Elemental

I’m sure I was going to add something to this post, but it’s been in the drafts bin so long, I’ve forgotten what it might have been. Perhaps I was awaiting inspiration for a more witty blog title…

Back in February last year Ben Casnocha had a summary of Herzberg’s concept of hygiene factors here. If you are not familiar with the concept, Wikipedia have a good explanation here. Read more…

mel starrs Opinion Ben Casnocha, herzberg, hygiene factors, John Ehrenfeld, Psychology

What I’ve been reading about:

• Amazon Simple Admin – Aha! I knew this had to exist – a simple way of putting amazon links into posts. WP plugin.

mel starrs News amazon, plugins, wordpress

These are my links for March 28th through March 29th:

• Feed Copyrighter Plugin – via Casa Salt Shaker (excellent Buenos Airean food blogger) a WP plug-in to add a note at bottom of feeds in readers asserting copyright.
• Fast Track: Libya – More on BBC World's Fast Track about Libya's ecotourism attempt by Foster's (first reported in UK press September 2007). Worth catching (can't find online)
• The cost of food: Facts and figures – Via Bitten – some great BBC graphics on global food and consumption
• Bitten: The Coming Food Crisis – Short piece by Bitten on wheat prices, but good links to other sources. Added bonus – his NYTimes blog often has tasty recipes…
• FT.com / Companies / Financial services – Tosca increases stakes in housebuilders – Redrow next for consolidation in the housing sector? "the majority of UK housebuilder stocks are trading below their book asset values and the potential cash value of land holdings"
• Build it Green and they will come – Some useful stats on the business case for building green offices

mel starrs News BBC, food, food blogger, Libya, United Kingdom

What caught my eye today, March 28th:

• FT.com / Companies / Financial services – Tosca increases stakes in housebuilders – Redrow next for consolidation in the housing sector? “the majority of UK housebuilder stocks are trading below their book asset values and the potential cash value of land holdings”
• Build it Green and they will come – Some useful stats on the business case for building green offices

mel starrs News United Kingdom

Doing some research and I came across the wonderfully voyeuristic Business Week Company Insight Centre.

After the news of Zaha Hadid awarding herself £725,000 on a turnover of just over £10m I thought I’d see what the rest of the industry was up to.

I was surprised to learn to learn that WSP CEO Chris Cole is a Fellow of CIBSE.  Last year’s pay was £604,000 with further stock options bringing him up to greater than Zaha proportions of £736,000.  Turnover for WSP for 2006 (the year the pay is for) was £416.7m, some 40 times more than Zaha.  This year (2007 results) their press release announced “outstanding financial results” with profit increasing 43%!  Of course, this is the fun one can have with statistics.  In actual fact, profit margin increased from 6.8% to 7.8% – an increase of 0.8%.  Still good news and good figures for the industry, but not nowhere near as dramatic as 43%.

So, does anyone know of any other CEO’s of multi-disciplinary consultancies who are CIBSE and who get paid more?  I’ll keep poking around Business Week and see what I can come up with…

mel starrs Uncategorized Business Week Company Insight Centre, Chris Cole, CIBSE, GBP, pay, WSP, zaha Hadid

What caught my eye today, March 23rd:

• This much I know: Amory Lovins – The US has cut by half the total amount of energy used to make a dollar of GDP. It has cut oil use per dollar by 54 per cent and electricity use by 17 per cent. The UK has started to think about ways of catching up.

mel starrs News electricity use, Energy, oil use, United Kingdom, United States

What caught my eye today, March 20th:

• 10 Reasons Organic Can Feed the World – 10 reasons GM won’t – Found by my usual circuitous route (Tyler Cowen > Marcus Bitten > Ecologist) an interesting article on the debate between GM and organic

mel starrs News Marcus Bitten, Tyler Cowen

…I’ve been tinkering with the site, waiting for WP2.5 to be released so I can find yet another new theme. In the meantime:

• added Twitter as obviously I do not belong to enough social media networks – will be handy for ‘blogging’ live from events though…
• added Lijit which my friend Cathy recommended aeons ago. Should act as a better search (one reason I want to change my theme – I can’t get on with the search box at the top of the page). Seems good so far but…
• …still added back in the google search bar
• added a link to my Blogher page
• updated my Blogroll to include all my sustainability, economics and business feeds. Also stripped a lot more pages using Feedity , so some feeds which don’t even exist are now there. As this is a direct link to my Google Reader, it will change on an almost daily basis, as I find new feeds and ditch old, broken and boring ones…
• added a new page which gives a little more detail of who I am, as I recently updated my LinkedIn profile

OK, that’s enough tinkering for now, back to proper posting after Easter as I have dicovered the joy of blogging from Google* Notebooks (move sections of text around, insert links, export to Documents and blog direct from there…)

*my current love for Google comes from being constantly on different computers in different internet cafes. Perhaps it will want when I get back to my own machine…

mel starrs Uncategorized Easter, Google, google lijit linkedin twitter blogher, internet cafes, search bar, search box, social media networks

What caught my eye today, March 19th:

• One year on, is the Code for Sustainable Homes working? – Building Design – Mark Brinkley on the ‘no’ side of the debate (I know there’s a word limit on this piece which explains why Mark’s not his normal verbose self ;o))
• 40 Under 40: Nominate a young engineer today – 3/19/2008 – Consulting-Specifying Engineer – via lagavulin – contest is open world wide and “young” is defined as under 40 – yay! Not allowed to nominate yourself though…
• Get Things Done with Bi-Modal Work Styles – A two hats approach to productivity – either you can disturb me (open) or p*ss off, I’m working (closed). Would add – you can do this with headphones in the office – if I’m wearing headphones – DO NOT DISTURB
• Keys to Climate Protection (Extended version): Scientific American – Jeffrey Sachs claims we need large-scale public funding of R&D and demonstration projects; IP policies to promote rapid dissemination to poor countries; the promotion of public debate and acceptance of new options. Carbon tax not enough.
• Amazing Green Roof Art School in Singapore – I LOVE green roofs and this is the best I’ve seen yet – gorgeous.
• Wal-Mart CEO: Wal-Mart Will Push Chinese Suppliers To Be Greener – Market forces rather than governments working here – both scary and good in equal measure…
• Dantherm News2Blog – Dantherm have a blog – and it’s actually quite good!
• The Designers Atlas of Sustainability – Book and blog by Ann Thorpe. “The Atlas presents an accessible conceptual overview of the three main landscapes for sustainability ?ecology, economy and culture?and how designers can navigate them.”
• ReGreen – 182 pg pdf available at USGBC Green Home guide. “The American Society of Interior Designers? Foundation and the U.S. Green Building Council have partnered on the development of best practice guidelines and targeted educational resources for sustainable

mel starrs News Amazing Green Roof Art School, American Society of Interior Designers, Ann Thorpe, Jeffrey Sachs, Mark Brinkley, Singapore, U.S. Green Building Council, Wal-Mart, Will Push

What caught my eye today, March 18th:

• EPA: US can halve greenhouse emissions for the cost of a cup of coffee a day – Interesting findings on Oikos “if emissions were cut by 56% by 2050, US GDP would grow by 80% between now and then, compared to 81% if emissions were allowed to increase on a business-as-usual basis”
• 2.5 Sneak Peak – Hang fire on the blog upgrade – WP 2.5 due out soon. The revisions look great but I’m not quite brave enough to dive in until offical release date…
• Government figures hide scale of CO2 emissions, says report – Two bases for calculation revealed by NAO. Second includes shipping and aviation.

mel starrs News Environmental Protection Agency, United States