Tag: essential

Essential Strategies For Salary Negotiation
TOP FOUR, WORK

Essential Strategies For Salary Negotiation

In the workplace today, salary negotiation is often considered an art. It is something that is not just done mindlessly, there has to be careful thinking and planning that takes place before you can ask your employer for a pay raise. It also comes in handy during job interviews, when your future employer will talk about the offer they can provide. But if you learn about the effective strategies, then you can easily get the pay that you've always wanted. If you are being interviewed for a job, after the first few interviews you will already be asked about the package. This is an important opportunity that allows you to be assertive about what you want, so you don't feel that you got the short end of the stick. It's important to speak up but think well about what you say. Before you acc...
How The FBI Knew What To Search For At Mar-A-Lago – The Presidential Records Act An Essential Tool For The National Archives And Future Historians
IN OTHER NEWS, POLITICS

How The FBI Knew What To Search For At Mar-A-Lago – The Presidential Records Act An Essential Tool For The National Archives And Future Historians

The FBI search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, on Aug. 8, 2022, has sparked a vigorous outcry from Trump and his allies. The details of the search are not clear, but reporting by The New York Times confirms that the search was “at least in part” for presidential records that Trump had taken from the White House and which were being sought by the National Archives and Records Administration. We asked Shannon Bow O'Brien, a scholar of the presidency at the University of Texas, Austin College of Liberal Arts, to discuss the history, law and customs associated with presidential archives. How do the archivists actually know what’s missing? Isn’t that hard to figure out? The archivists probably have a really keen idea of what is and what isn’t missing, based upon t...
Essential Reads On The Uses, Effects And Potential Of Cannabis
HEALTH & WELLNESS

Essential Reads On The Uses, Effects And Potential Of Cannabis

As states have legalized marijuana for medicinal and recreational use, and federal law now allows sale of hemp-derived products, cannabis and its derivatives are getting more attention and study. The Conversation has compiled excerpts of articles from scholars who have been watching recent marijuana developments. 1. Studies may support CBD claims Soaring sales of products containing the marijuana extract CBD followed Congress legalizing CBD in 2018. CBD sellers and users swear by its ability to relieve pain and anxiety. Although science isn’t yet sure about that, there are reasons for encouragement, writes Hillary Marusak, a professor of psychiatry and neuroscience at Wayne State University. “Neuroimaging studies in humans show that CBD can reduce activity in the amygdala and anterior ci...
4 essential reads – How Poetry Can Help People Get Through Hard Times
BOOKS

4 essential reads – How Poetry Can Help People Get Through Hard Times

When Russia invaded Ukraine, Ukrainian American writer Ilya Kaminsky’s poem “We Lived Happily During the War” went viral across social media. Poetry can often help people make sense of the world in difficult times. For World Poetry Day, The Conversation U.S. has gathered four articles on the power of poetry. 1. Poetry gives people a voice In 1991, Kentucky poet Frank X. Walker coined the term “Affrilachian” after attending a poetry reading that featured several Black Appalachian poets. Amy M. Alvarez, assistant teaching professor of English at West Virginia University, and Jameka Hartley, an instructor of gender and race studies at University of Alabama, wrote on the history of how Black people in Appalachia found their voice in poetry. “By coining the terms ‘Affrilachia’ and ‘Affrilach...
4 Essential Reads On Past Pandemics And What The Future Could Bring – When Will The COVID-19 Pandemic End?
COVID-19

4 Essential Reads On Past Pandemics And What The Future Could Bring – When Will The COVID-19 Pandemic End?

More than two years after the first cases of COVID-19 were diagnosed, people are exhausted by the coronavirus pandemic, ready for all this to end. When – if ever – is it realistic to expect SARS-CoV-2 will recede from the headlines and daily life? That’s the unspoken question beneath the surface of many of The Conversation’s articles about COVID-19. None of our authors can see the future, but many do have expertise that offers insights about what’s reasonable to expect. Here are four such stories from our archive. Written by historians and scientists, they each suggest a way to think about what’s at the end of the pandemic tunnel – and paths to get there. 1. Past pandemics are not a perfect prediction Almost as soon as it hit, people were trying to figure out how the COVID-19 pandemic wou...
4 Essential Reads – Pope Benedict Accused Of Mishandling Sex Abuse Cases
IMPACT

4 Essential Reads – Pope Benedict Accused Of Mishandling Sex Abuse Cases

When Pope Benedict XVI resigned in 2013 – the first leader of the Catholic Church to do so in more than half a millennium – the sexual abuse crisis had already roiled the church for years. During the conservative theologian’s papacy, the church revised canon law and announced new guidelines in an effort to respond to clergy abuse. But a new report accuses Benedict of having mishandled at least four cases of sexual abuse when he was an archbishop in Munich, Germany, in the 1970s and 1980s. The investigation, which covers abuse in the diocese from 1945 to 2019, concluded that the former pope failed to properly act on claims or punish priests – claims Benedict has rejected. The accusations against a living, if retired, pope underscore how dramatically the sex abuse crisis has shaken the ch...
Essential Reads About Sexual Harassment And Discrimination In Gaming And Tech – Microsoft Purchase Of Activision Blizzard Won’t Clean Up Gamer Culture Overnight
IN OTHER NEWS, TECHNOLOGY

Essential Reads About Sexual Harassment And Discrimination In Gaming And Tech – Microsoft Purchase Of Activision Blizzard Won’t Clean Up Gamer Culture Overnight

Microsoft announced on Jan. 18, 2022, its intention to purchase video game giant Activision Blizzard. The company, publisher of top-selling video games Call of Duty, World of Warcraft and Candy Crush, has been the subject of a series of sexual discrimination and harassment complaints. A day before Microsoft’s announcement, Activision Blizzard announced that it has fired “nearly 40 employees” since July following an investigation into hundreds of reports from employees of misconduct. California sued Activision Blizzard in July 2021, alleging a “pervasive ‘frat boy’ culture” at the company and discrimination against women in pay and promotion. The suit prompted a walkout by company employees who demanded that the company address the problem. The turmoil is an echo of the infamous Gamergate...
5 Essential Reads – The Battles Over Voting Rights, Preventing Fraud And Access To Ballots
IN OTHER NEWS, POLITICS

5 Essential Reads – The Battles Over Voting Rights, Preventing Fraud And Access To Ballots

President Joe Biden chose Atlanta – the historic home of the 20th century’s battle for civil and voting rights – to make a strong argument on Jan. 11, 2021, that the Senate must ditch the filibuster and pass legislation soon to protect voting rights. Biden told his audience, “I will defend your right to vote and our democracy against all enemies foreign and domestic.” After Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, Trump’s false assertions of election fraud sparked Republican-dominated state legislatures to pass bills that Democrats say restrict voting rights and place election administration in the hands of rank partisans. GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell says those charges are just “scary stories … about how democracy is at death’s door.” As part of our focus on how democracy...
Essential Reads: Facebook Became Meta – The Company’s Dangerous Behavior Came Into Sharp Focus In 2021
BUSINESS

Essential Reads: Facebook Became Meta – The Company’s Dangerous Behavior Came Into Sharp Focus In 2021

Meta, née Facebook, had a rough year in 2021, in public opinion if not financially. Revelations from whistleblower Frances Haugen, first detailed in a Wall Street Journal investigative series and then presented in congressional testimony, show that the company was aware of the harm it was causing. Growing concerns about misinformation, emotional manipulation and psychological harm came to a head this year when Haugen released internal company documents showing that the company’s own research confirmed the societal and individual harm its Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp platforms cause. The Conversation gathered four articles from our archives that delve into research that explains Meta’s problematic behavior. 1. Addicted to engagement At the root of Meta’s harmfulness is its set of algo...
4 Essential Reads – How Vulnerable Is Your Personal Information?
TECHNOLOGY, VIDEO REELS

4 Essential Reads – How Vulnerable Is Your Personal Information?

Eric Smalley, The Conversation When you enter your personal information or credit card number into a website, do you have a moment of hesitation? A nagging sense of vulnerability prompted by the parade of headlines about data breaches and hacks? If so, you probably push those feelings aside and hit the submit button, because, well, you need to shop, apply for that job, file that insurance claim, apply for that loan, or do any of the other sensitive activities that take place online these days. First, the bad news. If you regularly enter sensitive information online, chances are you’ve had some data stolen somewhere at some point. By one estimate, the average American had data stolen at least four times in 2019. And the hits keep coming. For instance, a data breach at the wireless carrier...