Mg is for Marketing

Silver Tarnishes Because it Reacts with Sulfur Gases and Oxygen Combined?

2014-05-18T11:49:00.000-07:00

Oxidation of Silverware Caused by Reaction with Oxygen Gas and/or Hydrogen Sulfide Gas?

Silver(I) Oxide

Tarnished Metal

One of the common misconceptions about silver plated serving ware is that it tarnishes because oxygen comes into contact with silver and forms silver(I) oxide (Ag₂O). The black color of silver oxide makes it easy to mistake silver oxide as the patina on our silver serving ware. Some sources include oxygen in the chemical reaction, however the black coating on the surface of the silver is due to reaction with hydrogen sulfide and oxygen both. Oxygen does the oxidizing but silver ends up with sulfur to counterbalance the Ag+ charge.

Silver Sulfide

Silver sulfide (Ag₂S) is actually responsible for the oxidative coating. To tarnish silver it must react with "sulfur gases." The most common sulfur gas is hydrogen sulfide H₂S [1].

Sulfur Dioxide

Hydrogen sulfide has a structure similar to water, where the O is substituted with an S. "Hydrogen sulfide often results from the bacterial breakdown of organic matter in the absence of oxygen, (Wikipedia)." It is a weak acid and can donate an H+ to be left with HS-.

A simplified chemical reaction of oxidizing silver is [2]

4 Ag(s) + 2 H₂S(g) + O₂(g) 2 Ag₂S(s) + 2 H₂O(g)

However tarnishing is a multistep process. This reaction "is a short-hand or end-result of many transformations. " The detailed reactions are given below.

Reduction and Oxidation Explanation

In this reaction silver goes from an oxidation state of zero in the reactants to +1, the oxidation state in the products (oxygen has a -2 oxidation state in water). Hydrogen remains the same at +1 and sulfur remains at an oxidation state of -2 on both sides of the equation. Oxygen is in its elemental form and has an oxidation state of zero on the reactants side and -2 on the products side. Silver is oxidized (reducing agent); its oxidation number increases and oxygen is reduced (oxidizing agent).

Can Hydrogen oxidize Silver?

Another alternative reaction given does not include oxygen. If you were to look at a table of electromotive force you would know that this could not happen the EMF would be -0.8Volts.

2 Ag(s) + H₂S(g) ---> Ag₂S(s) + H₂(g)

In this reaction hydrogen is reduced from +1 to zero and silver is oxidized from zero to +1.The oxidation state of sulfur remains unchanged.

Multistep Tarnishing of Silver

Corrostion and tarnishing are multistep reactions. Even the formation of rust is not a simple combination of iron and oxygen. Water is necessary for rust to form. Upon closer research of articles on the internet there is one website that talks about the multistep mechanism of silver tarnishing.

8Ag + 4HS^- <---> 4Ag₂S + 2H₂ + 4e^-
0₂ + 2H₂O + 4e^- <---> 4OH-

What would be the sum of the EMF of these reactions?

Ag ---> Ag+ + e-    EMF = -0.799V
2H+ --->2e-+H₂                                   EMF = 0V
0₂ + 2H₂O + 4e^- <---> 4OH- EMF = 0.4V

This reaction would not be spontaneous because the sum of the EMF's would be negative (-0.799+0.4=0.399V)

If the reaction were under acidic conditions the EMF would be large enough to tarnish the silver:

0₂(g) + 4H+(aq) + 4e^- <---> 2H2O(l) EMF = 1.23V

-0.799+1.23= 0.431V

Why Doens't Silver Oxide form When Silver is Tarnished?

Activity Series

Alkali and alkaline earth metals are the most active, most easily oxidized because their electron can be easily ionized. However transition metals and "noble"metals such as silver hold on to their electrons more tightly. Oxidation, therefore has a relationship to ionization energy. The lower the ionization energy the easier it is to oxidize an element.

Silver is a Less Reactive Noble Metal

One reason why silver does not form silver oxide when it reacts with air is that silver is not as reactive as some other metals, where reactivity is defined as the ability to form a positive ion. Reactive metals tend to have 1 valence electron in the s shell or the p shell, valence electrons and ionization energies (energy to eject an electron).

So why does silver react with sulfide ions in solution vs. hydroxide? When silver gets oxidized sulfur is probably the first thing it sees and so it reacts with it. To get it to react with oxygen and form an oxide it would take converting OH- or water to oxide (O²⁻). First the silver might have to form Ag(OH) in the steps similar to how the iron in steel becomes rust.

Solubility of Silver Sulfide and Silver Hydroxide in Solution?

The solubility product constant for silver is 6x 10-51, which means that not much Ag2S does not like to form the ions Ag+ and S-, whereas Ag(OH) is

1.52 x 10 -8. Silver hydroxide is much more soluble in water. It is therefore most likely that silver does not form silver oxide because it is more soluble in water and solid Ag(OH) is less likely to form than solid Ag2S in solution.

A Green Way to Remove Silver Sulfide Tarnish

A common way to remove the silver sulfide tarnish is to put the silverware in a solution of baking soda, warm water and aluminum. Aluminum is very reactive and will form aluminum oxide (Al₂O₃), a white powder. This is why we add baking soda. It creates a basic solution that helps to break through the outer aluminum oxide layer. The chemical equation for baking soda in water is [4]

NaHCO₃ (baking soda) + H₂O → H₂CO₃ + Na⁺ + OH^-

The reaction of silver sulfide with Aluminum can be expressed in the following reaction(s):

3 Ag₂S(s) + 2 Al(s) ---> 6 Ag(s) + Al₂S₃(s)

3Ag₂S(aq) + 2Al(s) → 6Ag(s) + 2Al⁺³(aq)+ 3S^-
2(aq)

or including the water

3Ag₂S(aq)+ 2Al(s) + 3H₂O(l) → 6Ag(s) +Al₂O_{3 (aq)} + 3H₂S(g)

Breaking the Reaction into Two parts:

OXIDATION: 2 Al(s) + 6 OH– (aq) –––> Al2O3(s) + 3 H2O (l) + 6 e–

REDUCTION: Ag2S(s) + 2 H2O (l) + 2 e– –––> 2 Ag(s) + H2S (aq) + 2 OH– (aq)

3 Ag2S(s) + 2 Al(s) + 3 H2O (l) –––> 6 Ag(s) + 3 H2S (aq) + Al2O3(s)

Aluminum Sulfide is a white powder.

Aluminum Sulfide

You Tubes Related to This Article:

Silver Tarnish Removal (II): Chemical Equation

Reducing Agents: Preparation and Tests for SO2 and H2S.

How to Use Sprites with HTML

2012-10-27T11:05:00.001-07:00

The homework for my web graphics class this week was to use sprites with a nav bar and HTML.

Fireworks

First I created the sprites in Fireworks. The image looks like this:

The article that I was going by did not say anything about creating states. It just said export it as a nav.png I did export the image but only in a .gif file. Firefox (version 5) would not give an option to export in .png I used paint to convert it.

HTML

Next I wrote the HTML passed W3C with 2 warnings.

Use the W3C Validator at http://validator.w3.org to check for XHTML syntax errors.

I was not able to get the sprite to work at first. When I removed the css style sheet I could see the next from the nav bar.
so it must have been something to do with the css.

CSS file is called mod9css.css

Last I wrote the CSS. It just tells which part of the png file to show but the part I don't get is how does the mouse know where you are.
I am not sure what all the # symbols are for. Active focused selected and hover seem like they are states that you should set up in Fireworks.

The page looks like this right now. The nav.png file is being called because you can see the graphics, but the css is not rendering correctly. When I replace the nav.png with the one in Blackboard things look worse. Nothing shows up.

No errors found on w3c validator.
Use the W3C Validator at http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator to check for CSS syntax errors.

One problem I had was that I did not slice my file up in to pieces. It was one big piece. At first I though I was supposed to use states, but it was the slice that I wanted. This is why I could not save the file as a .png. It only gave me at. gif as an option.

The image is aligned property but sprites do not work.

CSS Sprites only work when the CSS is in the HTML file and not a separate file.

Connecting Your Domain Name to Google Apps & Sites

2012-10-23T17:43:00.000-07:00

Once you have purchased a domain name and created an account on Google sites you will need to route your domain to Google Apps/Sites. With this you will have free email, free calendar and free web hosting. The only cost to you is the annual renewal of the web domain name.

Google Sites is a subset of Google Apps. Apps includes email, calendar and a whole sets of apps. With the mail app you can add multiple users.

Login to you web domain DNS host. DNS = Domain Name Service. In our case it is DNS exit. The screen will look like the image below.

I used ChicagoIBS.org as my site to test that this work out.

Google

DNS Exit

Alias Records - In this step you will shorten the webpage names for the email etc.

Search for the words "Google App Free.
You will find this domain name. https://www.google.com/a/cpanel/standard/new3
Type in the name of your domain
chicagoibs.org in my case.
Click on Set Up Apps
Click Sites Button
Click Next or Do this later
Exit this section
Go to Settings > General >Change URL
Change URL for ALL domain services
In this step you will shorten the webpage names for the email etc. Click the 2nd bullet of each section. For example in my case mail.chicagoibs.org Do the same for calendar, docs and sites.
Click Continue
Go back in to DNS Exit to to Edit DNS
Add Alias, external host - save changes
Click - I've completed these steps
Go to Organization and Users on the main navigation bar
Go to services
Turn on contacts, drive and docs, gmail, google calendar, google sites, google talk (the first six)
Save changes
Go to Setup > next > alternate method >domain name provider > other
Go back to the DNS Panel >TXT Records> Add Text > Text Data > Add Text > Save changes
Wait 5-10 minutes for DNS. Click Verify > Continue > changes to eamil unclick all
Click setup >do later/next until done
Test for sites.chicagoibs.org ( fill in your name)
Delete the TXT Record. Save

The email is setup in DNS Exit with MX

Email > Organization & Users > services
Settings > email > MX setup instructions
Setup gmail > next > other > next
MX on DNS > save change > wait 24 hours > next > yes changed > click back to where you started.
This may take 24 hours so wait and come back and check it.
To check it setting > email > MX record
mail.chicagibs.org

What Other Resources Exist in Our Galaxy to Support Life?

2012-10-21T09:59:00.001-07:00

In the last article we discovered that there are six places in the universe where life might be found in an article by Seth Shostak at SETI on Space.com. If we traveled to these six places what resources would we find. What life could possible live there?

6 years away from Earth - Enceladus, Titan, Europa, Callisto and Ganymede

Europa
Water under 10 miles of ice & Geothermal heat - Europa is dark and cold - No Photosynthesis

Enceladus

Water and chemicals - On Enceladus you have a moon with volcanic activity, a silicate crust, frozen exterior, hydrocarbons, ammonia, propane, ethane and acetylene, in the atmosphere, ice and water. For humans to live on Enceladus you would need oxygen and carbon dioxide. Humans would be bouncing around all over the place on Enceladus since it is 1/7 the size of our moon. Cold on the outside, warm on the inside of the moon.

Titan

Liquid Fuel, Nitrogen, Solar Wind, Organic Smog, Frozen Water, Wind, Liquid Methane Rain, Dunes, Rivers, Lakes, Hurricanes, Lots of complex chemicals, dry atmosphere, warm upper atmosphere, cold surface, only gets 1% of sunlight that Eath Does, Geologically Young, Habitable 6 billion years from now - Titan is much larger than Enceladus and should therefore have more gravity. There is an abundant source of fuel - ethane and methane. The moon is very cold. Methane cycle analogous to Earth's water cycle. Titan is bigger than our moon and smaller than Earth.

Callisto and Ganymede

Liquid oceans under 60 miles of rock

Mars

150- 300 Days - Mars Salty Water - Beneath the surface of Mars - salty water.

Venus
97-153 days- Heat, sulfur dioxide and carbon monoxide, floating microbes, acidic clouds

How far are you willing to travel to find these resources ?

Let's Pretend We are on a Spaceship

One of the resources that stand out from the six most likely places is water that is hard to access (except for on Enceladus), geothermal activity, lack of sunlight/cold environment, chemicals that a human could not normally breathe in unless they lived in one of the most polluted cities in the world and were exposed to them over long periods of time and their bodies adabped. The only place where there might be enough sun to ever have photosynthesis could be Mars or Venus.

Perhaps Enceladus, Titan, Europa, Callisto and Ganymede are an example of what was happening after the ice age on earth and Mars and Venus are examples of what could happen if Earth warmed up too much, i.e. global warming. If carbon monoxide exists on Venus and sulfur dioxide, it would not be too far off to think that carbon dioxide could exist as well.

Enceladus is the Artic Cordillera an area of the Anartica in Northern Canada that was once volcanic.

Titan is am extremely cold city with the worst air pollution on Earth with areas that are like Earth's dessert - Nambi Dessert.

Mars has been compared to the Atacama dessert.

Venus is basically a very hot highly polluted city where you could feed off of microbes in the upper atmosphere if you were a preditor. This is an extreme simplification, but if you suspend your logic then the model might be applicable.

So are the moons of Jupiter and Saturn to cold for humans to ever inhabit. Could something warm them up? Or do we just need some fuel and water to survive there?

Looking for Life

2012-10-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

Why Study Astronomy?

Map of the Universe

On a recent weekend trip my husband and I went on a tour of Yerkes Observatory. We enjoyed the tour and learning about lens and mirror telescopes and all about the famous people who had passed through Yerkes, which included Einstein and Hubble.

In searching for a map of the universe I found that there are 45,000 galaxies as shown by the 2MASS Reshift Survey.

While reading the information I read about a number of different stars and stellar systems like Eta Carinae (image below), Andromeda m31, Abel 2218, Coma Berenices NFC 4881, and Messier 100. I also read about the Sofia HAWC program.

One of the questions that comes up is why are we studying stars? They are so far away that it feels that we might never be able to visit. The answer is inevitably that we want to know if there is life elsewhere in the universe. If you are interested in physics, chemistry, biology, science then you should be interested in astronomy. Another reason is that we want to know what is going on in the universe to protect us from any activity that might be going on - asteroids, meteorites and supernovas.

When the Hubble telescope took all of those fabulous pictures is when we were able to turn the invisible into a visible. But what do all the pretty pictures mean?

Eta Carine

Eta Carinae is way more powerful than our sun, very active and really far away from us, 7,500 light years. In the image the star is actually in the middle and it is surrounded by two dumbells which are called Homunculus Nebula. Homunculus is little man in Latin and represents left over bits of stuff after an explosion. Some people think there is a black hole in the middle of each lobe.

On the tour what I read is that Eta Carinae is going to live a much shorter life than our sun. So could another earth be located there? If it will not be there for long as Eta Carinae will be exploding "soon." Well soon on the universe's time scale - in a few years, or in our lifetime or maybe in a million years. Well who can predict it anyhow. Eta Carinae puts out a lot more light than the sun, so if we lived there we would be barbecued with in a nanosecond.

After doing a bit more reading and finding the Space.com website to be quite interesting, it seems that our own Milky Way Galaxy is teeming with life, microscopic life most likely. There is proof for it.

Enceladus, on of the moons of Saturn, is the most likely place to find life in our galaxy. It is located in the E-ring of Saturn and is 1/7 the size of our moon. It has cold liquid water and is geologically active with many chemical compounds such as hydrocarbons, ammonia, propane, ethane and acetylene and plumes of gas that are ejected from the surface. The chemical composition of the moon is silicate in nature and the surface has craters and canyons. Many new classes of charged particles and nanograins have been found on Enceladus. It takes anywhere from 6-3 years to arrive on Enceladus.

Exploring our galaxy is the best first step and a heck of a lot easier than looking billions of light years away. At least for now.

Migrating to WordPress

2012-10-16T17:32:00.000-07:00

Why I Migrated My HTML page to WordPress

The page was slow. It took 20 seconds to load.
The ads I used to draw people to my page defeated the purpose of advertising.
The landing pages needed improvement.
The graphics needed improvement

What I've learned about WordPress in less than 24 hours
WordPress is a fancy version of Google Sites and other prepacked webpage building software - content management system (CMS) - that allows you design a website without needing to write code like HTML and CSS. It is built on PHP and MySQL.

The first steps are to decide the name (domain name) of your webpage and find a place where the website files and data will live (hosting). The name of my current website is www.chicagoibsibd.org I bought the name on in on DNSexit. Our website is hosted on a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) server. When WordPress is downloaded what you get is a bunch of PHP files. But these files do not reside on the computer you are sitting at. The PHP files live on the server computer. These PHP files allow the front page of the website to talk with the server in a dynamic interactive way. You can think of front end and back end to refer to what is going one relative to the person sitting surfing on their computer.

Theme & Created Pages
The theme that we selected was Twenty Eleven. It is a good theme to pick if you want your page to be found by people surfing the net and Googling a particular word on your page. I first started by creating a graphical header in Adobe Fireworks with free images found on stock xchng of a skyline. I'd like to shrink down the size of the header - work in progess.Then I created 9 webpages and did a cut and paste of the text in the central part of the page.

Multisites and Domain Mapping ( Day 3 Octboer 19) I am using http://www.0ehrl1.com/ to create the WordPress prototype site. There is only one installation of WordPress on our server. At first we had only this one site, 0ehrli.com but now we want to have new websites and need to create subdomains. In addition to creating multisites, we have to map the domain to actual DNS subdomains. We also created a child theme.

WAMP vs. LAMP and transferring files
In order to change the parent theme that comes with the Twenty Eleven and Twenty ten themes you have to have access to the wp-content > themes. The Lynda.com files explain how to transfer files when WordPress is hosted on a Windows WAMP server. In our case we have an Linux LAMP server and have to find a way for the front end developer, me, to pass my files to the LAMP server on the back end. One option in FTP. Another option might be Dreamweaver.

Plugins & Widgets
I installed a jetpack plugin after listening to the Lynda.com videos. One of them was called a You Tube channel gallery. When I installed the jetpack it seemed to direct me to WordPress.com to login, which confused me, but after doing this all of the plugins I selected were there.

What I am Working on Now

YouTube Video on each page

Area where I can put an image

Link to Ning

Signup for Mailchimp

Day 2 of WordPress
I am watching the videos for WordPress 3: Building Child Themes. Chapter 2.3 has to do with changing the header size and Chapter 5.1 has to do with inserting fixed sidebars. When I purchased the Lynda.com package I ordered the supplemental material. This was a good thing because these files (The New Cool) have a lot of prepackaged code that will allow you to easily change things.

Where are my files?
Where the files are located is an interesting question. This page explains it well. This is another with the template hierarchy. How to create a Wordpress Theme from scratch.

Well I am going to take a break. I need to learn how to log in to the LAMP server before I can proceed to modify my themes.
How do I place images and video in the sidebar?

Child Themes

How do I make a folder in the WordPress PHP files on the server? Can't seem to do it.

I have now listened to most of the beginner Lynda.com I am looking for how to make the header smaller. Understanding the child themes seems to be the next step. This blog was good:

WordPress 3: Building Child Themes notes

Functions.PHP (Lynda.com) Child WordPress Intermediate
To change the size of the header you have to go in to themes and twenty ten (or elevent) folder and the functions.PHP file. A function creates the header image.

Twenty eleven - make header image smaller and move to top (7 posts)
http://wordpress.org/support/topic/twenty-eleven-make-header-image-smaller-and-move-to-top

Day 1 Oct 16

Open up my website

Open up WordPress.org

Download the latest copy.

Find a place to put my website as a test location. Eventually I need to move the WordPress page to that it resides at my domain location.

I need to ask the web guy who runs the basement lab how he organized things.

http://[websitedomain]/wp-admin

Create a subdirectory? I did not do this

Select a Theme 2011

lynda.com These were helpful

Quick Edit allows you to change the hierarchy of the pages.

I tried to use the showcase template with the posts on the 2011 theme but it didn't work quite right.

What do I do about the widget and post area? I want to put a You Tube in there and the call to action to Join Ning and sign up for Mail Chimp.

Day 2
Lynda Chapter 12 Jetpack & Widgets
I seem to have missed the part where they explain how to install these. I went to the list of plugins and I am looking over the ones that have 5 stars for a rating. Activated the plugin.

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/jetpack/

I want to change the size of the header on 2011

http://en.support.wordpress.com/featured-images/

I looked at this blog for some help.

http://www.wealthydragon.com/2011/12/01/convert-html-website-to-wordpress-process/

Eding CSS

http://en.support.wordpress.com/custom-design/editing-css/

Time spent:

Oct 16 4pm - 7:32 pm going to library
Oct 17 6 am - 7 am
7:30 - 8:30 Getting Things Done pg 59

Starting the Job Search from the Ground Up

2012-09-27T11:12:00.001-07:00

Today I wipe the slate clean and eliminate the obstacles. This has been an interesting year but I've eliminated one job title from my list. Time to start over.

I have to admit that I've been lazy, but perhaps I can call it processing.

I've had numerous calls from recruiters this year. The statistics and distributions of job type and industry has given me some information on the job market. But what do I want? It is time to get of my rear in gear and hit the pavement to figure that out.

I have had three interviews this year. One of them was close to what I used to do as a scientist minus the beakers and lab equipment, but the other ones were pretty different. The problem was that I was not ready for theses interviews. They plopped into my lap like a gift from heaven, but I was not prepared. "Chance favors the prepared mind," as someone once told me. My mind was definitely not prepared.

Even if other people help you, if you are not ready yourself you will not be able to seize the opportunity. So I finally woke up and walked out of my cocoon and went to a series of four seminars through the local job networking group. It made me stop feeling sorry for myself and swept the cobwebs out of my brain. I like to envision them that way. They are the negative thoughts that linger and fester in there until we take some action to clean them out.

Life can be a positive chain reaction once we start moving in the right direction. Thanks to my friends and family, I've been able to realize that I'm not a loser just because I don't have a job title. There is the essence of me, my spirit and my personality that no one can take from me.

I am back in high gear looking for the yellow brick road and my ruby slippers. I've already written my career marketing plan. I am working on my handbill and my list of industries and companies. I'm ready to figure out what I want to do for the rest of my life!

Career Motivators: What Drives Me?

2011-03-22T17:51:00.001-07:00

Part II: Career Motivators - What Drives Me

Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Knowing what you want in a career is better than following where a path leads. I have uncovered a few personal motivators by going through the book "Get the Job You Want Even When No One's Hiring."

In addition to motivation, one must find meaning in what they do. A meaningful job to me is one that helps people, has personal meaning and connection to your life, a job that comes naturally with not extreme efforts, is fun, brings lots of opportunity and challenge.

Here are a few of my motivators, many of which are tied to my career values.

problem solving, finding an answer, research, solving hard problems, motivated to learn and solve difficult problems, finding the best solution
teaching, helping, knowledge
nice personality, smart
communication skills
saving money

Do my motivators align with my career direction? I am considering a career that involves business, analysis and builds upon my background in science.

Career Similarities and Differences
The differences between a scientific job and marketing research: you do not have to work with dangerous chemicals. Data sets for marketing can be larger and more complex than scientific data. Correlations tend to be weaker for measuring consumer behavior vs. scientific behavior.

Scientists are less concerned with the cost of doing research, where as market researchers are more concerned with the bottom line.

In general, I see marketing research as being a more people oriented job than a scientific researcher. Another career I am considering is product manager. Product manager involves more sales and is the most people oriented job of the ones I am considering. Finally the internet marketing job involves less people interaction, is more aligned with internet marketing, but involves the ability to respond to change quickly.

Product manager, marketing research and internet marking involve knowing the needs of the market. Knowing the market is not as readily translatable to the scientist's career. Both marketing research and internet marketing involve a lot of technology and writing skills. Product management and internet marketing are driven by sales and budgets.

Characteristics of a Scientist:
1. Inquisitive
2. Explorative
3. Persistent
4. Creative
5. Analytical

Characteristics of a Marketing Research:

scientific method — observation, hypothesis, prediction, and testing.
innovative ways to solve a problem
multiple methods to acquire data and shy away from over-reliance on any one method
base your research efforts on solid models
relationship between the value of information and its cost
clearly sees the market
win-win-win for company, the product and the customers

Characteristics of a Product Manager

passion to sell great products
empathy
humility
self-awareness
tenacity
decisiveness
innovativeness
confidence
focus
persuasiveness

Characteristics of an Internet Marketer

Adaptive/Pro active
Should have TAS (think Ahead Systematically) approach
Should know exactly the requirements of the business
Recognize the long term goals
has a personalized brand
knows the needs of the market
Should be able to write great content
Traffic increase
Maximize the budget

Career Potential: What Are My Values?

2011-03-22T16:57:00.000-07:00

What Are My Core Career Values?

I am reading a book that I should have read years ago. But then years ago we were not in the recession that we are coming out of. The book is "Get the Job You Want, Even When No One's Hiring."

Instead of following the trail of hot job areas, the book walks you through a career soul search.

I am currently working on the values clarification section and this is what I've learned about myself. This is what I value in order of most to least important. Some of this I knew already but it is time to use this information to look to my career future.

Career Values: I feel strongly about

Logic/Analysis/ Challenge/Overcoming Obstacles: research, look at data, solve challenging problems, experiment, figure out how things work
Collaboration/Teamwork: social, collaborate, integrate in to a team, nice personality, like to help people
Adventure/Discovery/Creativity/Innovation: create, explore, go on an adventure
Management/ Leadership: leadership, take responsibility, dedicated
Education and Knowledge: learning, teaching
Communication: good at presenting
Technical Competency: worked in technical jobs
Money/Wealth/Power/Influence: sales
Control People/ Projects: develop a project

This tells me that my main motivator is analysis, discovery and learning in a collaborative environment. I should seek a job that allows me to use both my analytical and social skills. These are typically two skills might be viewed as opposites. If I remember correctly, my Myers Briggs is ENTJ (extraversion, intuition, thinking, judgment).

One of the inconsistencies with working as a scientist is that it can be a solitary job. Being that I am a social teamwork oriented person I would like to find a career that involves more interaction with people.

The Journey Towards a Better Career FIt

2011-02-16T06:54:00.000-08:00

How Do You Define a Career Fit?
A good fit is when your goals, past industry experience and job function align with the company's short and long term strategic goals, organizational behavior and mission.

I am a Number-Cruncher
Whether it be chemistry or business, I am the type of person who loves to analyze and look at numbers and data to make meaning out of it.

My Career Path
When I was young my mother died of lung cancer. For me this was a moment that would shape my life and my career. I wanted to do something to help find cures for disease. I set a goal to get a Ph.D. and become a scientist. I achieved that goal and even ended up working at the National Cancer Institute. Reach for something you really want and chances are you may get there.

After the Ph.D.: The Jump to Biotechnology
When I graduated from Michigan State University I went in to biotechnology, as it sounded like an interesting new field with great opportunities.

I lived in Maryland and worked in R&D for 7 years before returning to Illinois to pursue a career in teaching. I taught undergraduate chemistry for 2-3 years at local colleges until I met my husband and got married. What I gained from teaching was feeling comfortable in front of a group of people and fine tuning the way I communicate information.

The Importance of Marketing
In 2007 I decided to go back to the life of a chemist in the lab. What I learned from my job in back then was the importance of marketing and how a company is run. Marketing was everything to that company, and I wanted to learn more about it so that I could make a contribution.

An MBA to Broaden Skills
In 2008 I decided to start an MBA program. I had started doing some consulting work. I wanted to learn more about business, entrepreneurship and how to write a business plan.

When I started at DePaul I was interested in Venture Capital. I chose DePaul because of the price, reputation of the school and the variety of campuses and coursework. For me the subjects that came easier were business statistics, internet marketing, writing business plans and organizational behavior skills.

What are the Transitional Careers?
There are several books available that discuss careers for transitioners. I tried science and medical writing prior to starting an MBA. I tried to get in to technical sales - right around when the recession hit. At that time I got interested in green and sustainability careers.

Part of transitioning involves considering your core skills - who you are - that transcend boundaries. When thinking about career, I think about my industry background, mostly biotech and biopharma, and also my functional role, number cruncher and analyst. After you consider your core transferable skills then you look for the language you need to convey the skills.

The Job Search Now
Now my main interest is internet marketing, market research, analyst position and still a technical sales role. I have learned a lot about human behavior and the 'probability of a click' from Google AdWords. These analytical skills will help me in my job search. As I heard in a recent presentation at DePaul, "You only have so much time and energy. You have to put it to good use."

Targeting and segmenting the job search and assigning numbers to the chance you'll get a job is a good skill to have. I am starting to develop a system to help me organize and prioritize how I spend my time. It helps when speaking to recruiters to get an idea of the per cent goodness of fit you have for a job. Tracking those job titles and goodness of fit will help you manage your time.

About to Graduate
I am on the edge of graduating. I have started looking for a job after having taken a job search vacation in 2010. After noticing that my writing skills have gone downhill from lack of use, I've decided to start this blog up and dedicate it to my career search and researching companies, job functions, job search strategies and skills and industries. I will be graduating in June. Let's wish all the job seekers out there good luck in 2011. May we all find the appropriate job!

AdSense and AdWords Synergy

2010-07-30T06:05:00.000-07:00

I just received a postcard from Google AdSense. Actually made money! $31.37

Our internet marketing class participate in the GOMC and received $200. It seems that in May AdSense on that site (and maybe some blogs) made about $25 back.

So it seems that if you put AdSense on the websites you run AdWords accounts on actually will give you back about 10% or some fraction of the money you spend on AdWords.

Experimenting with Google AdWords

2010-07-08T21:35:00.000-07:00

After receiving $150 in coupons from Google Adwords I decided to run a campaign today. It was easier than I thought to set up the initial campaign. My website is www.welldash.com, a website for wellness awareness and applications.

I chose the pages that I wanted to focus on as the landing pages.

wellness
depression
qigong
support groups
sleep

I wrote up my ads and selected the keywords. My campaign is called "Building Awareness." One mistake I made was to lump the Ads in one campaign and not divide them up in to groups. To fix this I went back to the home tab of Adwords and clicked on campaign. I divided the ads into 5 groups with appropriate AdWords for each.

I have started at $5 a day with <$0.60 CPC.

I set the landing page of each ad in the ad itself. Initially I had set everything to go to the index page but I went back and set the ads and keywords to go to the invidual 5 pages listed above.

Up to now the qigong page is the best performing page at 1% CTR.

2010-06-23T06:31:00.000-07:00

The Learning Curve

The summer I have decided to to some internet marketing and web development independent study. I am reading up on javascript and studying Twitter for the most part.

Direct Tweets
To direct tweet there must be a mutual follow and not a one way follow. The Twitter help section clarified that for me.

Deleting Tweets?
Recently I made a tweet where the URL shorted version seemed to be malfunctioning. I was using Hootsuite. It is possible that the fault lies with Hootsuite. If you use Twitter or LinkedIn you may see a Tweet with bit.ly or ow.ly. For example http://ow.ly/21SQq is the short URL I made in Hootsuite that seems to go nowhere.

My solution was to Tweet out again the entire URL. This experience has caused me to think about what Twitter application I am using to send out messages and that it is important to test the URL shortener before tweeting out.

MKT595 Week 9

2010-05-26T08:02:00.000-07:00

Disclaimers, Privacy Policy and Terms of Use

Given all of the news about privacy on Facebook, it seems that any website should be concerned about privacy policies, if the users are storing data on the website.

In the course of designing my website, WellDash, I have added a disclaimer in the footer area on each page.

"WellDash content is for educational purposes only. WellDash and its contributors cannot be held liable for any damages incurred by following any of the advice found on this website. Copyright © 2010 WellDash"

WellDash gives information and advice on wellness. I was wondering what type of disclaimer I should use. I consulted with a professor at DePaul. He said that a simple disclaimer is sufficient for now, but as the site grows the disclaimer should be revised and additional documents added.

In the case of an initial privacy policy, disclaimer and terms of use to start with, simple is better. More complicated online documents should be written under the advice of a lawyer.

Copyright
The image on this blog is taken from a stock.xchng, a website that provides free images. For the legal reasons we discussed in class it is better to have your own images or ones that are free.

Using PowerPoint Images and SmartArt on a Website?
One of the questions I have about copyright is, are the images and SmartArt that a user creates in PowerPoint copyrighted by Microsoft? Is it ok to use those on a website? It would seem to me that if the product was purchased by the user then the images are ok to use.

Week 8 MKT 595

2010-05-18T06:16:00.000-07:00

Creating New Social Networks
Diaspora: "Four Nerds and a Cry to Arms Against Facebook"

Who will rise up against the addiction that is Facebook and Farmville? Diaspora. I recently read an article in the NYTimes about a group of students creating a private social network.

The central theme of Diaspora is:
"to distribute the software free, and to make the code openly available so that other programmers can build on it. As they describe it, the Diaspora* software will let users set up their own personal servers, called seeds, create their own hubs and fully control the information they share. "

Why the name Diaspora? Diaspora refers to a tribe or community with common identity that are displaced refugees. It is an interesting, unique name that is very appropriate. The image of a mature dandelion loosing its seeds is also appropriate. Looks like the domain name is up for sale (diaspora.com and .org).

The difference between Diaspora and Facebook is a decentralized model where users and not a "central deity" control information. It is a bit like Ning but open source and free. (Yes Ning will be charging $3/month shortly).

Younger People are More Aware of Privacy
"Once you give away information it is no longer yours...but sharing is a human value...sharing and privacy are not mutually exclusive" -Diaspora

Wow, They Raised a lot of Money!
Looks like they Have a Market. Diaspora raised the money online on a website called Kickstarter. To date they have raised $108,304, well over the $10,000 they initially requested.

Keeping Up With Your Customers Via Internet Channels

Given the plethora of channels available it seems a challenge to be everywhere all the time unless you have help.

RatePoint
RatePoint is a company started by the founders of Geotrust, which was purchased by Verisign. The target market for RatePoint is small businesses. Given the economic environment, there are many entrepreneurs that will go for this type of company. When you sign up for RatePoint you get a free subscription for a month or two. During that time expect to receive phone call(s) from a salesperson with a guided tutorial on how to use RatePoint. Since RatePoint collects phone numbers, a call from them is not unsolicited. The salesperson will also ask if you will sign up for paid subscription.

The advantages of RatePoint are:

lower price
newsletters
keeping your customers separate from your other accounts on Twitter, Facebook and email.
marketing campaigns via email, Twitter and Facebook
surveys
business and product reviews

Ratepoint is advertising like crazy. If you sign up for the free subscription like I did be prepared to see adverts wherever you are on the Internet.

MKT595 Week 7 - Data Growth Explosion: Video is the Next Wave

2010-05-12T06:34:00.000-07:00

Data Growth During the Recession
Despite the fact that we are in a recession, data is growing at 70%, according to news from the EMC World Conference currently being held in Boston. The title of this year's conference, "The Journey to the Private Cloud Starts Now."

Digital Universe
EMC calls the total amount of information the digital universe. Amazingly enough, only 5% of data comes from data centers, 35% comes from enterprise and

"About 70 percent of the digital universe is created by individuals, although companies are responsible for the security, privacy, reliability and compliance of 85 percent of that data, the study said."

Video As the Next Wave of Communication & Expression
My inside source tells me that the explosion of video sharing will be the next wave of social interaction. Not too surprising. It seems that I myself am going this way. In building my website I have come to realize that a video will draw in more website traffic. But optimizing video for SEO is not actually that easy. A holistic approach toward quality and best practices are still important for getting a top You Tube hit.

Just Flip It
I am considering buying a flip video camera. I guess all of the advertising on the CTA blue line coming to and from classes at DePaul has finally worn off on me. Once I get enough videos I'll be needing to buy some data storage from Carbonite.

Carbonite
How much cooler can you get than a company called Carbonite? The name carbonite comes from the material that Han Solo was frozen in Star Wars (see image above). I am sure that this dates me, but Han Solo was hotter than Luke Skywalker. Carbonite is a startup company - the "Symantec of Online Backup." This company is doing so well that they just want to go public next year. It is one to watch.

MKT 595 Week 6

2010-05-04T19:23:00.001-07:00

Internet Business Models, Retail, Channels, CRM and Advertising

Advertising Alone is Not Enough
The one concept that I will remember from class this week is: advertising alone is not enough revenue to run an Internet business.

Advertising as the Sole Source of Revenue is Risky
A heat map shows that Internet users avoid areas of a website where there is advertising.

The image on the left shows the triangle hot spot where readers look. Actually there is a very small zone on the top right where some readers look as well in this example.

Adblock Used to Erase Advertising
Companies should be careful on how to retaliate, as they may alienate or loose customers by trying to fight Adblock

Fremium is Not the Only Model
Until this week I thought that fremium was the only model. There are lots to choose from.

How Much is Aggregate Data Worth? Where Do You Sell it?
I wanted to learn more about selling aggregate data. The latest controversy seems to be the fact that Mint (infomediary model) wants to sell user data. I think they need to make money somehow. I did a search on the topic of selling aggregate data and did not find much information.

How Do You Know Which Model is Right for Your Business? When to Change the Model?
This is really the golden question. Up to this point in my education at DePaul none of my professors have spoken about business models. How a company makes money and continues to do so is pretty important.

Home Grown Chitown Internet Biz
I follow what SitterCity and Groupon, two local companies are doing. SitterCity is based on a subscription model. SitterCity screens nannies and has also expanded out in to other related areas like elder care. Because they have a smaller market their recent strategy has been to go after a government contract and to consider international markets.

Groupon is an idea that appeals to a wider audience, "group coupons" and has been copied like crazy. Based on a novel idea of building collective action, users will receive a coupon if they get friends to sign up for the daily deal. The CEO of Groupon spoke for MGT570, and I must say that I found it very inspiring to listen to someone who grew a company out of thin air to 200 employees in only three years and receive venture capital worth 26M.

Groupon works on a brokerage model, bringing together companies who want to advertise a promotion and customers who want a deal.

As you can see neither Sitter City nor Groupon use advertising as a revenue stream.

CRM is More Than Software
CRM has three levels that span from the back to the front of the office: operational, collaborative and analytical CRM

Last but not least, the most important topic this week by far:

- plain text
- faces
- cleavage

are three ways to attract desire!

Week 4 BIng and More on Search

2010-05-02T19:42:00.002-07:00

Time to Reflect
After taking our midterm last week, I decided to review today what we had done two weeks ago. Attempting to open the video from class resulted in a really long upload time.

Microsoft Bing
We had two guest speakers in class from Microsoft Adam Scott and Jeremy Lamothe. One thing I remember is that market share for Bing is growing - Bing now owns 30% of the market and is growing faster than Google or Yahoo.

Google Losing Their Edge?
With the recent happenings in China with Baidu it seems it has shaken Google's reputation. Recently discussions at the dinner table tend to drift in the direction of - is Google on a downward spiral?

I have noticed lately that some searches I do on Google lately come up with very poor results (ex. what causes a migraine). Using my own personal judgment gives me better results. I did a search recently on a health related topic where the number one hit was really inaccurate and nothing on the first page answered the search box question I was asking.

I do think that Google does spread itself a bit thin on the number of product lines they offer, considering that advertising is the revenue stream. It seems like they will need to start trimming some fat and eliminating extraneous products to focus on their core.

Advice for GOMC
Adam and Jeremy had some great advice for our teams for GOMC. Broad word matches bring in more traffic. The more keywords you ad on may make things too specific and may reach too small of an audience.

Other things we learned from Adam and Jeremy:

you cannot bid on branded keywords or other trademark words.
dayparting - advertise on Monday and Tuesday pull back on the weekend
think about the time of day you advertise
landing page demographics
use 20-30 words at the most in a campaign of $200
keyword matching options

More on Search
Topics discussed in the remainder of class were:

website content above the fold
organic vs. paid search
searching "click here" will bring you to Adobe.com
each webpage should have only one main idea

Best Practices - just a few of many

use breadcrumbs
three click rule
spell check your website
use short paragraphs
active language,
bullets
custom 404 page
linkbait & many links to your website
meta tags
robots.txt
avoid Flash and pdf

How to Make Money on Your Website and Mobile App

2010-04-28T21:52:00.001-07:00

What is the Best Way to Make eMoney?

If a company has a decision between website or mobile app, what is the best way to earn money? What is the best strategy?

Website
Depending on the business it seems that advertising or a paid subscription is the best way to go. It seems that using Google Adsense you can earn up to $1500 a day or $10,000 a month. Webrevenue.org is a great website for learning more about this topic.

Build Traffic
To make money you have to first build traffic. Webrevenue states that the following factors help.

social site
connect to other sites
study the"repeat visitors" to the site
study stats using sites like Quantcast

Webrevenue has an interesting formula:

(Regular Monthly Visitors + (Regular Monthly Visitors * Rate of Growth)) = Next Month’s Visitors.

The author seems to say that a site will do well depending on how much effort you put in to the content.

Business Models
A list of ecommerce business models can be found on DigitalEnterprise.

Wired also features a great article on business models with a breakdown of how many business use each type of model. The majority, 34% uses advertising.

Mobile Apps
Mobitech states:
""In mature markets, the mobile Web, along with associated Web adaptation tools, will be a leading technology for B2C mobile applications through 2012, and should be part of every organization's B2C technology portfolio." (Gartner, 2010)"

Given the disadvantages listed for the iPhone, the startup cost, and the 30/70 split of revenue, developing a mobile app does not seem worth the cost unless you have money to burn. That is the impression I get from Mobitech.

On the flip side TechCrunch states that top iPhone apps can make $400-5000 a day. There is also less competition in the free apps area.

Selling Aggregate Data
Selling anonymous aggregate data is one way to make money. CloudAve discusses the controversy over Mint.com selling aggregate financial data. Besides the Mint.com discussion I was not able to find much information about selling aggregate data, which would imply it is hard to do or not as common.

How to Create a Template in Dreamweaver Video

2010-04-20T10:50:00.001-07:00

I just made my first You Tube video. Next time I will try Camstudios.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bggHd7RICzI

Week 3 GOMC Team Formation & What Search Is

2010-04-15T20:37:00.000-07:00

Marketing Sharpshooters Team Formation
This week we formed our teams for the Google Online Marketing Challenge. Our team name is Marketing Sharpshooters. We completed the following tasks:

Selected the business.
Got agreement from the business that it was ok to use their website.
Sent an email confirming the team.
Created a Google AdWords account.

The part that confused me was the statement that any campaigns created should be paused. Since we had not started any campaigns I assume they did not need to be paused. The help menu on Google AdWord explained how to pause a campaign.

We registered our team and entered our customer ID into the GOMC page. Now we wait for the $200 in AdWords.

Search
We discussed how searches are made in class this week. After you create a business website it is important to list in a directory. This helps the search to find what industry you are in. DMOZ is an open directory and the first place to index your page.

How Search Reads Your Site: Lynx, Browser for the Blind
One item that was of interest was the Lynx browser for the blind. Lynx only reads text and simulates which a search engine will see when it looks at your site. Since search engines look for words this is very helpful. I found it more user friendly to use a Lynx viewer. at the bottom of the HTML code I inserted a delorie.gif image so that the viewer could read my site. It was really neat to see the results. I have known one blind person in my life and wanted to volunteer at RFB&D.

Number of Links
The most interesting thing about search is that after 200-500 links to external pages the search engine optimization (SEO) will not pay attention to. Choosing which sites you anchor to is important.

Strategy of Choosing Words

When bidding on words the price of the word is not the only consideration, but also the quality

Ad rank = CPC bid x quality score

an expensive word does not mean your ad will be placed for sure, it also relies on how clickable your ad is. Adwords is like a word auction. You can place your bet but you want to make sure you have got a high quality website to sell.

Some Google Ads have images, which I imagine could boost the quality score.

Week 2 Analytics and KPIs

2010-04-08T18:36:00.000-07:00

One area of internet marketing that I find the most interesting is analytics. Coming from a scientific background, I like to measure and look at statistics. I like to fit data to models. Learning about how website hits are counted and miscounted by under- and over-representing the data is interesting.

I started looking at websites three months ago with Alexa, an Amazon owned company, and graduated to using Quantcast, which I find much more specific. We discussed these in class this week. Tt was interesting to hear that Alexa is less accurate. I have a friend who works for SPSS, a statistics company involved in this area. SPSS was recently bought out by IBM. He works in the area of telephony. I am interested in asking my friend if he can predict an outbreak of flu.

KPIs, key performance indicators, tell you how many people you convert to customers. If I invited 100 people to view my site and 30 people visited but only 5 people joined that tells you the conversion rate.

It was interesting to hear that webmasters tend to be males of a certain age.

One new word I learned was meme. A meme is a viral idea like a story that becomes part of the culture and has an almost cult-like following. Apparently the kid who smashed the iPad is trying to reach meme status.

One of the new places I've started exploring on the internet is Quibblo. By the looks of it this could be one of the new places that young people hang out to escape the grandmas on Facebook (for me everyone new that wants to be my friend is an older relative). I created a quiz and one of the last questions was,"Do you want to attend a Taylor Swift concert?"

Some interesting articles on teenagers and social media can be found. I want to follow what teens do because I know that they'll find something interesting and hopefully it is more cool than smashing an iPad:

What I learned this week is the growth rate of Twitter. I had attempted to use Twitter a while ago but did not understand it. After hearing Amber Mac's talk I understood that using Twitter takes time. I've started using Twitter again. This time with a different approach. I still wonder how they make money.

I don't have to read all the tweets. It is not email.
I will follow "famous" people and websites and blogs first.

So far I've found that as I follow people the number of people who follow me grows. What is cool is that I get to see people like Rick Bayless show the dishes he plans to serve at Frontera Grill before it happens. And maybe it isn't him that does the posting (it seems like it is) but it makes you feel more connected on a direct level and feel the "pulse" of what is happening out there. To get started I recommend Tweet Top.

Week 1 Internet and Interactive Marketing

2010-04-04T20:07:00.000-07:00

Interesting technical topics that expanded my horizons of internet marketing this week included:

1) Flash is not supported by the iPhone or any touch device

2) PHP is used instead of HTML for dynamic websites

3) Drupal can be used to allow anyone to have access to modify your website

4) the more external links you have to your website the more probable that Google’s SEO might find your webpage.

The topic of Flash has also come up in my web development class at Harper College. Flash on a website may limit the number of people who can view your site. If the user has to download an application they might move on to where they can get the information faster.

Interested in learning more, I did a search on what might replace Flash and found “The Future of Web Content – HTML5, Flash & Mobile Apps.”

One shift in the technical environment is that the number of mobile device platforms has increased. Flash covers 75% of the market share for online video but has we know the iPhone does not support it. This means that approximately 10M people cannot view flash on their iPhone. Politics, audience bias and not technical issue drive the battle between Apple, Google and Adobe. Each company has their favorites. One of the potential replacements for Flash is HTML5, which seems to align well with Google. HTML5 would allow a common video format.

Functionality of HTML5 and customer reach will depend on the browser you use. As we saw in class, the market share covered by each browser is constantly changing. However, part of the problem with removing Flash is that it is embedded in the infrastructure of many websites. It is like changing from oil to biofuels. It takes time to build a new distribution system. But ultimately it will boil to what the customer wants. The answer, in reality, may not be black and white but shades of gray.

In addition to the lecture portion of the class, I learned from one of my classmates that most companies do not make their website accessible to users with disabilities. It is an unwanted added cost of development. Perhaps this is the difference between academia and the working world. If the market share of customers with disabilities were large enough, I am sure the website would be accessible. The common theme seems to be that technology and marketing must go hand in hand, determining the target customer is important, as it determines what channels you will use to reach them. Investigating customer behavior first may heavily influence the type of technology you use.

Green NPV outweighs Finance NPV: Water Efficient Toilet Replacing Decision

2009-11-13T03:39:00.000-08:00

My first finance course has given me to power to make decisions based on facts. During the time of recession that we are in, many of us are doing home upgrades. To convince my husband to upgrade our toilets I've planned to impress him with this NPV calculation (he loves finance). When we make our choices, increasingly we are including green in the picture. What I have learned about finance has given me the synergistic power of quantifying a green decision. In finance you learn about Net Present Value or NPV. NPV gives you the power to make a financial decision based on the future cash flow. If NPV is positive you will make money and you choose the decision. If it is negative you do not pick it. We can apply this financial principle to carbon flow as well. What do I mean by carbon flow? I mean the carbon inflow and outflow required to produce and distribute any product or service.

When you consider any decision you should also consider not only the financial NPV but NPV of carbon flows or the life cycle analysis, LCA flows. Expressed in an equation total NPV = NPVfinancial + NPVcarbon. One example I will give you is, the decision to replace all the toilets in your house with water efficient toilets.
If we look at the LCA flow of the old and new toilets we have:

NPVLCA = benefit for years – cost in the first year

If this is positive we replace the toilet depending on the financial reasons

= increased water efficiency – (energy required to make the ceramic toilet + transportation of toilet)

It is assumed that ceramic would be an approximation for cement and that an average toilet weighs 75 pounds. Water savings would be 68%. The average household uses 238 gallons of water per day[6] or 87,000 a year. Savings would be 59,000 gallons of water. How much carbon or energy does it take to make 59,000 gallons? The amount of carbon saved is per 80,000 year. One question I have is what to use for the discount rate and over how many years? We can assume forever. The discount rate would be equal to the rate that carbon emissions are increasing each year, which is currently 2.5%[9], oddly enough approaching about the same rate of inflation.

Because carbon is the universal metric we convert all quantities back to NPVcarbon
NPVLCA = NPVcarbon = carbon factor H20 – carbon factor ceramic + carbon factor transportation

NPV(year 1)= 80,000 tons saved every year - [(1 t C/t cement)(0.034) + 3 ton C/ton gasoline]yr 1

= (80,000/0.025) – 3.034 = 2.4 million tons carbon

2.4 million tons of carbon can be saved by replacing one toilet that is more water efficient over the lifetime of the toilet.

The financial NPV is
NPVfinancial= benefit – cost

= savings on water bill forever– cost to replace toilet

= (25/0.03)-(500) = 833 – 500 = 333

If you saved $25 a year by changing the toilet the benefit outweighs the cost in NPV terms by $333.

Looking at the combined effect of financial and carbon flows, overwhelming the answer to replacing your toilet with a water efficient toilet is a resounding yes for greens all around.

One thing to note about this calculation is how easy the financial NPV is to calculate, but how much more complex a carbon NPV is to determine. Many assumptions and approximations might have to be made. What is powerful about this calculation is that the environmental effect of replacing one toilet has such a huge impact relative to the financial impact.

1. http://www.survivalinsight.com/reduce-water-bill-costs.html
2. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=1006032214497
3. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B873D-4P9MYFN-BK/2/c58323fdf4cbc244856fe80c96447f44
4. http://www.ghgprotocol.org/downloads/calcs/co2-mobile.pdf
5. http://www.crd.bc.ca/water/conservation/household/indoorsavingtips.htm
6. http://www.greenbuildingsupply.com/Public/Energy-WaterConservation/WatersavingToilets/CaromaDualFlushToilet/index.cfm
7. http://www.epa.gov/waterinfrastructure/bettermanagement_energy.html#basicone
8. http://www.epa.gov/watersense/
9. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061130190831.htm
10. http://www.greenandsave.com/remodeling/bathrooms/water_efficient_toilets.html

On Crossing Over From Science to Business

2009-11-05T08:07:00.000-08:00

I am half way finished with an MBA at DePaul, and the question of what ares of science/chemistry are most similar to business is becoming clearer. I've all but finished my required courses, and I'm down to the six electives and the one or two concentrations that I've chosen. I've chosen finance as my concentration and most likely entrepreneurship, but I'm still intrigued by marketing.

What makes the decision hard is that I am uncertain what part of my past life as a scientist will lead me to a future in the business world. In the past it has always been technical skills that got me a job and not so much my people connections. The challenge I find is in marketing myself and breaking away from the scientist stereotype - something that I would like to make my strength and not my weakness (people tend to see me as only a scientist). My short term goal is to transition to marketing or operations management in the biotechnology or pharmaceutical industry where I have the most experience.

I've taken accounting, business statistics, organizational behavior, economics, management of information systems, operations management and now finance and marketing. The classes I find more reminiscent of "chemistry skills" are finance, marketing and operations management.

I'll first describe the disciplines of chemistry and then follow up with business and how they are related. In chemistry there are the basic disciplines of general, organic, analytical, physical and inorganic chemistry. Generally, the most jobs in industry go to organic and analytical chemistry. Organic chemistry has to do with the study of chemical reactions of compounds consisting mostly of carbon and hydrogen. If you are a strategic thinker and can apply rules, you'll be good at organic chemistry. It also has a lot to do with geometry and shape. Inorganic chemistry has many parallels as well with organic, but the chemical compounds contain a metal. Analytical and physical chemistry have more to do with analyzing and fitting chemical behavior to models. Quantifying and predicting are important. Building equipment and writing computer code can also come in to play.

Of the business courses I've taken I would divide them in to organizing/categorizing/efficiency, forecasting/predicting, organizing people/communication skills, analyzing/quantifying/research

Functional Skill	Business	Chemistry
organizing/categorizing/efficiency	Accounting, Ops Management	Organic, rxn type, % yield
forecasting/predicting	Economics, Finance	Physical
organizing people/communication	Organizational Behavior, HR	N/A
analyzing/quantifying/research	Finance, Marketing	Analytical, Physical Research applies to all

A person can over analyze decision making when it comes to careers. What it really boils down to is are you passionate and motivated about the path you've chosen. If you have these elements when you inevitably hit a stumbling block, you can keep going. If we could all forecast the future then that would be boring. For me, I'll be gathering information until the very last minute and then make the best choice possible.