Brain Dead Foul Ups Sketched From The Naughty Schizophrenic

(CNN) — From the outside, Formula One looks like a sport brimming with money, with millions of dollars spent on cars, sponsorship and the rights to host races.

But in reality many of the 12 teams on the grid are struggling to survive, and F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone is reportedly considering a flotation on the stock exchange in an attempt to raise much-needed funds.

The possibility of such a measure, however, has not been backed by some of the elite motorsport’s most influential players — including bosses of the McLaren and Ferrari teams.

“The fact is at the moment, we all know in this room that there’s a lot of Formula One teams that are struggling to survive,” McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh told a press conference after Friday’s practice sessions for the Malaysian Grand Prix. “Which tells us we’re not doing enough, and that’s why we’ve got to keep pushing it.”

How victory cost Force India $1.3 million

British team Williams became the first F1 team to float on the stock exchange in March 2011, but Whitmarsh’s Ferrari counterpart Stefano Domenicali also voiced his concern at the possibility of F1 taking a similar step.

“Thank God that our (Ferrari’s) situation is very good in terms of our financial position for the future,” he said. “But we know that the situation of Formula One is not so stable.

“We know that there’s a lot of struggle around, so we need to put aside our self-interest a little bit to make sure that we can look ahead. Because this is a very critical period where … we know that it’s very tough.”

But not all teams agree that spending should be regulated by the sport’s global governing body, the FIA.

Austrian-owned Red Bull have dominated F1 for the last two years, claiming back-to-back drivers’ and constructors’ championships.

Red Bull’s team principal Christian Horner welcomed the possibility of further talks on the issue, but hoped a different solution could be found.

“Hopefully with some productive discussion going forward a solution can be found to make Formula One cost-controlled for the top teams, but also make it affordable for the teams in the middle of the grid and at the back of the grid,” he said.

There’s a lot of Formula One teams that are struggling to survive
Martin Whitmarsh

“The cost of being competitive in Formula One at present is too high. I don’t think anyone will dispute that. The debate is how we achieve it.”

It was a good day on track for McLaren, as 2008 world champion Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time in both practice sessions ahead of Sunday’s race in Malaysia.

The British driver was on pole position for last weekend’s season-opening Australian Grand Prix and he once again showed his pace, edging out Mercedes’ seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher in the afternoon run.

“It’s been a good day for me,” said Hamilton, who finished third in Melbourne last Sunday.

“We’ve made a few changes to the balance of the car since the last race and I’m much happier — but we’ll still be making changes to improve our long-run pace, which can always be better.”

Hamilton’s teammate Jenson Button was victorious in Australia and he was quick again, registering the third-fastest time at the Sepang International Circuit.

Schumacher’s fellow German and Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg was fourth, ahead of Toro Rosso’s Australian driver Daniel Ricciardo.

Double title winner Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull, who has taken the checkered flag at the last two races in Malaysia, was down in 10th after placing second in the opening session.

His teammate Mark Webber was seventh, one place behind Ferrari’s two-time Sepang champion Fernando Alonso.

(CNN) — Iran’s finance minister believes oil prices could rise as high as $160 a barrel thanks to sanctions over its nuclear program, a prediction that comes just as the chief of the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency headed to Tehran on Sunday for high-level talks.

“We must pay close attention when we speak of oil revenues and sanctions against oil sales, who are the winners and the losers of such sanctions?” Shamseddin Hosseini told CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” in an interview that airs Sunday.

“Indeed, it is difficult. But not just for Iran. And we can all rest assured that there will be a considerable increase in international oil market prices. Now, is this the best approach?”

The comments came as the International Atomic Energy Agency said in a carefully worded statement that its director-general, Yukiya Amano, was headed to Iran for talks on what it described only as “issues of mutual interest with high Iranian officials.”

The trip raises speculation that Iran may be willing to grant IAEA inspectors access to sites to determine whether it is developing nuclear weapons.

The talks come at a critical time for Iran, whose economy has been crippled by sanctions imposed by the United Nations, the United States and the European Union.

Eighty percent of Iran’s foreign revenues are derived from oil exports, and an embargo by the EU set to go into effect in July will further devastate its economy.

But Hosseini said the embargo would also likely hurt the EU, which is grappling with its own weakened economy.

Oil prices as a result of the sanctions, he said, “will go considerably higher than $100 per barrel.”

Even the International Monetary Fund “says as a result of these sanctions, oil prices will perhaps reach and hover around $160 per barrel,” he said.

Hosseini gave little indication to Zakaria that Iran would be willing to abandon its nuclear program, which Tehran has consistently maintained is solely for the development of alternative energy.

“There are conversations and dialogues taking place currently, but there cannot be a hegemony and a double-standard in the treatment of member countries such as Iran,” he said.

“If these principles can be understood and applied with mutual respect, I think we will be in a much better place. If we don’t, we will witness a increase in international oil markets.”

The Iranians met with the IAEA for the first time in three months in Vienna, Austria, last week and are expected to meet again Monday.

Later this week in Baghdad, Iran is set to continue talks over its nuclear program with world powers who make up the group known as P5+1: the United States, France, Russia, China, Britain and Germany.

Tensions over the country’s nuclear program have roiled the Middle East, with Iran threatening earlier this year to close the Strait of Hormuz, a vital oil shipping lane, if sanctions were imposed on its exports of crude oil.

Meanwhile, Israel has said it may attack Iran to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons.

During the height of tensions, oil prices soared to $110 a barrel. The price per barrel of crude oil finished last week at $92.50 per barrel.

In March, the IAEA noted what it called a sharp and troubling increase in Iran’s uranium enrichment capabilities.

The United States and its allies suspect that Iran is evading international inspections and is developing nuclear weapons. As punishment, Western nations have slapped crippling sanctions on Iran.

Leaders of the so-called Group of Eight — United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Japan and Russia — called on Iran on Saturday to comply with the requirements of the U.N.’s watchdog agency to open its doors to nuclear inspectors.

In a declaration, the G8 leaders said they welcomed the resumption of talks.

The leaders called on Iran to engage “in detailed discussion about near-term, concrete steps that can, through a step-by-step approach based on reciprocity, lead towards a comprehensive negotiated solution which restores international confidence that Iran’s nuclear program is exclusively peaceful,” according to the declaration.

The G8 leaders also urged Iran to comply with international obligations to uphold human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the freedom of religion.

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Editor’s note: Business Traveller is a monthly show about making the most of doing business on the road.

(CNN) — Recording traveling expenses can be one the most frustrating aspects of the business traveler’s busy life on the road. Restaurant bills, train tickets, hotel receipts; they all have to be accurately accounted for.

This can be a time consuming chore, but an array of high-tech devices have hit the market with the aim of simplifying the process.

According to Duncan Bell, operations editor of tech magazine T3, receipt scanners and, to a greater extent, smartphone apps, are the main drivers of these developments.

“Technology has made quite major changes in terms of how people do their expenses — particularly in larger companies,” Bell says.

“Whereas before it was inevitably hand written, and then later typed into a spreadsheet, which involved bringing expenses into the office, now it can be done on the fly on a variety of different technologies,” he adds.

Bell took a look at some of the most prominent products that are streamlining the expenses process.

Planon Slimscan

The Planon Slimscan is a pocket-sized scanner that enables users to record small receipts, business cards and all manner of other expenses-related paperwork.

It’s a device that looks “impressive” and is easy to carry around, says Bell.

Given its diminutive size, however, the Planon Slimscan is unable to scan larger items of paperwork, such as hotel or taxi receipts, he adds.

“They’re not actually physically wide enough to actually scan them (larger paperwork) in,” Bell says.

“(It’s) something that you produce with a flourish from your wallet … but is overshadowed by the usability element,” he concludes.

See also: Higher air fares, more mergers?

Epson WorkForce DS-30

A much larger device that aims to cater for receipts both large and small is the Epson WorkForce DS-30.

This portable scanner is still relatively lightweight but definitely something you would “put in your luggage rather than your wallet,” says Bell.

The extra bulk and size enables users to digitize larger pieces of paper up to A4 size. According to Bell, however, recording small receipts and most “expenses-related things” doesn’t require such high quality or precision technology.

“They are nice pieces of hardware, but maybe not the perfect solution for (recording expenses),” he says.

NeatReceipts scanner

The NeatReceipts scanner is a slim and lightweight device that its makers say can scan receipts, business cards and documents of all sizes to produce electronic files that are stored in a “digital filing cabinet.”

Despite overcoming the difficulties posed by documents of differing dimensions, Bell says NeatReceipts isn’t as efficient as it could be.

He describes the technology as similar to the prospect of flying cars — “a nice idea but (one that) never actually quite works” — because of the scanner’s propensity to misread entries on receipts.

“You have to think of it more as a means of scanning the receipt and then you changing the various mistakes,” he adds. “If you are expecting this to do your accounts for you — well it ain’t — but it will help.”

Concur

The Concur app is one of the many smartphone software programs now on the market. Bell says apps will likely be the future of expense-recording devices.

“They basically do the same job as scanner-based solutions … and (are) capable of putting (expenses) in a format that is useable by your accounts department,” he explains.

Concur itself enables users to photograph, record and collate invoices via an easy-to-use interface. According to Bell, it doesn’t try anything too clever and provides a simple system for digitally capturing and filing data that can then be passed onto accounting departments to process.

Even if accounts don’t accept digitized images of receipts, “the scans mean you’re not struggling to remember which taxi fare cost what when you come to fill in your expenses,” he adds.

ExpenseMagic

Another useful smartphone application for the tech-savvy business traveler is ExpenseMagic, says Bell.

“What ExpenseMagic does is use the hardware of your phone and an app to photograph receipts and enter various bits of information — but the main body of the work is done by an actual living person.”

“They have a team of accountants who will go though your photographed receipts and turn it into a form suitable for use by your accounts department.”

This takes away much of the stress of recording and sifting through mountains of crumpled up pieces of paper, explains Bell.

“The downside of this is obviously they are not doing this out of the good of their hearts, so there is a subscription cost that needs to be borne,” he adds.

Perhaps that’s another cost to add to your travel expenses.

Group A
Poland
Czech Republic
Greece
Russia

Group B
Netherlands
Denmark
Portugal
Germany

Group C
Spain
Republic of Ireland
Croatia
Italy

Group D
Ukraine
Sweden
France
England

(CNN) — Poland and Ukraine will host the European Championships for the first time in 2012, welcoming 14 other teams and football fans from across the continent.

World champions Spain will defend the title won in Austria and Switzerland four years ago, when Fernando Torres scored the only goal of the final against Germany.

The Germans, who like Spain went undefeated in winning the tournament in 1996, will also be back as Joachim Low’s team seek a fourth title in the competition’s 52-year history.

Click on the countries’ marker flags above to find out more details about the the sides taking part in the June 8-July 8 event.

To move from one country to another, first close the box by clicking on the “x” in the top right corner.

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Editor’s note: Part culture show, part travel show, over six weeks Fusion Journeys takes six stars of the creative world on a journey of discovery to a location of their choice. There, they will learn from a different culture and create something new inspired by their experience. Watch the show every Monday, Wednesday and Friday from April 9 to May 18, during Connect The World, from 20:00 GMT.

(CNN) — If Roger Moukarzel’s camera could talk, it would have some colorful stories to tell. From the front line of the Lebanese wars, to the bewitching fashion houses of Italy and France, the Beirut-born photographer has crossed every continent in search of the perfect picture.

Born in 1962, Moukarzel says his calling was thrust upon him as a teenager, when civil war broke loose on his doorstep and he felt a duty to document it. For 15 years he worked for news agencies Sygma and Reuters, capturing the spectacle and chaos of combat.

Swapping the battlefield for haute couture, Moukarzel’s fashion shots have featured on the cover of Elle magazine, while his advertising work has earned him three Pikasso d’Or Billboard Advertising awards over the past decade.

On his latest journey, Moukarzel swapped the baking streets of his home in Beirut for the glacial forests of Lulea in northern Sweden, more popularly known as the reindeer haven of Lapland.

Here he would fuse his experience of both documentary and fashion photography to create a series of staged images that tell the story of how climate change is impacting the life and landscape of the Sami — an indigenous people who live across four nations in northern Europe.

See more Fusion Journeys

He was met in Lulea by local part-time photographer and full-time reindeer herder Carl-Johan Utsi, himself a member of the Sami. Utsi’s knowledge and experience proved invaluable to Moukarzel as he attempted to tackle the rugged and frost-bitten landscape of Lulea.

Here, CNN asks Moukarzel to look back over his Fusion Journey.

CNN: Describe the photographs. What was the thought behind their composition?

Roger Moukarzel: This series shows members of the indigenous Sami people from northern Scandinavia, dressed in their beautiful, very flamboyant traditional clothing. They are stood in the snow in this incredible landscape of Lulea, but right behind I placed an image of industry … a big factory.

Many of the people that are suffering the effects of climate change have not done anything to contribute to it, and areas that are being destroyed are often far away from where the pollution is made. The idea with the images is to bring these two realities closer together.

CNN: What drew you to make this journey in the first place?

RM: I believe that the role of the photographer is not only to take nice pictures, but to show people something that changes how they see and understand the world.

There are lots of pictures out there of ice-caps melting, forests being chopped down and so on. They are very direct images. But I wanted to tell the story of an indirect process, a story that somehow shows the chain of events from factory pollution on one hand to habitat destruction on the other.

This journey for me was about creating images that would have an impact — that would ask the viewer to think about the cause and effect of climate change.

CNN: Why Lulea?

RM: The Samis are fighting everyday to preserve their traditions and culture. They mainly make their living from fishing and reindeer herding. The environment is really crucial for them and they are aiming to live in harmony with it.

But in the past few years, these people have really experienced climate change. Their livelihood has been affected because they’ve not been able to travel on the frozen lakes. Why? Because they’re no longer frozen! They are in crazy situation where they have to transport reindeer by truck because it is not safe for them on the ice.

I was told that two years ago, a whole herd of reindeer died in the mountains because the ice beneath them just gave way.

See also: Indian master chef gets fresh in Denmark

CNN: What were you first feelings encountering the landscape and the people?

RM: It’s interesting because for this project I had done a lot of research — I felt like I had really immersed myself in the location before I got there, and that I would have a good idea of what to expect.

But nothing prepares you for the reality — the sudden impact of the scenery, the extreme cold, the deep beauty of this dreamlike land. It goes to show that nature is much deeper than what you can ever see in a photo … this is something I always have difficulty accepting as a photographer!

As for the people, they were wonderful. So warm, smiling — despite all that is happening. They went out of their way to help me.

CNN: You collaborated with local photographer Carl-Johan Utsi, did you work well together?

RM: I could not have done it without him. As a fellow photographer, I think he understood my intentions much more, and as a Sami himself — his knowledge and understanding of the people and the area was very important.

From a technical point of view, his experience of shooting in extreme weather was very useful. It’s not something I’ve ever done before and he showed me what to do when my camera froze, how to deal with the surroundings from a photographer’s perspective.

We had a lot of practical difficulties setting up the shoot, transporting the canvas and equipment across a very challenging landscape, and he was there for guidance at each step.

CNN: Are you happy with the results?

RM: Yes, very much so. I think there is a lot going on in these photos. You have elements of indigenous culture — the colorful dress and these remarkable people; you have the striking, other-worldly landscape; and finally you have this shocking image that grabs your attention and gives the photograph its important meaning.

But ultimately, the images are only truly valuable if they have some sort of impact. Already, I think, just by being on CNN, by you talking to me now, I can say that they are having this impact.

From here I will be traveling to at least 12 other countries using the same idea, the same motif. I’m going to go to every continent to show the real impact that climate change is having … So this was the start of my journey, and I hope you’ll be there when I reach the end.

(EW.com) — “Battleship” is a special-effects-heavy movie invented to extend the brand of a commercial board game — suitable for ages 7 and up! — in which two players move imaginary boats around a simple grid.

That part’s not newsworthy. The surprise, for this veteran of board games, is that “Battleship” is also the rousing, engaging, and emotionally complex action war picture the silly 2001 action war picture “Pearl Harbor” only wished it could be. It’s “Pearl Harbor” with greater intelligence, less hokum, and more aliens. For every line of howler dialogue that should have been sunk, there’s a nice little scene in which humans have to make a difficult decision.

For every stretch of generic sci-fi-via-CGI moviemaking, there’s a welcome bit of wit. Under the direction of Peter Berg — the talented, ever-maturing filmmaker behind “Friday Night Lights” and “The Kingdom” — “Battleship” is a sound vessel floating in Hollywood’s oil-slick sea of “Transformers” sequels and vampire riffs.

The object of the original game is simple: Attack an opponent’s ”fleet” through a combination of mental strategy, deductive logic, and luck. The movie doesn’t forget these low-tech roots. There’s a nifty sequence in which sailors track incoming alien fighters using similar X-marks-the-spot skills. But before getting to the hardcore blow-’em-up portion of the humans-versus-aliens warfare entertainment, we are given time to invest in the relationship between Stone Hopper (“True Blood’s” Alexander Skarsgård) and his younger brother, Alex (Taylor Kitsch from TV’s “Friday Night Lights”) — the former a courageous Navy officer of great character, the latter a corner-cutting showboater who is about to have his character entirely re-welded through the Navy challenges that await him. (Kitsch does an admirable, controlled job of steering his character from screwup to leader.)

We understand that Alex loves a bombshell physical therapist named Sam (Brooklyn Decker), and that Sam happens to be the daughter of crusty U.S. Pacific Fleet commander Admiral Shane (Liam Neeson, barking but not biting). We see the emotional-zeitgeist logic in the special interest that Sam has taken in the physical rehabilitation of an Army veteran and amputee, authentically played by real-life Army vet and amputee Gregory D. Gadson. We appreciate the pop culture traffic jam that has musical glam girl Rihanna passing muster as a tough (yet cool!) fellow sailor. And we know to keep an eye on the conflict that rumbles at first between Alex and a Japanese officer (Tadanobu Asano) because Japanese-American hurts and fears left over from the real Pearl Harbor will be worked out before the movie is over for the benefit of boomers and assorted granddads in the audience.

It’s only once we know all these things — carbon-based touches not found in the Hasbro product — that “Battleship” gets down to the business of hotshot combat between brave U.S. Navy fighters and aggressive alien visitors. (The invaders, by the way, appear to have studied “Transformers” fashion magazines to design their space-metal wardrobes.) Amid this fracas, there’s a welcome mood lightener in the form of a gentle comic-neurotic turn by Hamish Linklater (“The New Adventures of Old Christine”) as a deep-space scientist who has reason to regret his search for extraterrestrial life.

“Battleship” is gratifying that way. At the story’s center are all the clanging fireballs a kid could want to watch whizzing across a computerized sky — not to mention naval strategy and a fact-based demonstration of real destroyer-ship capabilities. And surrounding the alien rumpus, the filmmakers have built an unexpectedly sincere salute to the awesome responsibilities of today’s U.S. Navy as well as to the heroic work of veterans who came before. For all that, the captains of this movie deserve a medal. B+

See the full article at EW.com.

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© 2011 Entertainment Weekly and Time Inc. All rights reserved.

(CNN) — From the outside, Formula One looks like a sport brimming with money, with millions of dollars spent on cars, sponsorship and the rights to host races.

But in reality many of the 12 teams on the grid are struggling to survive, and F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone is reportedly considering a flotation on the stock exchange in an attempt to raise much-needed funds.

The possibility of such a measure, however, has not been backed by some of the elite motorsport’s most influential players — including bosses of the McLaren and Ferrari teams.

“The fact is at the moment, we all know in this room that there’s a lot of Formula One teams that are struggling to survive,” McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh told a press conference after Friday’s practice sessions for the Malaysian Grand Prix. “Which tells us we’re not doing enough, and that’s why we’ve got to keep pushing it.”

How victory cost Force India $1.3 million

British team Williams became the first F1 team to float on the stock exchange in March 2011, but Whitmarsh’s Ferrari counterpart Stefano Domenicali also voiced his concern at the possibility of F1 taking a similar step.

“Thank God that our (Ferrari’s) situation is very good in terms of our financial position for the future,” he said. “But we know that the situation of Formula One is not so stable.

“We know that there’s a lot of struggle around, so we need to put aside our self-interest a little bit to make sure that we can look ahead. Because this is a very critical period where … we know that it’s very tough.”

But not all teams agree that spending should be regulated by the sport’s global governing body, the FIA.

Austrian-owned Red Bull have dominated F1 for the last two years, claiming back-to-back drivers’ and constructors’ championships.

Red Bull’s team principal Christian Horner welcomed the possibility of further talks on the issue, but hoped a different solution could be found.

“Hopefully with some productive discussion going forward a solution can be found to make Formula One cost-controlled for the top teams, but also make it affordable for the teams in the middle of the grid and at the back of the grid,” he said.

There’s a lot of Formula One teams that are struggling to survive
Martin Whitmarsh

“The cost of being competitive in Formula One at present is too high. I don’t think anyone will dispute that. The debate is how we achieve it.”

It was a good day on track for McLaren, as 2008 world champion Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time in both practice sessions ahead of Sunday’s race in Malaysia.

The British driver was on pole position for last weekend’s season-opening Australian Grand Prix and he once again showed his pace, edging out Mercedes’ seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher in the afternoon run.

“It’s been a good day for me,” said Hamilton, who finished third in Melbourne last Sunday.

“We’ve made a few changes to the balance of the car since the last race and I’m much happier — but we’ll still be making changes to improve our long-run pace, which can always be better.”

Hamilton’s teammate Jenson Button was victorious in Australia and he was quick again, registering the third-fastest time at the Sepang International Circuit.

Schumacher’s fellow German and Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg was fourth, ahead of Toro Rosso’s Australian driver Daniel Ricciardo.

Double title winner Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull, who has taken the checkered flag at the last two races in Malaysia, was down in 10th after placing second in the opening session.

His teammate Mark Webber was seventh, one place behind Ferrari’s two-time Sepang champion Fernando Alonso.

Editor’s note: Dov Seidman is the author of “HOW: Why HOW We Do Anything Means Everything” and CEO of LRN a company that helps businesses develop values-based corporate cultures. You can follow Dov on Twitter at @DovSeidman and join the HOW community on Facebook.

(CNN) — Our world has rapidly gone from being connected to interconnected to interdependent. When the world is tied together this intimately, everyone’s values and behavior matter more than ever, because our actions affect more people than ever and in ways they never have.

Such was the case when one banker exposed his company’s culture in the New York Times and as a direct result his bank reportedly lost $2.15 billion overnight in market value and a debate erupted on social media over banking industry practices.

Today, “how” we do what we do — our behavior individually and organizationally — not only matters more than ever, it matters in ways it never has before.

The fact that customers can instantly compare price, features, quality and service requires leaders to fundamentally rethink how their organizations operate and how their people conduct business.

Competitive advantage has shifted from what we do to how. Further, we are now asking more of our employees than we ever did in the past. We ask employees to represent their company and nurture its brand, not only when they’re on the job, but whenever they publicly express themselves in tweets, blog posts, emails, or any other social interaction.

We’re asking for distinctly human qualities and behaviors and how leaders elicit and guide those inspired behaviors must shift accordingly.

Here are steps you can take to become a more inspired leader.

Connect and collaborate, don’t command and control

The days of leading companies via a one-way conversation are over. Power has shifted and our leadership must shift with it. The old system of “command and control” to exert power over people is fast being replaced by “connect and collaborate” — to generate power through people. Leaders and managers cannot just impose their will.

Now you have to have a two-way conversation that connects deeply with your colleagues, customers and other stakeholders. Netflix found this out the hard way last year when they lost 800,000 subscribers after arbitrarily increasing prices and splitting up their distribution channels without explaining their actions.

Inspire, don’t only motivate or coerce

There are three ways to get people to do things: coercion, motivation or inspiration. Leaders need to focus more on inspiration and less on coercion and motivation, since external rewards and carrots and sticks have limitations, particularly in hard times when there are fewer carrots to go round.

See also: Want to be a leader? Act like one

Those who have flown on Southwest Airlines can testify how flight attendants are encouraged to flex their creativity and sense of humor when walking passengers through the mundane process of safety procedures. There is no rule book; rather Southwest’s culture inspires its employees to innovate in their behavior. Yet Southwest is the exception rather than the rule.

Business today faces an inspiration deficit as demonstrated recently by “The How Report,” an independent study that my company LRN conducted with the Boston Research Group and Research Data Technology.

The report found that CEOs are six times more likely than “average workers” to believe they work in a company where people are inspired. Employees said they were primarily coerced (84%) or motivated (12%) by carrots and sticks at work rather than inspired by values and a commitment to a mission and purpose (4%).

Yet the study reveals that companies that do inspire their people through values significantly outperform those who don’t. These companies experience higher levels of innovation, employee loyalty, and customer satisfaction, and lower levels of misconduct, employee fear of speaking up, and retaliation.

Behavior as offense, not defense

The most successful sports coaches have shown that behavior is no longer a defensive tactic. Instead, behavior is now an offensive strategy that inspirational leaders need to deploy all over the pitch to create the conditions that result in the game being won, not just being played. There are simply too many shots on goal for them to block in our radically interconnected world. The best defense is to keep the ball.

Behavior has become a powerful source of excellence and competitive advantage. Bosses can no longer get away with telling subordinates, “Just get it done — I don’t care how.” Today’s successful leaders are those who flip the switch and replace task-based jobs (which are about what people must do) with values-based missions (how we get things done).

Extend trust, don’t inspect for it

We live in an era when trust is the currency of the age and the key to a winning business strategy.

But the value of trust lies in finding ways to give it away. A New York City donut maker boosted his productivity and profits through trusting his customers to make their own change, illustrating in practice the inspired behaviors that flow from extending trust.

The extension of trust is the key enabler that inspires others to take the risks that are so essential to spurring innovation. It is in this innovation that real performance and, most importantly, real progress are seen. This is the basic formula for thriving in our hyperconnected, hypertransparent world.

See also: Why we pick bad leaders

Recognize and reward for “how” and not “what”

Leaders and managers should go out of their way to recognize employees for how they do what they do, not for what they do or how much they get done. This could consist of starting their next meeting not by asking “What is on the agenda?” but “How are we going to connect and collaborate to make a difference?”

Or it could be emphasizing a principled decision that a colleague has made for their company in the interests of long-term sustainability at the expense of short-term expediency. Today’s most successful leaders realize the need to relinquish traditional modes of control and set an example to their employees for how they lead, speak and manage performance.

Hire for character, not just skill

“Who” is an anagram of “how” and in a world where “how” matters more than ever, it takes “who” to do “how.” The Greek philosopher Heraclitus said, “Character is fate” and it is the responsibility of leaders to enlist employees who can contribute their full character and creativity to perform their best work and whose reason and purpose for going to work every day extends beyond their paycheck.

By inspiring their employees to pursue a higher, more meaningful purpose and achieve real sustainable value, leaders can achieve significance, not just long-term success.

Confucius said over 2,000 years ago: “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” The leaders who commit their companies to go on a journey to find new ways to innovate in “how” will be those whose organizations thrive, not just survive, in the 21st century.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Dov Seidman.

Chicago (CNN) — The United States will not agree to pay the stiff fees Pakistan is asking in order to open up NATO supply routes into Afghanistan, U.S. officials told CNN Saturday.

Ahead of a NATO summit on Afghanistan’s future, Pakistan is requesting $5,000 per truck as a condition to reopen the supply lines between the two South Asian countries, U.S. officials said.

Opinion: Why ordinary Afghans worry about NATO summit

The new cost is a sticking point in week-long negotiations between Washington and Islamabad to open the roads, known as the ground lines of communication or GLOCs. U.S. officials say the fees are inflated.

“We’re hopeful the GLOCs will be reopened soon, but we’re not going to agree to unreasonable charges. The Pakistanis understand that,” said a senior defense official who is not authorized to speak publicly about the talks.

Previously, the United States had been paying just a “small fraction” of the requested fee, officials said.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the United States would refrain from such a deal due to budgetary restraints.

“Considering the financial challenges that we’re facing, that’s not likely,” Panetta told the Tribune newspaper service earlier in the week.

Pakistan shut down the supply routes — stretching from Afghanistan through the lawless western tribal regions of Pakistan and down to the southern port of Karachi — last November after dozens of its troops were killed in a mistaken U.S. airstrike.

Haqqani: Pakistan just wants to blame its neighbors

The routes offer a shorter and more direct route than the one NATO has been using since November that goes through Russia and other nations and avoids Pakistan altogether.

Pakistani Ambassador Sherry Rehman said Washington was paying more for the northern route.

“Perhaps, if you look at the end route where your trucks move through much longer, but I believe the double of that amount is paid,” Rehman said.

But U.S. officials said the nations along the northern route do not receive “Coalition Support Funds,” which should allow Pakistan to lower costs.

The supply route will take on more significance as NATO troops prepare to depart Afghanistan by 2014 and will have to move heavy equipment and supplies out of Afghanistan for shipment from Karachi.

The drawdown forms a big part of the agenda at the NATO summit in Chicago starting Sunday, which Pakistani President Asif Ali Zadari is attending.

Pakistan did allow four trucks containing supplies destined for the U.S. Embassy in Kabul to cross its border Friday, the first in six months.

Rehman called it a first step.

“So this is a new beginning. And, obviously, I bring good tidings,” Rehman said.

But U.S. officials were less optimistic. Besides the cost, said one official familiar with the talks, there remained “quite a few other issues” to be worked out. He did not specify what those were.

(CNN) — Emmindingen is a small town in southwest Germany, with about 26,000 people and an enviable unemployment rate of just 2.8% .

But barely 20 miles away, across the French border, the picture is very different. The Alsatian town of Selestat has a similar industrial base, but an unemployment rate of 7.4%. Among young people, the contrast is even starker, with 23% of under-25s unemployed in the French town, compared to 1.8% in Emmendingen.

The differing fortunes of these neighboring border towns illustrate the complaints of many French businesses, as their country heads towards a presidential election.

Anne Leitzgen is the president of SALM Kitchens, a family-run business which has operated since the 1930s, and has one of the largest worktop production lines in Europe.

We are afraid money will be taken from our companies, and afraid that taxes will increase a lot
Anne Leitzgen, president of French kitchen manufacturers SALM

Despite a commitment to invest in Selestat, she worries about the increased costs of running a firm in France, saying taxes are higher, labor is twice as expensive, and workers’ benefits are double those paid in Germany.

Leitzgen says she is concerned the next French government will tax companies like hers out of business. “We are afraid money will be taken from our companies, and afraid that taxes will increase a lot and the situation will become bad for companies our size ,” she says.

Further, she says, the “relationship between the unions is more constructive and easier in Germany.”

Across the border is the workplace of Emmanuel Foyer, a Frenchman who lives in his homeland but commutes to work in Emmendingen. Foyer, the sales manager for plastics industry solutions provider Braunform, believes a German focus on the long-term is behind the current success.

“In Germany, for sure, we are thinking of the long-term. In a company like this, [there's a] huge focus on training and the future of our employees,” he says. “The approach in Germany to keep workers in times of low-load level means we were ready when the economy restarted.”

I sincerely hope that jobs reforms will be put in place immediately
Marcel Bauer, mayor of Selestat, France

The trade-off for German workers is less job security, no national, fixed minimum wage, and less extensive social protections for the unemployed.

But the mayor of Selestat, Marcel Bauer, says it is time for France to make these changes to regain its economic competitiveness.

“As soon as the next president is in office — be it the one we’ve got or a new one — I sincerely hope that jobs reforms will be put in place immediately,” he says. “The system needs to be more flexible. There is a lot that must change, starting with the mindset of employers and employees.”

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(CNN) — Mahesh Bhupathi is best known in tennis for his many successes as a doubles specialist, but now he’s playing a new role — that of a double agent.

The 37-year-old Indian veteran is still a professional on the ATP Tour, winning his latest doubles title in Dubai earlier this month, but also acts as manager to two of India’s brightest tennis hopes through his company Globosport.

And with a host of Bollywood film stars also featuring in the firm’s portfolio, Bhupathi has a ready-made route to success once his career on court comes to an end.

Bhupathi, who cites entrepreneurs such as Virgin boss Richard Branson and telecoms mogul Sunil Mittal as businessmen he looks up to, has recently made his screen debut in one of his company’s latest projects.

His wife, Lara Dutta, is an award-winning actress and was named Miss Universe in 2000.

When he does hang up his racket, the first player from India to win a grand slam title — Bhupathi now has 11 all in doubles formats — aims to mix the glitz and glamor of Bollywood with a plan to boost the prospects of burgeoning tennis talent in the country.

“All of us growing up are aware what support it takes to build a tennis player,” he told CNN’s Open Court show. “I don’t think there’s any dearth of talent in India — we’ve always had the best juniors in the world.

“The big transition is how do you get from the juniors to the seniors, and that comes through financial support.

“In the West the kids have coaches, trainers and a pretty robust support staff, so it takes a lot of money.

“We have one kid we are supporting fulltime now. He’s 14 years old and very talented, so hopefully we can make it to where we help more and more kids and eventually there will be a pipeline of players coming out of the country.”

Outside of cricket, whose stars are worshiped in India, Bhupathi is one of the country’s best known sporting figures.

He has a clean sweep of grand slam titles in the mixed doubles, claiming his first crown at the French Open in 1997 with Japanese partner Rika Hiraki, and can also boast four men’s doubles titles to boot.

I don’t think there’s any dearth of talent in India — we’ve always had the best juniors in the world
Mahesh Bhupathi

At January’s Australian Open he partnered compatriot Rohan Bopanna — with whom he recently won the Dubai Open title — but they were knocked out in round three.

Yet it is his partnership with another Indian player, Leander Paes, that has reaped dividends. They have won three men’s doubles titles together — at the French Open in 1999 and 2001 as well as Wimbledon in 1999.

Even with a career that is still in full swing, Bhupathi also acts as agent to Sania Mirza — the first Indian woman to break into the world’s top 30 players — and Somdev Devvarman, who reached a high of 62 in the men’s rankings last year.

“For me it’s two fulltime jobs so I’ve got to put in more work, but I really enjoy doing what I do,” he explained. “Sania was one of our first clients, I think we signed her when she was 15.

“The tennis part of it is easy for me because I’m on the road, I’m networked into the tennis world, so doing her racket and apparel, this is very easy as I’m there on site.

“I’m aware tennis isn’t going to last forever, and this going to be a smooth and natural transition now because Golobosport is eight years old.”

But though Bollywood is beckoning, Bhupathi insists his eyes are still firmly fixed on court for now.

London (CNN) — L’Oreal harnessed the French reputation for elegance to become a global cosmetics giant — and the company’s CEO says European economies should apply similar logic to escape their current woes.

Jean-Paul Agon, L’Oreal’s chair and chief executive, said European countries need to identify areas of expertise to succeed in the global marketplace — just like companies.

“You have to specialize yourself in some areas where you are going to be [in] the top league worldwide,” he said.

European countries had great potential if they could only find their niche, he added. “Europe could be rich (given) the diversity of its countries, the diversity of its expertise, as long as each country is able to maximize its success, its potential in its own field.”

If a country, like a company, wants to develop its business — to grow — it has to grab business from all around the world
Jean-Paul Agon, L’Oreal’s chair and chief executive

Agon has worked for L’Oreal since joining the company in 1978, with stints heading its operations in Greece and Germany — an experience he said had given him unusual insight into Europe’s current predicament.

“Based on this experience, I can see that it is very difficult for these two countries to live under the same currency,” he said.

“I think the German economy is successful because they have found their role in the worldwide economy. I think Greece has also to define what they can be good at, and what they will be known for, and famous for around the world.”

Identifying France’s particular area of economic potential should be a priority issue in the upcoming election, he said.

“France has talents that no other country [has] … in terms of luxury, in terms of technology. This is something the world needs and France has a great role to play.”

Other European countries needed to do the same thing — then work in unison as a cohesive economic bloc. France and other countries of Europe needed to unite and define objectives and ambitions, he said.

Each economy was now competing in a global marketplace, “whether we like it or not,” he said. “If a country, like a company, wants to develop its business — to grow — it has to grab business from all around the world.”

To that end, Agon said he expected emerging markets would drive L’Oreal’s expansion in the immediate future. Growth is likely to come from China and Brazil, he said, where the middle classes are booming.

“You have hundreds of millions of consumers really want [ing] access to these products,” he said.

Group A
Poland
Czech Republic
Greece
Russia

Group B
Netherlands
Denmark
Portugal
Germany

Group C
Spain
Republic of Ireland
Croatia
Italy

Group D
Ukraine
Sweden
France
England

(CNN) — Poland and Ukraine will host the European Championships for the first time in 2012, welcoming 14 other teams and football fans from across the continent.

World champions Spain will defend the title won in Austria and Switzerland four years ago, when Fernando Torres scored the only goal of the final against Germany.

The Germans, who like Spain went undefeated in winning the tournament in 1996, will also be back as Joachim Low’s team seek a fourth title in the competition’s 52-year history.

Click on the countries’ marker flags above to find out more details about the the sides taking part in the June 8-July 8 event.

To move from one country to another, first close the box by clicking on the “x” in the top right corner.

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(CNN) — It’s no wonder the illustrious Silver Arrow has a special place in the Mercedes team’s hearts. The car with the distinctive silver livery has delivered some of its greatest victories — from successive world championships in the 1950s to the China Grand Prix earlier this month.

Now a new generation of Mercedes stars will be paying homage to the racy little number — and its most famous driver — ahead of the DTM season opener this weekend.

Almost 57 years after F1 legend Juan Manual Fangio won the Italian Grand Prix in the Silver Arrow, driver Nico Rosberg will again be getting behind the wheel of the classic car.

Rosberg’s career-first F1 win at this month’s China Grand Prix is Mercedes’ first victory since Fangio in Italy in 1955.

And to mark the occasion, 26-year-old Rosberg will be taking the classic Mercedes W196 for a spin on Saturday before the DTM touring car series season opener at Hockenheim.

“I am absolutely delighted to be returning to Hockenheim as a Grand Prix winner,” he said on the Mercedes F1 website.

“Last year, I was able to drive a classic Silver Arrow on the famous Nurburgring Nordschleife, so now I’m really looking forward to climbing into the cockpit of Juan Manuel Fangio’s phenomenal W196 streamliner from Monza in 1955 and driving a few laps at Hockenheim.

“It means a lot to me that we have written a new chapter in the wonderful history of Mercedes in motorsport — and that there is plenty more still to come.”

The German follows in the footsteps of F1 racing father Keke, who won the world title with Williams in 1982.

However he still has some catching up to do to his famous Finnish father who collected five race wins in a nine-season career from 1978 to 1986.

“I have great memories of the DTM,” Rosberg said.

“The earliest date back to when my father was still racing. Then I started competing in the various junior classes that are staged as part of the DTM race weekend as I started out on my own motorsport career. A lot has happened in the meantime, and the highlight so far was obviously my win in China one week ago.”

Rosberg, who failed to repeat his performance in last week’s Bahrain Grand Prix, finishing fifth, will be joined on the track by fellow Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher.

The seven-time world champion, who finished 10th in Bahrain, will be behind the wheel of the 2011 Silver Arrow MGP W02 on Sunday.

“After a busy start to the Formula One season with four flyaway races in succession, it will be nice to come back to Germany,” said Schumacher, whose younger brother Ralf — a former F1 competitor — drives in the DTM series.

“I’m especially looking forward to the chance to give the fans a taste of a Formula One Silver Arrow in action. This will be my first visit to a DTM race in 20 years, and I hope that my brother and his fellow Mercedes-Benz drivers will get their season off to a great start.”

Bangkok, Thailand (CNN) — Six roasted fetuses covered with gold for black magic rituals were found in a Bangkok hotel room, and the gruesome discovery led to the arrest of a British citizen Friday, Thai police said.

Chow Hok Kuen, a 28-year-old Briton of Taiwanese origin, faces charges of hiding and covering dead bodies and a jail term of up to a year, police said.

The arrest came after police were tipped off about a website advertising the sale of the fetuses. Police searched Chow’s hotel room and found the fetuses packed in a box inside Chow’s baggage, they said.

Chow said that he planned to sell fetuses in Taiwan and that one could be worth up to 200,000 Thai baht, or $6,300, police said. He told police that the black magic rituals with fetuses are believed to bring good fortune for businesspeople.

Police say it’s unclear where the fetuses came from.

The British Foreign Office confirmed the arrest and will provide consular assistance if necessary.

(EW.com) — “Battleship” is a special-effects-heavy movie invented to extend the brand of a commercial board game — suitable for ages 7 and up! — in which two players move imaginary boats around a simple grid.

That part’s not newsworthy. The surprise, for this veteran of board games, is that “Battleship” is also the rousing, engaging, and emotionally complex action war picture the silly 2001 action war picture “Pearl Harbor” only wished it could be. It’s “Pearl Harbor” with greater intelligence, less hokum, and more aliens. For every line of howler dialogue that should have been sunk, there’s a nice little scene in which humans have to make a difficult decision.

For every stretch of generic sci-fi-via-CGI moviemaking, there’s a welcome bit of wit. Under the direction of Peter Berg — the talented, ever-maturing filmmaker behind “Friday Night Lights” and “The Kingdom” — “Battleship” is a sound vessel floating in Hollywood’s oil-slick sea of “Transformers” sequels and vampire riffs.

The object of the original game is simple: Attack an opponent’s ”fleet” through a combination of mental strategy, deductive logic, and luck. The movie doesn’t forget these low-tech roots. There’s a nifty sequence in which sailors track incoming alien fighters using similar X-marks-the-spot skills. But before getting to the hardcore blow-’em-up portion of the humans-versus-aliens warfare entertainment, we are given time to invest in the relationship between Stone Hopper (“True Blood’s” Alexander Skarsgård) and his younger brother, Alex (Taylor Kitsch from TV’s “Friday Night Lights”) — the former a courageous Navy officer of great character, the latter a corner-cutting showboater who is about to have his character entirely re-welded through the Navy challenges that await him. (Kitsch does an admirable, controlled job of steering his character from screwup to leader.)

We understand that Alex loves a bombshell physical therapist named Sam (Brooklyn Decker), and that Sam happens to be the daughter of crusty U.S. Pacific Fleet commander Admiral Shane (Liam Neeson, barking but not biting). We see the emotional-zeitgeist logic in the special interest that Sam has taken in the physical rehabilitation of an Army veteran and amputee, authentically played by real-life Army vet and amputee Gregory D. Gadson. We appreciate the pop culture traffic jam that has musical glam girl Rihanna passing muster as a tough (yet cool!) fellow sailor. And we know to keep an eye on the conflict that rumbles at first between Alex and a Japanese officer (Tadanobu Asano) because Japanese-American hurts and fears left over from the real Pearl Harbor will be worked out before the movie is over for the benefit of boomers and assorted granddads in the audience.

It’s only once we know all these things — carbon-based touches not found in the Hasbro product — that “Battleship” gets down to the business of hotshot combat between brave U.S. Navy fighters and aggressive alien visitors. (The invaders, by the way, appear to have studied “Transformers” fashion magazines to design their space-metal wardrobes.) Amid this fracas, there’s a welcome mood lightener in the form of a gentle comic-neurotic turn by Hamish Linklater (“The New Adventures of Old Christine”) as a deep-space scientist who has reason to regret his search for extraterrestrial life.

“Battleship” is gratifying that way. At the story’s center are all the clanging fireballs a kid could want to watch whizzing across a computerized sky — not to mention naval strategy and a fact-based demonstration of real destroyer-ship capabilities. And surrounding the alien rumpus, the filmmakers have built an unexpectedly sincere salute to the awesome responsibilities of today’s U.S. Navy as well as to the heroic work of veterans who came before. For all that, the captains of this movie deserve a medal. B+

See the full article at EW.com.

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© 2011 Entertainment Weekly and Time Inc. All rights reserved.

Editor’s note: Omar L. Gallaga is a tech-culture reporter for the Austin American-Statesman and a technology contributor to CNN.com, NPR and Kirkus Reviews.

(CNN) — Flush with cash and drunk with power after its $100 billion IPO, Facebook could be caught secretly brainwashing millions of new users into signing up (mind-control hoodies, anyone?) — and still I might not quit the world’s largest social network.

Ridiculous scenario aside, I’m pretty serious. Despite ongoing privacy concerns and rumblings of a backlash, it would take something drastic to make me leave Facebook at this point.

More than just a daily habit, Facebook has become the place where I get important, often surprising glimpses into the lives of the 1,365 people with whom I’ve chosen to connect. (That’s not counting friends-of-friends, for Facebook’s tentacles are ever-extended).

I’m not always in love with Facebook, of course. I get frustrated with the social network like everyone else. Every six months, Facebook introduces some huge new design of its site or engages in privacy-eroding practices that send many of its users howling into the status-update box.

They threaten to shut down their accounts, write furious blog posts and organize ridiculous movements such as Quit Facebook Day, which got less than 40,000 people to commit to deleting themselves — a tiny fraction of the network even back in 2010.

But, in large part, the people who say they’re leaving Facebook don’t. Or they quit and come back.

Me, I’m staying put. At this point, complaining about Facebook is like grousing about the electric company while watching TV, or saying how lousy politicians are but forgetting to vote. Facebook just is. It’s become an institution — one that’s going to be around for a long while — and all the missteps it’s made in its young, eight-year life have never prompted significant user defection.

Counterpoint: Why I quit Facebook, and am not looking back

Facebook is on track to hit a billion users sometime this year. A billion people. With just a few exceptions, that includes nearly every person I have ever worked with, a big chunk of my extended family, most of my friends going all the way back to elementary school and probably all the kids who were in my nursery at the hospital where I was born.

There’s critical mass, and then there’s Facebook, the Death Star that deflects every effort to blow it up. Facebook has won the social-media wars because it’s where all the people are. Those who have been waiting for something else to take its place, the way Facebook siphoned off the population of MySpace about five years ago, are still waiting. MySpace, even at its peak, never had the mainstream acceptance and durability of Facebook.

I post lots of random thoughts and news links on Twitter, share photos of my wanderings on Instagram and still check in on the increasingly hollow Google+ on a daily basis. But everything I post to those services also ends up on Facebook because it’s the platform that feels the most robust and future-proof.

Since Facebook introduced its controversial Timeline design last year, my important personal milestones (college graduation, marriage, the births of my daughters, the “Friday Night Lights” finale) all have neatly filed themselves into the digital record of my life.

That’s what Facebook wants, of course. But I’ve come to stop resisting its voracious appetite for personal information.

If I didn’t share, and my friends and relatives and co-workers didn’t share, I’d be less apt to know who just got engaged, who just celebrated a graduation or who in my online community just died suddenly. When my grandmother died earlier this year, it was the place my relatives posted photos of her I’d never seen before. It was where far-flung friends and family members offered their condolences for weeks after the funeral service.

Sure, we’ve seen the inevitable backlash as Facebook has grown to include everyone from your grandmother to that third-grade classmate you never really wanted to hear from again. But lately, it feels like the arguments in favor of leaving Mark Zuckerberg’s social network have gotten weaker as people become more resigned to the notion of a permanent Facebook.

When Facebook recently bought photo-sharing app Instagram for $1 billion, Instagram users vowed to quit, complaining that their precious little network had sold out to a monolithic company. (Funny, that didn’t stop Instagram from jumping from 30 million users to 50 million in about a month.)

Would-be competitors who have tried to take on Facebook have largely failed to gain traction. Path, which has a lovely interface and is more focused on smaller circles of friends, just hit 2 million users a few months ago. And Diaspora, the open-source, nonprofit that was supposed to threaten Facebook’s laissez-faire attitude toward privacy, has yet to crack half a million users.

Once Facebook has shareholders to answer to, things may change. But perhaps not as much as you’d expect. At a South by Southwest Interactive event in 2008, I saw Zuckerberg speak about his company to application developers. Even then, he stressed that the future of Facebook was not as a website or tool, but as a global communication platform upon which other things would be built. It’s been amazing to observe how little he’s veered from that vision during four years of astronomical growth.

If something is ever going to take the place of Facebook once the company gets so big and complacent that it loses focus, it will probably be something built on top of Facebook. Perhaps a mobile app that accesses the social network’s huge population, something Facebook-adjacent that takes what people like about Facebook and turns it into something more nimble and attractive than Facebook itself.

Maybe then I’ll think about pulling up stakes. Until then, I’m not leaving.

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(CNN) — It was Manchester City’s big moment, a chance to show how far the “noisy neighbors” from the blue half of town have come from under the shadows of their big rivals — but the day of wild celebrations ended with a humble apology to one of football’s most iconic names.

When Carlos Tevez lifted a banner proclaiming “R.I.P. Fergie” during a victory parade marking a 44-year wait for an English league title, it brought into sharp focus comments by Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson back in 2009.

“Not in my lifetime,” the Scot said when asked if his team would ever be underdogs against City.

United may not have been underdogs this season, but certainly had to play second fiddle as City won both league derby clashes and snatched the Premier League crown from Ferguson’s team in the final minutes of the campaign, if only by the narrowest of margins.

Arabian dreams: Abu Dhabi celebrates title success

City officials, to their credit, moved quickly to say sorry.

“The creation of the tasteless material is in itself reprehensible and in accepting and brandishing it, Carlos has made a significant error of judgment,” said a club spokeswoman.

“The club wishes to express its sincerest apologies to Sir Alex Ferguson and Manchester United Football Club for any offense or distress caused.”

Tevez, who has history with Ferguson after his acrimonious departure from Old Trafford to join City in 2009, was also contrite.

“I got carried away in the excitement of the moment and I certainly didn’t mean any disrespect to Sir Alex Ferguson, who I admire as a man and a manager,” said the Argentina international, who was given the banner by a supporter.

Did City win the title – or did United throw it away?

The incident took some of the gloss off an event that saw more than 100,000 people line the streets of Manchester to celebrate City’s triumph.

However, chairman Khaldoon al-Mubarak was at pains to emphasize that the club’s first title since the Premier League began 20 years ago is only a small step in the plans of City’s Abu Dhabi owners, especially in context of United’s 12 championships in that period.

“Manchester United set the benchmark for success for every club,” Khaldoon said in an interview with City’s website.

“I have the highest respect for Manchester United and Sir Alex Ferguson. To get 89 points and not win the league is unbelievable.

“We are trying to accomplish just some of what Manchester United have been able to do in the past. We look at teams like United, Barcelona, Real Madrid, AC Milan and Bayern Munich and what they mean to their cities.

“This is one step in that direction but there is a long way to go yet.”

City’s success has come, in large part, due to a spending spree of hundreds of millions of dollars on star players such as Sergio Aguero, Yaya Toure, Tevez, Samir Nasri, Mario Balotelli and David Silva, and there has been widespread speculation that Arsenal’s Premier League-leading scorer Robin van Persie will be the next big-money buy.

But Khaldoon said the future emphasis would be on developing a new training and academy facility to nurture talent to comply with UEFA’s new financial fair play rules.

“We have a championship-winning team. We are not starting from the same point as in other preseasons,” Khaldoon said.

“We have had to improve in a very dramatic manner. Now we have a nucleus of players who have won the FA Cup and the Premier League. To improve further we have to harness that nucleus and to improve in a tactical way.

“You’re not going to see any major changes. There will be improvements but it will be in a very manageable way.

“When you look at financial fair play, when you look at what the academy does for the community, how do we manage the evolution of this club over the next 10 years, it is fundamental to our growth strategy to have a continually successful program that produces young talent into the first team.

“Already today there are some wonderful young players in the academy and the reserve team, players who I think will be future superstars.”

Khaldoon said this season’s success will help further City’s goal of becoming one of the world’s biggest clubs.

“Today we are a global brand, that wasn’t the case three years ago. We go to the United States, Malaysia, China, Argentina … Manchester City has become an important club with a growing fan base,” he said.

“If we are not there already, we are very close to being the most popular club in the Middle East. Asia is a huge market with a lot of potential and as Premier League champions that gives us a lot of benefits, the same with North and South America.”

Manager Mancini and his squad paraded the trophy on an open-top bus tour of the northern city on Monday.

To continuous chants of “champione” there was a massive roar when the team first emerged on a raised stage in front of the historic town hall.

Mancini and captain Vincent Kompany received the biggest applause when they came out last, carrying the EPL trophy they had snatched from city rivals and defending champions Manchester United in the dramatic finale.

City beat QPR 3-2 Sunday with two goals in stoppage time from Edin Dzeko and Aguero to edge out United, 1-0 winners at Sunderland, on goal difference.

Belgian star Kompany told the gathered fans: “I want to say thank you, you guys have been amazing.”

Mancini added: “I think that you should be proud of these players. They did everything for you. They wanted to win this championship for you.”

For United fans, there was also some consolation late Monday when the club announced that veteran midfielder Paul Scholes would play on for another season.

The 37-year-old former England international midfielder came out of retirement midway through the campaign and starred for the former champions in several matches.

However, Ferguson was not complimentary to City’s spending policy when he talked about his postseason plans, with both clubs having been linked to young Belgian star Eden Hazard — who is expected to leave French club Lille.

“We know City are going to spend fortunes, pay stupid money and silly salaries. We know that happens. We can’t do anything about that,” Ferguson told United’s television channel.

“We are not like other clubs who can spend fortunes on proven goods. We invest in players who will be with the club for a long time, who will create the character of the club and the excitement for our fans. We are good at that and we are going to continue that way.”

Meanwhile, controversial QPR midfielder Joey Barton, who was sent off at the Etihad for elbowing Tevez in an off-the-ball incident, has been hit with two charges of violent conduct by the English Football Association.

Barton, who departed early in the second half to leave his team with 10 men, clashed with both Aguero and Kompany on his way off the pitch.

And while City celebrated their title success, Aston Villa manager Alex McLeish paid the price for a poor season which saw them narrowly avoid relegation.

Villa, among the founding members of the English football league, announced in a statement Monday that McLeish had been sacked after just under a year in charge.

The club’s American owner Randy Lerner gave his reasons in a statement on their official website.

“We need to be clear and candid with ourselves and with supporters about what we have lacked in recent years.

“Compelling play and results that instil a sense of confidence that Villa is on the right track have been plainly absent.”

Paul Lambert, manager of Norwich City who beat Villa 2-0 on the last day of the season, is the early favorite to succeed fellow Scot McLeish.

Editor’s note: CNN Marketplace Africa offers CNN viewers a unique window into African business on and off the continent. It is the destination for movers and shakers at the forefront of African business.

Watch the show: Fridays 1845, Saturdays: 0245, 0515, 1515 Sundays: 0015, 1515 (all times GMT)

(CNN) — For decades, many African countries saw some of their most skilful young people take their talents to other parts of the world, lured by the financial prospects outside the continent.

But lately, as much of Europe continues to shrink under the weight of austerity, an increasing number of Africans are turning their backs on cash-strapped western economies to return to their continent, seeking jobs and new economic opportunities.

One of these returnee Africans — known as “repats” — is Nigerian Joshua Egba. The 33-year-old financial consultant left the West African country a decade ago to continue his studies in London, UK.

“Things weren’t really happening in Nigeria in about 2002,” he says. “People were going to the UK for better opportunities.”

But this picture changed completely in 2008, Egba notes, when the global financial crisis hit Britain, bringing with it a feeling of fear and job insecurity.

“Business are laying staff off, the government is laying staff off, so you’re not safe,” he remembers. “I thought really it’s time for me to go home because I’m hearing all these stories, all these success stories coming from Nigeria, coming from Africa.”

Read more: The Africans looking to make it in China

For Nigeria, 2008 was a turnaround year as a series of government reforms boosted the country’s economy that has continued to grow since then: in the past three years, the oil-rich West African nation has seen growth of more than seven percent while much of the western world remains mired in financial turmoil.

While the evidence over the returnee figures in Africa is largely anecdotal, observers cite the continent’s impressive economic growth, coupled with improvements in governance, a boom in telecommunications and the economic slowdown in the West, as the key factors for the apparent increase in the number of Africans coming back to the continent.

Read more: Activists use web to fight back in anti-corruption battle

“People who wouldn’t have considered coming back in the first instance started looking at the possibility of actually going back to Africa to look for better opportunities,” says Funto Akinkugbe, managing director of findajobinafrica.com, an online platform that facilitates the connection between recruitment agencies, employers and jobseekers.

Akinkugbe notes that his site, which he says receives around 43,000 – 45,000 visitors on a monthly basis, has recorded an increase of 35-40% in the last two years over the number of people applying for jobs in Africa. He adds that this increase is supported by the ever growing number of the Africa-focused job portals, which now number in hundreds.

Akinkugbe says that the main areas of employment activity are the mining industry in Central African countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo, agriculture in West Africa and the oil and gas sectors in countries such as Uganda and Ghana.

But part of this increasing interest, Akinkugbe explains, is not only limited to Africans.

“You now also have Europeans looking at exploring opportunities in Africa because Africa is an emerging market, the next destination,” Akinkugbe says. “There’s been a number discoveries within the last 10 years in the oil and gas sector, so you have a lot of countries … that are willing to bring in experts so they can actually develop the local industry.”

Jean-Philippe Chauzy, a spokesperson for the International Organization for Migration, says African countries with growing economies have the potential to attract skilled profs back home.

“Those who are skilled and highly-skilled are basically employable on the global jobs market, so they will tend to go where jobs are available,” says Chauzy.

“Now, it might be in their country of origin if the country of origin has a growing economy — for instance, think of Angola where there is growth,” he adds. “So those migrants, because they have skills and they’ve got access to information, will weigh their chances — whether it’s better to stay in Europe or whether there’s more of a future going back home and creating an enterprise or a small business and basically trying to hone their skills.”

Read more: How ’99p’ stores made African businessman millions

But amid this brain-gain boom, there are still millions more professionals in the African diaspora put off by the daily inconveniences of living in some parts of the continent.

Problems such as traffic, power cuts, corruption and the general struggle to get things done quickly can act as a deterrent, especially among high-skilled African migrants.

Nigerian Tunde Ogunrinde, who returned to his country after spending some 20 years in Europe, is today the chief operating officer of restaurant chain Chicken Republic.

He says he was lucky to return to a well-established and organized industry but adds that more needs to be done to make it more appealing for professionals such as doctors, nurses and lecturers to come back to the country.

“The government really needs to put more of an enabling environment for those industries to lure back, not just people like myself in the retail, hospitality industry, but also in those industries,” says Ogunrinde.

Victoria Eastwood contributed to this report

(CNN) — A co-founder of the National Necrotizing Fasciitis Foundation said Thursday that she felt sorry for the young woman diagnosed with rare “flesh-eating” bacterial infection when she heard about her this week in media reports.

“First thing I thought when I saw the news was, ‘Oh, how tragic, another case!’ ” said Jacqueline Roemmele in a telephone interview about the first report of Aimee Copeland, a 24-year-old graduate student at West Georgia University who had lost a leg and was expected to lose her fingers to the infection.

Though there is uncertainty about just how common such infections are since no clearinghouse compiles statistics on their incidence, Dr. William Schaffner, chairman of the Department of Preventive Medicine at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center, estimates there are fewer than 250 cases every year in the United States. The reporting of such cases is not required by law.

“I get e-mails about these cases every single day,” said Roemmele, who noted that news coverage of such cases is far rarer than the infections themselves are. “If you look at our foundation and our Facebook page, there’s discussion constantly among thousands of people, but it just isn’t sexy for the media.”

Still, this week’s TV and print pieces about Copeland did not surprise Roemmele. “It was a cute girl that everyone can relate to,” she said.

In addition, Copeland’s relatives have made themselves available to reporters and her classmates have been vocal in their support.

“Every three or four years or so it happens, where a case will take off in the media,” said Roemmele, who is based in northern New Jersey.

But Roemmele said she was grateful for the coverage, whatever the motivation. Not only has her foundation received a “substantial” increase in donations since the cases went public, but the stories may have some educational value.

If people seek quicker treatment next time they get a cut that results in an rapidly spreading infection, causes pain disproportionate to the size of the cut and is associated with flulike symptoms, then the goals of her group will be furthered, she said.

Group A streptoccal bacteria, the same bacteria that cause strep throat, are the main culprits, though — as occurred in Copeland’s case — other bacteria can also result in the disease, known to doctors as necrotizing fasciitis, she said.

“You’re fine when you go to bed at night, but you wake up in the morning with your leg twice the size and turning black and you have a 105 or above fever,” she said. “I’ve known many, many cases where people have died within 24 hours.”

Roemmele herself survived the infection.

“Eighteen years ago, I had a surgery on my abdomen after a C-section for my twins,” she said. “By the time they finally found out what was wrong with me, my flesh was falling off in the nurse’s hands.”

After recovering, she and a fellow survivor founded the website. In the 12 years since, tens of thousands of people have told their stories on the site about the disease, she said.

“I’m happy to see that it’s again getting some attention,” she said. “The biggest problem we have is missed diagnosis. That’s huge. So, if somebody goes into the ER, invariably they’re turned away. By the time they go back, they’ve reached the advanced stages of the disease and they’re either losing limbs or losing their lives.”

That’s comes close to describing what happened to Dan Coogan.

In 1995, the 41-year-old triathlete was gardening in his yard outside Dallas. As he set about transplanting a tree, he lifted its 2-inch trunk, which was attached to a 2-foot-wide root ball. “One of the roots poked me in my calf, and I didn’t even know it,” he said. “Within an hour, I felt like I had a Charlie horse. By the end of the day, I was vomiting all the time. I felt like I had the flu. I had a fever. I went to bed sicker than a dog.”

A few hours later, at 4 a.m., his house was struck by lightning and caught fire. As firefighters arrived and extinguished it, “I could barely walk around because of the pain in my leg,” he said.

He went back to bed, in worsening pain. “I just started popping a lot more painkillers.”

At 10 a.m., with his cut growing fiery, he went to a small regional hospital in nearby Lewisville. “They checked me in and didn’t do anything for two days” except administer antibiotics, he said.

By then, “this thing had taken over the backside of my leg and was more than halfway up my thigh.”

His luck turned when a friend, who happened to be a surgeon, recognized that something was awry and arranged for his transfer to another hospital, where doctors immediately recognized the symptoms. “Within an hour of checking into that hospital, I was in surgery,” he said.

Each night for nearly two weeks, he underwent operations that included removal of the infected tissue and dead flesh.

“They told me every night for nine nights that they were going to take my leg off,” he said. But one of the doctors put it off, saying “I’m going to take a chance here,” he recalled.

“She was right, thank goodness. I made it through all the surgeries and debridement (tissue removal) and living on morphine for 2½ weeks … I was able to survive the whole thing and I walked out of the hospital.”

But his case, like most of the others he had learned about, generated no interest from the news media.

“The people who get it aren’t 24 and grad students,” he said, referring to Copeland. “And she’s got a community of other students … The press has kinda glamorized this one.”

Are you there? Send us your images or video.

(CNN) — A confidential U.N. report reveals Iran is exporting arms to the Syrian government in violation of a ban on weapons sales, the same day President Bashar al-Assad blamed the violence in his country on the work of foreign-backed fighters.

The draft report describes three seizures of Iranian weapons shipments, including two bound for Syria, within the last year, a Western diplomat told CNN on Wednesday on condition of anonymity. The official was not authorized to release details to the media.

The report was drafted by a panel of experts and submitted to the U.N. Security Council’s committee that monitors sanctions against Iran, the official said.

The revelations came as al-Assad, in a rare interview, told Russia 24 that weapons in the hands of rebels were flowing into the country from Lebanon and Turkey.

“You can’t simply close the borders and stop the smuggling, but you can reduce the flow,” he said.

Al-Assad put the blame instead on the so-called Arab Spring that saw popular revolutions topple the governments of Egypt, Libya and Tunisia.

“If we take into consideration the developments in Syria, the events in Libya and other countries, for the leaders of these countries, it’s becoming clear that this is not ‘Spring’ but chaos.”

The successful Arab Spring movements inspired the uprising in Syria that began in March 2011 with protests calling for political reforms and quickly devolved into a revolt with an armed opposition amid a brutal crackdown by al-Assad’s forces.

The United Nations estimates that at least 9,000 people have died in the 14-month crisis, while opposition groups put the death toll at more than 11,000.

CNN cannot independently verify reports of deaths and violence because the Syrian government has severely restricted access by international media.

Al-Assad blamed the violence on terrorists, including those who labeled themselves members of the rebel Free Syrian Army.

But opposition groups, including members of the rebel army, say al-Assad’s government has been trying to mar their efforts with false accusations of links to terrorism.

While the rebel army says its ranks are populated by those who defected from Syria security forces, al-Assad labeled them criminals.

“It’s not an army, first of all, and it’s not free because they get their arms from different foreign countries,” he said in the interview.

“That’s why they are not free at all — they are a bunch of criminals who have been violating the law for years and have been sentenced in various criminal cases. There are religious extremist elements among them, like those from al Qaeda.”

Al-Assad dismissed the enormous international pressure put on him to end the violence and step down, vowing that Syria would not bow on any issue.

The United States, the European Union and the United Nations have targeted Syria with a number of economic sanctions targeting al-Assad and his government.

Al-Assad acknowledged the sanctions have had an adverse affect on Syria’s economy.

“The world doesn’t consist just of Europe and the United States, and we find alternatives which allow us to overcome these difficulties. We can support small and mid-sized business, the basic element of our economy is agriculture, and it’s hard to affect it with sanctions,” al-Assad said.

Al-Assad also called a boycott of recent parliamentary elections by the opposition a failure.

“It seems to some people that if we conducted the reforms earlier, the situation would have been better now. It’s not right for one reason — terrorists spit on reforms. They are not fighting for reforms, they are fighting to bring terror,” he said.

CNN’s Amir Ahmed and Joe Vaccarello contributed to this report.

Editor’s note: CNN Marketplace Africa offers CNN viewers a unique window into African business on and off the continent. It is the destination for movers and shakers at the forefront of African business.

Watch the show: Fridays 1845, Saturdays: 0245, 0515, 1515 Sundays: 0015, 1515 (all times GMT)

(CNN) — For decades, many African countries saw some of their most skilful young people take their talents to other parts of the world, lured by the financial prospects outside the continent.

But lately, as much of Europe continues to shrink under the weight of austerity, an increasing number of Africans are turning their backs on cash-strapped western economies to return to their continent, seeking jobs and new economic opportunities.

One of these returnee Africans — known as “repats” — is Nigerian Joshua Egba. The 33-year-old financial consultant left the West African country a decade ago to continue his studies in London, UK.

“Things weren’t really happening in Nigeria in about 2002,” he says. “People were going to the UK for better opportunities.”

But this picture changed completely in 2008, Egba notes, when the global financial crisis hit Britain, bringing with it a feeling of fear and job insecurity.

“Business are laying staff off, the government is laying staff off, so you’re not safe,” he remembers. “I thought really it’s time for me to go home because I’m hearing all these stories, all these success stories coming from Nigeria, coming from Africa.”

Read more: The Africans looking to make it in China

For Nigeria, 2008 was a turnaround year as a series of government reforms boosted the country’s economy that has continued to grow since then: in the past three years, the oil-rich West African nation has seen growth of more than seven percent while much of the western world remains mired in financial turmoil.

While the evidence over the returnee figures in Africa is largely anecdotal, observers cite the continent’s impressive economic growth, coupled with improvements in governance, a boom in telecommunications and the economic slowdown in the West, as the key factors for the apparent increase in the number of Africans coming back to the continent.

Read more: Activists use web to fight back in anti-corruption battle

“People who wouldn’t have considered coming back in the first instance started looking at the possibility of actually going back to Africa to look for better opportunities,” says Funto Akinkugbe, managing director of findajobinafrica.com, an online platform that facilitates the connection between recruitment agencies, employers and jobseekers.

Akinkugbe notes that his site, which he says receives around 43,000 – 45,000 visitors on a monthly basis, has recorded an increase of 35-40% in the last two years over the number of people applying for jobs in Africa. He adds that this increase is supported by the ever growing number of the Africa-focused job portals, which now number in hundreds.

Akinkugbe says that the main areas of employment activity are the mining industry in Central African countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo, agriculture in West Africa and the oil and gas sectors in countries such as Uganda and Ghana.

But part of this increasing interest, Akinkugbe explains, is not only limited to Africans.

“You now also have Europeans looking at exploring opportunities in Africa because Africa is an emerging market, the next destination,” Akinkugbe says. “There’s been a number discoveries within the last 10 years in the oil and gas sector, so you have a lot of countries … that are willing to bring in experts so they can actually develop the local industry.”

Jean-Philippe Chauzy, a spokesperson for the International Organization for Migration, says African countries with growing economies have the potential to attract skilled profs back home.

“Those who are skilled and highly-skilled are basically employable on the global jobs market, so they will tend to go where jobs are available,” says Chauzy.

“Now, it might be in their country of origin if the country of origin has a growing economy — for instance, think of Angola where there is growth,” he adds. “So those migrants, because they have skills and they’ve got access to information, will weigh their chances — whether it’s better to stay in Europe or whether there’s more of a future going back home and creating an enterprise or a small business and basically trying to hone their skills.”

Read more: How ’99p’ stores made African businessman millions

But amid this brain-gain boom, there are still millions more professionals in the African diaspora put off by the daily inconveniences of living in some parts of the continent.

Problems such as traffic, power cuts, corruption and the general struggle to get things done quickly can act as a deterrent, especially among high-skilled African migrants.

Nigerian Tunde Ogunrinde, who returned to his country after spending some 20 years in Europe, is today the chief operating officer of restaurant chain Chicken Republic.

He says he was lucky to return to a well-established and organized industry but adds that more needs to be done to make it more appealing for professionals such as doctors, nurses and lecturers to come back to the country.

“The government really needs to put more of an enabling environment for those industries to lure back, not just people like myself in the retail, hospitality industry, but also in those industries,” says Ogunrinde.

Victoria Eastwood contributed to this report

Editor’s note: Each month, Inside the Middle East takes you behind the headlines to see a different side of this diverse region. Follow us on on Twitter: Presenter Rima Maktabi: @rimamaktabi, producer Jon Jensen: @jonjensen and writer Cat Davies @catrionadavies

Doha, Qatar (CNN) — Bahiya Al-Hamad is a 19-year-old college student and air-rifle shooter who is about to make history for her country.

When she travels to London to take part in the Olympic Games this summer, she will be part of the first group of Qatari women ever to compete at the Olympics.

Qatar is one of only three countries — the others are Saudi Arabia and Brunei — which have never sent female athletes to an Olympics Games. This year, three women will represent Qatar at London 2012. The others are swimmer Nada Arkaji and sprinter Noor al-Malki.

All three women have been given wild cards, but there is still a weight of expectation that is not lost of Al-Hamad.

“It’s an accomplishment for every Qatari woman,” she said. “I hope I can live up to their expectation.”

Training at her shooting club outside Qatar’s capital Doha, Al-Hamad added: “Every athlete’s dream is to reach the Olympics.”

Competing in London in July and August will be a high point in her life as well as a historic moment for Qatar. “I will be very excited to go see the atmosphere there and it will sure be one the most special days of my life,” she said.

Al-Hamad has won several regional competitions in the 10-meter rifle shooting category, but missed out on automatically qualifying for London 2012 by half a point. She said she was asleep when she received a call to say she had been awarded a wild card.

“I wanted to scream,” she said. “I really loved it. I was optimistic, but never expected to reach the Olympics.

“My dream when it comes to shooting is to be the Olympic or world champion.”

See also: Will Saudi women make Olympics debut?

One of her shooting club colleagues, Ali Rashid al-Mohannadi, 21, Gulf and Arab champion, and a senior engineering student, said he has nothing but respect for Al-Hamad.

“I think women now are better than us,” he said. “I’m very happy, because she’s a talented shooter. I’m very happy for her, and I hope she does well in the Olympic Games.”

However, not everyone in his socially conservative country feel the same.

“I feel men don’t realize the idea yet, but it depends,” said Al-Hamad. “Some of them are OK with it, some are not. They say ‘you’re a girl and you shoot?’”

She added: “Before, shooting was only for guys but now it became normal for females to an extent. When they saw women emerging in shooting they became a little bit more accepting.”

Also on Inside the Middle East: Iraqi artist inspired by George W Bush shoe thrower

Al-Hamad, who is in her foundation year at Qatar University, is now training two hours a day, five days a week with her Uzbeki coach to be ready to compete alongside the world’s greatest 10-meter rifle shooters.

“We participated in the junior Olympic Games in Singapore two years back but the result was not good,” said her coach, Ivan Shahov. “But I hope with this Olympic Games we have a chance.”

(CNN) — From the outside, Formula One looks like a sport brimming with money, with millions of dollars spent on cars, sponsorship and the rights to host races.

But in reality many of the 12 teams on the grid are struggling to survive, and F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone is reportedly considering a flotation on the stock exchange in an attempt to raise much-needed funds.

The possibility of such a measure, however, has not been backed by some of the elite motorsport’s most influential players — including bosses of the McLaren and Ferrari teams.

“The fact is at the moment, we all know in this room that there’s a lot of Formula One teams that are struggling to survive,” McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh told a press conference after Friday’s practice sessions for the Malaysian Grand Prix. “Which tells us we’re not doing enough, and that’s why we’ve got to keep pushing it.”

How victory cost Force India $1.3 million

British team Williams became the first F1 team to float on the stock exchange in March 2011, but Whitmarsh’s Ferrari counterpart Stefano Domenicali also voiced his concern at the possibility of F1 taking a similar step.

“Thank God that our (Ferrari’s) situation is very good in terms of our financial position for the future,” he said. “But we know that the situation of Formula One is not so stable.

“We know that there’s a lot of struggle around, so we need to put aside our self-interest a little bit to make sure that we can look ahead. Because this is a very critical period where … we know that it’s very tough.”

But not all teams agree that spending should be regulated by the sport’s global governing body, the FIA.

Austrian-owned Red Bull have dominated F1 for the last two years, claiming back-to-back drivers’ and constructors’ championships.

Red Bull’s team principal Christian Horner welcomed the possibility of further talks on the issue, but hoped a different solution could be found.

“Hopefully with some productive discussion going forward a solution can be found to make Formula One cost-controlled for the top teams, but also make it affordable for the teams in the middle of the grid and at the back of the grid,” he said.

There’s a lot of Formula One teams that are struggling to survive
Martin Whitmarsh

“The cost of being competitive in Formula One at present is too high. I don’t think anyone will dispute that. The debate is how we achieve it.”

It was a good day on track for McLaren, as 2008 world champion Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time in both practice sessions ahead of Sunday’s race in Malaysia.

The British driver was on pole position for last weekend’s season-opening Australian Grand Prix and he once again showed his pace, edging out Mercedes’ seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher in the afternoon run.

“It’s been a good day for me,” said Hamilton, who finished third in Melbourne last Sunday.

“We’ve made a few changes to the balance of the car since the last race and I’m much happier — but we’ll still be making changes to improve our long-run pace, which can always be better.”

Hamilton’s teammate Jenson Button was victorious in Australia and he was quick again, registering the third-fastest time at the Sepang International Circuit.

Schumacher’s fellow German and Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg was fourth, ahead of Toro Rosso’s Australian driver Daniel Ricciardo.

Double title winner Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull, who has taken the checkered flag at the last two races in Malaysia, was down in 10th after placing second in the opening session.

His teammate Mark Webber was seventh, one place behind Ferrari’s two-time Sepang champion Fernando Alonso.

Editor’s note: LZ Granderson, who writes a weekly column for CNN.com, was named journalist of the year by the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association and is a 2011 Online Journalism Award finalist for commentary. He is a senior writer and columnist for ESPN the Magazine and ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter: @locs_n_laughs.

Grand Rapids, Michigan (CNN) — President Obama appeared at two recent fundraisers with some serious sticker shock.

About 200 people ponied up at least $5,000 per ticket for an event hosted by Ricky Martin. That was followed by a function at a private home where 60 people spent $38,500 each to get through the door.

Just last week, Obama — with George Clooney — raised $15 million in one night. This makes me wonder how in the hell our political process became so distorted that Obama needs this much money to run for re-election. I thought we were broke? And yet, at the end of March, Obama and his presumed general election opponent, Mitt Romney, had raised nearly a combined $300 million, almost enough to fund Planned Parenthood’s annual budget by themselves.

Forget Wall Street, it’s the campaign trail that needs to be occupied.

The median income in the United States is about $50,000, so I doubt very many 99 percenters are able to meet the $75,000 minimum that was expected at a recent Romney fundraiser. Did you know the goal of the RNC is to raise $800 million by November? Imagine how many families could be helped if just half of that was used to train people for the new job market, as opposed to being spent to help one guy get hired?

Follow @CNNOpinion on Twitter and Facebook.com/cnnopinion

Face it, the president and Romney may have different political and economic views, but they are both propped up by highly affluent power brokers who are expecting big returns for the big checks they are writing.

This is why the worst thing to happen to our process was the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, which allows corporations (and unions) to spend unlimited funds to promote a candidate. This is akin to handing the keys of a bakery to the Cookie Monster. Super PACs are not just involved in shaping dialogue. They get involved with shaping policy, which inevitably makes the good of the people secondary to the good of the deepest pockets.

We don’t just need campaign reform, we need roadblocks to prevent special interest groups from turning the democratic process into more of a sham that it already is.

Let the Supreme Court keep its ridiculous ruling, but set a limit on the amount of money candidates can raise and spend on their campaigns. Require all ads and debates to be aired on public television, and then cap the number of hours each party is allowed to use during the general election.

By putting it on public television, we stop large media conglomerates from profiting from the process. So, ideally Obama and Romney would both get $10 million and 40 hours of advertisement to state their case.

Let’s take away the $200 million war chests that Obama has been able to amass in both 2008 and 2012, and force him and future candidates to find a way to persuade the country to vote for them without relying on their ability to outspend their opponent.

I know, I know, Romney wouldn’t even be in the position he’s in without outspending — and dare I say, bullying — his opponents.

By leveling the economic playing field, our politicians have a chance to return to being representatives of the people, not just the ones who know the right people or make the right promises.

Before making the rounds in New York on Monday, President Obama tweeted a sentence from the commencement speech he gave at Barnard College: “Don’t just get involved. Fight for your seat at the table. Better yet, fight for your seat at the head of the table.” He left out the part about needing $5,000 to get in the door so you can even see the table.

But I guess those messy details are easy to overlook in a country with an 8.1% unemployment rate, whose leaders still find it appropriate to hold fundraisers for rich people.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of LZ Granderson.

Group A
Poland
Czech Republic
Greece
Russia

Group B
Netherlands
Denmark
Portugal
Germany

Group C
Spain
Republic of Ireland
Croatia
Italy

Group D
Ukraine
Sweden
France
England

(CNN) — Poland and Ukraine will host the European Championships for the first time in 2012, welcoming 14 other teams and football fans from across the continent.

World champions Spain will defend the title won in Austria and Switzerland four years ago, when Fernando Torres scored the only goal of the final against Germany.

The Germans, who like Spain went undefeated in winning the tournament in 1996, will also be back as Joachim Low’s team seek a fourth title in the competition’s 52-year history.

Click on the countries’ marker flags above to find out more details about the the sides taking part in the June 8-July 8 event.

To move from one country to another, first close the box by clicking on the “x” in the top right corner.

(CNN) — He’s a former British Open champion but Ben Curtis’ fall from grace has been such that the Valero Texas Open was only the fourth tournament he’d scraped a place in this season.

But after securing his first PGA Tour victory in six-years on Sunday, and scooping the $1.1 million prize pot, the 34-year-old can stop praying for the phone to ring to offer him a shot at redemption.

His status had sunk to such an extent he had lost his Tour privileges but after holding his nerve over a tense few final holes, he secured a two-stroke victory over Matt Every and John Huh.

“It’s been a tough couple of years,” an emotional Curtis told the PGA Tour’s official website. “Just played through it, that’s all you can do.

“You think you’re just staying positive and not worried about it, but I think deep down, you realize all the hard work you put in that, you know, finally paid off.”

Curtis was catapulted into the limelight when he won the first major tournament he competed in — the 2003 Open at Royal St George’s. It was the first time a player had won on a major debut in 90 years.

He was named PGA Tour rookie of the year that same season, and four further victories followed up to 2006. But his form dipped and so began a drought that lasted 2,045 days.

It’s been a tough couple of years. Just played through it, that’s all you can do
Ben Curtis

Last year, he failed to record a single top ten finish for the first time since he joined the Tour.

“That’s a long time,” he added. “The last couple of years I felt like I was so close to playing so many good tournaments.

“I’d end up missing the cut by one or I’d have a bad round here or there or I haven’t putted well. Finally, every part of the game came together.”

Curtis showed he still has the mettle required to get over the line in a dramatic final few holes. He saved par on the 17th hole with a nerveless 23-foot putt.

Then on the final hole he rolled in a birdie putt to finish on nine-under and claim the tournament by two clear strokes.

“When you come out here and win one, well, if I win one every year I have a great career. That would be true,” Curtis said.

“But, you know, to get to three, four, five wins — you’re a solid player. I just feel like you get yourself into contention and just have that belief, and anything can happen.”

His victory secured Curtis a two-year Tour card and almost certainly means he will qualify for the lucrative FedExCup Playoffs at the end of the season.

After restoring his pride, Curtis is determined to make the most of his reinstated privileges too, which means he can play in all but a few tournaments on the 2012 Tour.

So where will he begin? “New Orleans next week,” he replied.

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(CNN) — He used to be found slugging it out for major tennis titles on the Centre Court turf at Wimbledon — now Mark Philippoussis spends his time lapping up the surf in San Diego.

After more than a decade in the pressure-cooker atmosphere of top-level tennis, and a stint as an eligible bachelor in a television dating show, the man who was known as “The Scud” because of his fearsome serve and aggressive approach now prefers a slower pace of life.

The 35-year-old enjoyed a 14-year career in the game, his pair of Davis Cup titles with Australia tempering the bitter sting of his two grand slam final defeats.

But Philippoussis has swapped his racket for a board, and insists he is as dedicated to surfing as he was professional tennis.

“The first wave I stood up on and rode to the beach, I thought, ‘This is what I am going to do for the rest of my life.’ I knew right then and there I was just hooked,” he told CNN’s Open Court show.

“It’s so hard to explain until you go out there and you surf — you can’t really explain what surfing does to you. For me it’s my meditation. People do yoga, they go on their runs and they see it as their way to release and for me it is getting in the ocean.

“Some of the things I have seen in the ocean — whales and dolphins on a wave I’m on, a dolphin underneath you — it makes you feel so small but also at the same time that you are part of something so special. It’s an incredible thing, it’s amazing surf.”

“It’s completely in the now, my mind’s not wondering what I’m going to do later, what I did yesterday, it’s only about being out there, being in the moment and surfing that wave, nothing else.”

If life is a beach for Philippoussis now, it wasn’t towards the end of his career when injury blighted his final attempts to snare the one thing his resume lacked — a major title.

He lost twice in grand slam finals — to compatriot Pat Rafter at the U.S. Open in 1998, before running into a young pretender called Roger Federer at Wimbledon in 2003. The “Fed Express” would go on to win the next five titles at the prestigious grass-court major.

But though disappointment will forever linger in those twin failures, Philipoussis regards his two Davis Cup triumphs as his finest achievement.

In both the successful 1999 and 2003 campaigns, Philipoussis won the decisive rubber that handed his team, and his country, victory.

The first came against Cedric Pioline in front of a hostile crowd in France, while the second installment saw him beat Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain in front of a partisan crowd in his home town of Melbourne.

The first wave I stood up on and rode to the beach I thought ‘This is what I am going to do for the rest of my life.’
Mark Philippoussis on his love for surfing

That commitment to the team, rather than the individual, is a typically Australian trait, where representing your country inspires pride and every last ounce of effort.

“It’s the pinnacle of what you want to do as an athlete,” he said, “especially in Australia where we are so sports driven. We love our sports. With the Olympics, with swimming, with everything we want to do, with the history.

“Davis Cup has huge history with Australia, with the names and how many times we have won the cup so you grew up watching a lot of those matches.

“There’s a tournament every week on the ATP Tour so obviously we want to do as well as we can, but if we don’t the mentality can be easily, “OK next week.” With Davis Cup, well, it is every year, but it’s every few months that you play that tie, and it’s not just you, you are playing for your teammates, your coach, your captain, your country.

“There’s a lot of pressure there, the atmosphere at Davis Cup is like no other event and it’s an incredible experience.”

His efforts in 2003 proved to be the final year Philippoussis threatened tennis’ top table, as persistent injuries and erratic form saw him slide out of the top 100 and turn his thoughts to life off court.

There’s a lot of pressure there, the atmosphere at Davis Cup is like no other event and it’s an incredible experience
Mark Philippoussis

As such Philippoussis, who completed various stints of modeling throughout his playing career, played the role of eligible bachelor for the 2007 television show “The Age of Love” in which he had to choose one lady to date from a group of younger “kittens” or older “cougars.”

“If I could sum it up in one sentence I would say it was quite an experience,” he explained. “It was fun, then extremely frustrating, then I kind of wanted to get off the show and it was one of those things that I look back on and I don’t regret at all.

“I did it, it was another experience in my life and it was fun. Would I want to do anything like that again? No. Absolutely not, but it was fun.”

His last competitive tennis match came in Dallas in 2010 but now his main focus in life is to plan board meeting after board meeting, in the Pacific Ocean.

“One of the amazing things about surfing is that every wave is different, every condition is different, every time I get up on the board is different. But the most important thing for me is it’s my passion, I want to try to get as good as I can.

“I’m improving; I’m out there every day. Just like tennis, if you want to get better, you’ve got to get out there, so I am.”

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Editor’s note: Part culture show, part travel show, over six weeks Fusion Journeys takes six stars of the creative world on a journey of discovery to a location of their choice. There, they will learn from a different culture and create something new inspired by their experience. Watch the show every Monday, Wednesday and Friday from April 9 to May 18, during Connect The World, from 20:00 GMT.

(CNN) — As a multi award-winning chef, bestselling author, TV channel proprietor and hugely successful syndicated show host, Sanjeev Kapoor is arguably the world’s most revered exponent of Indian cuisine.

For the past 18 years he has concocted a handful of new recipes every week as the host of “Khana Khazana,” said to be India’s most watched, and Asia’s longest-running, cookery program.

As if that weren’t impressive enough, Kapoor has penned 36 cookbooks, while his website consistently attracts a hungry audience of 25 million users a month.

Suffice to say, the man has a distinguished rep in the venerable tradition of Indian cuisine.

But the myriad blend of spices and stimulation of the senses that characterize his country’s culinary heritage couldn’t be more at odds with the restrained subtlety that dominates contemporary cooking in northern Europe.

So it is perhaps testament to Kapoor’s desire for a challenge that he chose Copenhagen, Denmark, as the location for his “Fusion Journey.”

See more Fusion Journeys

Here he would meet with, and learn from, Rene Redzepi, head chef and proprietor of Noma, the two Michelin-star restaurant ranked best in the world by Restaurant magazine, where fresh ingredients and simplicity reign supreme.

His mission was to synthesize the two divergent culinary traditions, and ultimately combine them into a completely original dish of his own. In his own words, Kapoor looks back over his Fusion Journey.

Sanjeev Kapoor: When you’ve been in the profession for as long as I have, it’s imperative to keep making new discoveries, to go beyond your particular area of expertise. And the best way to do that is to travel.

So I couldn’t resist the chance to fly to Copenhagen. With its Scandinavian climate and classic European architecture, it’s a world away from Mumbai — and the style of our cuisines are just as contrasting.

The challenge is that from an Indian perspective taste is paramount. Our savory dishes are more salty, our hot dishes are more hot, our sweet dishes are more sweet, our sour things are more sour.

This is all because the use and blend of spices is very bold — the objective is to embellish and we often have 15 to 20 contrasting herbs and spices in a single dish.

But Rene and his Nordic cuisine is all about simplicity. It’s all about passion and appreciation for the ingredients themselves.

This philosophy was immediately apparent as soon as we journeyed out to the farms around Copenhagen, where Rene buys most of his food directly.

This emphasis on sourcing fresh ingredients, having a relationship with the producers, knowing the history of the food, is something I admire and relate to — but not something that I’m able to practice very often in my country.

It’s an irony that the act of going to back to nature, as it were, is something that is so easy to do in India, and yet we have been going in the opposite direction.

Unlike a lot of the industrialized West, we’re generally much closer to our environment, but we don’t focus on it.

Instead, it is all becoming very commercial in nature. The food deliveries arrive at your kitchen and you won’t know where it’s come from, how far its traveled, who the supplier is, what relationship they have with the grower and so on.

This is a shame because you can’t then guarantee the quality of the product and, on top of that, you lose the emotional connection to the food … it becomes more like a commodity.

See also: Ballet star takes inspiration from Chinese dance

Watching Rene work at Noma was a fascinating experience. He has so much reverence for the food and tries to keep the natural essence of his ingredients intact. So for instance, a simple carrot might be slow-roasted for hours, allowing it to soak in its own juices — really bringing out its essential flavor.

In India, we’re quick and explosive in the kitchen — we’d rarely cook a vegetable for longer than 15 minutes — and the culture is about pleasing every taste sense on just one spoon, adding layers of flavor so that they all blend together. But then, of course, the individual ingredients are somewhat hidden.

So, how to bring these two very different styles together in one dish? I took the best of both. While Rene and I had been foraging, I’d come across some wonderfully fresh and fragrant mustard leaves. It’s not too sharp yet it’s pungent and very mustardy … something that I have grown up with as it’s very popular in traditional North Indian cooking.

I decided to blend this beautiful Norwegian salmon — coating it with the mustard leaves and some lime, a little seasoning and let it cook gently. The result was a dish that had a distinctive Indian aroma, but with more of a Nordic approach to the style and philosophy of preparation.

The respect for the ingredient — focusing on Mother Nature, one leaf to the next — has enabled me to return home with a new appreciation for what Indian cuisine still has to offer.

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(CNN) — While the business world can be a hostile place, it doesn’t often throw up situations where you’ll literally find yourself with an arrow to your throat.

That’s unless you’re on one of a range of increasingly extreme corporate retreats and away-days, designed to build team spirit or put decision-making skills into practice by relocating participants away from the routine of the office and into demanding situations.

The United States is leading the trend for unconventional corporate retreats — but just how extreme can they get?

James Carter is CEO of Be Legendary, an American company that offers extreme “survival retreats,” held in the blazing heat of Nevada’s deserts, or the avalanche country of the San Juan range in the Rocky Mountains.

“The basics of human survival are shelter and security,” says Carter. “Executives, if they’ve ever lived in that world, have completely forgotten what it’s like.”

“We do what the military does in a safer way — to break them down so we can build them back up again. We give them the skills to survive.”

See also: To reach the top, do what others won’t

The desert experience involves archery and a “fire walk” across hot coals. The latter activity is intended to leave participants energized and on a “spiritual high,” ready to attempt an even more cathartic challenge — having an arrow pressed against their throat until it snapped.

“The arrows take 25 pounds of pressure to break, and it takes 75 pounds of pressure to pierce skin. But all of that information doesn’t matter when you’ve got an arrow against your neck,” said Carter.

“Even though they know they won’t really be hurt, there’s still a sharp pain. That’s a watershed moment when people cry.”

Perhaps even more grueling is the “Deep Snow Survival” retreat, held in the Rockies. Participants are given snowshoes, beacons and taught alpine survival skills, before trekking deep into avalanche country. Their guides then tell them there has been an avalanche, that they will have to overnight in the snow, and they need to begin building snow shelters immediately.

“Here’s a real survival situation,” said Carter. “You’ll see someone who starts absolutely busting their butt to build a shelter. But if you sweat in that environment you’ll get hypothermia. So you have to make sure they ease off, you have to take care of one another.”

After a couple of hours, when the participants have built their shelters, they are collected, told there is no avalanche and returned to base. Although the avalanche is not real, the camaraderie and shared experience it inspired is genuine, Carter said, which is the true value of the exercise.

“That night the beer we share around the fireplace has never been sweeter,” he said. “There’s more color in the world. That memo you wrote last week, the one I was so annoyed about, doesn’t matter now. Everything is put into perspective.”

Adventure Associates is another firm that specializes in physically demanding corporate retreats. On one of their regular offerings, based in North Carolina, participants are made to cycle, hike or kayak in pursuit of tokens they will then exchange for materials that can be used to make a boat. Having designed and built the boat, they must then try to row it across a lake.

According to Adventure Associates director Ed Tilley, the retreat, with its mix of experiential challenges and corporate-training workshops, provides a good forum to strengthen team dynamics and implement communication and decision-making skills.

“It enables our clients to put into practice some of the skills they’ve been learning — how to manage different team members’ strengths, and manage around their weaknesses,” said Tilley.

See also: Want to be a leader? Act like one

If that all sounds a little arduous, there are other offerings that focus on out-of-the ordinary bonding experiences that are more about thrills than endurance.

Jetlev Southwest, headquartered in Newport Beach, California, frequently caters to executive groups — particularly from the tech industry — seeking a novel team-building experience. A day out of the office trialling the Jetlev R200 — a personal, water-powered jet pack that can propel the wearer 30 feet in the air over water — fits the bill.

“It’s a bonding experience, one that very few people in the world have ever had,” said trainer Dean O’Malley, adding that first-time users typically managed to reach heights of 10 to 15 feet with the jet pack.

Another option for executives seeking an invigorating buzz is to take to the skies in an Italian military training plane for an old-fashioned dog fight.

Headquartered in Fullerton, California, Air Combat USA operates what marketing director Denise Jennings describes as a “fantasy camp for wannabe fighter pilots.” Corporate groups receive training before taking to the sky in a SIAI-Marchetti fighter under the supervision of an instructor. A popular format is for corporate groups to book the aircraft for the day so they can operate a 10-person knock-out dog fight tournament.

Jennings said that as well as being a unique and physically demanding team-building exercise — “People come back and say they feel like they’ve run a marathon” — the experience appealed to competitive spirits of “Type-A personality” executives. “They’re drawn to the fact that somebody’s going to walk away the top gun.”

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(CNN) — Boredom is an unlikely new frontier in workplace research. Commonly associated with goofing off, taking absurdly long lunch-breaks, and playing internet games on the sly, new studies suggest it’s something that affects high-performing employees as well as those in menial jobs.

Sandi Mann, a senior psychology lecturer at the University of Central Lancashire, in England, says boredom is the second most commonly hidden workplace emotion, after anger, and believes modern workplaces are becoming more boring.

“Changes in legislation all the time leads to bureaucratic procedures that people find boring,” she says. “We seem to be in a culture of having meetings, which a lot of people find boring. There are a lot of automated systems now, so a lot of the things we do are quite remote. We have more people working night shifts, which are more boring because you’ve got fewer people to talk to.”

In addition, Mann feels that, as a society, we’re becoming less inclined to tolerate boredom. She says: “People have more of an expectation to be fulfilled by everything they do. Compare our grandparents’ generation: there wasn’t any desire to have self-actualization and to reach their potential. They didn’t go down the coal mines in order to be fulfilled.

“That attitude has changed. Now, we get people quite commonly quitting higher paid jobs for jobs that are lower paid but more satisfying.”

Despite its proliferation, Mann thinks there’s little awareness about boredom, which she deems “the new stress.”

“It’s as stressful as stress but, whereas stress management courses are 10 a penny, organizations are terrified to admit their workers might be bored,” she adds.

See also: Extreme retreats: fire walks and snow survival with your workmates

Last year, Mark de Rond, from the University of Cambridge’s Judge Business School, spent six weeks studying military surgeons at Camp Bastion in Afghanistan. He found that boredom had a destabilizing effect, even on otherwise high-performing individuals.

In his first week, de Rond saw 174 casualties arrive, observed 23 amputations and 134 hours of operating. A good proportion were local children. Although the work is mentally and emotionally demanding, the surgeons are “brutally effective,” he says.

“I don’t think I’ve seen teams more effective than when someone’s bleeding out in Bastion. It’s almost beautiful to watch. They’re so very composed; it’s so noise-free. The problem is when people don’t have anything to do,” says de Rond.

According to de Rond, although there are days when no casualties come in, because the surgeons are on call around the clock, they can never really relax. As they wait for helicopters to bring in casualties, they feel guilty for wishing for more work. They start to compete with each other, become critical of each other’s efforts, and become reflective about the futility of it all. “As they become unhappy, they become like big bears — you just don’t want to be around them,” de Rond says.

A study on the link between counterproductive work behavior and boredom by researchers at Montclair State University and University of South Florida identifies six ways bored employees might harm their organizations: by abusing others, by “production deviance” (purposely failing at tasks), sabotage, withdrawal, theft and horseplay. Of these, the most common is withdrawal (absence, lateness, taking long breaks) says the University of South Florida’s Paul Spector.

He and his co-researchers drew on studies that show that some people are more boredom-prone than others. These people are more likely to get angry, engage in risky driving, display aggression and hostility, and lack honesty and humility.

At the bottom of it all is resentment: “To some extent these behaviors can be the product of someone just getting back at the employer, blaming the employer for creating boring conditions, and trying to strike back,” Spector says.

He adds that there’s little correlation between workload and boredom. “You can be very busy and still be bored. And you could be distressed even though you’re not all that busy — if you just hate what you’re doing.”

De Rond has also seen a kind of “existential” boredom manifest in professional services firms. “That’s not a result of having nothing to do — they have nothing worthwhile to do.”

See also: Why ambition could make you rich, but not happy

The solution, according to de Rond, is “disarmingly straightforward.” “Provided everyone is capable, all you have to do is to give people something to care about more than themselves,” he says.

Bastion provides an example. “You’ve got casualties coming in who will die if you don’t do something quickly — that is more important than yourself, at that point. Teams work incredibly effectively when that happens,” he says.

To replicate this effect, leaders need to explain to teams “why what they do is important, who it matters to and why.” “It’s that that keeps a team focused,” de Rond says. “Otherwise it’s just work.”

De Rond also believes it’s necessary for workplaces to engineer a culture of “psychological safety” in which “it’s okay to ask questions.”

Allowing employees to air the doubts and anxieties that arise when they are bored is, he notes, “a very frightening thing” for organizations to do. “Most people would suspect that if you start questioning protocol, you then eat into morale.”

But in an environment of psychological safety, he theorizes, “what you should see is some of the vulnerability of the people involved. It’s where people can be okay with that, instead of being defensive about it. If anything, it should really boost morale.”