News Cut: August 15, 2008 Archive

The best place to work

Posted at 5:59 AM on August 15, 2008 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Surveys and trivia

The Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal is out with its list of the best places to work.

According to a news release, here's the criteria:

To be eligible for consideration as a Business Journal Best Place to Work, companies had to have an office in the Twin Cities 11-county metro area with 10 or more employees, or be Minnesota-based companies with at least 1,000 employees in the state. They also had to have a certain number of employees, depending on company size, complete the online survey.

The online survey part of it is a little questionable. One can imagine the benevolent boss begging the employees to click the survey.

Here's the list:

Administaff Inc.
Arts Midwest
Azul 7
C.H. Robinson Worldwide Inc.
Capella Education Co.
Carmichael Lynch
Certes Financial Professionals Corp.
Clockwork Active Media Systems
CMGRP Inc.
Colliers Turley Martin Tucker
Comcast
Ecolab Inc.
Ecumen
First Financial USA Ltd.
Fortune Financial
Fredrikson & Byron
Goff & Howard Inc.
Gray, Plant, Mooty, Mooty & Bennett
Great River Energy
Harbinger Partners Inc.
HealthEast Care System
Horizontal Integration
Intertech Inc.
Into the Mystic Inc.
JRA Financial Advisors
Lakeview Health
Lancet Software Development Inc.
LarsonAllen
Lindquist & Vennum
Merrill Lynch, Pierce Fenner & Smith Inc.
Olson
Oppenheimer Wolff & Donnelly
Parsinen Kaplan Rosberg + Gotlieb
RBA Inc.
Reside
Riverbridge Partners
Salo
Securian Financial Group Inc.
Solution Design Group Inc.
SPS Commerce
Tobin Real Estate Co.
Vibrant Technologies Inc.
Wells Fargo
Wenck Associates Inc.
Winthrop & Weinstine

If you work at one of those places, what's so great about it. If you work at another place not listed, why do you think it shold -- or shouldn't -- be on the list.

(PS: I'll be on the road to St. Cloud this morning. Posting will be sporadic until the afternoon)

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Melody's Olympics

Posted at 7:35 AM on August 15, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)
Filed under: Sports

MPR's Public Insight Network guru Melody Ng is back in China on vacation and has just provided some pictures and commentary on life around Beijing.

Melody reports:

"This is the first time I've been able to get online. It sounds ridiculous considering what a developed city Beijing is, but it's been difficult getting Internet access. The two apts we've lived in haven't had Internet, even though they were supposed to (and we left one for the other to try to get Internet)."

Her fascinating diary is below the fold.

Continue reading "Melody's Olympics"

Delegate profile: Yolanda Lehman

Posted at 3:09 PM on August 15, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

(An occasional introduction to some of the Minnesota delegates to the national political conventions)

Name: Yolanda D. Lehman

City: St. Cloud

Political affiliation: Democrat

Occupation: Adjunct professor St. Cloud State University. Teaches a class called "Race in America." Former pastor of Resurrection AME Zion Church in St. Cloud.

Family: Husband - Dr. Christopher Lehman, professor at St. Cloud State (ethnic studies), Daughter (7), Son (6 months)

Pledged to: Barack Obama
"I was introduced at the DNC through his amazing speech that I watched on television. I remember sitting on the floor in a hotel room watching the speech with tears running down my face and I said, "this man will certainly be the first African American president of the United States and we must do what we can to help him get elected." (listen - mp3)

How she became a delegate: I did not know that I would become a delegate. That was a happy surprise. I got to the CD6 convention and realized I'd need to quickly fill out some paperwork and give a little speech. I gave my little speech. At first there was a large field so none of us had the votes we needed. As the field whittled, I was left as the delegate... " (listen - mp3)

Looking forward to: The in-service day Minnesota delegates are holding on Wednesday, preparing Meals on Wheels. My hope is they will allow my daughter to stand with me and do that preparation because that's something I want to sow seed into her -- service. (listen-mp3)

Most inspiring person she's met: My father is a Harvard MBA who has chosen not to pursue glory and wealth but publishes the St. Louis Black Pages, a combination magazine-directory that promotes African American businesses. In his free time he goes about the city doing as many good works as he can around issues of integrating people leaving prison into the community, helping entrepreneurs start up businesses, very active in the community supporting people who have need."

Favorite book (other than the Bible): : Uprooting racism: What white people can do to work toward racial justice (Paul Kivel) (listen - mp3)

Favorite movie: Malcolm X "I have to admit I liked Denzel Washington a lot, but I also liked the movie a lot."

Favorite music: "I listen to a lot of gospel music."

The piece of advice she most often gives: I read this quote that says 'all is well, all is well, all matters of things are well.' That is the principle by which I try to live my life, with a philosophy of abundance. Everything that I will need will be provided to me as I need it. I am an eternal optimist. Most people are intrinsically good. We don't have to sit around and be despondent..." (listen - mp3)

Getting to Denver: We are going to pack my six month old son and our seven-year-old daughter into our Honda Civic and my husband and I are going to drive through the night, praying that they stay asleep.the 14 hours to Denver. It's a wonderful opportunity to bring, especially, the seven year old into the process and see the sights and smell the smells and hear the things that are going on. She door-knocked for Kerry and she's really passionate about politics. (listen - mp3)

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Pawlenty mischaracterizes unemployment rate

Posted at 4:13 PM on August 15, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)
Filed under: Economy

We're having a spirited discussion downstream about the unemployment rate compared to the dark days of 1983. I won't bother repeating the discussion here.

But, Gov. Pawlenty, you're not helping my point very much.

Said the governor on his radio show today:

"The unemployment number for July has gone up to 5.8% which is a near historic high in our state,which is unfortunate but it reflects a stumbling or struggling economy both nationally and in states like Minnesota."

Not that near, governor. The 5.8 percent rate is nowhere close to the historic high in Minnesota. That would be 9 percent in 1982. (See statistics)

In fact for nearly two full years between 1982 and 1983, the unemployment rate didn't fall under 7 percent. We may get to that point, but about four or five times as many people would've had to have become unemployed last month than actually did.

Last month's seasonally unadjusted unemployment rate, by the way, is exactly the same as the day he took office in 2003. Seasonally adjusted, however, it has increased by about 1.5 percent over that period.

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The News Cut challenge

Posted at 7:00 PM on August 15, 2008 by Bob Collins (4 Comments)

You know the drill. Take the quiz, and lament your results in the section below. And remember: Good luck. We're all counting on you.

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