There is nothing wrong with having high hopes for your small business. Fulfilling a dream usually is what brings us to starting a business, and we get to decide how far and wide that dream will go.

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With your head in the clouds…

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Podcasts created by big corporate brands to humanize themselves in the minds of everyday people — or branded podcasts, as they are known in the biz — are an increasingly common phenomenon these days. McDonalds launched one a while back to plug the return of its Szechuan sauce. Tinder has one, as do Microsoft and Nike and Slack. Hell, even Goldman Sachs has one, though how you’d humanize a giant octopuslike bank is anybody’s guess. So it should not come as a particular surprise that Netflix, the all-consuming video distribution platform and entertainment company that has laid waste to countless waking hours, has bought into the trend as well. But what may be a little surprising is the way in which the company has done so: As it turns out, Netflix’s various branded podcast adventures are far more peculiar, and in some ways, more interesting than one would otherwise assume.

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Dr. Edith Humphrey considers the Judges’ parable of the bramble and the trees, and the most famous of the Servant Songs of Isaiah, to illuminate the godly vs. self-seeking ambition, and the New Testament readings for this week.

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We know that great leadership takes not just intelligence and drive but also the ability to get along well with and learn from others. The key, says Amer Kaissi, is to be both ambitious and humble throughout your career. He's studied how people succeed across diverse industries and offers advice of how to find a better balance between our desire to achieve and the qualities that earn more respect from colleagues. Kaissi is a professor of healthcare administration at Trinity University and the author of Humbitious: The Power of Low Ego, High Drive Leadership.

"Work Comp Matters" - the central location for all your workers' compensation, employment and labor law matters. Steve Appell hosts this weekly podcast from sunny southern California - presenting some…

Hustle culture is a trap. Learn how it's sabotaging your success and why rest is the ultimate key to unlocking your true potential.

The post Hustle Culture: The Silent Killer of Ambition first appeared on Chase Jarvis.

The post Hustle Culture: The Silent Killer of Ambition appeared first on Chase Jarvis.

PERSIAN AMBITIONS

The UK needs to address growth and debt problems if it is to match resources to ambitions on international priorities Expert comment LJefferson 5 November 2024

The budget marks the lowest amount in decades the country has spent on development, and it is struggling to fund other international priorities too.

The UK’s Chancellor Rachel Reeves unveiled her much-anticipated budget last week, the first of the new Labour government. Labour is in a difficult place. There are numerous calls on the public purse and public services are not performing well. Meanwhile, public debt remains close to 100 per cent of GDP, and there has been a long run of sluggish growth.
 
Reeves argues with some justification that the previous government left her a challenging inheritance – gaps in this year’s spending plans, and persistent debt questions left unresolved. More importantly, there are longer-term concerns about the sustainability of UK public spending – the country’s Office for Budget Responsibility has warned public debt could triple by the 2070s due to an ageing population, the climate crisis, and security risks. The focus has understandably been on kitchen table questions about tax rises and funding public services.
 
But this picture also has longstanding implications for international policy – on whether the UK can afford to invest in its foreign policy. The Chancellor did announce an increase of £2.9bn for defence. But the question of whether the UK can get on a sustainable path to spending 2.5 per cent of GDP on defence is still being worked through in the ongoing Strategic Review, and remains challenging despite increasingly urgent warnings from parliamentary committees about the UK’s defence readiness.

The budget also marks one of the lowest amounts in recent years the UK will spend on development overseas, despite setting an ambition to reset relations with the Global South and recover the UK’s role as a leader in international development.
  
The UK needs to either match resources to ambition, spend much more efficiently, or, in the case of the aid budget, it could seek to focus on priorities that are less dependent on spending. But even this will still require consistent resources, alongside significant diplomatic attention, intellectual leadership, and focus.

Longer-term, the UK may need to consider larger questions: addressing broader problems with its lack of growth and productivity will be critical to fund an expansive international role.

With this budget, UK aid spent overseas is at a historic low

In 2020 the UK government cut its goal for spending on international development to 0.5 per cent of Gross National Income (GNI), ending a longstanding policy of spending 0.7 per cent. Labour have echoed this, promising to only return to previous levels when fiscal circumstances allow.
 
But this masks a bigger issue. Since 2022, significant amounts of the UK’s aid budget have been spent on accommodation for asylum seekers in the UK. This is within the rules governing aid, but reduces the amount spent on reducing poverty overseas. In 2023 this spending was 28 per cent of the £15.4bn aid budget. In 2016, it was 3.2 per cent. 

Previous Chancellor Jeremy Hunt quietly allowed a top-up of aid spending over the last two fiscal years to offset how much is being spent at home on asylum seeker accommodation. That provided an additional £2.5 billion for 2022–23 and 2023–24.

But Rachel Reeves declined to provide extra funding this time, meaning the amount being spent overseas is likely the lowest its been since 2007 – an effective cut – under a Labour government.

The Minister for Development, Anneliese Dodds, speaking at Chatham House last month, said the government is working on clearing the backlog of asylum claims, which should free up more to spend overseas.

But beyond this there has been little clarity on plans to address the issue. And costs for asylum seeker accommodation have increased significantly – the UK appears to spend much more than comparator countries per head, according to the Center for Global Development, raising questions about how this spending is managed.

Development is not just about money – but money is important

The UK debate about development has often focused on the 0.7 per cent figure, which can distract from larger questions about what development policy is intended to achieve. As many experts have argued, development aid is about more than spending, and the wider, complex process by which the UK contributes to broad-based growth and stability for poorer countries is not about hitting a specific number.
 
There are things the UK can do that aren’t about spending more directly. This might include focusing on priorities like reforming multilateral development banks so they provide more low-cost public finance, and more flexible and agile loans to poorer countries – a priority echoed by Dodds. It might also incorporate focusing more broadly on helping developing countries attract more investment to bolster growth. 

There is also the issue of developing country debt, much of which is held by the private sector. Dodds previously said, when she was shadow chancellor, she might consider changing the law to address this issue. However,  she declined to recommit to this when questioned at Chatham House. 

None of this can be done unilaterally – on debt, for example, the UK has spearheaded some creative policies. Its UK Export Finance body developed climate-resilient debt clauses – agreements that countries can pause debt repayments in the event of a climate shock – but the UK holds limited amounts of developing country debt. Impact will only come by galvanizing and coordinating others to adopt similar approaches.

Expert

Cities as climate leaders: Progress and ambition 1 December 2021 — 12:00PM TO 1:00PM Anonymous (not verified) 16 November 2021 Online

This panel discusses the progress cities have already made, whether progress at COP26 was enough, and what more needs to be done to scale action and ambition internationally.

Cities are critical to tackling the pressing environmental challenges of our time. While they now account for an estimated 75 per cent of global CO2 emissions, cities also offer a unique opportunity for devolved leadership on climate action. At the recent COP26, some significant progress was made in elevating cities’ position on climate action with a flurry of announcements and commitments.

For example, more than 1,000 cities are now committed to the Cities Race to Zero and C40’s Clean Construction Declaration saw multiple cities committing to at least halving emissions from initial construction of buildings by 2030. A raft of financing commitments were also made to improve urban resilience in the face of climate change.

This builds on existing momentum before COP26. Over 50 world cities are now on track to meet Paris Agreement and the Marrakech Partnership is further enabling collaboration between governments and cities within the UNFCCC processes.

Therefore, how we design, build, govern and use our urban places will be a key factor for decarbonization and climate change adaptation.

On the back of COP26, this panel brings together leaders from across urban development sectors to discuss the progress cities have already made, whether progress at COP26 was enough, and what more needs to be done to scale action and ambition internationally. 

17 July 2020

Water, Energy and Development in Angola: From Ambition to Actuality 13 December 2018 — 5:00PM TO 6:00PM Anonymous (not verified) 28 November 2018 Chatham House, London

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Hungary has made progress in greening its economy and cutting emissions, but it needs to speed up efforts to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources, improve energy efficiency in buildings and promote sustainable transport, according to a new OECD Review.

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4-5 October 2018, Germany - Jointly organised by the OECD and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the conference aimed to discuss innovative applications of blended finance as the strategic use of development finance for the mobilisation of finance towards sustainable development in developing countries in the water sector.

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