Lancome Criticized for Cancelling a Performer

The cosmetics company Lancome had hired Denise Ho, a Canto-pop star, to perform at a free concert. A democracy activist, Ho was criticized by a Bejing paper, and Lancome cancelled the show. The company now faces criticism, which the South China Morning Post says is its own fault:

"What's a definite no-no is to hire someone like Ho and then promptly ditch her after an official mainland newspaper complains. That not only makes you look spineless and unprincipled, it shows you are incompetent, which is more unforgivable in the corporate world." 

Ho had questioned the decision in a statement posted in Chinese on Facebook:

I understand that this was a decision made by Lancôme's head office. Here I demand Lancôme's head office spell out the reasons behind the decision. The company owes me and the public a proper explanation.

Freedom, justice and equality are the values cherished by the people of Hong Kong. If we are penalised for defending our rights and upholding our beliefs, this is not just about me any more. Our value system has been completely distorted.

The company made one short statement: "Hong Kong Actress Denise Ho is not a spokesperson of LANCOME. We are sorry for the confusion caused. Thank you for your continuous support to LANCOME." 

Of course, that wasn't enough, and a longer statement, shown here, came later. 

Discussion Starters:

• Ho was arrested in the 2014 Umbrella Movement. Should Lancome have known better? Or stuck with its initial decision?
• Assess Lancome's statements. What else, if anything, should the company say?

At Last, Email Help?

Email "triage" tools can help us organize and our messages and, maybe, make better decisions about our communications. Hiri seems to focus on how people use email rather than on the tool itself. After all, we're the problem, not email. 

The company makes big claims: "Communication is the soul of your company. Hiri is an email app that helps you save time, organise your day, and improve communication." We'll see, but the app does have some nifty features:

• A weekly score of your clarity, brevity, and tone. (I'm curious about how this is rated.)
• A forced wait time of 30 minutes, to avoid checking email too often. This could be frustrating, but checking too often causes stress, according to some studies.
• Distinguishing emails that require action from FYIs. Tasks are created from emails that require a response or action. This could be useful to diminish attention to all those emails on which we're copied. 

Discussion Starters: 

• How could these features help people organize their time and improve communication?
• Which email triage tools have you used in the past, and how have you found them helpful? 

Outrage Over Stanford Sexual Assault Case

A Stanford student's light sentence and father's appeal have outraged thousands. Brock Turner was a Stanford University student who sexually assaulted an unconscious woman behind a dumpster and fought the case in court. Turner received a six-month sentence in county jail and probation, although the maximum allowable was 14 years.

The victim read a long letter to the judge, which has received almost 9 million views as of this writing. Her speech was impassioned and told her story: how she didn't know what happened to hear until she read it on the internet, how damaged she has been since the attack, and so on. It is an emotional, gripping speech that is difficult, but important to read.

Turner's father didn't help his son or the public outrage with his defensive letter, including, "That is a steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action out of his 20 plus years of life." ThinkProgress calls the letter "impossibly offensive," and most people agree. 

A letter to Brock's father challenges him to recognize: 

I need you to understand something, and I say this as a father who dearly loves my son as much as you must love yours:

Brock is not the victim here.
His victim is the victim.
She is the wounded one.
He is the damager.

In a statement, Stanford assured the public that the university did everything within its power.  

Discussion Starters: 

• Optional: Read the victim's letter. What makes her statement so compelling? 
• What's your view of the father's response? The public response? 

J.P. Morgan Eases Its Dress Code

J.P. Morgan is following other companies and easing its dress policy. As the biggest asset holder, the bank may lead a trend among financial services firms. Wall Street banks are known for their pinstripe suits and ties, but CEO Jamie Dimon is often seen dressing down. 

An email to staff explained the new policy, which allows khaki pants and polo shirts but not halter tops, and encourages dressing up for client meetings. The company already had a weekend dress policy in place. 

Barclays implemented a similar policy last year but had to clarify: no flip flops. And J.P. Morgan warned with this change that it's not the same as weekend casual, which could mean jeans and more causal wear.

A man I know complained about his not-for-profit organization's policy that disallowed shorts but allowed skirts for women. The organization changed its policy and now allows some shorts. 

Image source (from WSJ video).

Discussion Starters: 

• Why did this take so long? Many of the banks' clients are tech employees in jeans and shorts.
• What's your view of dress policies that disallow shorts but allow skirts?

UCLA Responds to Shootings

It's another sad day of shootings, this time at UCLA, leaving two dead in what seems like a murder-suicide. 

The university has published several communications to keep the community informed and help people deal with this tragedy: 

• An email from Chancellor Gene Block, also posted on the university's website
• A news statement on the website
• A press conference with the Chancellor, posted on YouTube

Messages offer condolences and counseling, thank police and others who responded, and focus on healing. Trying to get back to some sense of normality, the university will resume classes except in the engineering building where a professor was killed. Provost Scott Waugh explains: "Obviously there's a lot of very distressed students, faculty and staff. And our goal within the school is to heal those wounds and make sure that they feel comfortable with the situation before resuming normal activities."

Discussion Starters: 

• Who are the primary and secondary audiences for the university's messages? 
• Assess the chancellor's press statement. What principles of delivering bad news and delivering oral presentations does he use? 

Zoo Defends Killing Gorilla

Although reports say a boy "fell" into a gorilla cage at a the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden, the zoo says the boy "climbed through a public barrier." Harambe the gorilla was shot and killed on the spot. A YouTube video showing part of the incident received more than 14 million views so far, and people on both sides of the argument are outraged. 

With the hashtag #JusticeforHarambe, animal activists and others question the zoo's decision and blame the parents.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) says this situation is another example of why people shouldn't gawk at animals in captivity.

The zoo explained the decision in a media statement, in a Facebook post, and during a press conference. The director scolded people who dispute the decision, saying they don't understand silverback behavior and weren't there to assess the situation. He has a point: people view a one-minute clip on YouTube and decide that the gorilla was holding the boy's hand and helping him to safety. But what do we know? 

Discussion Starters: 

• What's your view, given what you have read about the situation? Did the zoo act appropriately? What else would you like to know in order to make a judgement call?  
• Assess the zoo's three communications:  media statement, Facebook post, and press conference. What, if anything, can management do differently to address the criticism? 

Email Clouds Our Judgement

Hasn't email ruined enough vacations, marriages, and careers? Will it now steal a chance at the presidency? Hillary Clinton's server issue is a symptom of a deeper problem: email causes us to make bad decisions. Several times, she admitted that she wished she had acted differently. We have all made mistakes on email: sent it to the wrong person, replied all, or sent a half-drunk, angry message in the middle of the night.

Millennials take blame for being constantly connected, but the Boomers are just as guilty, and we should know better. We know that email lives forever: on the sender's server, on the receiver's server, in print, posted on social media sites-in countless crevices. And double deleting doesn't save us from legal discovery software.

We assume a level of privacy because email has driven us to communicate quickly, often without any sense at all. We accept privacy policies without reading them, manage 122 emails a day, and "shoot" each other emails. As mobile use increases, email joins IM and texts, for which people expect an immediate response.

Advice and tools abound to reduce email dependence and volume. We should check email less often, use triage tools, and stop sending so damn many of them.

But these behavioral approaches miss the point: we love email. The immediacy and volume feed the micromanager's feelings of disconnection and lack of trust, making us dependent on email to function. We risk reputational and relational damage to maintain our addiction.

Clinton has experienced on a large scale what we have all come to realize about email: it owns us, and we are to blame.

Everyone needs a private cave like Fitzgerald Grant's on Scandal, and perhaps Clinton will get one. In the meantime, let's remember that no email message-nor any written communication that travels via the web or satellite-is truly private.

Image source.  

German Chocolate Company Responds to Racist Comments

Germans reacted strongly when pictures of non-whites on the packaging of Kinder chocolate were replaced by children who looked African or Middle Eastern. 

The main group disputing the new photos is the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (Pegida), which supports Germany's anti-immigration movement. Comments were harsh and called racist, and the group members seemed to miss that the photos are of their own national soccer players when they were young. This was part of a Kinder marketing campaign before the Euro 16 Football tournament starts in about two weeks in France.

Some stood in defense of the company. 

 

The manufacturer, an Italian company, responded to critics: "Ferrero would like to expressly distance itself from all kinds of xenophobia and discrimination."

Discussion Starters: 

• Should the marketing campaign have been more obvious? Do you think Ferrero was making a political statement? 
• Assess the company's short response. What else, if anything, should the company say?

Persuasion for Britain to Leave the EU

British celebrities have joined forces and signed a letter to convince Britons to stay with the European Union. 

 

In the letter, 282 big names (most of which I never heard of) from film, fashion, art, music, and theater focus on "EU markets and influence, access to EU funding, and movement of talent." The letter body follows:

The EU referendum marks the biggest democratic decision of our time, and the outcome will have lasting and far-reaching consequences for the future of this country for generations to come.

The referendum forces us to look in the mirror and ask ourselves: what kind of nation do we want to be? Are we outward-looking and open to working with others to achieve more? Or do we close ourselves off from our friends and neighbours at a time of increasing global uncertainty?

From the smallest gallery to the biggest blockbuster, many of us have worked on projects that would never have happened without vital EU funding or by collaborating across borders. Britain is not just stronger in Europe, it is more imaginative and more creative, and our global creative success would be severely weakened by walking away.

And what would ‘Out' really mean? Leaving Europe would be a leap into the unknown for millions of people across the UK who work in the creative industries, and for the millions more at home and abroad who benefit from the growth and vibrancy of Britain's cultural sector.

From the Bard to Bowie, British creativity inspires and influences the rest of the world. We believe that being part of the EU bolsters Britain's leading role on the world stage.

Let's not become an outsider shouting from the wings.

Creative Industries Federation survey

Among reasons cited for the vote of confidence in Europe by Creative Industries Federation members were:

Access to EU markets and influence - the EU is the largest export market for the UK creative industries, totalling 56% of all overseas trade in the sector. It is vital that Britain is able to influence regulatory discussions which may have a bearing on future trading, such as the current discussions around the creation of the Digital Single Market.

Access to EU funding – the Creative Europe programme has provided seed funding for films such as The King's Speech, The Iron Lady and Slumdog Millionaire. ERDF funding has provided vital support to arts organisations in the regions, including the Liverpool Everyman and Sage Gateshead. In addition, Federation cultural education members benefit from the €80bn innovation fund, Horizon 2020. All this could be imperilled.

Movement of talent – the UK is a creative hub. Close collaboration with EU partners is key to Britain maintaining this position. From orchestras to art schools to architecture firms, the UK's creative industries are enriched by the diversity of cultural exchange and strengthened by the movement of talent across the EU.

The creative industries have been the fastest growing sector of the UK economy since 2008 and added £84.1bn GVA to the economy last year.

The creative industries employ 1.8m people in this country (1 in 17 jobs in the UK; and 1 in 8 jobs in London). [DCMS stats from January 2016 – 2014 figures].

The creative economy (includes the contribution of those who are in creative occupations outside the creative industries) employ 2.8m people in this country (1 in 11 jobs in UK; and 1 in 6 jobs in London).

Not everyone agrees. A columnist for The Guardian wrote an article titled, "The luvvies' Brexit letter only shows most people vote with their wallets." According to The New York Times, "luvvies" is "a satirical term borrowed from Private Eye magazine to describe Britain's self-enamored stars." 

The New York Times article compares this effort to another political celebrity move:  J.K. Rowlings opposed Scotland's independence, and didn't win herself any favors as a result.

Image source.

Discussion Starters: 

• How convincing do you find the celebrities' letter? Which are the strongest and weakest arguments? 
• What's your view of celebrity involvement in political controversies? How does these differ, or do they, from celebrity product endorsements?

FDA Changes the Nutrition Label

For the first time since the early 1990s, the Food and Drug Administration has updated the nutrition label that appears on packaged foods. The agency is proud of the change, calling it a "major step." Michelle Obama has been part of the process and is quoted in the FDA's press release: "This is going to make a real difference in providing families across the country the information they need to make healthy choices."

The major changes, in case they're hard to notice, include bigger calorie and serving size numbers, and a new line for added sugars.

I have to say I'm disappointed. This is the first change in more than 20 years, when the label was introduced. Although these modifications are important, they say little for the FDA's ability to rethink what information people need to make good food choices and how it could be best represented. 

Is there no other visual that could help people? A more dramatic change, in itself, might encourage people to look. Also, the percentages are still based on a 2,000-calorie diet, which the FDA deems average, but this doesn't suit everyone. 

This change comes when the FDA is under pressure to revise what it calls "healthy" food. This month, The Wall Street Journal questioned the agency's logic. According to the FDA, avocados and almonds aren't healthy because they are high in fat. Frosted Flakes and low-fat Pop Tarts are okay because the requirements don't include other factors, such as sugar content. The FDA responded to The WSJ's inquiry: "We believe now is an opportune time to re-evaluate regulations concerning nutrient content claims, generally, including the term ‘healthy.'"

We'll look forward to those changes happening soon. 

Discussion Starters: 

• What other type of visual could help people make decisions about food? 
• Why do you think the label has stayed the same for more than 20 years? 

Will Anyone Miss the Time Warner Cable Brand?

The Time Warner Cable brand, which Bloomberg calls "beleaguered," will cease to exist. Synonymous with poor customer service and frequent outages, the company is merging with Charter Communications, which will expire the name.  

David VanAmburg, managing director of American Customer Satisfaction Index, said, "Nobody in the cable industry performs particularly well. One merger isn't going to change structural issues with pricing, infrastructure and battles with content providers. When there's not a great deal of competition in an industry, you're not going to get great satisfaction scores."

Charter will introduce "Spectrum," new products and offerings from Time Warner and Bright House Networks, which Charter also recently purchased.

In a statement obviously written for Wall Street analysts, Charter Communications announced the merger deal.

Discussion Starters: 

• The company has a lot more work to do than simply changing the name. What are your experiences with Time Warner, and how do you think they can improve service? 
• This is a critical time for Charter. What should the company communicate now about its plans?

Amtrak Apologizes, Again

It took a year, but the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) finally announced the cause of an Amtrak crash in May 2015 that killed eight and injured about 200 people. The driver had accelerated to 106 mph, although the limit for a curve on the track was less than half that. Turns out, the driver was distracted by an emergency situation involving another train, which the driver heard on the radio. The NTSB press release calls this "the result of a loss of situational awareness." 

The NTSB report includes 11 safety recommendations and notes that "positive train control, a technology that could have automatically stopped the train and prevented the derailment" wasn't in place. Amtrak has since implemented the technology and issued this statement, included in a Yahoo article: 

"Amtrak has taken full responsibility for and deeply regrets the tragic derailment of Northeast Regional Train 188. Our hearts go out to the families who suffered a loss, the passengers and employees who were injured and to everyone onboard the train," the company said in a statement, adding that they would "quickly implement" the NTSB's recommendations after a review.

On its Facebook page last May, Amtrak wrote this apology. Both statements are big improvements over the service updates we usually see from Amtrak and MetroNorth after accidents. Of course such updates are important, but so are apologies-and not only when the company is found to be at fault.

Image source.

Discussion Starters: 

• Compare the two apologies from Amtrak. Should the organization do something differently now? 
• How can transportation companies balance important service updates with apologies in crisis situations? 

Data Visualization as a "Discipline"

A Harvard Business Review article reminds us to focus on our message when visualizing data. Author Scott Berinato suggests asking ourselves two questions to start: 

• Is the information conceptual or data-driven?
• Am I declaring something or exploring something?

Berinato then identifies four types of visual communication: idea illustration, idea generation, visual discovery, and everyday dataviz. For idea illustration, he offers a weak and an improved example. You'll notice that the first includes elements of "chart junk" that detract from the message.

Discussion Starters: 

• How does Berinato's second example illustrate principles from Chapter 9 in the text book? 
• Consider a message you need to communicate. How does this article help you decide what visuals would support your points? 

Discovery Girls Responds to Controversial Swimsuit Advice

Readers didn't appreciate the Discovery Girls article telling young girls which bathing suit will make their bodies more perfect.

 

Criticism was harsh on Twitter and Facebook, with parents already struggling to help their children have a positive body image, regardless of their shape and size. Discovery Girls' readers are between 8 and 13 years old.

The publisher responded in a Facebook post saying that the article was a mistake and contrary to the magazine's views. She also took the opportunity to promote the Discovery Girls' book. 

An open letter from Catherine Lee, Publisher of Discovery Girls

First, I want to thank all the parents and my amazing readers who brought this swimsuit article to my attention. As the founder of Discovery Girls magazine, and even more importantly, the mother of the first Discovery Girl in 2000, I am in total agreement with all of you regarding this article, so much so that I wanted to make this letter as public as possible. We want to make sure that our girls know that any article that makes you feel bad about your body is not a good article, and should be questioned.

It's still hard for me to believe that an article so contrary to our magazine's mission could have been published on our pages. I have been a loss for words for days. The article was supposed to be about finding cute, fun swimsuits that make girls feel confident, but instead it focused on girls' body image and had a negative impact. Nobody knows better than Discovery Girls how impressionable our girls are at this age and we are ALWAYS mindful of this. We've received hundreds of thousands of letters over the years from girls sharing their insecurities about their bodies. We've been so concerned about helping girls have a healthy body image that we wrote an entire book, Growing Up, on puberty and body image.

The book, which took over five years to write, was a labor of love. We worked with so many writers, editors, and over 20,000 girls and their parents, too. We invested so much time and effort into it because we knew how important it is to get it right. Our girls need resources to provide them with the guidance they need to develop a healthy body image and love all that they are.

As much we like to think that something like this would never happen to us, it did. We're not immune to making mistakes, but we are always willing to get better and learn from our mistakes. We'd like to thank the readers who contacted us to let us know they couldn't believe we could make such a mistake. It means a lot to us, because it means you hold us to a higher standard, which we hope you will continue to demand from us. And for those of you who don't know us as well as our regular readers, our reader's comments are what keeps us improving. This is what makes Discovery Girls the magazine that we're all so proud to be a part of. I know with certainty, if you hang in there, you'll find that no magazine works harder to ensure the well-being of your daughters than Discovery Girls.

Catherine Lee

Chicago Tribune article, in my opinion, doesn't help. The author does a great job criticizing Discovery Girls, but the article photo shows girls will similar, thin bodies. 

Discussion Starters: 

• How well does Lee's response work? How could it be improved? 
• How does a "mistake" like this happen? What do you think went wrong, and how can the magazine avoid it in the future?

Geek Squad's Confusing Email

Geek Squad's email, with the subject line, "IMPORTANT NOTICE: We've updated our Privacy Policy," is a confusing mess. After reading the email, I have no idea what the changes are and why they're important to me. 

The main points of the email seem to be that the website is going to be combined with Best Buy's, and Geek Squad customers will now follow Best Buy's privacy policy. As usual, the email focuses on what's important to the company instead of what's important to customers. 

The tone is "excited" with references to simpler, streamlined, easier experiences for customers, but it's not clear what those are-or how they're different from Geek Squad's current process.

Of course, we're referred to Best Buy's privacy policy, also a fun read. At least the top part of the page summarizes the most important information, and the full legal policy is below, with this note: 

We want you to read the whole policy. This highlights section provides a summary of Best Buy's privacy practices, and is not the whole policy. The highlights and full privacy policy apply to Best Buy retail stores, our Web site at www.bestbuy.com, our mobile app, and other locations where we may collect personal information.

The company should probably update this blurb to include Geek Squad.

Discussion Starters: 

• What do customers most need to know? 
• How could Geek Squad have approach this differently?

Higher Restaurant Reviews with More Time and Distance

An article in the Journal of Consumer Psychology found that guests give higher online ratings to restaurants that are farther from their home and if they waited two or three months to write the review after visiting. If both criteria were met, the effect was even better for a positive review. According to the lead author, "If someone visited a Red Lobster restaurant in their home town and then in another state, he or she gave a better star rating when the restaurant was out of town."

Researchers at Temple University studied more than 166,000 TripAdvisor reviews for their paper, "Effects of Multiple Psychological Distances on Construal Level: A Field Study of Online Reviews." To understand why people gave higher reviews, they analyzed word choice. When people wrote about restaurants closer to home, they described details about the food and service, but when they wrote after a couple of months about their time away from home, they used more general language about their "pleasant" experience.  

The image here encourages guests to write a review when they get home. Perhaps that's not the best strategy. 

Discussion Starters: 

• Why do you think people give better reviews when waiting to write and when writing about restaurants farther away?
• What are the implications of this research for restaurants wanting to boost online reviews? What strategies can they use? 
• What are the implications for people who rely on reviews to make restaurant choices?

Prof on a Plane Accused of Terrorist Activity

Guido Menzio, an associate professor and economist at the University of Pennsylvania is an unlikely terrorist, but he was a suspect nonetheless. Menzio's seatmate on an American Airlines flight from Philadelphia to Syracuse found his answers curt and became worried when she saw him drawing something cryptic. She cleverly slipped a flight attendant a note, and the crew turned the plane around and started asking Menzio some questions.

A Washington Post article says he was "ethnically profiled" as a someone Middle Eastern, although he is Italian. Turns out, Menzio wasn't trying to overtake the plane but was working out a price-setting model for a presentation.

The woman boarded another plane and has not been identified for comment.

The airline seems embarrassed by the incident. Of course, Menzio was quickly cleared, but the flight was delayed more than two hours. The Post summarizes Menzio's reaction:

Menzio for his part says he was "treated respectfully throughout," though he remains baffled and frustrated by a "broken system that does not collect information efficiently." He is troubled by the ignorance of his fellow passenger, as well as "A security protocol that is too rigid–in the sense that once the whistle is blown everything stops without checks–and relies on the input of people who may be completely clueless.

Discussion Starters:

• It's interesting that Menzio says he was treated respectfully. Would you agree? What could he mean by that? 
• What action, if any, should be taken against the woman passenger? The airline crew? 
• Should the woman apologize? If so, how?

Too Much Social Media Sharing Affects Learning

How much time do you spend each day giving feedback on social media posts? A study by researchers at Peking and Cornell Universities found that too much sharing on microblogging sites Twitter and Weibo causes cognitive issues.

Here are highlights of the findings:

• Reposting online messages interferes with online information comprehension.
• Reposting further compromises performance in a subsequent unrelated learning task.
• Cognitive overload mediates the negative effect of reposting.

A premise of the study is how few original posts are on each site: 

At Weibo, for instance, 4.8% users contribute more than 80% of the original posts, whereas the majority users primarily comment on or repost others' messages (Fu & Chau, 2013). Similarly, more than half of Twitter users never post a message, whereas the top 10% most active users contribute to over 90% of all content (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2011).

From studying student-participants, the authors concluded that reposting items "interfered with participants' information comprehension both online and offline." The authors warn that people attend to functionality for feedback rather than content, and that more cluttered interfaces (um, Facebook's six new Reactions?) isn't helping. They also say that valuable time spent on cognitive functions, such as reflecting on and integrating information, is impaired, reducing our ability to process and comprehend information.

Image source.

Discussion Starters:

• Intuitively, does this study make sense to you? Why or why not?
• How do you think this research may translate to other social media platforms or online activities?
• An article by The Independent was titled, "Why resharing on social media could be making you more stupid." Is this an overstatement? Why or why not?

Joe Paterno Back in the News

It's been a while since we heard about Penn State football coach Joe Paterno, who was in the news in 2011 because his assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky, had been sexually abusing young boys. Some questioned who knew and for how long, and recent court papers reveal Paterno's possible awareness since 1976.

The current dispute is over whether Penn State or its insurance company should pay the $60 million in damages sought by 26 people who Sandusky abused. According to the insurance company, one sentence in the case revealed an important piece of evidence: "in 1976, a child allegedly reported to PSU's Head Coach Joseph Paterno that he (the child) was sexually molested by Sandusky." In addition, the evidence shows other cases reported in the 1980s.

Joe Paterno died of lung cancer in 2012, only two months after he was suspended from Penn State and within a year of the story breaking. His family is denying the evidence and calling for a full review of the facts. 

Sandusky was sentenced to between 30 and 60 years, but he's filing for a new trial. Three university leaders-the former president, athletic director, and a senior vice president-still face charges for failing to report incidents. 

Discussion Starters: 

• This is based on just one sentence in the report-and it's the insurance company's perspective, obviously to avoid claims. What do you think? 
• Research the case in 2011. The university took a while to suspend Joe Paterno. Why? And was the suspension the right decision?

Princeton Professor Creates "CV of Failures"

Princeton University Professor Johannes Haushofer published his "CV of Failures" on the school website, as he says, "to balance the record and provide some perspective":

Most of what I try fails, but these failures are often invisible, while the successes are visible. I have noticed that this sometimes gives others the impression that most things work out for me. As a result, they are more likely to attribute their own failures to themselves, rather than the fact that the world is stochastic, applications are crapshoots, and selection committees and referees have bad days.

This list includes programs he didn't get into, journals that rejected his articles, and research funding he didn't get.

CV of Failures

The idea came from an article in Nature by Melanie I. Stefan, a lecturer in the School of Biomedical Sciences at the University of Edinburgh.

Haushofer tweeted, "Dear everyone writing your own CV of failures: just to point out I'm not aware of scientific evidence saying it does anything good for you." Still, his compilation is an expression of humility and reminds all of us that successes are built on failures. In my view, if we don't have failures, it's possible we're not reaching high enough.  

Discussion Starters:

• If you wrote a resume of failures, what would you include? Think about the companies that didn't hire you and the schools from which you were rejected.

• How do your failures make you feel? Are you still feeling hurt by them, or have you moved past it?