding schools. In most cases, parents are informed of these loans from the schools' admissions and financial aid offices, says Power.
The schools say they provide parents information on the loans but don't go out of their way to encourage the practice. Jose Baltier of Midland, Texas, says he was stumped about how to pay for his son's education at a selective boarding school in Massachusetts until he received the school's acceptance package, which included a brochure for the lender Your Tuition Solution. He says he contacted the company and a day later was approved for a loan.To be sure, lenders say the loans are less risky than they were before the recession. Qualifying is harder and in most cases is restricted to borrowers in good credit standing and who submit income documentation. The repayment periods -- which previously stretched up to 20 years -- are shorter now, and the loan sizes lenders provide are smaller, says Power. Lenders also say they encourage parents who sign up for their loans to choose the shortest repayment period possible and to explore more affordable alternatives, like a tuition payment plan that allows parents to split up tuition costs typically over 10 months and doesn't charge interest.
Despite the risks, experts say many parents are intent on making private education a reality for their children no matter the cost. Robin Aronow, an independent educational consultant to families in New York City, says parents believe that private schools will give their children a higher quality of education and will help them get into a better college, which is why they're willing to stretch.
That's the case for Dunham, who says he and his wife haven't saved for college for their two children. Instead, he says, they're trying to give them the best education now in the hopes that it'll open doors to better colleges. "We'll figure out how to pay for it then, or with any luck they'll get scholarships," he says. "Right or wrong, we're hoping our experiment works."
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Children of Famous Moms
Children of Famous Moms
Saturday, May 12, 2012
The Sexiest Cars of All Time
The Sexiest Cars of All Time
Queen Mothers of the Animal Kingdom
Queen Mothers of the Animal Kingdom
Four newly hatched cygnets follow their mother swan into the lake at Crossgates Country Club near Millersville, Pennsylvania, on April 30.
A baby one-day-old American Bison and his mother nuzzle each other in the zoo de Servion, in Servion, Switzerland on April 27.
Baby elephant 'Assam' explores his enclosure with his mother at the Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg, Germany, on April 27.
Gorilla Chelewa holds her baby born the day before at Cabarceno Nature Park in Cantabria, northern Spain, on April 25.
An infant mongoose lemur is shown nestled in the fur of its mother at Busch Gardens in Tamp, Florida, April 25.
A white stork brings a branch in its nest, near Biebesheim, western Germany, on April 25.
10-year-old Sumatran orangutan Cahaya cuddles her 6-day-old male cub Malou at the zoo in Zurich, Switzerland, on April 12.
A newborn South American female tapir baby lies next to her mother at the Debrecen Zoo in Hungary on April 16.
A 1-month old albino Bennett tree-kangaroo rests in his mother's pouch at the 'Garden of Nature' zoo in Hungary on April 21.
Two storks care for their chicks on April 23 at the wildlife park in Eekholt, Germany.
A golden takes care of her 1-day-old offspring in Liberec Zoo on April 13. The Liberec Zoo, in the Czech Republic is the only one in Europe which breeds the species, a goat-antelope from Asia, in captivity, according to a spokesperson from the zoo.
A baby baboon is seen in his mother's arms at the Hagenbeck Zoo on April 18 in Hamburg, Germany.
A 1-day-old Asian elephant baby keeps close to her mother, Lai Sinh, in their enclosure in the Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg, Germany, on April 13.
Kiazi, a rare Eastern Bongo, stands beside his first-time mother, Djembe, on April 2 at Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia. His name means sweet potato.
An American bald eagle feeds its young at Gray's Lake Park in Des Moines, Iowa, on April 9.
Mother Orsa and her three young bears roam around their open-air enclosure at a wildlife park on April 10 in Germany.
Polar bear mother, Vilma, cuddles with her cub, Anori, at a zoo in Germany on March 29. Anori was born on January 4 and has the same father as polar bear Knut, who died in 2011.
Orangutan infant, Aurora, rests on top of her surrogate mother, Cheyenne's, head after eating breakfast at the Houston Zoo on March 29. Born at the zoo in March 2011, Aurora was abandoned by her mother and hand raised by volunteers for nine months before being adopted by Cheyenne.
A mother polar bear plays with two of her three cubs born last November at the Moscow Zoo, on March 22.
A female giraffe calf born this month at the Wildlife Conservation Society's Bronx Zoo stays close to her mother in New York on March 22.
Wira, a newborn male baby Sulawesi crested macaque, is held by his mother, Wino, at ZSL London Zoo on March 14.
Two Asiatic lion cubs that were born in November, venture outdoors for the first time accompanied by their mother at Blijdorp Zoo in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, on February 22.
2-year-old Henry rides the back of his mother Kuchi inside a Western lowland gorilla habitat at Zoo Atlanta in Atlanta, on March 9.
A 3-day-old Lechwe antelope stands next to its mother at the zoo in Berlin on February 10.
A baby baboon only a few days old, stands next to its mother in an enclosure at the "ZOOM" Zoo in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, on March 12.
Maggie, a baby giraffe, is nuzzled at the Oakland Zoo on February 2 in Oakland, California. Weighing in at 80 pounds and 72 inches, Maggie is the first female giraffe born at the zoo in nearly a decade.
Rhinoceros offspring, Mala, lies next to its mother, Mana, in their compound at the zoo in Magdeburg, Germany, on January 28.
Western Lowland gorilla mother Bana holds her new baby born on November 16, 2011.
Four baby capybaras are accompanied by their mother as they explore their enclosure on November 3, at the zoo in Schwerin, Germany.
Sumatran tiger Jumilah is seen with her cubs at Taronga Zoo on October 25, in Sydney, Australia.
Torsten Blackwood
Chimp hug
A chimpanzee cuddles her infant at the Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia, on September 30.
A Mother-Daughter Spring Break
A Mother-Daughter Spring Break
When Emma, a freshman in college, asked me to take her somewhere warm over spring break, I seized the chance to spend time together. We wanted Miami without spring break debauchery and South Beach without fashionista chic. And I knew better than to suggest Canyon Ranch. Once, when I told Emma that the apartment seemed empty without her, she replied, “Are you saying I’m fat?” (She’s not.) In short, we needed a resort with real food, no beer-guzzling college hooligans or European runway models.
A friend mentioned the Fisher Island Hotel and Resort, on a small, highly exclusive private island two miles from South Beach, the kind of place where oligarchs and Oprah Winfrey buy and sell $15 million condos. I was alarmed by the prices but seduced by the descriptions of the 45-room hotel — a seaside Italian villa begun in 1926 by a descendant of Cornelius Vanderbilt that has peacocks roaming the property.
I imagined sunrise walks on the beach, giggly mother-daughter spa treatments and intimate candlelit meals during which Emma would lean in and at long last tell me what college was like besides “fine.”
I failed to anticipate that exam-rattled 18-year-olds sleep long past noon and then stay up all night (I get up around 6 and am asleep easily before 10). Nor had I known that embedded in the ethos of this particular private island is a class system that places short-term guests below the salt.
The mother-daughter idyll beneath the palm trees was peaceful, luxurious and almost as though Emma had never left campus in Ohio. In the end it turned into a love-hate relationship that oddly enough mirrored my love-hate relationship with the resort. I loved everything about it, but it didn’t love me back, and that, I hated. It turned out it wasn’t personal.
It’s a long story, so I’ll begin at the bar.
There wasn’t one.
Fisher Island boasts 18 tennis courts, two of them grass, a nine-hole golf course designed by P. B. Dye, 3 swimming pools, 2 deepwater boat marinas, 6 restaurants, a fancy food and wine store, pillow menus, a tropical bird aviary and even a miniature observatory. But when I was there midweek in March there was no place to sit and have a glass of wine.
It goes without saying that any mother traveling with a teenage daughter is at some point going to need a drink. Even a good-enough mother will at least try not to drink too much in front of a college-age child; I needed a bar where I could enjoy a soothing cocktail fast and discreetly.
I tried the beach club first, but lashing winds from the sea battered the outdoor bar and kept away hotel guests and, more important, the bartender. The two restaurants that are attached to the hotel didn’t have separate bar areas, and something advertised as the Sunset Bar, close to the beach and facing the skyline of Miami, was closed the entire time we were there.
I considered driving our golf cart off the villa grounds to the Golf Grill, overlooking the nine-hole course, but that, Emma said primly, would set a bad example of maternal drinking and driving.
The entrance to the Vanderbilt Mansion opens onto a charming, outdoor stone-paved courtyard with large white sofas and armchairs underneath umbrellas that circle a giant banyan tree, imported by the Vanderbilts from India. It’s beautiful, and at dusk the perfect place to have a drink. I sat there many times for long stretches, and no waiter ever came and asked if I wanted anything. I saw no other guests sitting there, let alone over drinks, and I was forced to conclude that it was just a courtyard, one that felt like the world’s loveliest and loneliest bus terminal waiting room
Famous Engagement Rings in History
Famous Engagement Rings in History
America's Best Burger Cities 2012
America's Best Burger Cities 2012
“The best ones fall between $10 and $20,” says burger enthusiast Keith Flanagan, who’s also an account executive at a New York City public relations firm. “Anything less should make a foodie question the quality, and anything more should make a foodie question the restaurant’s hubris.”
Once the ultimate cheap comfort food, the burger is increasingly becoming a gourmet indulgence—often prepared with grass-fed, Kobe-style beef, topped with shaved truffles, or rendered quirky through toppings such as fried duck eggs. So where to go to sample the best burgers? Providence, RI, according to T+L readers, who voted in the annual America’s Favorite Cities survey to rank cities on features that delight travelers, among them, irresistible foods like pizza and burgers.
To be fair, the survey’s list of 35 major metropolitan areas didn’t include some smaller towns that were key in the burger’s evolution, such as New Haven, CT, home of the legendary Louis’ Lunch, or Wichita, KS, where White Castle sold the first burger that resembles what Americans eat today.
Other cities in the top 20, however, have their own claim on hamburger history. The Los Angeles area launched the first McDonald’s and the In-N-Out Burger, both in the 1940s. Minneapolis/St. Paul, meanwhile, is famous for the Juicy Lucy, a burger with the cheese cooked inside the patty.
While some cities keep it simple (Dick’s Drive-In in Seattle serves an old-school $1.50 burger), others like Philadelphia’s Hickory Lane American Bistro aim higher. “It’s not just a sandwich anymore—it’s become an entrée,” says owner and executive chef Matt Zagorski, whose burger ($14) blends filet mignon, short ribs, and brisket.
The No. 1 burger city, Providence, may have it both ways, offering both classic and creative burgers, with an emphasis on locally sourced ingredients—within reason. At Harry’s Bar and Burger, you can wash down your 100-percent-Hereford-beef sliders with spiked milkshakes, such as the Caramel Twinkie, made with ice cream, vanilla vodka, and snack cakes.
Purists like chef Zagorski think that the power of a great burger meal ultimately comes down to the high-quality beef. Why not just eat a good steak then? “Because,” he says, “it would be sacrilege to put cheese and mayo on a steak.”
Is He In or Is He Out? Crunchtime for Scott Thompson at Yahoo.
Is He In or Is He Out? Crunchtime for Scott Thompson at Yahoo.
According to sources with knowledge of the situation, the board of Yahoo is not likely to take long in assessing whether he will stay or if he will be let go, due to a controversy around how a non-existent computer science degree got on his bio and also in Yahoo regulatory filings.
A special committee of independent directors is now investigating the matter, including trying to assess the damage the controversy has had on Thompson’s ability to lead the Silicon Valley Internet giant.
How quickly the board moves is likely to be a sign of their intent. If within the next days, it is likely to let the former president of eBay’s PayPal unit go and replace him with a current company exec; if it waits longer and shows some public support of him — which the board has not done since the scandal erupted — Thompson’s chances are better that he will only be given some sort of censure.
One important task is also closely considering the impact of possible legal problems related to Thompson and others signing documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission that were not accurate.
One thing is clear from interviews with multiple sources, many members of the board have not been happy with how Thompson has handled the matter since activist shareholder Daniel Loeb of Third Point uncovered the problem a week ago.
While first tossing the borked bio as an “inadvertent error,” Thompson was then largely silent about the issue with staff, despite being in close meetings with them, which caused stress among key execs.
Then, he made a public announcement in which he apologized for only the “distraction” caused by the incident and not the error itself as some had hoped he would.
Yesterday, apparently feeling it was time to try to explain things face-to-face, Thompson made another attempt to explain what happened in two separate meetings with his direct reports and then his senior staff, apparently trying to get through to them that he did not fake his resume nor did he give an inaccurate bio to Yahoo when he was being hired for the job earlier this year.
Thompson thought it was time — now that the board investigation was underway — to answer questions directly, said a source.
Among other things, Thompson gave a somewhat convoluted explanation that it appeared in his bio due to a misunderstanding during an interview with a headhunting firm. And that he never noticed it once it proliferated And that when an NPR interviewer asked him directly about his CS degree, he did not want to correct her in mid-discussion — although others report he said he did not hear the question fully.
Sources said Thompson — who is on the midst of initiating changes across a large and troubled organization, after laying off 2,000 employees — thought the sessions went well, that he clearly communicated that he was taking blame for the problem and its repercussions. Those sources also noted that he received support for doing so after the talks.
But, more than a dozen others I interviewed who were listening remotely — some of whom I sought out and some who contacted me directly — thought Thompson’s complex explanation was deeply problematic and that he tried to foist the blame on others rather than on himself.
Every one of these people expressed the need for him to step down to allow the Silicon Valley Internet giant to move forward.
What the board thought about the performance is still not clear, said sources, but things are coming down to two distinct scenarios.
The first is a quick parting of the ways with Thompson, within days, either for cause or via a negotiated settlement. Others at Yahoo involved with perpetuating the mistake in the bio are also at risk.
This option is perhaps the more likely at this moment, unless the scandal dissipates and employees continued rancor over the situation can be assuaged soon.
In this case, sources said, Thompson will be replaced by a current board member or a member of the top staff. When directors fired Carol Bartz last fall, CFO Tim Morse became interim CEO and he is one of the likely candidates for the job again.
The second scenario centers on needing Thompson to complete a number of complex transactions related to the sale of Yahoo’s Chinese assets and its re-negotiations with Microsoft over its troubled search partnership, among other things.
In that case, Thompson will be censured in some manner by the board and will also probably have to endure some punishment for allowing false regulatory documents to be filed by Yahoo. Others at Yahoo will also be subject to the same treatment in such an outcome.
How will it turn out?
Only board member Patti Hart has so far paid for her faulty vetting of Thompson, stepping down from the board earlier this week.
But whether she will be the only shoe to drop in what has turned out to be a bizarre wildfire that as raged across Yahoo’s troubled landscape remains to be seen.
Thus, most definitely watch this space.
What Ryan Seacrest's Future Means for Television
What Ryan Seacrest's Future Means for Television
His reach will soon extend to sharper fare. Thanks to an expanded contract with NBCUniversal, announced in late April, Seacrest will cover the London Olympics, Today show segments, and possibly the presidential election. The move is a testament to his appeal, but it’s also a sign of the waning separation between news and entertainment and the rising pressures of live-event coverage. Seacrest’s career trajectory is an indication of the difficulties his employers are having attracting an audience for which his easily digestible image could at least be a salve, if not a solution.
NBC’s ratings stalwart Today has most recently been losing ground to ABC’s Good Morning America. The network is also ramping up for the Summer Olympics, the rights to which cost $1.18 billion (the last time the network aired the Games, in 2010, it lost $223 million on the investment). Over at E!, Seacrest’s cable home, new chair Bonnie Hammer is introducing scripted shows to the reality-TV haven’s lineup, signaling a departure from the fare Seacrest does best. If the dusk of unscripted television should ever arrive, his new role as a straight-faced host will allow him to retain his perch. What’s more, his stack of contracts manages to cross networks, a rare form of leverage.
Since he started as host of American Idol, the Fox show that put him in front of 13 million viewers in 2002 and recently re-signed him for another two years, Seacrest has launched an eponymous production company responsible for the slew of Kardashian-family reality shows as well as Bravo’s new hit Shahs of Sunset. He has negotiated corporate-sponsorship deals that monetize his popularity and saddled up with Mark Cuban as a minor shareholder in the rebranding of Cuban’s HDNet channel. CAA, the agency that currently represents him, is a partner in the HDNet rebranding, and Clear Channel, which signs his reported $20 million–a–year radio contract, has a minority stake in Ryan Seacrest Productions. On screen and off, he’s a good ally to have—at least as long as he can retain his sheen as the hardest-working man on the airwaves.
Supermodel Christy Turlington Burns defends her campaign to boycott Mother's Day
Supermodel Christy Turlington Burns defends her campaign to boycott Mother's Day
Turlington Burns’ Every Mother Counts organization, which raises awareness about the 360,000 women who die each year from pregnancy or childbirth-related problems, wants fellow moms to spend the holiday in silence – no phone calls, no gifts, no Facebook, no fanfare from family.
Live Poll
6 tips for making a smooth move
6 tips for making a smooth move
The Week in Music for May 11, 2012
The Week in Music for May 11, 2012
Sizing Up Facebook
Sizing Up Facebook
The Many Ways to Catch Shut-Eye in the Sky
The Many Ways to Catch Shut-Eye in the Sky
Why One of Silicon Valley’s Savviest Investors Has Shut His Wallet
Why One of Silicon Valley’s Savviest Investors Has Shut His Wallet
The last new investment Hartz made was more than a year ago. At the time it was a little company no one had heard of called Pinterest. You’ve probably heard of it now. Hartz also made early bets on Airbnb, Flixster, Palantir, Trulia and Yammer among others. He’s mobbed up with the PayPal mafia, not as a former colleague, but again, because he was an early backer. Hartz is making follow-on investments in his current roster of startups, but he’s not looking to do anything new — it’s just too expensive.
“We don’t know where we are in this cycle,” Hartz says from Eventbrite’s San Francisco headquarters. “We can’t know how much longer this abundance of capital will last, but I don’t want to be a part of it. When I see a massive number of new investors and carpetbaggers coming in, it’s time to get out.”Hartz doesn’t use the word bubble; it’s more complicated than that for him as a guy who sits on both sides of the money equation as an investor and an entrepreneur. It’s more a winter is coming view of the startup world, especially for the consumer internet on which Hartz focuses. His advice: Get prepared for a chill to set in.
As an investor Hartz points to the usual signs of too much money-chasing deals. The billboards on highway 101 between San Francisco and Silicon Valley touting startups no one has heard of. The bus stop signs in tech-heavy locales like Mountain View and Palo Alto advertising scads of engineering jobs.
“Everyone is competing for the same people, going after the same real estate, the same support services,” Hartz says. “The natural resources of the startup world are getting scarcer and scarcer, and the cost is getting higher and higher. It’s all an outgrowth of an abundance of capital.”
While venture capital investment in internet companies at $1.4 billion was down slightly in dollar terms in Q1 of 2012 compared to the end of 2011, there has been eight consecutive quarters of more than $1 billion invested in the sector according to the National Venture Capital Association. That’s well over $8 billion in a two-year period. No wonder for every Instagram, or Dropbox, a dozen copycats crop up.
All that money makes novice entrepreneurs do funny things, Hartz says. “That relentless competition coupled with the cash tends to train entrepreneurs to be far more aggressive and less focused on things like measurable results,” Hartz says. “There are some entrepreneurs who can and should be aggressive, but they possess a certain type of pattern recognition, an understanding about what’s really lifting a business.”
Hartz puts his fellow PayPal mafia brethren in that category, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk in particular. “The PayPal guys have always been very good at seeing what makes a business work, and then raising capital opportunistically during the good times,” Hartz says. “They bulk up ahead of the downturn.”
At Eventbrite Hartz is taking his own advice. He’s raised $80 million to date, but is sitting on $58 million preferring to run Eventbrite frugally while growing steadily month after month. Don’t misunderstand, Hartz believes in the consumer internet. He’s all-in as an entrepreneur, but as an investor, he’s out.
“When things are most dire, and people are most scared,” Hartz says. “When people openly mock the consumer internet space and the excesses of it, that’s when I will start investing again.”
It's Time to Rethink Continuous Improvement
It's Time to Rethink Continuous Improvement
Admittedly, continuous improvement once powered Japan's economy. Japanese manufacturers in the 1950s had a reputation for poor quality, but through a culture of analytical and systematic change Japan was able to go from worst to first. Starting in the 1970s, the country's ability to create low-cost, quality products helped them dominate key industries, such as automobiles, telecommunications, and consumer electronics. To compete with this miraculous turnaround, Western companies, starting with Motorola, began to adopt Japanese methods. Now, almost every large Western company, and many smaller ones, advocate for continuous improvement.
But what's happened in Japan? In the past year Japan's major electronics firms have lost an aggregated $21 billion and have been routinely displaced by competitors from China, South Korea, and elsewhere. As Fujio Ando, senior managing director at Chibagin Asset Management suggests, "Japan's consumer electronics industry is facing defeat. "Similarly, Japan's automobile industry has been plagued by a series of embarrassing quality problems and recalls, and has lost market share to companies from South Korea and even (gasp!) the United States.
Looking beyond Japan, iconic six sigma companies in the United States, such as Motorola and GE, have struggled in recent years to be innovation leaders. 3M, which invested heavily in continuous improvement, had to loosen its sigma methodology in order to increase the flow of innovation. As innovation thinker Vijay Govindarajan says, "The more you hardwire a company on total quality management, [the more] it is going to hurt breakthrough innovation. The mindset that is needed, the capabilities that are needed, the metrics that are needed, the whole culture that is needed for discontinuous innovation, are fundamentally different."
So should we abandon continuous improvement? Absolutely not! It has created tremendous value and still drives competitive advantage in many companies and industries. But perhaps it's time to nuance our approach in the following ways:
Customize how and where continuous improvement is applied. One size of continuous improvement doesn't fit all parts of the organization. The kind of rigor required in a manufacturing environment may be unnecessary, or even destructive, in a research or design shop. Sure it's important to inject discipline into product and service development, but not so much that it discourages creativity.
Question whether processes should be improved, eliminated, or disrupted. Too many continuous improvement projects focus so much on gaining efficiencies that they don't challenge the basic assumptions of what's being done. For example, a six sigma team in one global consumer products firm spent a great deal of time streamlining information flows between headquarters and the field sales force, but didn't question how the information was ultimately used. Once they did, they were able to eliminate much of the data and free up thousands of hours that were redeployed to customer-facing activities.
Assess the impact on company culture. Take a hard look at the cultural implications of continuous improvement. How do they affect day-to-day behaviors? A data-driven mindset may encourage managers to ignore intuition or anomalous data that doesn't fit preconceived notions. In other cases it causes managers to ask execution-oriented, cost-focused questions way too early, instead of percolating and exploring ideas through messy experimentation that can't be justified through traditional metrics.
Continuous improvement doesn't have to be incompatible with disruptive innovation. But unless we think about continuous improvement in more subtle, nuanced, and creative ways, we may force companies to choose between the two.
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