Higher education institutions need to double down on their market-led research and innovation efforts and their engagement with the commercial world or they risk irrelevance. “Colleges that don’t embed market-focused innovation into their DNA are doing a massive disservice to their students who will need to invent their own jobs,” says Benjamin Soffer, chairman of the Israeli Tech Transfer Network and former head of the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology’s technology transfer office.

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Innovation has become a buzz word for city success. Major corporations have long targeted talent-rich innovation hubs, but the “war for talent” is now intensifying their focus on talent hotspots.

Among real estate investors, several large investment managers have started to explicitly target cities perceived to have a strong innovation system. Meanwhile, city governments are seeing the innovation economy and innovation districts as key building blocks of sustainable long-term growth and smart city futures.

There truly is no typical career path in venture capital anymore. VC was once a cottage industry that sprung up from executives at leading companies like Fairchild Semiconductor. Then for a number of years, many of the best VCs like John Doerr, Jim Breyer, and Peter Wagner usually attended Stanford or Harvard for undergraduate and eventually did graduate work with a stint at a technology company like Intel, Hewlett Packard, and/or Silicon Graphics before being mentored in a leading firm.

One afternoon a manager we’ll call Kassie sent an email to her teammate, Harrison, explaining why she hadn’t included him in a meeting with a group of company executives earlier that day. She and Harrison got along well, and she wanted to make sure he wasn’t offended. Two days later the email still hadn’t been returned. This small incident made Kassie question their relationship. Why the sudden rudeness — was Harrison actually upset? Were they really on “good” terms? How should she act the next time they crossed paths? Harrison, meanwhile, had “write Kassie back” on his to-do list but had just been too busy to get around to it. He had no idea that his slow response concerned Kassie.

You can never really tell if your small business is going to be hacked.  But the likelihood is high.  In fact, according to a 2015 report, 62% of small and medium sized companies have been hit by a data breach.  Even if you take every precaution, you’re still at risk.   But if you ignore this situation you’re putting yourself and your company in danger of a serious disruption, loss of information and potential liabilities.  Are you in trouble?  The hackers are looking for weaknesses and, when found, they’ll pounce.  If you are doing (or not doing) any of these nine things you’re definitely more at risk of being hacked.

Miami and Los Angeles are just two of the major U.S. cities where minority entrepreneurs are thriving. But would the nation’s capital have been at the top of your list?  Or Orlando? Our 2019 rankings of the Best Cities for Minority Entrepreneurs identify the top 10 cities for startup owners of color and minorities.  The cities in the top 10 rankings may surprise some people, but perhaps not other people

Image: https://smallbiztrends.com

If you can imagine New York City in 25 years, what would it look like?

Start by envisioning a super- connected and efficient metropolis. Your morning commute begins by walking to your curb where an underground waste disposal is hidden by manicured grass. Sensors trigger a notification that your bin is full and needs to be picked up.

Everyone wants to grow and innovate like Amazon these days. From meager beginnings selling books online back in 1994, Amazon is currently the largest e-commerce retailer and cloud computing platform in the world, and now dominates even the giant Walmart. In my role as a business advisor, I’ve long wondered how to pass their secrets along to other new ventures.

Few things are more refreshing than enjoying a cool beverage after spending a day under the hot summer sun. But gulping down a drink does not always quench thirst. Seawater, for example, may look appealing to someone stranded in the middle of the ocean, but taking a swig of it will only worsen dehydration.

Demand for seafood is increasing across the globe, and the United States is no exception. Aquaculture, or aquatic farming, is increasingly meeting this demand and now supplies just over 50 percent of all seafood globally. In fact, it has been one of the world’s fastest growing food sectors for years.

When it comes to intelligence, we all have bad days. Heck, we even have many bad moments, such as when we forget our car keys, forget a friend's name, or bomb an important test that we've taken a day after staying up all night worrying about it. Truth is, none of us-- including the world's smartest human-- is perfectly consistent in our cognitive functioning. Sometimes we are at our very best and feel like our brain is on fire, and at other times, we don't even recognize ourselves.

Most of us are so digitally connected that we have become utterly disconnected.

Michelle, the COO of a multinational corporation, was one of the most respected executives in her industry. A true workhorse, she was famous for her ability to multitask and constant online presence. While her staff admired the way she worked, they felt pressured to do the same. Recently, several of them were signed off from work, citing burnout, and two others had handed in their resignation.

PR trends much like fashion or technology are never static and are always changing at a rapid speed. This mirrors the fact that nothing can exist without advancing in a world which is evolving at such a high rate. Consumer demands, moods as well as shopping trends, software, manufacturing and supply management, social tendencies and morality undergo a transformation very frequently and demand that the techniques of reputation building and marketing the same are also updated from time to time.

Night owls might be creative, but early risers are richer and more productive. Entrepreneurs who want to make it big should ditch the late-night brainstorm sessions and hit the hay early to help their companies grow.

By waking up earlier than most, I have time to exercise, eat breakfast and go over everything I have planned for the entire day. Many founders haven't even hit snooze -- which is another habit you'll want to ditch. When the alarm goes off, get up. Anyone can be an early riser with a little practice. The simplest way to achieve your prime wake-up timeframe is to roll back your alarm by 15 minutes each night.

Higher education institutions in the United States face starkly different prospects. Top-ranked schools turn away throngs of top applicants, while cushioned by staggering endowments. Others, including many small liberal arts colleges, are facing declining enrollment, nervously watching expenses outpace revenue, and tapping their endowments to cover shortfalls. These pressures have forced many schools to make painful choices, including cutting programs, laying off faculty, merging with other schools, and reducing student admissions. In the worst cases, some schools have lost accreditation or have shut down. There will likely be more: our review of public data suggests that at least 90 medium-size not-for-profit institutions across the country show some signs of financial pressure.

A chorus of questions greeted New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio when he announced in March that he wanted to make the island of Manhattan bigger by extending it 500 feet into the East River, in order to better protect the Financial District and nearby areas from sea level rise.

Crystal R Icenhour, PhD, is one of the rising stars of American biotechnology. After more than 25 years in medical research and biotech, she was named founding CEO of Aperiomics, a company that harnesses the power of next-generation sequencing to identify any known pathogen (bacteria, virus, fungi or parasite) in a single test. Aperiomics is the only company of its kind and scope in the world. Throughout Dr.Icenhour’s career, she has demonstrated strong leadership in business and science and has dedicated herself to “bridging the translational gap between these two worlds.”

Increasingly, HR departments are becoming people analytics departments. More than 70% of companies now say they consider people analytics to be a high priority, according to Harvard Business Review. Firms in nearly all industries are exploring how data can be applied to improve recruiting, hiring, training and development, performance management, and more.

Graduates at universities and colleges around the United States are wrapping up the academic year, preparing to face a new era of life. As part of that tradition, celebrities, politicians, athletes, CEOs and artists are offering a range of life advice in commencement addresses.

Here are some of the best moments and words of wisdom from commencement speeches in 2019.

Women-owned businesses are on the rise. Just look at the numbers. The number of women owned small businesses with employees increased by 2.8 percent, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau’s Annual Survey of Entrepreneurs. But where are these women entrepreneurs? Our rankings of the best cities for women entrepreneurs provide answers. Our 2019 best cities rankings identify the percentage of entrepreneurs to the overall population, along with other factors.

Image: https://smallbiztrends.com