Best Coffee

Coffee drinkers are going bananas over a brew that's made of Monkey Dung. Brits are flooding exclusive US stockists with orders for the brew, called Kopi Luwak, made from berries that have passed through the digestive system of Indonesian monkeys. Unlucky coffee plantation staff have to search through the dung to gather the bizarre "harvest" of coffee berries,which are said to emerge virtually intact.

Experts reckon the monkey business gives the drink a unique "earthy"taste, which has made it the most expensive and sought-after coffee in the world. It is in such short supply - just 500 lb of it is harvested a year - that it is virtually impossible to get hold of in Britain and has only limited availability in the States and Japan.

Experts say the brew first came to light hundreds of years ago, when explorers sampled it on the Indonesian isles of Java, Sumatra andSulawesi. The monkey - known as the Palm Toddy Cat - lives on a diet of alcoholictree sap and coffee berries. The animal is a palm civet, a dark brown tree-dwelling cat-like creature found throughout Southeast Asia. The scientific name is paradoxurus hermaphroditus.

US-based food and drink critic Chris Rubin said: "Whether it's because the intestinal juices give some special flavour or because it eats only perfectly ripe berries, the Toddy Cat's droppings produce what many say is the world's finest coffee."

Some exclusive US outlets sell Kopi Luwak for around a FIVER a cup. US Coffee supplier Mark Mountanos has snapped up 110 lb of the beans. He said: "We've had interest from all over the world because it is very hard to get hold of."

US coffee shop owner Richard Karno ordered a pound from Mark's firm - butonly after he convinced him it wasn't a joke. He said: "It's the best coffee I've ever tasted. It smells musty, but it roasts up real nice

Great Leaders

Great leaders show up a lot
Great leaders are great communicator and show up on site, hall, cafeteria and email boxes. They catch-up and talk with folks. They get to know their people ie who does what well and who needs attention. They find out what the real issues are on the front lines. Great leaders share their ideas about direction and purpose of the organization. They lead by example – illustrating what is important and paying attention to key issues. They establish strong bond and relationship with their people.

Great leaders rehearse mentally
Great leaders think and plan in details about the kinds of situations they might face. They run through them in their mind--a kind of mental practice. They focus on long term future and remain aware of its consequences. They think farther ahead than most of their peers. They rehearse individual encounters. Scenario planning helps you to recognize changing future situations because it's their job to choose the path for their organization in an unfamiliar forest. Without mental rehearsal and thinking about the future, leaders are forced to rely on precedents to deal with new situations. In today's rapidly changing environment, that doesn't work.

Great leaders manage the consequences of performance
Great leaders manage the systems of consequences so that it's in the best interest of the subordinate to do what's in the organization's best interest. Great Leaders have clear expectations and spend a lot of time ensuring people understand exactly what they expect and what the consequences of behavior are. Great leaders stay focused on performance. You don't hear them talking much about somebody's "attitude." They concentrate on the performance they want from subordinates and on the things they can control

Great leaders do lots of performance interviews
Great Leaders conduct performance interview regularly with someone who works for them with the objective of influencing them to change their behavior. Most of the interviews are short and informal. Great leaders tend to make small course corrections early, rather than waiting for problems to develop.

Great leaders critique their own leadership performance
Great leaders believe that leadership is a performance issue and the most important thing they do. They believe that it's something they'll get better at if they work at it. Great leaders are continually doing "after-action critiques" on their own performance. They pay attention to the items that are under their control and try to do those better and better and better. They monitor the results they get from their actions and then modify their actions to get the result they want. This grows out of the concentration on consequences and behavior. The result is that the great leaders use a wider array of leadership and communication tools and use them more effectively than their less effective peers.

I Hate My Job

When you have an "I Hate My Job" day, try this....

On your way home from work, stop at your pharmacy and go to the thermometer section and purchase a rectal thermometer made by Johnson and Johnson. Be sure you get this brand.

When you get home, lock you doors, draw the curtains and disconnect the phone so you will not be disturbed.Change into very comfortable clothing and sit in you favorite chair, open the package and remove the thermometer. Then, carefully place it on a table or a flat surface, so that it will not become chipped or broken.

Now the fun part begins. Take out the literature and read it carefully.You will notice that in small print there is a statement."Every rectal thermometer made by Johnson and Johnson is personally tested"

Finally, close your eyes and repeat out loud five times."I am so glad I do not work for quality control at Johnson and Johnson."

Lesson in Leadership

While visiting England, George Bush is invited to tea with the Queen. He asks her what her leadership philosophy is. She says that it is to surround herself with intelligent people.

He asks how she knows if they're intelligent."I do so by asking them the right questions," says the Queen."Allow me to demonstrate."

She phones Tony Blair and says, "Mr. Prime Minister. Please answer this question: Your mother has a child, and your father has a child, and this child is not your brother or sister. Who is it?"

Tony Blair responds ,"It's me, ma'am."

"Correct. Thank you and good-bye, sir," says the Queen.

She hangs up and says, "Did you get that, Mr. Bush?"

"Yes ma'am. Thanks a lot. I'll definitely be using that!"

Upon returning to Washington, he decides he'd better put the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to the test. He summons Jesse Helms to the White House and says, "Senator Helms, I wonder if you can answer a question for me."

"Why, of course, sir. What?s on your mind?"

"Uhh, your mother has a child, and your father has a child, and this child is not your brother or your sister. Who is it?"

Helms hems and haws and finally asks, "Can I think about it and get back to you?" Bush agrees, and Helms leaves.

He immediately calls a meeting of other senior Republican senators, and they puzzle over the question for several hours, but nobody can come up with an answer. Finally, in desperation, Helms calls Colin Powell at the State Department and explains his problem."Now lookee here, son, your mother has a child, and your father has a child, and this child is not your brother or your sister. Who is it?"

Powell answers immediately, "It's me, of course, you dumb cracker."

Much relieved, Helms rushes back to the White House and exclaims, "I know the answer, sir! I know who it is! It's Colin Powell!"

And Bush replies in disgust, "Wrong, you dumb shit, it's Tony Blair!"

The Shameless Art of Kissing Ass

Kissing ass, sucking up, brown nosing, polishing balls. We have lots of terms for trying to make someone like you, almost all of them dirty. It’s seen as a manipulative, shallow, and dishonest. But damn if it isn’t effective.

If you master the art of charming people, everything becomes easier — making the sale, getting the promotion, keeping your job. You’ll make more money, create more friendships, and feel more secure.

The key is doing it right. Kissing ass has gotten a bad rap because so many people are bad at it. They’re like amateur magicians that the crowd boos because their tricks are obvious.

Unfortunately though, the technique is light on training materials. You can’t take Brown Nosing 101 in college or browse through the Sucking up section at the bookstore. What we need is a guide for how to kiss ass effectively… which is why I’ve written one.

Ass Doesn’t Taste so Bad
The first step in learning to kiss ass effectively is to get rid of the bad taste in your mouth that comes just from thinking about it. If you’re disgusted by what you’re doing, you’ll never be able to do it well.

What’s so wrong about getting someone to like you? You’ve probably done it to get laid or talk your way out of a speeding ticket. If it works and doesn’t hurt anybody, then why not carry those skills over into business?

After all, most people like having their ass kissed, as long as the one doing the kissing is good at it. I know I do. We all like to be around people that make us feel better about ourselves. It’s only human. So why feel guilty about it?

You’ve Got to like Asses
You can never become a top-notch ass kisser unless you genuinely like people. All people. Otherwise, they’ll be able to tell that you don’t really mean it, and they’ll hate you for trying to manipulate them.

How does one go about learning to like people? Part of it is realizing that, whether you like it or not, you’re a lot like everyone else on this planet. You feel the same emotions, make the same mistakes, and have the same desire for people to love you anyway.

Another part is teaching yourself to see the good side of people. Work at it long enough, and you can find something you genuinely like about anyone, even if it’s only their talent for making you hate them.

Either way, if you’re going to kiss someone’s ass, you need to put yourself in the right state of mind. You need to like them, and they need to know it.

Don’t Overdo It
Second to disliking them, the worst mistake you can make when kissing someone’s ass is to overdo it. You want them to like you, so you give a compliment that obviously isn’t true or you shower them with too many compliments in a row.

It doesn’t work because people know when you’re lying. If you walk in for an interview and immediately start complementing the furniture, family pictures, and everything else you can find, they’ll know what you’re doing, and they’ll know it’s dishonest. No one is that impressed.

Similarly, if your boss drives a piece of junk car, you’d be stupid to try and convince him that it’s the prettiest one you’ve ever seen. Compliment him on his frugality or disregard for what other people think, but don’t lie to him. He’s smarter than that.

The problem with overdoing it is that it insults people’s intelligence. You think you’re making them feel better, but in reality, you’re very sweetly telling them that you think they’re gullible enough to believe your nonsense. Don’t do it.

Instead, just be natural. If you see something you genuinely appreciate, complement it and move on. They’ll appreciate you noticing, even if it’s something simple.

Kissing Ass Takes Practice
The first time you kiss someone’s ass, you’ll probably do it wrong. Worse, since you’ve read this article, you’ll probably know it. You might be embarrassed, trip all over yourself, and feel horrible about how inept you are.

Accept it and move on. Learning the fine art of ass kissing is like every other skill. It takes practice. The masters of the craft dedicate years to it, honing their skills of observation and delivery. And they make plenty of mistakes.

I recommend practicing on your relatives. Your mom, for instance, is morally obligated to like you, no matter how dishonest you are. Try throwing out a compliment every now and again. Once she gets over the shock, she’ll probably appreciate it, and you’ll get valuable practice.

You should also start with safe complements. Tell someone you like their shoes or their car. Don’t try to be clever. Just spit it out, saying something like “I really like those shoes,” and see what happens. It takes time, but you’ll get a feel for how people will respond.

Use Your Skills to Your Advantage
Once you feel comfortable with your skills, put them to work to help you make more money. Here are some ideas:

1: Find something positive that your company is doing and tip off the press, using yourself as a source.

2: When a coworker covers for you, send them a thank you note that says, “These days, not many people watch out for each other, and it means a lot that you would cover for me. Thanks for being a great human being.”

3: If a customer finds some genuine flaws with your product, tell them it’s the most insightful feedback you’ve heard in months and ask for their permission to pass it on to product development team

4: The next time your boss says something smart, ask him or her to repeat it and then write it down

5: If your company has an Employee of the Month Program or something like it, make a habit of nominating coworkers you notice doing something good

Even more importantly, the higher you go in business, the more important it is for people to like you. The price of stock in publicly traded companies changes dramatically based on how much people like the CEO. You can never get to that level without becoming a master ass kisser. Like it or not, that’s how the game is played.

How to be an Ultimate Kiss Ass

Being the ultimate kiss ass is a skill that some people are simply born with. It's a delicate balance between being a total brown-noser and disappearing from your boss' radar. Truth be told, being the ultimate kiss ass can be the ultimate skill for advancement in business, relationships or even life in general.

Here are a few tips on how to do it!

Step 1 Mark your target. There's no point in being a kiss ass to everybody. Being the ultimate kiss ass is about marking the target or person in your life who you need to get something from. Usually this is your boss or someone who stands in the way of you getting what you want. If they can tell you "no" for something that's important in your life, then their ass needs to be kissed!

Step 2 Learn your target. Once you've marked your target, now it's time to learn everything you can about them. What do they like? What turns them on? What turns them off? This step also isn't as broad as wondering whether they like golf. It's more about how they react in the course of a conversation. Play close attention to what they respond to. Some tycoons want to be challenged, while some secretaries of tycoons want to be complimented because of their stature on the totem pole. Again this is a delicate dance, a trial and error process which you'll need to apply in order to learn what your "mark" responds to.

Step 3 Determine what you want. This can be a short term goal, like a raise, or a long term goal, like to eventually take over regional operations. Either way you must have a goal in mind. There's nothing worse than someone who relentlessly kisses ass when there's no specific goal in mind.

Step 4 Apply your technique. Now that you've marked your target and studied them you are ready to be the ultimate kiss ass, so pucker up. Use your full bag of tricks. Being one step ahead of someone is a great way of kissing ass without them ever catching on. Rather than being transparent, they'll just perceive you as helpful. Compliments also work well. Also, if your boss loves a specific sports team, or loves the local ballet, just happen to have a pair of tickets for that event which you can't use. Slowly but surely integrate yourself into their life until you move from "included" to "integral."

Should Employees Be Loyal to Their Employers

Should employees be loyal to their employers?
Before answering whether or not employees should be loyal to their employers, it's important to note why many employees are not loyal to their employers. The reason will make you realize you're more of an moron than a human being.

A. Financially discouraging employee loyalty
Financial aspect of employee loyalty is one of the biggest problems at large corporations. There are two very important corporate policies at many corporations that financially discourage employee loyalty:

1. Communist merit increase policies.Companies that give everyone a 3% raise across the board are doing a disservice to employees who exceed their expectations . Sure, you can take the butt kisser path and focus only on getting promoted for the bigger raise. The problem is that companies would crumble if everyone was a butt kissing promotion hunter. People that chase promotions don't actually produce anything other than arrogance.

2. Salary increase caps on promotions.For those that actually are butt kissers, bad organizations still find a way to lose their loyalty, even though they're dying to love thy employer. Many companies have a salary increase cap when an employee is promoted. And whether that cap is 10%, 15%, or 20%, that's still "Bush" league.

B. Breezing past the career side of employee loyalty
The bread and butter of most employee loyalty articles focuses on the human or career side of encouraging employee loyalty. Giving employees training options, career advancement paths, and making them feel like they are an important piece of the puzzle are just some of the methods often used to help encourage employee loyalty. The problem is that most corporations merely pretend to care about this aspect, and employees see right through it.

1. Online training courses that are completely worthless.Someone shoot me in the head . Is this seriously what they think employees want? How about sending employees to a legitimate training class where they actually develop specific skills for the job that they are interested in?

2. BS career advancement paths.Telling an employee that they have plenty of ways to move up in the organization because of a "Grade Level System" at the organization is laughable, man . Allowing someone to move up from Data Analyst I, to Data Analyst II, to Data Analyst III, all while having the exact same responsibilities isn't exactly a career path. It's called career suicide. How about giving me some flexibility and allowing me to learn some new technology and different aspects of the business (not that I personally am interested in that, but proactive types seem to be interested in it).

3. Pretending to implement a sense of ownership.At large corporations, they try to encourage a sense of ownership by offering stock option plans and other nifty ideas. The problem is that most large corporations are simply too big for anyone to have an impact on the success of the business. It's like 500 people carrying an obese woman . It doesn't take long before you realize no one is going to notice if you only pretend to help. You can always rely on 20% of the people to carry 80% of the load.

C: What can companies do to encourage loyalty?
1. Give merit increases and demerit decreases.In order to keep the people that deserve to stay, you give them reason to stay by giving them larger raises. More importantly, you use a crappy employee's money to pay them. You gain loyalty from good employees and lose loyalty from the ones you wanted to fire. Japanese managers aren't wimps. Losing the "loyalty" of worthless employees is never a bad thing. It's called managing people OUT of a company.

2. Enable people to decide how much someone is worth, not a corporate policy.Putting bureaucratic caps on promotion based raises is like a wife setting a limit of one sexual encounter per month with her husband. Upon learning that her husband left her for a lady that does not have a sexual encounter policy, she's surprised by the disloyalty of marriage in today's world, and is in shock that there are women who do not have a monthly sexual count policy. When the wife tries to counter with two sex sessions per month, well honey, it's a day late and one back door short.

3. Challenge employers, be loyal to your career.This doesn't sound like something that would encourage loyalty, but in the long run, it would dramatically improve or end corporate policies that discourage loyalty. Dropping your blind loyalty and focusing on the success of your own career will force employers to rethink their ridiculous policies, otherwise they risk losing all of their good employees. Loyalty is a two way street, like Lady Gaga. If companies don't offer people the income they can get elsewhere, the training that makes them useful, the career path that makes them stay, and a sense of ownership that makes them care, there's no reason for employees to remain at an organization.

D: Conclusion: Should employees be loyal to employers?
No, and it has absolutely nothing to do with anything I wrote above. Loyalty is only something that exists in personal relationships. Employees who claim to be loyal are just people that fear change. Employers smell fear. To reward you for your fears, the company pays you 75% less than the guy sitting next to you that has no problem quitting his job if the bathroom is busy.

However, this doesn't change the fact that I still want my employer to add an Annie's frozen yogurt machine to improve employee loyalty

Qualities of an entrepreneur - Are you an entrepreneur

Entrepreneur is described as a person who forms a business out of nothing. Entrepreneur sees the opportunity where a common man just passes by. Everybody who starts a business is not an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs are not made; in fact they are born with these qualities. Some distinctive features of an entrepreneur are

Self Motivated:Entrepreneurs are self motivated. To be an entrepreneur, you have got to be passionate by nature and capable of seeing hope in the gloomiest of situations. An entrepreneur life is prone to failures, disappointments and hazards. Entrepreneur should be able to fall, recover, stand up and get going again all on his/her own. Small pitfalls can not shake their belief in themselves.

Opportunist:While the word may sound a little harsh and more of a negative trait than positive but the fact is that entrepreneurs are extremely good at spotting the opportunity and grabbing it with both hands when it comes their way. Not only will they make lemonade of every lemon they get, they will look forward to sell it.

More Work – Less Talk:Entrepreneurs do not indulge themselves in years of planning and thinking process, they are more interested in executing the idea, instead of looking for its drawbacks. They prefer to give it a try. If you have got some business idea and you have been discussing it with everyone around you for sometime without doing anything about it, then you can be anything but an entrepreneur.

Education:Mostly entrepreneurs are pretty sharp and intelligent when it comes to grasping the basic ideas but you will hardly find them topping the position chart or scoring extra ordinary marks in exams. They are normally interested in knowledge that is going to help them in their future ambitions; they don’t go around stuffing their mind with extensive knowledge which they know will never be used.

Immovable personality:Entrepreneurs are bad listeners when someone is trying to discourage or criticize their plans. If they think the opportunity is there to grab, they will simply discard all “what” and “if”, especially if they are coming from someone else. This may hurt their social reputation but they hardly ever care. However, this stubbornness will never stop them from being flexible; they are quick to figure out if something is not working, and they are ready to change. They are quick to accept failure and move on to the next venture.

About the Author:William King is the director of Consoles and Video Games Wholesale Suppliers , Australia Wholesale Suppliers, Distributors, Dropshippers & Manufacturers. He has 18 years of experience in the marketing and trading industries and has been helping retailers and startups with their product sourcing, promotion, marketing and supply chain requirements.