Dreaming about a Fulbright Experience? Go for It!

This is the application timeline of the Fulbright Fellowship.

Interested in applying for the Fulbright program? Wanting to become part of a big and prestigious family, but feel afraid about not being selected in such a rigorous program, do not worry! we all, at some point of our lives,  feel afraid about applying to competitive programs like this one since there are many people, who want to be part of it, but small spots available to be chosen.

Taking big decisions in life, like going abroad for a whole year, are scary and at the same time exciting because they imply “change” or getting out of your comfort zone. Feeling scared about the outcomes (being chosen or not) and excited about the potential possibilities of change ( being selected)  are feelings that describe myself back in the summer of 2011 before applying to what it turned to be one of the most amazing experiences of my life, the Fulbright experience. During that summer, the Fulbright possibility looked amazing to me; nonetheless, I have to be sincere with you guys, it looked almost impossible since there was only one spot available to the category I was planning to apply, and for sure, there were several competitive candidates applying for it, too. After several weeks of researching and reading about the program, I finally decided- last minute- to give it a shot and I applied.

The application was really long and detailed. It took me hours of work to get through it by myself; however, the time I put into it was completely worthy. The time to complete the application was not as stressful as waiting to hear back from them with the resolution. As you know, the selection process takes several months (around 9 months). At that time, the site was not comprehensive and detailed as it is now. The Fulbright program, sponsored by the U.S. Department of State and Foreign Governments, recently changed the site and it now shows applicants a detailed competition timeline ( picture above) that tells applicants when to hear from them with a resolution. Even the waiting time was killer to me, I totally recommend each student to apply to it and dream about it, it totally worths your time!

Now, every time I have a minute to look back and reflect about what I have achieved and experienced in my life, I feel grateful about each challenge I set for myself- including applying to Fulbright-and the great experiences that those “dreams” and “experiences” left in my life. Bottom line, do not feel afraid about taking this step, just do it!

If you have decided to move forward and apply to it, follow my blog and my social networks. I am always open to hear your questions. I will be happy to answer any doubt and help you to get through the application process. I am so sure you will not regret the effort and time you put on it.

Host City for the Olympics 2020: Madrid, Tokyo, or Istanbul?

After several months of waiting  to know which city will be winner to host the Olympic Games in 2020, the day has finally arrive. Today,  is the big day and the day of the truth for these three beautiful cities: Madrid 2020 (@Madrid2020ES) Tokyo 2020, and Istanbul 2020. All of them offer great space to host this important event; nonetheless, in my perspective,  I think the best place/option to host such important games is Madrid 2020. Madrid is a beautiful city that is prepared: it has a great infrastructure, it is a safe country, and its transportation, culture, and people make of this city the perfect place to celebrate.

Many people might say that Madrid is not prepared due to the economic crisis the country is facing and then, Tokyo shows up as the best option; I might say, right now Madrid could be facing a tough situation; nonetheless, I totally believe this event will push the country to move on. All people from Madrid and the whole country, Spain, will be happy and proud of being the host city/country in 2020. Go Madrid 2020!  

#NSAPickUpLines

NSA

On August 25th, 2013 one of the hash tags trending on Twitter was the #NSAPickUpLines.  Everybody seemed really engaged tweeting about the different  National Security Agency’s (NSA) surveillance activities it has conducted during the last months and that have been published by neswpapers such as The Guardian, The New York Times, Wired, and Wall Street Journal.

Last Sunday, The well-know German magazine Der Spiegel stated the U.S. NSA secretly monitored the U.N.’s internal video conferencing system by decrypting it last year.This specific report was one of many developments that have come to light since a former NSA contractor Edward Snowden leaked national security documents to the press, revealing a government surveillance program called PRISM that collected metadata over telecommunications lines. 

The news magazine said that documents it obtained from Snowden show the NSA decoded the system at the U.N.’s headquarters in New York since last summer. The leaked documents stated that the decryption “dramatically increased the data from video phone conferences and the ability to decode the data traffic.”In three weeks, the German newspapers said, the NSA increased the number of decrypted communications at the U.N. from 12 to 458 and it has “eavesdropping posts” in 80 U.S. embassies and consulates worldwide. The NSA was able to obtain a wide range of data, including evidence that suggests the Chinese spied on the U.N. in 2011. It is impressive how people are engaging more an more in the social networks when a news piece like this comes out. 

 

Reinventing Life Science Startups – Evidence-based Entrepreneurship

Great for Entrepreneurs!

Steve Blank

What if we could increase productivity and stave the capital flight by helping Life Sciences startups build their companies more efficiently?

We’re going to test this hypothesis by teaching a Lean LaunchPad class for Life Sciences and Health Care (therapeutics, diagnostics, devices and digital health) this October at UCSF with a team of veteran venture capitalists.

Part 1 of this post described the issues in the drug discovery. Part 2 covered medical devices and digital health. This post describes what we’re going to do about it.  And why you ought to take this class.

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When I wrote Four Steps to the Epiphany and the Startup Owners Manual, I believed that Life Sciences startups didn’t need Customer Discovery. Heck how hard could it be?  You invent a cure for cancer and then figure out where to put the bags of money. (In fact, for oncology, with a successful…

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New Strategies: Evernote

New Strategies: Evernote

Bad News for Cisco: Orders from the Asian Market Decline

    

Once again, Cisco started tightening its work force after receiving bad news from its Asian market. Orders from Asia declined 3% and its business in China fell 6%, while orders in the Americas market increased by 5%. The company is just projecting to rise its revenues by 3% to 5% in the current period, compared to 6% in the fourth period. 

The Silicon Valley company is planning to make a huge lay-off in the incoming weeks. They reported to cut about 4,000 jobs, which is about 5% of its entire workforce, despite the jump in profits in the fourth final quarter, which was reported to be 18%. 

Global Recovery Leaded by Developed Economies

During the last years, we have seen an emerging market growing at fast-pace rates every quarter; hence, leading the global economic growth. The main countries experiencing such growth were mainly  the BRIC’s countries, which are Brazil, Russia, India, and China. Nonetheless, this situation has changed this year, for the first time since the start of the financial crisis Japan, The U.S., and Europe together are contributing more to the global growth than the emerging markets according to an estimate by investment firm Bridgewater Associates LP.

Among the factors to this shift: a resurgent Japan, whose economy expanded 2.6% on an annualized basis last quarter reported by the government last Monday. The recovering of the U.S. economy and an expected  slightly EU’s economy expansion that new reports this week are expected to show.

On the other hand, the emerging market countries are experiencing a contraction on their growth. Beijing’s official full-year growth target is 7.5%, making it the year with the slowest growth ever seen since 1990, still surpassing the U.S. pace of 2%, though many analysts comment that China will grow even slower than the government’s target. Brazil, the biggest Latin America’s economy, is also stagnating. Brazil grew just 1% last year after growing at almost 8% in 2010. Global companies investing in the emerging markets are optimistic about these numbers.

Obama’s Photographer Joins Instagram

Welcome Obama’s Photographer to Instagram

TYBA: An Alternative for Linkedin’s Users

Tired of Linkedin?

     

If you think that LinkedIn does not provide you with the opportunity to show your whole picture (skills, portfolio, pictures, videos, your whole you) to prospect employers, and you feel that linkedIn is turning a little boring,  now you have the opportunity to try a new site called TYBA. I found TYBA user friendly and on top of this, it gives you the ability to add several sections on the site to showcase all the  work  you want to show to prospect recruiters. I came across with this site while browsing different news on my former University’s twitter account (IE Business School), where I studied my Master’s Degree.

TYBA mission is to connect talented individuals at an early stage in their careers with companies looking to hire them. TYBA founders were students from IE Business School in Madrid, Spain. This piece of news made me happy because they were students from my alma mater.

In my opinion, I have lately found LinkedIn a little bit boring because the information you can share about your work is  limited; even though, some changes have been made recently. In general,  I feel that LinkedIn is made more for people, who have some years of experience (around 3 years of experience) and it does not help students, who are trying to get an internship or just want to jump into the job market as entry level employees.  Discover the TYBA experience, it is fun!!

Congratulations Jorge Schnura, Eiso Kant, and Phillip Von Have in such a great start-up and good luck!!! Sure, it will be a great success.