Take the next 10 minutes to see that everyone deserves a second chance! Heard of Dave's Killer Bread? Well, he was a drug pusher... but hey, he's changed! Big guy way to go!!!

Love this persian guy... gotta watch him talk about Stereotyping... guys, if you get a chance to meet him! Do!

It's very ironical then that the government itself wants some of the key men managing India's policymaking to not last more than a single term. And that too, a smaller term of three years! The SEBI chiefs are a case in point. First it was Mr. Damodaran, and now it's Mr. Bhave.

The former was not re-appointed after finishing his 3-year term that ended in 2008. Now, the government is repeating the process. It is all set to start the process of selecting the next SEBI chief. This gives a clear signal that it does not favour a second term for Mr. Bhave.

This is particularly sad given that Mr. Bhave has done some good work at the helm of affairs at SEBI. And his good work was largely to provide more safety mechanisms for small investors against the might of companies and mutual funds. But probably this has brought him in the eye of storm of these biggies - companies and mutual funds - who have occasionally taken out knives and blamed Mr. Bhave for taking sides with retail investors.

And it all boils down to the fact that individual investors have to cover their own rear ends, look after themselves... all because the Indian Government doesn't really have your interests at stake. I wish more government bodies were run like private businesses... they'd be more concerned about who pays their bills... their customers - the Indian citizen.

Sooner or later, I expect many investors taking things into their own hands... most likely dumping Mutual Funds for ETFs (check out my other post about this). Well, thank God I'm managing my own money! Care to join?

Most of the people who click on this article from somewhere won’t finish reading it. So says Nick Carr. The New York Times will remind you that you’ll probably forget reading it in a few minutes. The idea has gotten so prevalent, even the Onion has started to take its jabs.

There’s some truth to it. Posts like this and search trends point to what we’re after. Many people want the ability to focus more and feel like they’re losing the ability to focus on a particular task for long periods of time. We feel like we’re losing that ability. Getting Things Done and all the other books out there tend to give you some rituals to cope with the problem— but only if you could stick to them. Most of us, just a few weeks after reading that book, sit next to filing cabinets (virtual or otherwise) and go about our merry way.

That’s because we’re focused on the wrong thing. To get a longer attention span — even a span long enough to read this article — don’t worry about managing the information. Worry about managing your attention. Paying attention, for long periods of time, is a form of endurance athleticism. Like running a marathon, it requires practice and training to get the most out of it. It is as much Twitter’s fault that you have a short attention span as it is your closet’s fault it doesn’t have any running shoes in it. If you want the ability to focus on things for a long period of time, you need attention fitness.

To read more... follow the link. Don't think you'll regret it...

Deceptive bosses, it transpires, tend to make more references to general knowledge (“as you know…”), and refer less to shareholder value (perhaps to minimise the risk of a lawsuit, the authors hypothesise). They also use fewer “non-extreme positive emotion words”. That is, instead of describing something as “good”, they call it “fantastic”. The aim is to “sound more persuasive” while talking horsefeathers.

When they are lying, bosses avoid the word “I”, opting instead for the third person. They use fewer “hesitation words”, such as “um” and “er”, suggesting that they may have been coached in their deception. As with Mr Skilling’s “asshole”, more frequent use of swear words indicates deception. These results were significant, and arguably would have been even stronger had the authors been able to distinguish between executives who knowingly misled and those who did so unwittingly. They had to assume that every restatement was the result of deliberate deception; but the psychological traits they tested for would only appear in a person who knew he was lying.

This study should help investors glean valuable new insights from conference calls. Alas, this benefit may diminish over time. The real winners will be public-relations firms, which now know to coach the boss to hesitate more, swear less and avoid excessive expressions of positive emotion. Expect “fantastic” results to become a thing of the past.

If you want to ensure shareholder value is not lost... don't just hear the management... listen to them - there are plenty of signs!

And the (Indian) Empire Strikes Back...