Author: Pamela Tom

Tricks of the Trade: Study Suggests How Freelancers Can Land More Jobs

| by Pamela Tom

According to Elance.com, the online workplace lists more than three million registered freelancers worldwide, and each month it posts 100,000+ freelance jobs ranging from computer programming and web design to finance and engineering. As an increasing number of freelancers depend on the virtual workplace, how can they make themselves more attractive to potential employers?

New research suggests freelancers who demonstrate work commitment through an incremental career path, by moving between similar — but not identical — types of jobs, are the most likely to be hired. The findings also conclude that competitors who work on only one type of job or on too many disparate types of jobs are disadvantaged when it comes to winning assignments.

The study, “Dilettante or Renaissance Person? How the Order of Job Experiences Affects Hiring in an External Labor Market” by Ming D. Leung, assistant professor, UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business,  appears in the February issue of the American Sociological Review.

“Previous findings would suggest that freelancers should specialize in a particular type of work so prospective employers know what they’re good at,” says Leung, “But I was curious about how freelancers can demonstrate their skills and commitment in an online world to acquire more jobs. My research suggests that employers on Elance.com appear to value freelancers who demonstrate their commitment by making incremental moves between jobs.”

Leung observes that nuances in the online workplace will continue to affect hiring trends in the future.  For workers, direct competition with other freelancers searching for online work presents new challenges.  And in the virtual workplace, Leung says employers are often concerned with how engaged and committed a virtual, non-local worker will be despite the availability of information, such as a freelancer’s job history and ratings/feedback from prior employers.

To understand how employers navigate the uncertainty of not meeting a potential hire in person, Leung analyzed millions of job applications and more than 100,000 worker profiles around the world from a 2007 Elance.com data set. Leung began by calculating how similar jobs on Elance were to one another. He then looked at the jobs each freelancer completed and found that those who exhibited some movement in their past history — by taking jobs that were similar to one another but not the same — were more likely to get hired through the website than those freelancers who accumulated experiences from dissimilar jobs or from jobs that were identical.

An adviser to Elance.com, Leung says the rise in contract and temporary employment is leading employers to increasingly embrace such a virtual workforce for specific skills and flexible employment arrangements. He also notes that in contrast to past characterizations of contract employees being low skilled and low paid, today’s freelancers are performing highly skilled tasks.

This study suggests virtual labor markets will continue to change employment and career opportunities. By better understanding the market’s dynamics, Leung says, freelancers will be more prepared to demonstrate their credibility and competence to employers.

See abstract.

As an increasing number of freelancers depend on the virtual workplace, how can they make themselves more attractive to potential employers? New research by Ming D. Leung suggests freelancers who demonstrate work commitment through an incremental career path, by moving between similar — but not identical — types of jobs, are the most likely to be hired. 

Study Finds Paid Search Ads Don’t Always Pay Off

| by Pamela Tom

Watch Prof. Tadelis talk about his research.

Businesses spend billions to reach customers through online advertising, but just how effective are paid search ads? Using data from eBay, economist Steven Tadelis at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business compared whether consumers are more likely to click on paid ads than on free, generic search results and found that advertisers may not be getting their money’s worth.

 “We found that when you turn off the paid advertising, almost all of the traffic that came through the paid search is just substituted by the other free channels,” says Tadelis, associate professor in the Haas Business and Public Policy Group.

Tadelis conducted the study, “Consumer Heterogeneity and Paid Search Effectiveness: A Large Scale Field Experiment,” at eBay. The study was co-authored by Thomas Blake, an economist in the economics research team that Tadelis started at eBay, and former eBay economist Chris Nosko of the University of Chicago.

To measure the effectiveness of paid search, the researchers turned off eBay’s paid search in 68 direct marketing areas in the U.S. In other words, if a consumer typed in the search term “white blouse” while online in these markets, he or she would only see the generic search results at the top of the list; not the paid ad that typically appears in a shaded box at the top of the search. She would not see any retail ads by eBay for “white blouse” but only from other advertisers who bid on the “white blouse” keywords.

At the end of 60 days, Tadelis and his colleagues compared sales of two groups: one group that received no paid search results and another group in which paid search remained untouched. Again, consumer sales as a result of the paid search showed no measurable increase off those who made purchases via unpaid channels (such as organic searches, or directly visiting ebay.com).

In order to ensure the robustness of their results, in a second experiment, the researchers also eliminated eBay’s paid keyword searches throughout the country and then compared sales for that period to an equivalent period with paid search on.

“If advertising is indeed a strong driver of sales, we should have seen sales plummet,” says Tadelis. “But the impact on sales was indistinguishable and not significantly different than zero.”

Furthermore, for “brand” keywords such as “eBay” or other company name keywords, paid ads sit just above the generic search results. For example, a search for “Macy’s” results in a Macy’s free search below the Macys paid ad.  Consequently, Tadelis says the paid search result adds no additional benefit to the advertiser. “It’s not that clicking on the result caused engagement, it’s that the intent to engage caused people to click on it,” says Tadelis.

On any given day advertisers, including eBay, bid on millions of keywords. Tadelis hopes their work will encourage other e-commerce businesses to conduct this type of microeconomic research to better measure the impact of paid search traffic on the web.

See full paper.

Haas@Work Lecturer Pierre M. Loewe Passes Away

| by Pamela Tom

Berkeley-Haas Lecturer Pierre M. Loewe, who spent his career in innovation consulting and teaching, died Dec. 31 in San Francisco from acute myeloid leukemia (AML). He was 67.

Loewe was born in August 1946 in Paris, where his father worked as an engineer and his mother was a pediatrician. He earned his MS in Management at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and spent most of his career as a management leader. After working as an assistant professor at Centre d'Enseignement Supérieur du Management Public, Loewe started his management career as a project manager for McKinsey and Company in 1970.  He later held positions as director of marketing at Salomon/North America and as senior vice-president at The MAC Group, later acquired by Gemini Consulting. From 1994 to 1995, Loewe taught strategic implementation at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management until he became one of the founders of Strategos. As Strategos co-founder and director, Loewe helped client teams launch new business, develop strategies, and embed innovation into their companies.

Loewe began teaching at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business in 2010 and led the inaugural Haas@Work experiential learning class, where he was known for providing a well-organized, academically rigorous curriculum.

“I will miss him dearly. He was so generous with his time, uncompromising on quality of client deliverables, and a wonderful coach,” says Rohit Behl, MBA 14,  one of Loewe’s students.

“Pierre’s fresh perspective, rigorous approach, organization, and attention to detail added considerably to our general thinking about curriculum development for the applied innovation courses,” says Haas Senior Lecturer Sara Beckman.  “More importantly, he was a pleasure to work with as a person—high energy with a dry sense of humor, always pushing us to do better and more.”

Dave Rochlin, executive director of Haas@Work, remembers Loewe as passionate and enthusiastic. “He was a good friend and colleague, and cared deeply and uncompromisingly about doing good work. His frequent CaringBridge posts revealed that he approached his illness and treatment with his usual good humor, grace, and (of course) consultant’s eye … and fought valiantly against what he knew were long odds.”

Loewe is survived by his sister, Anne-Marie Giroudot-Loewe; nieces Isabelle and Valerie; and eight grand-nephews and grand-nieces.

A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 9, at St. Francis Lutheran Church, 152 Church St., San Francisco. His family requests that in lieu of flowers, donations in Loewe’s memory may be made to the new Hematologic Malignancy Program at UCSF.

 

Berkeley-Haas Professor Janet Yellen Confirmed to Head Federal Reserve Board

| by Pamela Tom

Janet Yellen, professor emeritus at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business and a trailblazer for women economists in academia, will become the 15th chair of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors on Feb. 1. The U.S. Senate confirmed the presidential nominee today (Monday, Jan. 6, 2014).

The historic appointment makes Yellen the first woman to lead the nation’s central banking system and monetary policy. In her confirmation before the Senate Banking Committee in November, Yellen said she intends to use the role to prevent another financial crisis, will hold down short-term interest rates until unemployment recovers, and looks forward to leading the normalization of monetary policy. She will also continue promoting transparency of Fed decisions in order for the American people to understand how those decisions affect them.

The Eugene E. and Catherine M. Trefethen Professor Emeritus of Business Administration, Yellen taught macroeconomics and international business to undergraduate and MBA students at the Haas School for 24 of her 26 years on the Berkeley campus. She became the second woman at the business school to earn tenure in 1982 as well as the title of full professor in 1985, forging the path for other female business professors at Berkeley-Haas years ago.

Yellen succeeds Fed Chair Ben Bernanke and will serve a four-year term. 

Yellen’s appointment represents a long tradition of faculty from the business school and across the university serving the federal government at the highest levels.

Read more about Janet Yellen’s path breaking career and public service.

Watch Janet Yellen’s testimony before the Senate Banking Committee, Nov. 14, 2013.

Haas Professor Emeritus Janet Yellen has been confirmed as chair of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors.

Prof. John Morgan Receives 2013 Williamson Award

| by Pamela Tom

Professor John Morgan, who holds the Gary & Sherron Kalbach Chair in Entrepreneurship, received the inaugural Williamson Award, the Haas School’s highest faculty award named in honor of the Nobel Laureate, for exemplifying the attitudes and behaviors that differentiate Berkeley-Haas as an institution, on Friday, Dec. 6.

The Williamson Award honors Morgan for his contributions to the school, his colleagues, and students. Dean Rich Lyons and Haas Professor Emeritus and Nobel Laureate Oliver Williamson presented the award to Morgan at a faculty meeting Friday.

Morgan teaches game theory and strategy. Much of his research focuses on competition in online markets. In 2004, Morgan founded the school’s Xlab Experimental Social Science Laboratory for conducting experiment-based investigations of issues of interest to social scientists. As faculty director of the Center for Executive Education, Morgan facilitates the program’s strategic issues. He also belongs to two academic groups: Haas Business and Public Policy Group and Haas Economic Analysis and Policy Group.

“John was a natural and obvious first recipient of this new and prestigious award. His exemplary research and teaching deserve this highest form of recognition,” says Andrew Rose, associate dean for Academic Affairs and chair of the Faculty.

The Williamson Award honors Oliver Williamson, who received the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 2009, and celebrates honorees who best reflect the character and integrity associated with Williamson’s scholarly work and legacy. It will be bestowed annually by the Berkeley-Haas dean.

“Prof. Williamson is a scholar whom we all admire,” says Dean Rich Lyons.  “He has been an inspiring teacher for a generation of doctoral students, and a leader both on the UC Berkeley campus and in the wider academic community.  As such, he is a powerful exemplar of UC Berkeley’s values of research and creative activity, teaching and service.”

Lyons says Williamson also embodies the Defining Principles of the Haas School:

Question the Status Quo: by producing frame-breaking research;

Confidence Without Attitude: by becoming an intellectual partner with his students;

Students Always: by always exploring and uniting diverse fields of scholarship;

Beyond Yourself: by establishing an endowed chair with his Nobel proceeds.

Dean Rich Lyons, Nobel Laureate Oliver Williamson, Professor John Morgan

Student Aeronautics Startup Receives $1 Million

| by Pamela Tom

Late one night in summer 2012, Jordan Greene, BS 14, was awoken by his friend Harshil Goel, BA 14 (Math), who called to tell him he was on to something incredible.

Goel had re-derived a set of fluid equations used in aeronautics for the past century and thought he’d come up with a better way to build a wing.

Greene immediately rang his friend, Zachary Hargreaves, BS 14 (EECS), to relay the message.

The trio believed they could turn Goel’s epiphany into a product and went on to co-found startup VIRES Aeronautics, which last week announced a first venture-funding round of $1 million, led by investors including the influential Tim Draper.

VIRES Aeronautics is now testing new airplane wing technology that promises to make planes take off and land faster, carry more weight, fly longer, and use less fuel.

Calling it “the first true innovation in aviation since the jet engine,” Draper Associates contributed $250,000 to the round, which also included Lemnos Labs, Promus Ventures, Lance White, Don Hutchison and Toivo Annus.

Greene, who grew up in Marin County among a family of entrepreneurs, met Goel in the Berkeley dorms in 2010 during their freshman year, and the two immediately connected: Goel, the inventor with mechanical engineering and math expertise, and Greene, the business major with entrepreneurial spirit.

Greene met Hargreaves in a Berkeley engineering class. Having worked on the cyborg beetle project at Berkeley (remotely controlled beetles implanted with nerve and muscle stimulators) and at NASA, Hargreaves brought “an unparalleled knowledge of control systems to the group,” Greene says.

Goel, now VIRES Aeronautics’ CEO, says his passion for inventing started as a high school student in San Ramon with “rockets and other wild technologies,” including a futuristic transmission he built with a classmate.

Greene, Goel, Hargreaves, and four others went on to start their first venture, VIRES Corp. The startup, which focused on a plastic recycling machine and a wind turbine, among other projects, was named to Inc. magazine’s 2013 list of America’s Coolest College Startups.

Earlier this year, Goel, Hargreaves, and Greene reincorporated as VIRES Aeronautics Inc. and shifted their focus to aerospace.

Since VIRES Aeronautics’ inception, Greene says the team has had the support of Berkeley mechanical engineering professor Philip Marcus and department chair David Dornfeld, one of Goel’s mentors. Greene credits Haas Lecturer Kurt Beyer’s entrepreneurship class with cultivating his knowledge of the startup world.

The team started working on a retrofit kit to use on legacy planes and developed a rip-stop nylon belt that wraps around the entire plane wing. That belt, when activated, smooths the airflow over the wing, improving flight performance.

Goel tested the kit and belt initially using a Hangar 9 Toledo, a six-pound plane with a 70 inch wingspan. The team moved on to trial the technology on a military unmanned vehicle (drone) with a 15-foot wingspan, and expects to continue testing with the military and several universities.

“We ended up receiving an unfathomable increase in lift and decrease in drag,” Greene says.

VIRES Aeronautics is now in the accelerator program at Lemnos Labs, which focuses on early-stage hardware companies. VIRES plans to sell the technology to large aeronautics firm, but the team believes it could be applied to anything from automobiles to turbines.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

VIRES Aeronautics co-founders Harshil Goel, Jordan Greene, and Zachary Hargreaves

Wells Fargo Gives $100K to Cleantech to Market Program

| by Pamela Tom

Cleantech to Market, an interdisciplinary program in the Haas School of Business' Energy Institute, has received a $100,000 philanthropic grant from the Wells Fargo Foundation. The grant is part of a $2 million Wells Fargo Clean Technology and Innovation program supporting technology advancements for a clean energy future.

"We are excited to be a recipient of this highly competitive Wells Fargo environmental grant," says Brian Steel, Cleantech to Market co-director. "We truly appreciate being recognized and will use this grant to provide campus researchers with more commercialization support to aid their efforts to develop environmentally beneficial technologies, while at the same time developing the next generation of innovative and effective cleantech leaders."

Cleantech to Market (C2M) is an experiential MBA course that applies the Haas School’s innovative leader curriculum to identify and evaluate commercialization paths for high-potential research. Each year, C2M accepts Berkeley MBA students and students from more than 20 graduate programs across the UC Berkeley campus, including the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, who are working on research related to climate change, such as low-carbon energy, water, and green chemistry. Each C2M project team performs 1,000 hours of market research to help align technical research with pressing environmental and market needs.

Funded by the Wells Fargo Foundation, the Wells Fargo Clean Technology and Innovation grant program began in 2012 as part of Wells Fargo's commitment to provide $100 million to environmentally focused nonprofits, colleges, and universities by 2020. The goal of the program is to inspire innovation from entrepreneurs and fund research entities working on critical environmental issues.

"Wells Fargo recognizes that the health of our environment is critical to fostering more sustainable communities today and for years to come," says Ashley Grosh, head of Wells Fargo Environmental Affairs Clean Technology program. "We're pleased to announce Cleantech to Market as a recipient of Wells Fargo's environmental grant program to help provide long-term solutions to the world's greatest environmental challenges."

Visit the Cleantech to Market website.

 

Haas Team Takes Second in Haas Tech Challenge for Gap Inc.

| by Pamela Tom

Seven top MBA programs developed innovative strategies for Gap Inc. to enable employees to use collaboration technology as part of the third annual Haas Tech Challenge Nov. 8 to Nov. 9 at the Haas School.

Harvard Business School’s team took the top prize in the challenge, which was hosted by the Berkeley MBA students’ Haas Technology Club. The Haas team—captain Joe Lukasiewicz and Sammit Adhya, both MBA 15, and Caroline Bas and Anil Jindia, both MBA 14—placed second. The Stanford Graduate School of Business took third place.

For the challenge, Gap CIO Tom Keiser and VP of Enterprise Infrastructure Naveen Zutshi asked students to explore the “Consumerization of IT,” which has led employees to demand the same easy access to information and flexible collaboration tools in their workplace that they have in their personal lives. The case challenged students to help Gap identify the most promising opportunities to provide a seamless collaboration experience to employees while managing issues such as asset management, security, mobile device management, and cost containment.

Other Tech Challenge sponsors included IBM and VMware, with support from Haas and the Fisher Center for Management and Technology’s CIO Leadership Program.

Prior to the event, corporate participants collaborated with Haas Adjunct Professor Andrew Isaacs and student volunteer case writers, who wrote the case for the competition. Evgeniya Kalenykh and Philipp Suchan, both MBA 14, were co-chairs of the event.

On Friday morning, Dean Rich Lyons delivered an opening keynote on technology innovation and IBM’s Jay Subrahmonia spoke on the future of cognitive computing. After Gap’s case was presented, student teams were given a day to come up with solutions.

The Haas team proposed three ideas for Gap: integrate with IBM’s Watson Engagement Advisor product to capitalize on the growing trend of collecting unstructured data; use and apply Big Data concepts as an overarching layer within a cloud-based architecture, and promote a company-wide culture of collaboration.

The winning HBS team presentation focused on gamification techniques, or game thinking in non-game contexts, to improve Gap’s intelligence by encouraging employees to collect data in a fun, social way. Aside from using employee-generated data, the students recommended Gap use IBM’s Watson technology, an artificially intelligent computer system, with manual analytics to create predictive insights.

Haas Tech Challenge team members Sammit Adhya and Joe Lukasiewicz, both MBA 15, and Caroline Bas and Anil Jindia, both MBA 14.

 

Berkeley-Haas to Boost its Efforts in Creating Social and Environmental Impact with Vibrant Hub for Research, Learning, and Practical Innovation

| by Pamela Tom

The Haas School  will significantly boost its efforts to inspire creative and effective business solutions to address some of the world’s most pressing problems with the launch of its new Institute for Business and Social Impact. The institute, which held a launch event Nov. 6, is being led by Professor Laura Tyson, economist, policy maker, and former Haas School dean.

“Our students are determined to make a difference in the world, but the answers are not simple or obvious,” says Tyson, whose extensive public service roles include chair of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers and director of the White House National Economic Council under President Bill Clinton.

During her tenure as dean (1998-2001), Tyson was instrumental in renewing the Haas School’s attention to teaching and researching topics around social responsibility in business that date back to the 1950s, launching several key initiatives in this area that continue to this day.

One of the focal points of the institute is helping students define career interests in social impact. “We will provide students with the tools and vision they need to design pathways to fulfilling careers so that they can help create a more prosperous, equitable, inclusive, and sustainable society,” adds Tyson.

Alumni who have forged similar pathways thanks to their Haas courses and activities include Rob Kaplan, MBA 07. Kaplan started building his business case for social and environmental responsibility while at Haas, where he was on the MBA team that developed a green-marketing strategy for Fetzer Wines. Today, as director for product sustainability, he has helped put Walmart on track to meet its 2015 goal of eliminating 20 million metric tons in carbon emissions.

Research will also be an important aspect of the institute’s role, galvanizing the Haas faculty’s thought leadership in areas ranging from corporate social responsibility and multi-sector leadership to fraud, corruption, and ethics; environmental governance; poverty; health efficacy; gender parity; and more.

The institute will house several of the school’s current centers and programs that already provide courses, activities, and research spanning the for-profit, nonprofit, and public sectors. They include :

The Institute is also launching an initiative on the impact of women on business and the economy. Through classes, applied research, a speakers' series, and seminars with leading executives, this program will explore strategies to foster the advancement of women in corporate management, entrepreneurship and nonprofit leadership.

Beyond its centers and programs, the institute will provide a vibrant hub for collaboration with other groups at the Haas School and UC Berkeley around shared goals.

“The social importance of what we do has always been a part of our school’s DNA,” says Haas School Dean Rich Lyons. “The tools of business can and should be applied to bend the many unsustainable paths our world is on, such as the rising cost of health care, public education, access to clean water, carbon use, obesity, clean air, etc. Bending these paths will require the combination of skills and mindsets we aim to deliver at Berkeley-Haas. The Institute for Business and Social Impact is the next level of how we develop these pathbending leaders.”

The Haas School's commitment to exploring the relationship of business and society began in the late 1950s when Professor and Haas School Dean Emeritus Earl F. Cheit laid a scholarly foundation for the study of the social impact of business through his teaching and research, and by organizing the first national symposium on this subject at UC Berkeley.

Tyson renewed these efforts during her deanship by launching the Forum on Corporate Philanthropy in 2000 and raising the initial funding to expand the effort into what became the Center for Responsible Business. She also launched and raised funds for the Social Venture Competition and partnered with Columbia and London business schools to grow it into a global competition. It is the longest-running social entrepreneurship competition in the world.

The institute launch is being supported by donations from Haas School alumni: Allan Holt, MBA 76, a managing director at the Carlyle Group, and his wife, Shelley, gave a $1 million endowment. Margo Alexander, BS 68, chairman emeritus of the Acumen Fund, gave a $100,000 gift.

The institute’s launch will be celebrated on Nov. 6 with an alumni panel discussion for the Haas community on how Berkeley-Haas has helped them build distinguished careers that foster a more inclusive, equitable and sustainable society. The event is sold out. Additional institute events for the spring are being planned now.

Visit the Institute for Business and Social Impact website at http://www.haas.berkeley.edu/IBSI.

Professor Laura Tyson

Study Linking Shareholder Resolutions to Firm Performance Wins Moskowitz Prize

| by Pamela Tom

Adopting corporate social responsibility (CSR) shareholder resolutions leads to large increases in shareholder value and operating performance, according to the study winning the 2013 Moskowitz Prize for Socially Responsible Investing.

The award was presented today at the 24th annual SRI Conference in Colorado Springs to researcher Caroline Flammer for a paper titled, "Does Corporate Social Responsibility Lead to Superior Financial Performance? A Regression Discontinuity Approach.” 

The Moskowitz Prize is awarded annually by the Haas School's Center for Responsible Business. The only global award recognizing outstanding quantitative research in the field of sustainable and responsible investing, the prize was named for Milton Moskowitz, one of the first investigators to publish comparisons of the financial performance of screened and unscreened portfolios.

In her winning paper, Flammer found that corporate financial performance improved sharply in the immediate wake of shareholder-sponsored CSR proposals that were “close calls” -– those passing by a small margin of votes. Studying close call proposals is appealing since the outcome of the vote is as good as randomized and cannot be anticipated prior to the vote.

Specifically, Flammer’s results show that the stock market reacts positively to the passage of close call CSR proposals (e.g., reducing CO2 emissions, implementing equal employment opportunities policies, etc.). Flammer, an assistant professor in general management at Ivey Business School at Western University in London, Ontario, further documents a significant increase in the company’s return on assets (ROA) and net profit margin (NPM).  

Lloyd Kurtz, chief investment officer at Nelson Capital Management and lecturer at Berkeley-Haas, and Nadja Guenster, visiting professor at Berkeley-Haas, serve as the faculty co-chairs of the Moskowitz Prize. They lead the prize selection committee, an expert panel of judges from both academic and investment circles.

In the 18-year history of the Moskowitz Prize, 2013 set a record for the number of award submissions. “The Moskowitz Prize and the recognition afforded to the winner each year have gained a lot of traction among academics working in the field of sustainable investing," remarked Kurtz. "This past summer was a busy time for us, with 11 judges reviewing 49 studies to select a winner. Dr. Flammer can take credit for a strong research effort that impressed us all.”

Since its inception in 1996, the Moskowitz Prize has been awarded annually at The SRI Conference, the largest and longest running conference serving investors and investment professionals in the sustainable, responsible, impact (SRI) investment industry in North America. The SRI Conference is produced by First Affirmative Financial Network.

The 2013 Moskowitz Prize sponsors are Calvert Group, First Affirmative Financial Network, Nelson Capital Management, Rockefeller and Co., Neuberger Berman, and Trillium Asset Management.

Read the winning paper

More information about the Moskowitz Prize

 

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Berkeley-Haas to Launch Mobile Learning Platform for Executive MBA Students

| by Pamela Tom

Haas and EmpoweredU today announced the debut of a new mobile learning platform for the Berkeley MBA for Executives Program.

EmpoweredU’s mobile learning platform provides the tools, mobility, and ease of the iPad for a mobile learning experience. The partnership is the result of a recently completed pilot program that allowed students in the Berkeley MBA for Executives Program to test out the mobile education technology.

The platform features built-in functionalities and tools for streaming content via the Internet, course site creation, online lectures, assignment, test administering, grading, user publishing, live chat, peer-to-peer interaction, discussion forum, development of student portfolios, messaging, and news and Web-content access. Initially, these will be applied to the following courses: Finance; Leading People; Marketing; and Building Trust Based on Relationship. Four courses per semester will be added later.

The platform greatly enhances student-to-student communication and student-to-instructor communication. Haas students will be able to access the platform’s mobile discussion boards and social learning tools. The mobile platform allows for audio, video, and essay creation. It also integrates key iPad features like Notifications and Facetime.

"We are so proud to have gone from demo to pilot to deployment in just a few months, and we are now helping Haas students get an online mobile experience unlike anywhere else," said EmpoweredU CEO Steve Poizner. "This partnership merges the best innovation of Silicon Valley with one of the premier executive MBA programs in the world."

The Berkeley MBA for Executives offers a general management program much like the Berkeley Full-time and Evening & Weekend MBA programs. However, the program is specifically tailored to seasoned executives who have an average of 12 years professional experience. Classes meet every three weeks on Thursdays through Saturdays over the course of 19 months to allow students to continue working while getting their graduate degrees. The new mobile learning platform allows students to stay in touch with classmates in between class sessions and facilitates juggling coursework with career and family commitments.

"Our executive MBA program will be the first degree program to experience the benefits of this mobile learning experience," said Adam Berman, who heads the Haas School’s initiatives in learning technologies. "For senior professionals on the go, having this kind of technology means getting the most out of their MBA experience, using their time most efficiently, and deepening their ties to their classmates."

 

　

　

Berkeley-Haas Celebrates Nomination of Business Professor Janet Yellen to Head Federal Reserve

| by Pamela Tom

Colleagues and friends at UC Berkeley are celebrating Haas School of Business Professor Janet Yellen’s nomination Oct. 9 by President Barack Obama to become the first woman to head the nation’s Federal Reserve Board of Governors.

If confirmed, Yellen will succeed current Fed Chair Ben Bernanke, who will step down in January 2014. The Federal Reserve Board is tasked with setting economic policy to promote price stability and employment, which she has described as “not just statistics to me.”

Yellen, the Eugene E. and Catherine M. Trefethen Professor Emeritus of Business Administration, taught macroeconomics for more than two decades at the Haas School, where much of her research focused on unemployment and labor markets, monetary and fiscal policies, and international trade and investment policy. Earlier this year, she was named a Berkeley Fellow, joining an honorific society of distinguished friends of UC Berkeley chosen in recognition of their contributions to the campus.

Yellen has served as vice chair of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors since 2010.  She was president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco from 2004 until 2010. She has been a vocal advocate for transparency of Federal Reserve policies and actions. Yellen also chaired the President’s Council of Economic Advisers from 1997 to 1999 during the Clinton administration.

“I could not think of a sharper mind or a more thoughtful citizen to lead the world’s most influential central bank in its effort to regain the economy’s full potential,” said Berkeley-Haas Dean Rich Lyons, “She is part of a rich and proud history of Haas faculty who continue to serve the nation at the highest levels of government.”

Yellen is one of several female UC Berkeley professors who have successfully challenged the barriers to the White House’s primarily male circle of economic advisers.  Like Yellen, her Berkeley-Haas colleague, Professor Laura Tyson, also chaired the President’s Council of Economic Advisers during the Clinton administration, and economics Professor Christina Romer held the job for four years in the Obama administration.

“Janet Yellen has the knowledge, the experience inside and outside the Fed, the experience inside and outside of Washington, and the temperament to lead the Fed effectively, especially in the conditions that the economy faces and will perhaps face over the next few years,” said James Wilcox, a Haas professor and former senior economist at the Federal Reserve.

“By force of her arguments, openness to those of others, and record of accomplishments, Yellen has earned great credibility with and the respect of central bankers here and abroad, of economists, of business, of legislators, and of policy analysts,” added Wilcox.

A native of Brooklyn, Yellen studied economics at Brown University and earned a PhD at Yale University, studying under economist Joseph Stiglitz, who shared the 2001 Nobel Prize in economics with Yellen’s husband, UC Berkeley economist and Emeritus Professor George Akerlof, and Michael Spence of Stanford University.

Yellen spent 26 years – from 1980-2006 – as a Berkeley-Haas faculty member. She taught thousands of undergraduate and MBA students in required macroeconomics courses, and many more in graduate electives in international economics and trade. Her popularity with students twice earned her the school’s Earl F. Cheit Award for Excellence in Teaching, in 1985 and 1988. Yellen also held an affiliated appointment in the university’s economics department.

“I hired her and have been pleased ever since. At the Haas School, her colleagues and students admired her scholarship and her teaching,” said Earl “Budd” Cheit, dean emeritus of Berkeley-Haas. “As a dean, I especially admired her willingness to be an institution builder. To me, her defining characteristic is quiet competence.”

Yellen has drawn crowds to campus when delivering Federal Reserve speeches in recent years. 

Former Yellen student Juan Manuel Matheu, MBA 04, is the chief executive officer with Banco Falabella in Santiago, Chile. He said he was impressed by Yellen’s “ability to listen respectfully to different points of view, contrast them with her clear ideas, and even incorporate part of them in her own thinking.”

Matheu recalled one class in which discussions started in the classroom and ended with Yellen and her students continuing the conversation with pizza in the Haas School courtyard. “She cares and embodies our values; she is the living example of all four of the Berkeley-Haas Defining Principles, especially ‘Confidence Without Attitude.’”

Colleagues and students across the campus have been watching the Federal Reserve nomination process with anticipation for months.

Yuriy Gorodnichenko, an economics professor specializing in macroeconomics and international economics, focused on just that at a recent fundraiser for graduate students. He auctioned a promise to pay $500 to the highest student bidder if Yellen – or Christina Romer – becomes Fed chair in the near future.

“I offered this to not only help raise funds for the graduate association, but also to draw attention to how prominent Berkeley faculty members are, not only in research, but also in policy,” he said.  “It is pretty incredible.”

See the Janet Yellen Fact Sheet

Read a Profile of Janet Yellen in BerkeleyHaas Magazine Fall 2012

Updated from Oct. 9, 2013

Miner Safety Team Wins 2013 Intel Global Challenge

| by Pamela Tom

A Chilean team that designed wearable sensors to collect and transmit industrial workers’ biomedical data won the grand prize at the ninth annual Intel Global Challenge on Oct. 9.

With members from engineering and research company SoluNova, Chilean mining company Coldeco, and the University of Chile, Mobile Monitoring Station was motivated by the lack of existing data on industrial workers’ exposure to health risks. The team, which expects its sensors to reduce dangers facing miners in particular, received a $50,000 grand prize from the Intel Foundation.

The competition showcases business opportunities with the greatest potential for a positive impact on society. This year it brought 29 teams from 20 countries to UC Berkeley, where participants interacted with and were judged by representatives of leading venture capital firms.

“The Intel Foundation helps us bring the best computing-focused startup teams from around the world to UC Berkeley,” says Andre Marquis, executive director of the Lester Center for Entrepreneurship, which hosts the annual event. “These are amazing, disruptive entrepreneurs.”

Representing the U.S. in the competition was the Berkeley team and social media award winner Eventable, which developed a marketing platform to help brands and retailers convert online visitors into in-store shoppers.

Other top-placing teams, each of which received a $10,000 award, include :

  • Gameleon of Bulgaria, which developed a cloud-based platform for creating, playing, and monetizing Web games (First Place in the Internet, Mobile, and Software Computing category, plus Best Presentation).

  • Karmashop of Mexico, which created a cloud-based fundraising management tool allowing users to customize how they receive donations (First Place in Computing for Social Innovation, plus Best Poster).

  • Tensive of Italy, which invented implantable biomaterials for the reconstruction of bone and tissue (First Place in Computing and Hardware).

Study of Clean Energy Startup Wins Berkeley-Haas Case Series Best Case Award

| by Pamela Tom

A study of a clean energy startup making a “life-or-death” decision about which market to enter first has won the inaugural Berkeley-Haas Case Series Best Case Award.

Presented today (Sept. 30) by Dean Rich Lyons, the Best Case Award was created to raise awareness for the Berkeley-Haas Case Series and promote excellence in case writing among Haas faculty. The award includes a $2,500 prize.

The winning case, “Alphabet Energy: Thermoelectrics and Market Energy,” was chosen among more than a dozen cases published in 2012. Beverly Alexander, co-director of the Haas School's Cleantech to Market Program, co-wrote the case with five students: Adam Boscoe; Mason Cabot; Philip Dawsey; Luc Emmanuel Barreau; and Russell Griffith, all MBA 12.

The objective of the "Alphabet Energy" case is to teach students how to analyze market opportunities and identify the best initial market, while balancing the challenges of a startup with limited time and resources.

The case begins as Alphabet Energy founder and CEO Matt Scullin, who earned his doctorate in materials science and physics at UC Berkeley, ponders the next step for his prototype of a thermoelectric device that can turn wasted heat into electricity on the cheap. The market is potentially huge: 60 percent of the energy generated in the U.S. is wasted as unutilized heat. Harvesting even a small fraction of it means lower costs and big efficiency gains.

Scullin had licensed a solid-state, silicon-based device developed by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory that can be produced at about one-tenth the cost of current thermoelectric devices, making widespread adoption attractive for the first time. His research had shown that customers would demand a quick payback to take the plunge.

Scullin narrowed the application to four potential industries: automotive; aerospace and defense; power generation; and manufacturing. All have large upsides but involve significant hurdles. Scullin was not sure whether Alphabet had the resources to pursue more than one, and the decision could make or break the young company.

The case includes a step-by-step analysis of each industry, taking into account market size, development time and engineering costs, gross margins, and even company culture—such as whether an association with cars and motorcycles is more positive for employees than weapons components.

The Berkeley-Haas Case Series was launched in February 2012 to help promote faculty research, create more timely teaching tools, and strengthen the Haas School's ties with the business community.

Read the winning case, “Alphabet Energy: Thermoelectrics and Market Energy"

Visit the Berkeley-Haas Case Series website

 

 

 

 

Janet Yellen Fact Sheet

| by Pamela Tom

Janet YellenBerkeley-Haas

Current Title: Eugene E. and Catherine M. Trefethen Professor Emeritus of Business Administration, UC Berkeley, Haas School of Business

Academic Group: Haas Economic Analysis and Policy Group

1980-2006

See Janet Yellen’s faculty biography.

Positions held:

2014 – present, Chair, Federal Reserve Board of Governors
2010 – 2013, Vice Chair, Federal Reserve Board of Governors
1985 – 2006, Professor, Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
2004 – 2010, President and CEO, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
1997 – 1999, Chair, President’s Council of Economic Advisors
1994 – 1997, Member, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
1982 – 1985, Associate Professor, Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
1980 – 1982, Assistant Professor, Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
1978 – 1980, Lecturer, London School of Economics and Political Science
1977 – 1978, Economist, Division of International Finance, Trade and Financial Studies Section, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
1971 – 1976, Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, Harvard University
1974, Research Fellow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Areas of research:

  • Unemployment and labor markets
  • Monetary and fiscal policies
  • International trade and investment policy
  • See published research, below.

See Yellen’s research in the American Economic Review.
The American Economic Association named Yellen 2012 Distinguished Fellow.

Teaching:

From 1980-2004, Yellen taught thousands of Berkeley-Haas students in the undergraduate, full-time MBA, and Evening & Weekend MBA programs. She taught the required macroeconomics course at the MBA level for 11 semesters.

Undergraduate courses:
o    Macroeconomics (required course)
o    Introduction to International Business
o    Business Fluctuations and Forecasting

MBA courses:
o    Macroeconomics (required course)
o    Introduction to International Business
o    Applied International Economics
o    Survey of International Business
o    Theory and Institutions of International Trade
Teaching Awards:

Yellen won the Earl F. Cheit Award for Excellence in Teaching in the full-time MBA program in 1985 and in the Evening and Weekend MBA program in 1988.

Berkeley-Haas Dean Emeritus Earl “Budd” Cheit on Janet Yellen:  “I hired her and have been pleased ever since. At the Haas School, her colleagues and students admired her scholarship and her teaching.  As a dean, I especially admired her willingness to be an institution builder. To me, her defining characteristic is quiet competence.”
For the News Media:

Berkeley-Haas Media Relations Manager | Pamela Tom, [email protected]

Former students of Yellen’s are available upon request. Faculty experts available to speak to the media:

Andrew Rose is a professor of international business and trade at the Haas School of Business and teaches global macroeconomics. Rose has conducted research with Yellen, whom he says may be the most experienced candidate ever for the Federal Reserve job.
Contact Andrew Rose: (510) 642-6609 or [email protected]Carl Shapiro is an economist and another example of Berkeley-Haas professors’ commitment to public service. Shapiro served as a member of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers (2011-2012) and as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics, Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice (2009-2011 and 1995-1996). He is a longtime colleague of Janet Yellen. Contact Carl Shapiro (510) 642-5905 or [email protected]James Wilcox has been a professor of economics at the Haas School of Business throughout Yellen’s tenure there, and served as a senior economist on the Council of Economic Advisers. His work looks at banking and business conditions. He says Yellen has the knowledge, temperament and experience to be a great Fed chief. He also notes that while with the Fed in other roles she has earned the respect of central bankers, economists, policy analysts, business and legislators in the United States and internationally. Contact James Wilcox: (510) 642-2455 or [email protected]

Ulrike Malmendier is a professor of economics whose research focuses on corporate and behavioral finance, and the economics of organizations. She has written about how those who lived through the Great Depression feel about money and financial matters, and the impacts of overconfident chief executive officers in corporations.
Contact Ulrike Malmendier: (510) 642-3364 or u[email protected]
Laura Tyson is a professor of business administration and economics at the Haas School of Business and a former member of Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board who chaired the Council of Economic Advisers in the Clinton administration and the National Economic Council.  Her research focuses on U.S. trade policy, emerging markets and the global economy. 
Contact Laura Tyson: (510) 642-1230 or [email protected]

Multimedia Resources:

Credit: UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business

Video: Janet Yellen speaking at the International House, UC Berkeley, November 13, 2012

Clip 1  (Runs :18)
“James Tobin and Milton Friedman, both Nobel Laureates, disagreed on almost every aspect of monetary policy but they were united in arguing that transparency regarding central bank decisions is vital in a democracy to lend legitimacy to them.”

Clip 2  (Runs :22)
“The impact of monetary policy on the economy today depends not only or even primarily on the FOMC’s current target for the federal funds rate or the quantity of assets on its balance sheet but rather on how the public expects the Federal Reserve to set the paths of these variables in the future.”

Photos:
Click this link for photos of Janet Yellen.

Print:
Berkeley-Haas magazine article on Janet Yellen (November 2012)
Janet Yellen won the Berkeley-Haas 2012  Business Leader of the Year Award. In this feature article she talks about how she became interested in economics, her years at Berkeley-Haas and her career at the Fed.

Wikipedia
Janet Yellen Published Research:

  • The Fabulous Decade: Macroeconomic Lessons from the 1990s, with Alan Binder. New York: The Century Foundation Press, 2001.
  • “Trends in Income Inequality and Policy Responses.” Looking Ahead (October 1997).
  • “The Inequality Paradox: Growth of Income Disparity.” National Policy Association (1998).
  • “The Continuing Importance of Trade Liberalization.” Business Economics (1998).
  • “Monetary Policy: Goals and Strategy.” Business Economics (July 1996).
  • “An Analysis of Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing in the United States,” with George Akerlof and Michael Katz. Journal of Economics (May 1996).
  • “East Germany In From the Cold: The Economic Aftermath of Currency Union,” with George Akerlof, Andrew Rose, and Helga Hessenius. Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 1991:1.
  • “How Large Are the Losses from Rule of Thumb Behavior in Models of the Business Cycle?” with George Akerlof, in Money, Macroeconomics and Economic Policy: Essays in Honor of James Tobin, edited by Willima Brainard, William Nordhaus, and Harold Watts, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1991.

 

 

Haas Professor Emeritus Janet Yellen with Dean Rich Lyons and Prof. Laura Tyson

Haas, UC Berkeley Leaders Celebrate New Hub of Activity

| by Pamela Tom

Haas and UC Berkeley leaders on Wednesday (Sept. 18) celebrated the first major step toward creating a new hub of activity on the eastern edge of campus at the newly renovated Memorial Stadium.

That step, achieved through cross-campus collaboration, was represented by the recent opening of the Berkeley-Haas Innovation Lab and the Lisa and Douglas Goldman Plaza within the stadium gates. A new 5,000-sq. ft. Cal Recreational Sports facility slated to open in October is sure to add to the activity at the stadium, drawing from students who live at the International House, Greek houses, and nearby dormitories.

Speaking to an audience of about 200 staff and faculty in the new Berkeley-Haas Innovation Lab within the stadium walls, Dean Rich Lyons noted how the eastern edge of campus has already become more lively not only at lunchtime but all day long as a result of the newly remodeled Haas courtyard.

Lyons recalled how the new Haas building was "transformational" for the business school when it opened two decades ago. But management education has changed since then, Lyons noted, and new teaching methods don't work as well with traditional tiered classrooms designed for lectures.

"We want students to work together, to learn from each other," Lyons said. "We talk about learning by doing, applied learning."

The Innovation Lab, a 2,700-sq.-ft. open, reconfigurable classroom, enables students to more easily work together and break into small groups with their own spaces. The industrial-style space, located less than 300 steps from Haas, has movable tables, chairs, and white board partition walls. Building the space was made possible by a $1 million gift from Mike Gallagher, BS 67, MBA 68, whom Lyons thanked Wednesday. Gallagher, former CEO of Playtex Products, attended the ceremony with his wife, Linda.

"I'm inspired by the students I meet when I'm at Haas. They're exceptional people with great opportunities for successful careers and a way to impact the business world positively," Gallagher said recently. "The I-Lab seemed perfect for the Defining Principles and the opportunity for students to have a place to work on innovative projects collaboratively and individually and for professors to try new teaching techniques."

"I'm not sure every school really understands innovation or teaches it well, but Berkeley is doing a good job," Gallagher added. "Haas gets better every year, and it's been a joy to be involved and help."

A gift to Cal Athletics from San Francisco philanthropists Douglas and Lisa Goldman led to the plaza named in their honor. Joined by his wife, Lisa, Douglas Goldman spoke about the potential to create another gateway to campus, akin to Sproul Plaza, at Memorial Stadium. Goldman, a former Haas Board member who the school will honor in November as its Business Leader of the Year, suggested the stadium should be bustling more than just six times a year during home football games. Rather, he sees an "opportunity to create more community, to make the Berkeley experience that much more exciting and robust." That multi-use public space is likely to be enjoyed in particular by what alumnus Doug Goldman dubbed “the lost tribes of the campus"  — faculty, staff and students who live and/or work on the campus's hilly east side.

Alumni Mike Gallagher and Douglas Goldman learn how Senior Lecturer Sara Beckman will use the new Innovation Lab.

Prof. David Vogel receives second book award for The Politics of Precaution

| by Pamela Tom

The journal Governance has awarded Professor David Vogel the 2013 Charles H. Levine Memorial Book Prize for his book The Politics of Precaution: Regulating Health, Safety, and Environmental Risks in Europe and the United States (Princeton University Press, 2012).

The award committee described The Politics of Precaution as “a convincing and illuminating book on a broad topic that students of risk regulation, environmental policy, and comparative public policy should find most helpful.”

Vogel’s book discusses the politics of risk regulation and how over the past five decades, there has been an overall shift toward greater risk regulation management in Europe than in the U.S. He explores the transatlantic policy shifts on a variety of topics from food safety and agriculture to air pollution, consumer safety, and hazardous substances.

The annual prize is sponsored by the International Political Science Association’s Research Committee on the Structure of Governance. It recognized a book that makes a contribution in the field of public policy and administration, takes an explicitly comparative perspective, and is written in an accessible style.

Vogel holds the Soloman P. Lee Chair in Business Ethics at Berkeley-Haas and has been the editor of the California Management Review, the school’s journal, since 1982. In August 2012, Vogel won the prestigious Academy of Management Organization and Natural Division Book Award for Politics of Precaution.

Vogel has authored 15 books and is a noted scholar on corporate social responsibility over an academic career that spans nearly four decades. He has been a faculty member at Berkeley’s business school since 1973.

The award committee also honored UC Berkeley Assistant Professor Jennifer Bussell with special recognition for her book, Corruption and Reform in India: Public Services in the Digital Age (Cambridge University Press, 2012). Bussell teaches at the Goldman School of Public Policy.

The journal Governance has awarded Professor David Vogel the 2013 Charles H. Levine Memorial Book Prize for his book The Politics of Precaution: Regulating Health, Safety, and Environmental Risks in Europe and the United States (Princeton University Press, 2012).

Truth or Consequences? The Negative Results of Concealing Who You Really Are on the Job

| by Pamela Tom

Most people know that hiding something from others can cause internal angst, but new research suggests the consequences go far beyond emotional strife: Having to conceal information about oneself (e.g., sexual orientation) during an interaction disrupts one’s intellectual acuity, physical strength, and interpersonal grace—skills and abilities that are critical to workplace success.

“With no federal protection for gays and lesbians in the workplace, our work suggests that the wisdom of non-discrimination laws should be debated not merely through a moral lens, but with an appreciation for the loss of economic productivity that such vulnerabilities produce,” says Clayton Critcher, a member of the Haas Marketing Group, who conducts research on consumer behavior and social psychology, including questions of self and identity.

Critcher’s paper, “The Cost of Keeping it Hidden: Decomposing Concealment Reveals What Makes it Depleting,” forthcoming in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, details multiple negative consequences of concealment. Concealment produces deficits because of the difficulty of having to constantly monitor one’s speech for secret-revealing content that needs to be edited out, says Critcher, who co-authored the article with Melissa Ferguson of Cornell University.

The researchers conducted four studies, each of which was a variation on a single paradigm. When participants arrived at the study, they learned they would be taking part in an interview. Following a rigged drawing, all participants learned they were assigned to be an interviewee. Another supposed participant—who, in reality, was an actor hired by the researchers—was the interviewer.

Some participants were given special instructions about what they could reveal in the interview. In three of the four studies, some participants were told they should make sure not to reveal their sexual orientation while answering the questions. For example, participants were told that in answering questions, instead of saying “I tend to date men who …,” the participants could say, “I tend to date people who ….”

After the interview, participants thought they were moving on to an unrelated study. In actuality, this second part of the experiment was related, offering researchers the opportunity to measure whether participants’ intellectual, physical, or interpersonal skills were degraded by concealment. The studies revealed a variety of negative effects of concealment.

In one study, participants completed a measure of spatial intelligence that was modeled after military aptitude tests. Participants randomly assigned to conceal their sexual orientation performed 17 percent worse than those who went through the interview without instructions to conceal. In another experiment, participants tasked with hiding their sexual orientation exhibited reduced physical stamina, squeezing an exercise handgrip for 20 percent less time than those in a control condition. Another study revealed that concealment led people to show less interpersonal restraint. After having to conceal their sexual orientation, participants responded to a “snarky” email from a superior with more anger than politeness. During another test, participants demonstrated poorer performance on a “Stroop task,” a commonly used measure of executive cognitive function. In all cases, the willpower necessary to conceal  sexual orientation left people with fewer resources to perform well on other tasks.

In some studies, the researchers varied whether the interview questions focused on participants’ personal or dating life, or on topics for which one’s sexual orientation would never be revealed. Concealment caused similarly sharp declines in both cases. “Environments that explicitly or implicitly encourage people to conceal their sexual orientation—even when employers adopt a ‘Don’t Ask’ policy by not directly inquiring about employees’ sexual orientation—may significantly harm workers,” says Critcher.

“Establishing a workplace climate that encourages openness by supporting diversity may be one of the easiest ways to enhance workplace productivity.”

See Abstract.

Most people know that hiding something from others can cause internal angst, but new research by marketing Asst. Prof. Clayton Critcher suggests the consequences go far beyond emotional strife: Having to conceal information about oneself (e.g., sexual orientation) during an interaction disrupts one’s intellectual acuity, physical strength, and interpersonal grace—skills and abilities that are critical to workplace success.

Energy Week to Feature Experts, Innovations, Oct. 8-11

| by Pamela Tom

Energy and resources issues facing California and the world will be the focus of a weeklong series of activities Oct. 8 to Oct. 11 organized by the student-run Berkeley Energy & Resources Collaborative (BERC).

Energy Week, titled "California at a Crossroads," will include the annual BERC Symposium, the largest student-run energy conference on the West Coast on Oct. 11 at the International House. The symposium, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., will feature two keynote speeches, a reception, and panels throughout the day.

The morning keynote will be given by Cheryl Martin, director of The Advanced Research Project Agency – Energy (ARPA-E). ARPA-E advances high potential high impact energy technologies that are too early for private sector investment. Prior to ARPA-E, Martin worked at venture capital firm Kleiner Perkin Caulfield and Byers and spent 20 years with Rohm and Haas Company, which was acquired by Dow Chemical in 2009.

The afternoon keynote will be delivered by hedge fund founder Tom Steyer. Steyer founded Farallon Capital in 1986 and grew the firm to over $20 billion in assets under management. He stepped down from his leadership role in 2012 to focus on political activism, most notably advocating for alternative energy. He has since founded the TomKat Center for Sustainable Energy at Stanford University and supported a number of campaigns for environmental policy change.

"With the current challenging clean-tech finance environment, and with key energy policies coming up for review, it is an important time to reflect on California’s energy direction," says Energy Week Co-chair Matt Penfold, MBA 14. "Challenges in the energy field will only be solved if people with different views come together to discuss the hard topics. Each of our panels will discuss a problem in energy that needs to be solved."

Panel discussions will delve into such topics as the current state of clean-tech finance, California’s ideal electricity generation mix, and how to inspire people to change behavior.

In addition to the symposium, Energy Week will include a pitch event featuring eight clean-tech startups pitching their ideas to a panel of investors in an open forum. The pitch event will be held from 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Oct. 9 in the Citrix building.

The following evening, Oct. 10, the BERC Innovation Expo will be held from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. in the Field Club room in the new Memorial Stadium. The expo will bring together more than 50 scientists, researchers, and companies to showcase their latest breakthroughs.

"It's really the only place on the West Coast where so many new and emerging technologies will be on display at one time," Penfold says.

BERC is an interdisciplinary UC Berkeley student club, founded by Berkeley MBA students.

For more information and registration, visit berc.berkeley.edu/energy week 2013/.