GeekMBA360

I know many young and mid-career professionals who are considering going back to school during the recession. I keep hearing one question: "should I apply business school and get an MBA? Or should I go to law school and get a JD"?
To put it bluntly, if you’re asking this question, I think you don’t [...]

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A few readers asked me about the software, technology infrastructure, and cost for starting and running this blog. Here is a step-by-step replay of how this blog was started:

Domain name: I registered the domain name at www.namecheap.com. Cost: $8.41/year.
Blog software: WordPress. Cost: Free. 
Web hosting company: I’ve been using Pair Network hosting for a [...]

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Recently I had the opportunities to talk to several people who had profited tremendously from the current financial crisis. They recognized that there was a huge housing bubble, and the loose lending practices would get us into deep trouble. I guess you could call them "Dr. Dooms" — in the past year, they have been [...]

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One of my favorite entrepreneur success stories is Ben & Jerry’s. In 1977, Lifelong, ex-hipper friends Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield took a correspondence course on ice cream making from the Pennsylvania State University. They then founded the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream shop, and the rest is history.
Think about it – all they [...]

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It’s open enrollment period at my company now. I need to decide how much I’m going to deduct from my paychecks in 2009 for 401K, Health Saving Account (HSA), and Flexible Spending Account (FSA).
In the past, I have always maxed out 401K deduction to take advantage of the tax saving benefit. I’ve also put some [...]

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In the past three days, I got the same question from readers in three different age groups. Reader #1 is a recent college graduate. Reader #2 got his MBA four years ago. Reader #3 is a mid-career professional in his early forties.
All of them asked me the same question: I’m interested in a lot of [...]

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"No company will ever get rid of their number-one cheerleader. Open enthusiasm and support is contagious and has positive effects on the entire workplace. Because of this, companies will consider their cheerleaders highly desirable. A company cheerleader is like a free PR department, always singing a company’s praises and inspring others to see the good [...]

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How can we get out of the current mess we’re in? It has to be innovation and technology. I’m starting a new series on innovation — so far my blog has been very much focused on "playing defense" against Depression 2.0. But, we need to start thinking about "offense" as well.
To start the series on [...]

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Almost every technology company is cutting costs now. Below is a list of cost-cutting moves I, my friends, and industry contacts have experienced:

Lay off employees
Raise insurance premium by 200%, and essentially force employees to enroll in Health Saving Account (HSA) based health insurance plan
Instead of getting more office space, squeeze more employees per [...]

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I have to write this down. I’ve never felt like this emotionally.
I had a long day yesterday. There were quite a bit of office politics I had to deal with at work. On top of that, my company announced that it would increase the insurance premium that we pay out-of-packet by a disgusting 200%. [...]

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