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Cybersecurity steps to consider following Facebook’s reported breach

Damon Sayles Science & Technology

Some are calling it the worst Facebook hack of all time. Last month, Facebook engineers recognized unusual activity within their systems, and the company announced a network attack had exposed personal information of roughly 50 million users. As a Facebook user, there are a few steps that can be taken to keep your account safe from future attacks. And while they may seem like elementary rules of social media cybersecurity, here are three that seem to be forgotten and only remembered when a big breach takes place.

Travel2020: Of bots or brawn — The changing booking trends in travel

Lark Gould Travel, Hospitality & Event Management

At the recent Digital Travel Summit in Las Vegas, the word of the hour was "chat bot." Those are the pesky pop-up boxes that interrupt site research with an "assistant" who is ready to help with nifty, on-the-spot answers to anything that ails. For most of us, these are an annoying inconvenience, as we know, despite friendly jargon and seemingly responsive wording, the only thing human behind the name is the programmer that created it. Yet, at the Summit, where big brands met quant companies, the challenge to replace the human was the next great space race.

Mistakes to avoid with holiday marketing emails this year

Emma Fitzpatrick Marketing

Fa la la la la! It’s the most wonderful time of the year: holiday marketing planning. It’s time to draft those email subject lines, finalize the copy for your social posts and decide what deals to highlight. Ah, the magic of the season! Already, 40 percent of people have started their holiday shopping, according to research from the National Retail Federation. More people will be choosing to shop online this year, as eMarketer predicts e-commerce sales will increase 15.3 percent.

The corn maze of strategic planning

Robert C. Harris Association Management

Fall is the season for pumpkin patches and corn mazes. A corn maze is a strategically designed field that invites people to enter. The goal is to find the exit as efficiently as time allows. It is designed with obstacles and dead-ends so participants feel lost or confused. The maze comes to mind because an association board president said, "Our facilitator is going to lead us through the corn maze. When we exit, our strategic plan will be near completion."

The positive spiral of operationalizing curiosity

Catherine Iste Business Management, Services & Risk Management

Why can’t we? This is a natural first question along the path of becoming a curious company. Once we start asking, we inevitably start answering. When those efforts are positively reinforced by beneficial results, we start incorporating inquiry into our approach. Then, when we get comfortable enough asking questions as part of the routine, we begin to realize we can ask better questions in a better way. Here are a few ways to incorporate curiosity into our approach and the potential impact it can create.

Justice Department sues California over brand-new net neutrality law

Michelle R. Matisons Science & Technology

"Net neutrality" is more than just a catchy phrase referencing internet accessibility; it is the principle of equal treatment of all internet data. As it stands now, companies can favor certain data, content, and websites over others, which is a violation of First Amendment free speech protections, according to net neutrality advocates. In order to avoid these data and content manipulations, states have passed laws, as California did Sept. 30. The California law, which would go into effect Jan. 1, 2019, is one of the strictest in the country. This is why it didn’t take long for the federal government to announce a lawsuit against the Golden State.

Insights from a speech-language pathologist: Semantics

Sheilamary Koch Education

Imagine a boy in a classroom who regularly raises his hand to respond to questions, yet when called on hems and haws not knowing what to say. While he claims to have the answer, no one has time to wait for him to come up with it. Meanwhile, other students shout it out and the teacher wonders why he raised his hand in the first place. One viable explanation for the boy’s actions comes from Judith O. Roman, M.A., CCC-SLP, who is a clinical faculty member at Northwestern University’s Center for Audiology, Speech, Language, and Learning. In this series, we turn to Roman, an expert in the field of pediatric speech and language pathology, who shares her experience in the area of expressive language.

6 tips for must-read headlines and sermon titles

Mark MacDonald Religious Community

Everything in communication today involves editing. Why? Because our attention spans make us resist spending time reading or listening to something perceived as "long." Our headlines or titles are the ultimate summary of what’s to come in the content. But some research suggests that people don’t read an entire headline any more. Yes, it’s gotten that bad. Others say people often assume the meaning of a headline by seeing three to four of the first words. Can a church create headlines or sermon titles that demand to be read? Here are six tips.

Dream big: 4 ways AI, VR, and AR can enhance your marketing

Emma Fitzpatrick Marketing

A few years ago, having an Amazon Echo or Google Home was a novelty. In early 2017, only 7 percent of U.S. households had them, according to 2017 Gartner and Inside Radio research. By March 2018, that number skyrocketed, according to Voicebot.ai research, and 20 percent of U.S. adults had a smart speaker in their home. In just two years, Gartner predicts 75 percent of households will have one. That adoption and the embrace of smart speakers’ artificial intelligence (AI) will soon come to marketing and business as well.

Workplace violence is a challenging HR compliance issue

Terri Williams Business Management, Services & Risk Management

It’s not a topic that anyone wants to think about, but companies should be preparing workplace violence prevention and response plans. According to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), workplace violence can include verbal abuse and threats, physical assaults, and homicide. Employees, customers and clients, and visitors can be the perpetrators or victims of workplace violence. While over 2 million American workers a year report being a victim of workplace violence, OSHA notes that millions of other incidents are never reported.

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