Implementation – Page 3 – Go Lean…Caribbean

Category: Implementation

Continuity of Business: Learning from Instagram’s system failures

Posted on May 23, 2019 in Implementation, Industries, Planning

Go Lean Commentary

Spent time on Social Media lately? It’s all the rage!

Most Social Media sites – think: Twitter, Facebook and Instagram – allow consumer accounts for free. Their business model is to sell “eye balls”, advertisements based on a large (and growing) viewing audience. The goal of this business model is to fulfill the promise of being connected with friends (physical and virtual); following the sun … with 24-7-365 coverage.

(This writer, while living in North America, has actual friends on Facebook who live and work in India and Pakistan).

According to a previous blog-commentary, Continuity of Business (CoB) is the simple concept to ensure that if there are any extraordinary events – i.e. emergencies and natural disasters – that the tools and techniques are in place to pick-up and continue for business-as-usual. This is important for these Social Media business models.

For these sites, if the promise of 24-7-365 is broken, then it is Big News. See the example here of the recent incident with Instagram and the related VIDEO (of an earlier outage in March):

Title: Instagram back online after a worldwide outage left irritated users complaining of being unable to load pictures on the site

The issue focused around new content on the site not loading correctly

It appeared that existing and older content could still be seen and viewed

The latest stories were also unable to be found or seen by users on the app

By: Joe Pinkstone For Mailonline

Instagram crashed for some users around the world, with people complaining they were unable to load new pictures on the app.

Reports have now stopped coming in and it appears to be resolved, but there is no official word from the Facebook-owned site.

The home page was displaying older pictures but new content failed to appear, at least for some users.

The problem stretched to stories as well, although older stories could still be loaded and viewed.

The reason behind the issue remains unknown but the outage started around 3:37pm BST.

Affected areas included Europe, Australia, South America and the mainland US and a smattering of users complained of login and website trouble (seven and five per cent of complaints, respectively).

But the primary issue appeared to be with the news feed as 86 per cent of all issues centered around the lack of content loading, according to outage site “downdetector“.

This was the second outage of the last 24 hours for Instagram as a spike in user complaints was also seen around 8pm BST yesterday.

It comes exactly a month after the Mark Zuckerberg empire of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp was struck by a huge outage.

Facebook and Instagram were forced to apologise after users at this time were unable to load the sites and were faced with a ‘can’t be reached’ message for four hours.

Whatsapp, owned by Facebook, also suffered a four hour outage for some users internationally.

Downdetector.co.uk reported over 7,700 complaints that Facebook was down in the UK.

MailOnline has approached Instagram for comment.

Source: Published May 14, 2019 Retrieved May 23, 2019 from: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-7028163/Instagram-CRASHED-people-world.html

———-

VIDEO – Facebook was down for hours on Wednesday, including Instagram and Messenger – https://youtu.be/36z5hMH-2qk

CBS News
Published on Mar 13, 2019 – Facebook was partially down in the United States on Wednesday. In many cases, the platform wasn’t working at all. BBC News’ Dave Lee reports from San Francisco.

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Category: News & Politics

There is a plan for a home-grown Social Media site for the Caribbean, my.Caribbean.gov. This is embedded in the book Go Lean…Caribbean, which serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). There will be the need to employ our own CoB strategies, tactics and implementations to ensure 24-7-365 compliance. This means learning lessons from other sites like Facebook and Instagram; (same company by the way). Our CoB plans must be “Step One, Day One” in the Go Lean roadmap.

The Go Lean book features one advocacy (Page 111) for fostering Social Media sites in the Caribbean. That advocacy is entitled: “10 Ways to Impact Social Media“. These “10 Ways” include the following highlights, headlines and excerpts:

1	*Lean-in for the Caribbean Single Market* – Ratify treaty for the CU.** This treaty allows for the unification of the region into one market, thereby expanding to an economy of 30 countries, 42 million people and GDP of over $800 Billion (circa 2010), thereby creating the economies of scale to deploy technology investments such as web portal www.myCaribbean.gov and e-Deliveries. The portal will grant free access, email, IM, and profile pages for CU stakeholders (resident, visitor & Diaspora). The CU will also facilitate deployments of Libraries through out the region. These edifices will serve as learning centers and arrange for the public’s access to the Internet.
2	CU Social Media Home Pages – Facebook & Twitter The CU will use Facebook (FB) & Twitter for normalized communications with stakeholders. The CU will feature its own channel on Facebook and Twitter for publishing notices and accessing the www.myCaribbean.gov portal. CU users can even log-on to the portal with FB or Twitter user profiles. Trending data will be published and available for data-mining.
3	Hi Density Wi-Fi & Mobile
4	Diaspora Marketing & Tourism Outreach
5	CU Asian Outreach
6	Contact Center for e-Government Services
7	Contact Center for Tech Support
8	Reverse-911 Messaging
9	Postal Union Interface The accedence of the CU will transfer jurisdiction of the region’s postal efforts to the Caribbean Postal Union. The CPU will employ hybrid e-mail/postal mail schemes (Last-leg, First-leg, FB/Twitter delivery notification) to facilitate efficiency.
10	Big Data Informatics

Internet & Communication Technologies are regarded as the “great equalizer”; it is where small states and large states are able to easily compete on the basis of merit, talent and competence, not just population size. The theme of doubling-down on the ICT & ‘Social Media’ landscape has been detailed in many previous Go Lean commentaries; consider this sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15075	e-Government 3.0 – Improved governance is the first benefactor of ICT & Social Media
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11453	Location Matters – For location of Data Centers – even in a Virtual World
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9839	Alibaba Cloud stretches global reach with four new Data Center facilities
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8823	Lessons from China – WeChat: Model for Caribbean Social Media
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4381	Net Neutrality and the innovation culture – It must matter here in the Caribbean

The Caribbean’s Social Media offering is just a subset of the overall Electronic Commerce (e-Commerce) landscape. This can lower the cost of living and doing business in the homeland. In order to furnish the prospects of e-Commerce, we need to have our Caribbean Cloud enabled all the time, the whole 24-7-365.

Will we suffer from the periodic outages as Instagram just reported?

The Go Lean roadmap prepared for this eventuality with its Data Center “Arts & Sciences”; notice this excerpt from Page 106:

High Availability (HA)
HA is a system design approach (hardware, software and networking) that ensures operational performance will be met, like parallel processing or mirroring. There are systems (i.e. hospitals, banking, electrical grid) that must maximize availability and minimize downtime. Recovery time or estimated time of repair is closely related to availability, optimizing the time to recover from planned or unplanned outages.
A CU mission is to facilitate quick recoveries after hurricanes [and other disasters].

ICT, Social Media and e-Commerce are positioned to impact Caribbean communities. Compared to our status quo, we must be better than the examples in the foregoing stories; we must sustain our systems and processes. This is how we will be a better homeland to live, work and play. 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

———

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Disaster, e-Commerce, Model

Way Forward – For Energy: ‘Trade’ Winds

Posted on April 21, 2019 in Implementation, Locations, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

While the Caribbean is among the best addresses on the planet, it is among the most expensive energy-wise.

So what is the Way Forward for optimizing our energy infrastructure?

While we need to look forward, we also need to look backwards. This was the assertion of the 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean, which advocates for the installation and deployment of a regional power grid heavily dependent on wind energy. The book states (Page 113):

The Bottom Line on Alternative Energy
The economic history of the Caribbean featured wind power on the merchant sail ships to and from Europe and the African continent during the Slave Trade. Now 250 years later, wind is a source of economic energy once again – this time to power wind turbines to generate electricity for power grids. The winds are so consistent for portions of the Caribbean that the eastern island chain is branded the Windward Islands.

The region also has two other sources for alternative energy: solar and tidal. There is no plan to build or use nuclear energy, beyond any existing facilities. After the Fukushima incident in Japan, March 2011, the economic impact of nuclear is too negative – tourism may be impacted.

The Go Lean book relates a vision of transforming to 100% renewable energy in the Caribbean, asserting that this could bring the energy cost down from one of the highest in the world to one of the lowest. The book continues:

The … installation of a multi-national/regional power grid [will mean] power-sharing between member-states. The end result being lower costs (from $.35/kWh to $.088), lower pollution and less imports of foreign oil – granting energy independence.

This is not just a theoretical plan. No, there are glimpses of this strategy already in motion – for wind – in the Caribbean and the results-successes are undeniable. See this actuality in this sample news article here:

Title: Wind Farm Saves Jamaica $54M on Oil Imports, Energy Minister Says
By: Oswald T. Brown

April 17, 2019 – Jamaican Energy Minister Fayval Williams said Wigton Windfarm Limited has saved the country’s government over $54 million on oil imports.

The energy minister, speaking Friday at Wigton Windfarm’s Initial Public Offering (IPO) investor briefing at the Montego Bay Convention Centre in Rose Hall, St. James, said the production of clean energy from the facility has enabled the country to avoid the purchase of 800,000 barrels of oil, and the emission of one million tons of carbon dioxide, thereby reducing the country’s carbon footprint, the Jamaica Gleaner reported.

Wigton, located in Rose Hill, South Manchester, is the largest wind energy facility in the English-speaking Caribbean.

The company, which is a subsidiary of the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica (PCJ), began operating in 2004 with the commissioning of a 20.7 megawatt-generating plant, Wigton I.

This was followed by the development of Wigton II in 2010, which generates 18 megawatts of energy. Wigton III, the 24-megawatt expansion of the facility, was officially commissioned into service in June 2016 by Prime Minister Andrew Holness.

Williams commended the company for the progress made since its inception and lauded the IPO as a “bold strategy.”

“I can say that I am truly pleased with the strides that Wigton has made over these years,” she said. “The growth in [renewable energy] globally will undoubtedly bring greater investment opportunities in the future for a company like Wigton and we want Jamaica to be a part of this growing global movement in an even greater way. I believe we have the will and the capacity, and as a government, we are putting the plans in place to ensure that we maximize our renewable energy potential.”

Jamaicans will have the opportunity to purchase shares in Wigton from when the IPO opened on April 17 to its closure on May 1.

Source: Retrieved April 19, 2019 from: https://washingtoninformer.com/wind-farm-saves-jamaica-54m-on-oil-imports-energy-minister-says/

This news article depicts the manifestation of wisdom and best practices – a delivery from the Go Lean book. This is the Way Forward for Energy for the Caribbean region.

This commentary continues the consideration on the Way Forward for the full Caribbean and the individual member-states. This submission here focuses on energy while many others in the series contemplated how the member-states can reform and transform their societies. This is entry 7-of-9 for this April 2019 compilation of commentaries; (the list started as 3, grew dynamically to 6 and will finalized with 9). The full series of commentaries related to the Way Forward is presented as follows:

Way Forward: Puerto Rico learns its “status” with America
Way Forward: Virgin Islands – America’s youngest colony
Way Forward: Bahamas – “Solutions White Paper” – An Inadequate Plan
Way Forward: Jamaica: The need to reconcile the Past
Way Forward: Caribbean Media Strategy & Deliveries
Way Forward: Strategy for Justice: Special Prosecutors et al
———
Way Forward: Strategy for Energy – ‘Trade’ Winds
Way Forward: Strategy for Independence – Territory Realities
Way Forward: “Whatever it takes” – Life Imitating Art

This series posits that “no man is an island” and further that “no island is an island”; so the technocratic deployments for energy – as for other strategies – need the benefits of a leveraged confederacy, as in the Caribbean Union ‘Trade‘ Federation (CU). It is the assertion here that the political Caribbean can elevate society with implementations to harness the trade winds, on the land, at the coast, and in the territorial waters:

Cape Cod Wind Farm, Massachusetts, USA

Trade winds; how ironic!?

Yellow = Westerly Trade Winds

This is the same natural phenomena – Westerlies – that propelled commercial interest in the Caribbean / New World region; with the ease of westerly winds, this actuality can now contribute to sustainable energy deliveries. We need to pay attention to the “colors of the wind” – see Appendix B VIDEO below.

As related in a previous blog-commentary, wind is not the only option for our alternative energy Way Forward. The full universe of alternative options may include hydro-electric – at waterfalls – and geo-thermal at hot-springs and/or geysers – in volcano zones. Coupled with the implementation of a regional grid, these benefits are too attractive to ignore: environmental (no fossil fuels) and economic (affording conveniences of modern life). While only some Caribbean member-states have the natural features to pursue these foregoing options, all of the 30 member states, on the other hand, can ideally take advantage of these options here:

Wind – The wind always blows in the Caribbean – i.e. Trade Winds – and its free.
Solar – The sun always shines in the Caribbean and its free. Some member-states are implementing this option now to great fanfare and great results. See the news story in the Appendix A below.
Tidal – The tides always rise and fall in the Caribbean and its free..

This theme – environmental and economic benefits of alternative energy – aligns with many previous commentaries from the movement behind the book Go Lean…Caribbean; see this sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14832	Counter-culture: Manifesting Change – Environmentalism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13985	EU Assists Barbados in Renewable Energy Self-Sufficiency
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10367	Science of Sustenance – Green Batteries
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7056	Electric Cars – Better energy deliveries solves transportation as well
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5155	Tesla unveils super-battery to power homes from wind & solar options
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4587	Model: Burlington, Vermont, USA – City powered 100% by renewables
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=915	Go ‘Green’ … Caribbean

Basic needs are not just limited to food, clothing and shelter in our modern times. No, energy deliveries must be counted as a basic need too. This is why our Caribbean communities spend so much of their family, community and national budgets on electricity supplies (or oil imports); this accounts to a lot of the economic pie. But the consideration for energy in our region goes beyond economics, there is also the consideration for “standards of care”. Our reality in the Summer heat – think: ‘Hotter than July‘ – is that we need air-conditioning solutions. Otherwise life in the homeland is unbearable.

So our Way Forward for Green Energy solution is for the motivation for economic optimization and environmental impact.

Environmental considerations also include combating Climate Change; this is important for Caribbean stakeholders, as Climate Change is one of the great threats that imperil our lives and livelihoods. Our status quo is that we must be prepared in our disaster planning to ‘Rinse and Repeat’ every hurricane season.

Wind energy is therefore a win-win for the Caribbean; solar too – see Appendix A below. The Caribbean energy needs are undeniable. The effects of fossil-fueled-driven Climate Change are undeniable. Lastly, the need for alternate energy, to lower the costs of living in the Caribbean, is undeniable. We hereby urge all Caribbean stakeholders – citizens, businesses and government leaders – to lean-in to this Go Lean … Caribbean roadmap.

This is how we can make the Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

————

Appendix A – Historic Day on Union Island with electricity produced solely from solar

April 16, 2019 – For the very first time during the day, electricity on Union Island was produced using solely solar photovoltaic (PV) and battery energy storage.

“Today’s historic event is possible after the successful completion of the Union Island Solar PV and Battery Energy Storage project last month. Over the past weeks, we have been testing the system to ensure the process runs smoothly. The Company is pleased with the outcome in this noteworthy project,” a post on VINLEC’s Facebook page said on Tuesday.

“In the near future, the solar PV farm will generate electricity on the island during the day to supply to the grid. We anticipate that on sunny days, the solar plant will generate excess electricity than is required to supply the average daytime load on the island. The excess electricity will be stored in batteries. The expected annual energy output is approximately 32 per cent of the electricity generated in Union Island in 2018.

“VINLEC wishes to express sincerest thanks to the residents of Union Island for their support and understanding during this process,” the post said.

The UAE-CREF Union Island 600KW Solar PV Battery Hybrid Power Plant was officially opened on March 25, 2019. The project was funded under the UAE Caribbean Renewable Energy Fund at a cost of US$3 million and developed in collaboration with VINLEC on behalf of the Government of SVG.

The Solar Power Plant displaces 320,000 litres of diesel fuel per year at savings of EC$500,000.00.

Source: Retrieved April 20, 2019 from: https://searchlight.vc/searchlight/press-release/2019/04/16/historic-day-on-union-island-with-electricity-produced-solely-from-solar/?fbclid=IwAR3E4tyrnqKbveKKZAF0R1bPlglav2rWCkyOZTL1zxv_O9xZfdEOd2tQB9Y

————

Appendix B VIDEO – Pocahontas | Colors of the Wind | Disney Sing-Along – https://youtu.be/O9MvdMqKvpU

Disney
Published on Jul 9, 2016 – Paint with all the colors of the wind for this sing along.

More Disney!
Instagram: http://Instagram.com/Disney
Twitter: http://Twitter.com/Disney
Facebook: http://Facebook.com/Disney
Tumblr: http://disney.tumblr.com/

A Little Disney History: From humble beginnings as a cartoon studio in the 1920s to its preeminent name in the entertainment industry today, Disney proudly continues its legacy of creating world-class stories and experiences for every member of the family.

Category: Entertainment

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Green Energy, Jamaica, SVG, Transform

[Top]

5 Years Later – They can hear you now about the Post Office – ENCORE

Posted on December 15, 2018 in Government, Implementation, Industries

5 years ago, the book Go Lean … Caribbean was introduced; the publication date was November 2013.

The book scanned the landscape in the Caribbean and found a lot of deficiencies in the economics, security and governance in the region. For example, for those 5 years the movement behind the Go Lean book have been telling people that there is an overriding need for a technocratic postal solution in the Caribbean region. This is how to keep up with the demands of globalization.

People – the audience – have only yawned.

Now the Caribbean member-state of The Bahamas has a crisis with their postal facility. The people there should now be ready, willing and able to consider alternatives and improvements to their regional governance.

Title: Wells confirms “undeliverable” mail was shredded
NASSAU, BAHAMAS – Addressing allegations that mail at the General Post Office had been shredded, Minister responsible for the post office, Renward Wells, confirmed on Thursday that the most recent and deliberate destruction of “undeliverable” mail was on November 1 and 2, upon the authorization of the Postmaster General.
…
The Bahamas has membership in the United Postal Union (UPU) and it is therefore required to ensure that delivery of mail among countries follows consistent rules and standards.
…
The General Post Office is in the process of being relocated to the Town Centre Mall in early 2019.

Wells outlined in his statement that the standards of the Post Office will be restored to one that will regain the respect of international partners.

“Postal workers and the Bahamian public have been in excess of three years without an adequate means for providing this essential service,” he said.
…
Source: Posted December 14, 2018; retrieved December 15, 2018 from: https://ewnews.com/wells-confirms-undeliverable-mail-was-shredded

This commentary is the first of a 4-part series from the movement behind the Go Lean book in consideration of the 5 year anniversary of the book’s publication. The theme on these 4 submissions is “5 Years Later and what is the condition now“. The focus here is on the Agents of Change that the book identified: Globalization, Climate Change, Technology and the Aging Diaspora.

Have the problems lessened, or have they intensified? The other commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:

5 Years Later: New Post Office Eco-system – Globalization issues ‘loud and clear’ now.
5 Years Later: Climate Change – Coming so fast, so furious.
5 Years Later: Technology – Caribbean fully on board.
5 Years Later: Aging Diaspora – Finding Home … anywhere.

The Go Lean book was written 5 years ago as a 5 Year Plan to reform and transform the Caribbean region. Had the plan been adopted by the regional stakeholders, then the Agents of Change would have been mostly assuaged. The plan, or roadmap, to introduce and implement the Caribbean Union Trade Federation is still outstanding to even start. We now need to push the leaders – Top Down – and the subjects – Bottoms’s Up – to execute the strategies, tactics and implementation prescribed in this book.

This approach – rebooting the postal eco-system – had been relayed in a previous blog-commentary from January 23, 2018; it is appropriate to Encore that blog-commentary here-now:

——————–

Go Lean Commentary – First Steps – A Powerful C.P.U.

The movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean wants to deploy an “apolitical technocracy” in the Caribbean. What is an apolitical technocracy?

Quite simply, an organizational structure designed to just deliver.

Sounds familiar? Frankly, the Post Office is a powerful example of an apolitical technocracy:

They just deliver the mail …

… “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds”.

(While the Postal Service has no official motto, the popular belief is that these words are tribute to America’s postal workers).

Technocracies are supposed to be automatons, a machine that just chugs-and-chugs. Think computers; think C.P.U.. But in the case of this Go Lean scheme, C.P.U. does not mean Central Processing Unit, no, it means Caribbean Postal Union.

The book Go Lean book – available to download for free – serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Postal Union, for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy and create new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

This commentary is Part 6 of 6-parts; it completes the series from the movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean in consideration of the First Steps for instituting a new regime in governance for the Caribbean homeland. The other commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:

First Steps: EU: Free European Money – To Start at Top
First Steps: UK: Dignified and Efficient
First Steps: US: Congressional Interstate Compact – No Vote; No Voice
First Steps: CariCom: One Man One Vote Defects
First Steps: Deputize ‘Me’!
First Steps: A Powerful C.P.U.

All of these commentaries relate to “how” the Caribbean can finally get started with adapting the organizational structures to optimize the region’s societal engines. Whereas all the previous submissions addressed the need for reform at the Top. This commentary addressed the automation, the technocratic C.P.U.. This is designed to affect every man-woman-child in the Caribbean region, to just deliver. This simple functionality will do wonders for the quest of this roadmap: make the Caribbean member-states better places to live, work and play.

The Go Lean book stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal and postal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xv. Whereas the business of the Federation and the commercial interest in the region cannot prosper without an efficient facilitation of postal services, the Caribbean Union must allow for the integration of the existing mail operations of the governments of the member-states into a consolidated Caribbean Postal Union, allowing for the adoption of best practices and technical advances to deliver foreign/domestic mail in the region.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society. One advocacy in the book is entitled “10 Ways to Improve Mail Service … in the Caribbean Region“; this detailed the best practices for postal mail and logistics; (Page 108). See this Bottom Line introduction:

The Bottom Line for the Caribbean Postal Union
Without a regional hub-and-spoke system, mail from one island to another can take weeks – such a business climate cannot breathe success with this lack of efficiency. The purpose of the CU is to facilitate the economic engines of the region. Therefore postal communications between individuals, households, businesses and governmental institutions must be efficient and effective – establishments must be able to connect with their customers and governments to its constituents. The Caribbean Postal Union (CPU) will operate as a private business, a multi-national corporation, owned by CU member-states, chartered to employ best practices and world class methods in the execution of the fulfillment side of the e-Delivery model. A mark of success: delivery of first-class mail in 3 – 5 days.

Improving the postal mail eco-system in the Caribbean can have a transformative effect on regional society. CPU is mostly an e-Logistics enterprise. Imagine the following (global) trends that wait in the balance:

Imagine a Caribbean reality with flat-rate envelopes and flat-rate boxes. Imagine the automation, the robotic technologies, the scanning and sorting. The brand CPU would really be apropos – more software, e-Commerce and Internet Communications Technology – as opposed to the neighborhood mail-carrier. See this industrial shift in the related news article in the Appendix below. In fact, the company www.Stamps.com provides a model for the CPU to emulate. See this Introductory VIDEO here:

VIDEO – Welcome to Stamps.com, USPS Postage Software Overview – https://youtu.be/wCCAkRkUWE0

Stamps.com

Published on Apr 23, 2013 – Welcome to Stamps.com, USPS Postage Software Overview This video shows new customers how Stamps.com software works. Highlights include how to buy and print postage stamps and shipping labels, e-commerce shipping features, postage spending reports plus many more features.

Category: Howto & Style

License: Standard YouTube License

In addition, previous Go Lean blog-commentaries detailed the width-and-breadth of the mail-logistics business model for the Caribbean; see these prior submissions here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13627	Amazon as a Role Mode: Then and Now
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9839	Alibaba Cloud stretches global reach with four new facilities
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7991	Transformations: Caribbean Postal Union – Delivering the Future
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3187	Amazon Role Model – Robots helping tackle Cyber Monday
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2488	Alibaba – A Chinese Role Model for the C.P.U.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1416	Amazon – An American Role Model for the C.P.U.

Forging change is heavy-lifting for the CU/Go Lean roadmap, but conceivable, believable and achievable? Why because so many other entities have executed these action plans before. We do not need to “re-invent the wheel”; we only need to conform to the published best-practices. This applies to the Caribbean Postal Union and all other societal engines.

Yes, we can succeed in forging change and assuaging the crises in the Caribbean. We have the existing organizations constructs of the CariCom, British Overseas Territories, US Territories and the EU. We can use these to “touch” every country-establishment-person in the region. This will lead to the success of our goals, to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

———–

Appendix Title: Important: USPS making changes to First-Class Mail International Flats

January 21, 2018 Update: Stamps.com has launched a new International Flat service. Get more info on how to ship merchandise with International Flats.

Merchandise No Longer Allowed in First Class Mail International Flats
If you ship merchandise abroad using USPS First Class Mail International Flats, there’s a new rule going into effect soon that you need to know about. Effective Sunday, January 21, 2018, First Class Mail International Large Envelope/Flat service for merchandise will NO LONGER be available from the USPS. First Class Mail International Flats will only be approved for use when sending documents. This change is occurring to comply with Universal Postal Union requirements.

Here are some examples of what USPS considers a document (still OK to ship using First Class Mail International Flats):

Audit and business records
Personal correspondence
Circulars
Pamphlets
Advertisements
Written instruments not intended to be resold
Money orders, checks, and similar items that cannot be negotiated or converted into cash without forgery.

Here are examples of items that will NO LONGER be allowed to be shipped as First Class Mail International Flats, effective Jan. 21, 2018:

CDs, DVDs, flash drives, video and cassette tapes, and other digital and electronic storage media (regardless of whether they are blank or contain electronic documents or other prerecorded media)
Artwork
Collector or antique document items
Books
Periodicals
Printed music
Printed educational or test material
Player piano rolls
Commercial photographs, blueprints and engineering drawings
Film and negatives
X-rays
Separation negatives

These goods are dutiable and must be must be shipped using First Class Package International Service. Once this change goes into effect, shippers will need to include Customs Forms and the recipient could pay a duty or tax to receive the product.

Cost Savings Using First Class Mail International Flats
Moving from First Class Mail International Flats to First Class Package International Service will have a big impact on shippers.

Source: Posted December 26^th, 2017; retrieved January 21, 2018 from: http://blog.stamps.com/2017/12/26/important-usps-making-changes-first-class-mail-international-flats/

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Industrial Reboot – Payment Cards 101

Posted on October 11, 2018 in Economics, Government, Implementation, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

The purpose of any business is to earn a profit.

Profit is good!

We may be more familiar with a parallel version of this expression, as related in a previous blog-commentary:

… greed is good! In this case “greed” is not being defined as excess, but rather the natural desire to possess wealth, goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention to keep it for one’s self. The dreaded excess of “greed”, on the other hand, is a “vice” that must be cautiously monitored and curtailed, i.e. Crony-Capitalism.

When there is an opportunity for profit, people, companies and industries step-in and step-up for the chances to earn. This is the basis for capitalism and other market-based economies. So the profit motive is attached to any industrial landscape. Whenever economic engines become strained and stressed – devoid of profit – the industrial landscape should be revisited and rebooted.

This is the assessment of the Caribbean – our economic engines are in crisis – and this is the intent of the movement behind the book Go Lean…Caribbean – a crisis is a terrible thing to waste . This is why the book opens with a relevant pronouncement in the Declaration of Interdependence (Page 13):

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

There is now the opportunity to transform the industrial landscape of Caribbean communities; we can install controls so as to better manage our economy and industrial landscape. Among the many strategies and tactics discussed by this Go Lean movement, there is this one irresistible prospect of introducing electronic money (e-Money) or Payment Cards through out the region.

So, instead of cash, industrial stakeholders will do most transactions … electronically. This changes everything!

With an e-Money/Payment Cards deployment, there would be so many benefits; consider these possibilities:

Functional – Payroll and Government Benefits can be easily loaded; credit programs can also be added.
Universality – whether its e-Money or Payment Cards, all financial transactions can be executed
Portability – e-Money can be used in Cyberspace and in the real world transactions (merchant POS, ATMs)
Security – Smartchips and PIN options can ensure against unauthorized use.
Resilience – card-to-card transactions can be conducted even with no online connection – think Block-chain.
Risk-aversion – The informal economy and Black Markets are mitigated, thereby fostering tax revenues.
Far-reaching – Benefits outside of the payment transaction; the scheme increases the money supply (M1), which increases available bank capital for community investments.

This is Payment Cards 101. See the exploratory VIDEO in the Appendix below.

The actuality of a country’s universal acceptance of e-Money/Payment Cards is not just academic, it is already in play … in model countries – think India. They, this emerging economy of 1.2 billion people, have rolled out numerous e-Money products for their “rupee” currency. They have learned-lessons – good, bad and ugly – for us to apply in our implementation. This summary was detailed in a previous Go Lean commentary; consider this excerpt:

Excerpt: What the U.S. can learn from India’s move toward a cashless society

Silicon Valley fancies itself the global leader in innovation. Its leaders hype technologies such as bitcoin and blockchain, which some claim are the greatest inventions since the Internet. They are so complex that only a few mathematicians can understand them, and they require massive computing resources to operate — yet billions of dollars are invested in them.

India may have leapfrogged the U.S. technology industry with simple and practical innovations and massive grunt work. It has built a digital infrastructure that will soon process billions more transactions than bitcoin ever has. With this, India will skip two generations of financial technologies and build something as monumental as China’s Great Wall and America’s interstate highways.
…
In 2009, the government launched a massive project, called Aadhar, to solve this problem by providing a digital identity to everyone based on an individual’s fingerprints and retina scans. As of 2016, the program had issued 12-digit identification numbers to 1.1 billion people. This was the largest and most successful I.T. project in the world and created the foundation for a digital economy.
…
And then India launched its Unified Payment Interface (UPI), a way for banks to transfer money directly to one another based on a single identifier, such as the Aadhar number.
…
With a system such as UPI, the billing processor is eliminated, and transaction costs are close to zero. …

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, that the United States should follow Modi’s lead in phasing out currency and moving toward a digital economy, because it would have “benefits that outweigh the cost.” …

Where as India’s e-Money deployment is for their rupee currency, the Caribbean’s plan is to introduce a regional integrated currency branded the Caribbean Dollar (C$). This was the stated intent of the book Go Lean … Caribbean, to serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the aligning Caribbean Central Bank (CCB), the issuer of C$. This Go Lean/CU/CCB roadmap depicts e-Money and Payment Cards as a hallmark of technocratic efficiency, with the agility to manage this deployment. This will affect all aspects of Caribbean society – economics, security and governance. As a currency product, surely it affects the economic engines, but with the ubiquity of a government Payment Card system – the government is the largest employer – the universality of this reboot will have immediate impacted.

This reality fits in with the quest of the Go Lean roadmap, to optimize all societal engines, as stated with these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines ; where there is economic successes, “bad actors” always emerge, so there must be a solution for predictive and reactive mitigations and interdictions.
Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these above engines. This include a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies, including the independent administration of the Caribbean Central Bank.

The Go Lean/CU/CCB roadmap anticipated e-Money and Payment Card schemes. The book detailed strategies as follows:

e-Government – The CU is prescribed as the regional administrator for ICT for the Single Market of 30 states and 42-million people. While the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB) will manage the region’s M1, they will embrace the e-Government mandate, calling for card-based, electronic payment options for all federal transactions and encouraging this mode for state/municipal/private facilitations as well. This means that the Caribbean dollar (C$) will be mostly cashless, an accounting currency much like the first years of the Euro. The CCB will settle all C$ electronic transactions (MasterCard-Visa style or ACH style) and charge interchange/clearance fees. – This scheme is fully defined on Page 198.
Cruise line passengers using smart-chips – the cruise industry needs the Caribbean more than the Caribbean needs the industry. But the cruise lines have embedded rules/regulations designed to maximize their revenues at the expense of the port-side establishments. The CU solution is to deploy a scheme for smartcards (or smart-phone applications) that function on the ships and at the port cities. This scheme will also employ NFC technology – (Near Field Communications; defined fully at Page 193 – so as to glean the additional security benefits of shielding private financial data of the guest and passengers. [This scheme will incentivize more spending among cruise line passengers.] – Defined fully on Page 193.
Electronic Commerce – This holds the promise of “leveling the playing field” so that small merchants can compete against larger merchants. To facilitate e-Commerce, purchased merchandise must get to their destinations as efficiently as possible. The CU’s implementation of the Caribbean Postal Union allows for better logistics for package delivery. – Defined fully on Page 201.
Internet Marketplace / Social Media – The CU‘s web portal, www.myCaribbean.gov, will grant free access, email, IM, and profile pages for CU stakeholders, even normalizing communications thru social media sites. This will facilitate internet commerce activities in the region, as the CU will have hot data on profiles, habits and previous activities, thereby creating opportunities for measured marketing. – Defined fully on Page 198.
Government Benefits / Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) – allows State welfare departments to issue benefits via magnetically encoded payment card, used in the United States and the United Kingdom. Common benefits provided (in the United States) via EBT are typically of two general categories: food and cash benefits. – Defined fully on Page 353.
Unemployment Benefits – The CU‘s mandate for e-Delivery and e-Payment will make the unemployment benefits process more effective and more efficient. Claimants will be able to apply online or on the phone, and payments will be disbursed to debit/payment cards, as opposed to paper checks. (Payments will be in Caribbean dollars, even in Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands). – Defined fully on Page 89.
Remittance Solutions for Diaspora – By pursuing the e-Government / e-Payment strategy, the Caribbean Diaspora will be able to remit transfers back home by just loading values onto C$ payment cards [for free]. This simplified system will minimize transfer fees and furnish [Foreign Currency] (Fx) controls. – Defined fully on Page 154.

There are countless examples of electronic money schemes facilitating more commerce (i.e. e-Commerce). The key is having an settlement / clearing entity. Under the Go Lean roadmap, that role is assumed by the CCB.

This changes everything … for everyone. Yes, we can!

The Go Lean book provides details of the community ethos to adopt, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies that are necessary to executed in order to deliver the e-Money / Payment Card solutions to the Caribbean region. Within its 370-pages, the Go Lean book re-affirms the mantra that Internet & Communication Technologies (ICT) can be used as a great equalizer so that small nation-states can compete against large nation-states.

The points of effective, technocratic e-Money stewardship were further elaborated upon in previous blog/commentaries. Consider this sample:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14248	Leading with Money Matters – Almighty Dollar
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10513	Transforming Money Countrywide – The Model of India
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7034	The Future of Money
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6635	New Security Chip in Credit Cards Unveiled
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5668	Move over Mastercard/Visa, Time for Local Settlement
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5210	Cruise Ship Commerce – Getting Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4425	Cash, Credit or iPhone …
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3889	RBC EZPay – Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2074	MetroCard – Model for the Caribbean Dollar
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1350	PayPal expands payment services to 10 markets
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=906	Bitcoin virtual currency needs regulatory framework to change image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=528	Facebook plans to provide Fintech – Mobile payment services
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=833	One single currency, divergent economies – Europe’s Model

An e-Money transformation will mean rebooting the industrial landscape of the Caribbean. In general, rebooting the region’s industrial landscape is not a new subject for this Go Lean movement; this commentary has previously identified a number of industrial initiatives to launch a reboot in the region. See the list of previous submissions on Industrial Reboots here:

Industrial Reboots – Ferries 101 – Published June 27, 2017
Industrial Reboots – Prisons 101 – Published October 4, 2017
Industrial Reboots – Pipeline 101 – Published October 5, 2017
Industrial Reboots – Frozen Foods 101 – Published October 6, 2017
Industrial Reboots – Call Centers 101 – Published July 2, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Prefab Housing 101 – Published July 14, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Trauma 101 – Published July 18, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Auto-making 101 – Published July 19, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Shipbuilding 101 – Published July 20, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Fisheries 101 – Published July 23, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Lottery 101 – Published July 24, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Culture 101 – Published July 25, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Tourism 2.0 – Published July 27, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Cruise Tourism 2.0 – Published July 27, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Reinsurance Sidecars 101 – Published October 2, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Navy Piers 101 – Published October 9, 2018
Industrial Reboots – Payment Cards 101 – Published Today – October 11, 2018

In summary, our Caribbean region needs a better industrial landscape to improve our economics, security and governance. While transforming to an e-Money / Payment Card economy may be heavy-lifting, it is worth all the hard work. This plan is conceivable, believable and achievable – India is doing it!

Let’s lean-in to the Go Lean roadmap to reboot our industrial landscape. Time to get going. There is only one destination for all of this effort: a better Caribbean homeland to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

——————-

Appendix VIDEO – How Credit Card Processing Works – Transaction Cycle & 2 Pricing Models – https://youtu.be/avRkRuQsZ6M

BancardSales
Published on Apr 4, 2014 –
How Credit Card Processing Works : http://www.bancardsales.com

This video explains how credit card payments are passed from the cardholder to the merchant bank account. Included in the video is the transaction cycle, and a detailed explanation of the two main pricing models. If you’ve ever wondered:
How Does Credit Card Processing Work?
How To Process Credit Cards?
How Credit Card Processing Works?
How To Accept Credit Card Payments At Your Business or Understanding the transaction flow?

Then you’ll want to watch this video. It’s part of a credit card processing basics video series so be sure to check back for more updates and additional videos in the series.
Additionally, you can check out http://www.bancardsales.com for more tips and tutorials on how merchant account processing works.

Category: Education

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Amazon: ‘What I want to be when I grow up’

Posted on October 1, 2018 in Economics, Implementation, Industries

Go Lean Commentary

For the planned entity, Caribbean Postal Union, the question should be asked:

What do you want to be when you grow up?

The answer should be:

Amazon

It turns out that Amazon was only founded in 1999, so this is less than 20 years. It is that quickly that an enterprise can have a transformative effect on society. We need transformations in the Caribbean and we are hoping to follow the Amazon business model as the solution for our regional postal-logistical needs.

How successful is Amazon as a model for success?

Well, now Amazon market capitalization has exceeded $1 Trillion. See the VIDEO and news story here:

VIDEO – Amazon 2nd company to top $1 trillion valuation – https://www.usatoday.com/videos/tech/nation-now/2018/09/05/amazon-2nd-company-top-1-trillion-valuation/37720169/

Sep 4, 2018 – Amazon has become the 2nd publicly traded company to be worth $1 trillion, after Apple. Amazon has cemented customer loyalty through its devices and fast, free shipping as well as music and video streaming perks. AP

————-

Title – Amazon’s stock value tops $1 trillion, joins Apple in trillionaire club

Amazon’s meteoric stock surge briefly pushed its market value above $1 trillion, a milestone that makes the online retail giant only the second publicly traded company in the U.S. to pass that mark – following Apple.

Amazon topped $1 trillion for the first time Tuesday when its shares climbed past $2,050.27 in late-morning trading and hit an intraday record high of $2,050.50. Shares pulled back to $2,039.51 for a gain of 1.3 percent for the day.

The accomplishment comes after Amazon’s per-share price crossed $2,000 for the first time last week.

Under CEO Jeff Bezos, who is now the richest person in the world with a net worth of an estimated $166 billion, Amazon has emerged as the most powerful force in the e-commerce business, capturing roughly 50 percent of the online retail market, according to eMarketer.

But it’s not just Amazon’s disruptive force in retail that has attracted investors on Wall Street. The company has diversified its sales and profit streams, from a public cloud-computing business to paid subscription services like Amazon Prime, and advertising revenue on its website.

Some Wall Street pros see the stock climbing even higher.

Citing Amazon’s improving business mix, rapid growth and profit potential, Morgan Stanley analyst Brian Nowak last week upped his price target for Amazon shares to $2,500, which is the highest on Wall Street, according to Bloomberg. If that fresh target is reached, it would boost the company’s market capitalization to more than $1.2 trillion.

In the race for most valuable U.S. company, Amazon now trails Apple by roughly $100 billion.

….

See the rest of the news article in the Appendix below.

This one company is worth US$1 Trillion. The whole Caribbean’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is [far] less; it is our plan to elevate the economic engines in the region to get the economy’s output up to $800 Billion.

Amazon is a model for e-Commerce, logistics, media and innovation. This is the role model we want for our Caribbean Postal Union and the aligning online portal, www.myCaribbean.gov. It is good to have a roadmap to follow to duplicate the successful journey of Amazon.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as such a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU). These entities are designed to address the “Agents of Change“ in modern society, but for a Caribbean scope only. The “Agents of Change” at play in the foregoing news sources, according to the book (Page 57), are defined as follows:

Technology
Globalization

Asking the question: “What I want to be when I grow up?” is emblematic of future planning. This exercise is important for the region if we truly want to have a future. Though our people may survive, such an eventuality is not guaranteed for our culture. Ghost Towns do happen!

Our Caribbean region cannot continue with the status quo in terms of business operations and societal outworking. We must now reboot our industrial landscape to foster new opportunities (jobs, entrepreneurism and industrial development). This is the charter of the Caribbean Postal Union effort. In fact, the following 3 statements are identified as the prime directives of this CU charter:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

In a previous Go Lean blog-commentary, it was related that …

… what Amazon did and does, is the epitome of what the CU/CPU needs to do to reboot Caribbean society. The company disrupted the status quo in so many industries – think: book retailers & movie rentals – and transformed markets to exploit opportunities and derive profits. This is the “Sum of All Caribbean Dreams“.

This reference to Caribbean Dreams is presented early in the Go Lean book with these opening pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence (Page 13 and 14):

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

Monitoring and analyzing the business model of Amazon has been a frequent occupation for these Go Lean blog-commentaries; consider these previous submissions, as follows:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14316	Forging Change: Soft Power – Clean-up or ‘Adios Amazon’ Amazon is proving that people and communities will be motivated to change in order to have the prospect of acquiring money or to prevent losing money. This “soft power” is now emerging as the preferred way to forge change on society. The summary statement is: “Clean-up your societal defects or else … face the loss of an economic bonanza”.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14191	Scheduling in the ‘Gig Economy’ Amazon is proving that there is always “honorable” work available in the service industry. Any reference to the Post Office of 1987 can now be replaced with the *Gig Economy*. Amazon is very prominent in the Gig Economy in the US.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13627	Amazon: Then and Now It has only been 18 years ago (1999 – 2017) since Amazon launched in Seattle, Washington USA. Now today, they are huge … and transforming how America shops … and consume media; even their digital assistant – Alexa – is transformative.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13091	Amazon Opens Search for HQ2 Amazon is accepting bids for a 2nd headquarters in North America. The city that lands HQ2 will have a lot to celebrate, as this enterprise can create many high-paying direct jobs – 50,000 – and have an indirect stimulus on the rest of the economy. This is a feature of Amazon that “we” want to model in the Caribbean.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12291	Big Tech’s Amazon – The Retailers’ Enemy Big Tech companies like Amazon have the treasuries, talent and temperament (culture, values and commitment) to change the world, for good and for bad. The Amazon threat had been “all things internet”, but now they are attempting to dominate the physical retail space as well, with their acquisition of Whole Foods grocery stores.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11358	Retail Apocalypse – Preparing for the Inevitable There is feast and famine “in the cards” for the retail eco-system. On one end of the spectrum , there will be prosperity for electronic commerce stakeholders, but on the other end, for brick-and-mortar establishments, there will be a Retail Apocalypse. This is not just a future problem as the threat has already manifested!
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9839	Alibaba and Amazon’s Cloud allows for global reach This model, with cutting-edge data centers, is the new colonialism.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7297	Death of the ‘Department Store’: Exaggerated or Eventual Modern technology and electronic commerce has transformed many aspects of society; much has been added and much taken away. Just consider: cameras, watches, pagers, maps, calculators, calendars, payphones, books, music and more. The related industries have also been affected: travel agencies, music retailers, book retailers, newspapers, travel agencies and Big Box retailers. Amazon is to blame for many of the transformations.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7023	Thanksgiving & American Commerce – Past, Present and Amazon To better understand American commerce, one must understand Cyber Monday and its dominant player Amazon. This company demonstrates how to be lean and technocratic as it employs cutting-edge automation and robotics. They are a great model for a new Caribbean.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1416	Model of an E-Commerce Fulfillment Company: Amazon Amazon is the model for the Caribbean Postal Union (CPU): our means for delivering the mail. Considering the US, one might think that the American model would be the US Postal Service (USPS). No, the Go Lean book relates how the USPS is a failing enterprise, while Amazon flourishes with growth, capital and profits.

One Trillion Dollars …

… this sounds great! This is what is meant by the old encouragement: Reach for the stars!

Can we pursue such a quest in the new Caribbean?

Yes, we can!

Consolidating and integrating the existing postal agencies in the Caribbean, should be “low hanging fruit”. Currently, these entities are just inefficient, ineffective cost centers, but here is the opportunity to transform them to this new vision: the CPU functioning as a job-creating profit center.

We cannot ignore this win-win possibility.

We hereby urge all Caribbean stakeholders to lean-in to the empowerments in the Go Lean/CU/CPU roadmap. Whether we pursue this roadmap to make a trillion dollars or just to optimize the mail, the end-result will be a positive benefit. This quest can make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for the roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————-

Appendix – Amazon’s stock value tops $1 trillion, joins Apple in trillionaire club – Cont’d

By: Adam Shell, USA TODAY

…
Amazon’s stock, which is up nearly 75 percent this year, has been one of Wall Street’s top performers in the bull market that began in March 2009, gaining more than 3,000 percent, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.

Amazon is also pushing into new businesses, such as groceries, a move highlighted by its purchase last year of upscale grocer Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion. It also entered the health care space in June, with the purchase of online pharmacy PillPack.

The only other U.S. stocks within striking distance of a $1 trillion market value are Microsoft and Google-parent Alphabet, both of which are valued at roughly $850 billion.

Tuna Amobi, an analyst at Wall Street firm CFRA, sees Amazon’s stock price rising as high as $2,200 a share. Amazon’s suite of businesses, he says, act as “building blocks” that give it a diversified stream of revenue and will help it deliver “consistent” earnings results in the quarters ahead. “A lot of investments are starting to pay off,” he says.

Still, like any stock, Amazon is not risk free. Despite reporting a profit of $2.5 billion on $52.9 billion in sales in the quarter ended in June, and forecasting year-over-year sales growth of 23 percent to 31 percent in the current quarter, Amazon is not a cheap stock.

It currently trades at nearly 100 times its expected earnings over the next 12 months, which is about five times the broad market’s price-to-earnings ratio of 21, according to Bloomberg.

Another potential risk that could derail Amazon is a potential regulatory crackdown from Washington, D.C., which could look to counter its clout in online retailing, Amobi says.

Amazon is one of the popular and strong-performing “FAANG” stocks – Facebook, Apple, Netflix and Google parent Alphabet are the others – that have come under increased scrutiny from President Donald Trump and lawmakers because of their growing dominance. Executives from Facebook and Twitter will testify Wednesday before the Senate Intelligence Committee regarding interference of foreign nations on social-media platforms.

Amazon also faces increasing competition in online retailing from big players like Walmart and Target that are fighting to regain lost market share. It is also facing challenges from Microsoft and Google in the competitive cloud-computing business.

Source: USA Today – Posted September 4, 2018; retrieved October 1, 2018 from: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/09/04/amazon-tops-1-trillion-market-value/1191141002/?csp=chromepush

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Amazon, CPU, e-Commerce, ICT, Model, Transform

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Lessons Learned from 2008: The Long View – ENCORE

Posted on September 15, 2018 in Ethos, Implementation

10 years ago today (September 15, 2008) …

… Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy … and brought the global financial system to its knees.

The whole world was watching, as global markets immediately plummeted.

But this writer was there, on the inside of Lehman Brothers. This fact was related in the opening of the 2003 book Go Lean … Caribbean (Page 8), as follows:

2008
The peak day of the recent global financial crisis was September 15, 2008. On this day, Wall Street giant Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection, and eventual dissolution, after succumbing to the weight of over-leverage in mortgage-backed securities. There is an old observation/expression that states that “there are 3 kinds of people in the world, those who make things happen, those who watch things happen and those who wonder ‘what happened?’“ Principals of SFE Foundation were there in 2008 … engaged with Lehman Brothers; on the inside looking out, not the outside looking in. Understanding the anatomy of the modern macro economy, allows the dissection of the processes and the creation of viable solutions.

This is the first of a series of commentaries relating the Lessons Learned from 2008. This first one – entry 1 of 4 in this series from the movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean – is in consideration of the “economic chaos” that led-up to the Great Recession and why it is necessary for these commentaries to be so long and comprehensive. The Caribbean problems are complex and complicated – there are no short and simple solutions. It will take a thorough roadmap to effect the necessary changes for the region to reform and transform. If we do not learn the applicable lessons from 2008, we will only repeat the mistakes of 2008.

The commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:

Lessons Learned from 2008 – The Long View – ENCORE
Lessons Learned from 2008 – Too Big to Fail -vs- Too Small to Thrive
Lessons Learned from 2008 – Righting The Wrong – ENCORE
Lessons Learned from 2008 – Still Recovering

All of these commentaries relate to “how” the stewards for a new Caribbean can shepherd the economic engines of the region to apply the economic best-practices to make progress. As a Caribbean region, we need those lessons, and progress.

Some of these commentaries are Encores, as is this one. So as follows is the original submission from August 26, 2014. See that entry here:

—————–

Go Lean Commentary – Why So Long? Can’t We Just…

We have now reached a milestone in the publishing of the (sometimes) daily blogs from the publishers of Go Lean…Caribbean, 150 submissions. This is a good time to address a consistent question we’ve gotten from some readers:

Why are the blog commentaries so long?
Can’t you accomplish the same objective with shorter blogs?

This submission here is meant to be a practice in active listening: We hear you! Consider this attribute of one blog published on August 20, 2014:

3742 words: NYC’s MetroCard – A Model for the Caribbean Dollar – https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2074

So can we accomplish the same objectives with shorter commentaries? The answer: No!

The question is interpreted by us as “Can’t we just…?”

There is a serious reason why this is the answer: These are serious issues. We cannot, must not skim on the consideration of the solutions.

Our experience has taught us that serious problems require thorough and thoughtful consideration. There is no place for abbreviation in this exercise.

Our experience?

Consider these events from 2008, (a frequent topic of discussion in Go Lean…Caribbean blogs):

Video: Too Big To Fail – 2011 Movie (Pardon the adult language):
YouTube Video Sharing Site (Retrieved 08/20/2014) –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aqf97p1Rdm0

As the events of September 2008 unfolded where the financial system (Wall Street) was on the brink of collapse, stakeholders from the US Treasury Department assembled a representative body to conceive a remedy.

The resultant plan/proposal was introduced on September 20, by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and was later named the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP)^[a].

The plan/proposal was only three pages long, intentionally short on details to facilitate quick passage by Congress.^[b]

The plan called for the U.S. Treasury to acquire up to $700 billion worth of mortgage-backed securities…

… in the end, in an analysis by Bloomberg Business News Source, it was disclosed that the Federal Reserve had, by March 2009, committed $7.77 trillion to rescuing the financial system. This amount is more than half the value of everything produced in the U.S. that year.^[c]Wikipedia Online Encyclopedia Source (Retrieved 08/20/2014) –
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_Economic_Stabilization_Act_of_2008

So can’t we just…?

The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB). This Caribbean empowerment roadmap has 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The book described both the CU and CCB as hallmarks of technocracy, a commitment to efficiency and effectiveness. The book itself is 370 pages and covers 144 different missions.

As alluded above, principals in the Go Lean…Caribbean movement were front-and-center in the events that unfurled in 2008.

The roadmap was constructed with the ethos to be thorough in the assessment, strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies to understand the complexities of our time and forge permanent change in the Caribbean region. The following is a sample of these specific details from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Intelligence Gathering	Page 23
Community Ethos – “Crap” Happens	Page 23
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Strategy – Vision – Confederate 30 Member-States	Page 45
Strategy – Missions – 144 Advocacies	Page 457
Tactical – Confederating a Permanent Union	Page 63
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Region	Page 127
Planning – Lessons Learned from 2008	Page 136
Planning – Lessons Learned from New York City	Page 137
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Wall Street	Page 200
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Main Street	Page 201
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Hollywood	Page 202
Appendix – Credit Ratings Agencies in 2008	Page 276

Imagine following a long complex and detailed recipe for baking a cake. To get the best results, it is important to include all the ingredients and follow the exacting instructions, the more detailed the better.

The quest for Go Lean…Caribbean is not as simple as baking a cake, rather a goal that is so much more important, to make the Caribbean region a better place to live, work and play.

We cannot skim on this effort – too much is at stake!

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

———————

Appendices:
a. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/business/21draftcnd.html?_r=0; retrieved August 20, 2014.
b. http://content.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1843642,00.html; retrieved August 20, 2014.
c. Ivry, Bob; Keoun, Bradley; Kuntz, Phil (November 28, 2011). “Secret Fed Loans Gave Banks $13 Billion Undisclosed to Congress”. Bloomberg Markets Magazine. Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved May 14, 2012 from: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-28/secret-fed-loans-undisclosed-to-congress-gave-banks-13-billion-in-income.html.

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Blog # 800 – An Inconvenient Truth – Caribbean Version

Posted on September 14, 2018 in Ethos, Implementation, Planning

Go Lean Commentary

There was a film released in 2006 entitled An Inconvenient Truth. This capped the campaign by former US Vice-President Al Gore (1993-2001) to educate citizens about global warming; this was a comprehensive slide show that he estimated to have given more than a thousand times. This film was part documentary and part prophecy. When asked of the need for a sequel, Co-Producer Laurie David responded:

“God, do we need one, everything in that movie has come to pass. At the time we did the movie, there was Hurricane Katrina; now we have extreme weather events every other week. The update has to be incredible and shocking.”^[149]

Incredible and shocking is also our Inconvenient Truth for the Caribbean. The prophecy highlighted in that 2006 documentary manifested in the Caribbean in the years since. There was a sequel to that original film, the 2017 An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power. The tagline for the movie was:

Fight like your world depends on it.

See a Trailer of the sequel in Appendix B below.

Here is where we are in the Caribbean – our world depends on our fighting to assuage the great threats to our society. These are defined in the book Go Lean…Caribbean – available to download for free. The book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation and protection of Caribbean society – for all member-states.

In the book, the threats are described as Agents of Change (Page 57), none more challenging than Climate Change for us:

Climate Change – This issue is a major concern for the whole world, but particularly impactful on the Caribbean. There is some debate as to the causes of Climate Change, but no question as to its outcome: temperatures are rising, droughts prevail, and most devastating, hurricanes are more threatening. The CU roadmap must address the causes of Climate Change and most assuredly its consequences. The CU federal government must therefore advocate systems and schemes for a lower carbon footprint. Notwithstanding, the CU must implement recovery measures to respond, react and rebuild from the ever-more-devastating hurricanes.
Technology – Internet & Communications Technologies (ICT) is dynamically shifting the world. There are also industrial changes taking place, as in more efficient manufacturing methods, automation/robotics, and transportation options … in response to Climate Change, i.e. Green Energy options.
Aging Diaspora – Those that expatriated in the 1950’s and 1960’s now comprise an aging Diaspora – with the desire to return to the “town of their boyhood”. With inadequacies to prepare and respond to natural disasters, the repatriations may not happen.
Globalization – We are competing against a “flat” world. Any one country can provide a competitive delivery of the needs and wants of any other society, no matter where they are located physically.

*************

Inconvenient Truth 1

What is inconvenient is that we do not have a partner in the United States of America. We must raise the mantle ourselves and fight for our own cause. President Trump has wiped out all Global Climate Change initiatives by the US federal government. So this government is headed by someone that does not even believe the scientific certainty of Climate Change.

This actuality was boldly lamented in the book, in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 11):

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

Inconvenient Truth 2

Natural Disaster preparation and response is reflective of our priorities. Hurricane Maria exposed the deficiency among the American stakeholders. Puerto Rico got no love from Washington; even in death the misery was understated, under-valued and undercounted. Despite this bad report, President Trump continues to defend his administration actions, despite irrefutable evidence to the contrary; see article in Appendix A.

Our other colonial legacies were equally unprepared:

French – Lack of cooperation with Dominica – post Maria
Anglophone – Barbuda become a ‘Ghost Town’ after Hurricane Irma

The Go Lean book asserts that the full region of 30 member-states must come together – ourselves – to optimize the societal engines of economics, security and governance. We have delivered a “day late and a dollar short” on so many mitigations – consider our Catastrophic Risk Insurance Funds.

Inconvenient Truth 3

Rising Sea Levels may cover the coral islands.

The geology of the Caribbean has resulted inn 2 kinds of islands: Volcanic versus Coral (Reef). The volcanic islands tend to be mountainous, while coral islands tend to be flat. Climate Change have a real devastating effects on coral islands. Already the Pacific island-nation of Kiribati is facing extinction from high sea-level rise. This same fate awaits many Caribbean member-states. This is why many Caribbean states are members of the formal SIDS (Small Islands Development States).

Inconvenient Truth 4

Seaweed is not so innocent. The beautiful beaches are no longer “so beautiful” without strenuous re-engineering, This is a direct result of Climate Change – https://stluciatimes.com/2018/03/04/fisheries-department-supports-sargassum-cleanup/

Inconvenient Truth 5

Our Diaspora is not returning. The original implied contract was for Caribbean citizens to emigrate abroad then come back home for retirement. Due to societal defects, many of the Diaspora are not returning; even to support their elderly parents; rather, they have been bringing their elderly to the foreign destinations. There is also a Climate Change angle, winters in northern locations – think: Canada – is milder due to global warming.

Inconvenient Truth 6

We are doubling-down on economic failure.

The primary economic engine in the Caribbean region is based on tourism. There is the need to diversify; yet the member-states have been doubling-down on the failing business models in tourism rather than investing in better models. Consider the example of resort-casino gambling.

Inconvenient Truth 7

We are doubling-down on our societal defects and hate.

Our people leave their Caribbean homes for “Push” and “Pull” reasons. “Pull” refers to the lure that life is better abroad, but “push” refers to the societal defects that drive people away to seek refuge. The Caribbean region does not embrace the “live and let live” ethos, so minority groups have experienced a Climate of Hate.

This is inconvenient and sad!

***********

These Inconvenient Truths are consistent for the movement behind the Go Lean book. The original book, and subsequent blog-commentaries, detailed the assessment in current Caribbean society, and then advocated for a new Caribbean – with new community ethos, strategies, tactics and implementations.

This submission is a new milestone; this is blog-commentary # 800.

These prior entries posit that the Caribbean status quo is truly in crisis. Alas, this crisis is a terrible thing to waste. Let’s reform and transform now! Yes, we can!

This is the quest of the Go Lean movement, to forge a Single Market and a technocratic government for the 30 Caribbean member-states. But the Go Lean book asserts that this effort is too big a task for just for Caribbean member-state alone, so the book urges all 30 member-states to convene, confederate and collaborate in order to effect change. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs. (The issue of jobs alone is paramount to any Hope and Change movement in the region).
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The book stresses that reforming and transforming Caribbean communities must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 14):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

The Go Lean book accepts that the Caribbean region – all 30 member-states – is currently at a Failing disposition. But we can do better and be better. First, we must acknowledged our Inconvenient Truths.

And then work or fight towards reforming and transforming our society. Our world depends on it!

This is hard, heavy-lifting, but this roadmap is conceivable, believable and achievable. Let’s get started. Let’s make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————–

Appendix A – Trump questions Puerto Rico death toll, prompting San Juan mayor to call him ‘delusional’ and ‘paranoid’

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump on Thursday questioned a report putting the death toll from last year’s catastrophic hurricane in Puerto Rico at nearly 3,000. He also called the new estimate an effort by Democrats to discredit him.

San Juan’s mayor described the president’s claim as “delusional” and even prominent Republicans such as House Speaker Paul Ryan distanced themselves from Trump’s tweets about Puerto Rico.

“This was done by the Democrats in order to make me look as bad as possible when I was successfully raising Billions of Dollars to help rebuild Puerto Rico,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “If a person died for any reason, like old age, just add them onto the list. Bad politics. I love Puerto Rico!”

Trump’s comments, which come as his administration prepares for Hurricane Florence to hit the East Coast, led both Democratic and Republican lawmakers to weigh in countering his claim. When Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico last year, it devastated homes and infrastructure and left large swaths of the territory without power for months.

Ryan, pressed by reporters on Trump’s tweet, said he disagreed with the president but would not comment on whether he thought Trump should apologize.

Ryan said he had “no reason to dispute” the findings of a study commissioned by Puerto Rico’s government that put its death toll at nearly 3,000 people.

“Those are just the facts of what happens when a horrible hurricane hits an isolated place like an island,” Ryan said when asked about Trump’s tweet.

Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican who has been outspoken on the government’s response to the storm, lamented in a tweet that the deaths had become political. He repeated the study’s findings that 3,000 more people died on the island after the hurricane than during comparable periods.

“Both Fed & local gov made mistakes,” Rubio wrote. “We all need to stop the blame game & focus on recovery, helping those still hurting & fixing the mistakes.”

Florida Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican and early Trump supporter, said he disagreed with the president.

“I’ve been to Puerto Rico 7 times & saw devastation firsthand,” Scott, now a candidate for Senate, posted on Twitter. “The loss of any life is tragic; the extent of lives lost as a result of Maria is heart wrenching. I’ll continue to help PR.”

Ron DeSantis, a former Republican congressman running for governor in Florida, also disputed Trump’s assertion. “He doesn’t believe any loss of life has been inflated,” spokesman Stephen Lawson said in an emailed statement.

As his team braces for Hurricane Florence, Trump has praised his administration’s responses to deadly storms – including in Puerto Rico.

San Juan mayor Cruz responded, …

“Simply put: delusional, paranoid, and unhinged from any sense of reality.”

“Trump is so vain he thinks this is about him. NO IT IS NOT,” Cruz wrote on Twitter.

Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló said he “strongly denounced” what he described as questioning the impact of the storm for political purposes.

“The victims and the people of Puerto Rico do not deserve to have their pain questioned,” he said in a statement. “It is not time to deny what happened, it is time to make sure that it does not happen again.”

Democrats on Capitol Hill blasted Trump.

“Only Donald Trump could see the tragedy in Puerto Rico and conclude that he is the victim,” said Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. “May God bless the souls of the nearly 3,000 Americans that died in Puerto Rico and may he take pity on your soul Mr. President.”

Without mentioning Trump by name, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, slammed the “cavalier” tweeting about the number of deaths in Puerto Rico.

“You have lost compassion for people who are diverse,” she said.

Trump’s Thursday morning tweets focused on a George Washington University study released last month that examined the toll from Hurricane Maria. From September 2017 to February 2018, 2,975 people died, according to that study, which was commissioned by Puerto Rico’s government.

Late Thursday, deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley pushed back on criticism of the Trump’s response to Maria in a statement, saying the administration provided “unprecedented support to Puerto Rico.” Gidley said Cruz and the “liberal media” have tried to “exploit the devastation by pushing out a constant stream of misinformation and false accusations.”

In addition to force of the hurricane itself, many people in Puerto Rico died because disease and infection due to the lack of electricity and drinkable water on the island. The storm destroyed homes and and crippled roads, bridges, and hospitals.

George Washington University said Thursday it stands by the methodology used in the report and said the work was conducted with “complete independence and freedom from any kind of interference.”

“We are confident that the number – 2,975 – is the most accurate and unbiased estimate of excess mortality to date,” the school said in a statement.

Trump also took heat after he visited Puerto Rico in the aftermath of the Sept. 20, 2017, storm. The president tossed paper towels to Puerto Rican residents at a local relief center, angering storm victims and others who saw his actions as insensitive.

After his tweets Thursday, Democrats accused Trump of minimizing the death toll for callous political reasons.

Andrew Gillum, the Democratic candidate for governor in Florida, slammed Trump’s tweet.

“No death is partisan and our brothers and sisters in Puerto Rico deserved better from @realDonaldTrump before, during, and after the hurricane.”

The House Democratic Caucus tweeted that Trump “won’t acknowledge the thousands of Americans who died on his watch,” and added, “Even worse, Republicans have no interest in holding this administration accountable and ensuring that Congress is prepared to respond to these disasters.”

A report released this summer by the Federal Emergency Management Agency identified deficiencies in the administration’s response, including that the agency was not adequately staffed heading into the hurricane season. In the months leading up to Maria’s approach, FEMA had 10,683 people on hand, about 86 percent of the agency’s target, the report found.

The report found that the island itself was not prepared for such a storm, which contributed to widespread loss of power and communications – hampering the response.

A Government Accountability Office report last week confirmed many of those findings, and also noted that 54 percent of the FEMA workers deployed last year were serving in a role they were not qualified to perform. Staffing shortfalls complicated many aspects of the response, including the effort to move people into temporary housing in the mainland, the GAO found.

“The 2017 hurricanes and wildfires highlighted some longstanding issues and revealed other emerging response and recovery challenges,” the report said.

Source: USA Today newspaper – Posted September 13, 2018; retrieved September 14, 2018 from: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/09/13/donald-trump-without-evidence-questions-puerto-rico-death-toll/1288118002/

—————–

Appendix B VIDEO – An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth To Power (2017) – Official Trailer – https://youtu.be/huX1bmfdkyA

Published on Mar 28, 2017 – Watch the new trailer for An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, the sequel to An Inconvenient Truth. In theatres July 28, 2017. #BeInconvenient

Climate Changes, Truth Does Not.

A decade after AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH brought Climate Change into the heart of popular culture, comes the riveting and rousing follow-up that shows just how close we are to a real energy revolution. Vice President Al Gore continues his tireless fight traveling around the world training an army of climate champions and influencing international climate policy. Cameras follow him behind the scenes – in moments both private and public, funny and poignant — as he pursues the inspirational idea that while the stakes have never been higher, the perils of Climate Change can be overcome with human ingenuity and passion.

Official Movie Site: http://www.inconvenientsequel.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AnInconvenie…

Twitter: https://twitter.com/aitruthfilm

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aninconveni…

Category: Film & Animation

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Caribbean Unity? Ross University Saga

Posted on August 28, 2018 in Government, Implementation, Locations

Go Lean Commentary

¹¹Again, if two lie down together, they will keep warm; but how can one keep warm alone? ¹²And though one may be overpowered, two can resist. Moreover, a cord of three strands is not quickly broken. – The Bible Ecclesiastes 4:11 – 12 Berean Study Bible

It is so unfortunate that these Caribbean islands think that they are … “islands”. Didn’t they ever hear:

‘No man is an island’? – English metaphysical poet John Donne (1572-1631)
The phrase ‘no man is an island‘ expresses the idea that human beings do badly when isolated from others and need to be part of a community in order to thrive. Donne was a Christian but this concept is shared by other religions, principally Buddhism.

These islands do acknowledge that there are other islands, but rather than cooperating and collaborating together, the strategy seems to be limited to just competition – “It’s Better in … “

This is the continued focus of this series of commentaries on Caribbean [dis]unity. This submission is 2 of 4 from the movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean – is in consideration of the societal defects in the region that prevents us from banding together. We do not reform nor transform like other communities; we do not confederate nor consolidate; we somehow think that we are better than our neighbors and can survive alone. What a joke!

The other commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:

Caribbean Unity? – What a joke – Tourism Missteps
Caribbean Unity? – Ross University Saga
Caribbean Unity? – No Freedom of Movement in/out of French Antilles
Caribbean Unity? – Religion’s Role: False Friend

All of these commentaries relate to “how” the stewards for a new Caribbean can shepherd unity in this region. But first we must accept that Caribbean Unity is a joke, despite a previous formal exercise in regional integration called CariCom. In truth, CariCom is not the first integration attempt:

In the English-speaking islands, there was the disastrous West Indies Federation.
In the Dutch-speaking islands, there was the now-defunct Netherlands Antilles.

This talk of Caribbean Unity/Disunity is not just academic; this has real world implications. Just last year, the Eastern Caribbean island of Dominica was devastated by Category 5 Hurricane Maria; the operations of their biggest non-tourism economic engine – Ross University and their 3500 students – was greatly impacted. The end result, another island, Barbados seems to have recruited Ross University to “relocate shop” to their island … permanently – not just during the recovery. This charge reflects the disunity of the region. Dominica and Barbados should have been collaborating, not competing.

This is not just our movement’s complaint alone; many community leaders identify and observe this bad trend. Consider here, this news article relating the story:

Title: Ross University saga an indictment on CARICOM
The leader of the Lucian Peoples Movement, Therold Prudent, has declared that the Ross University saga involving Dominica and Barbados, is an indictment on the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the regional grouping to which both countries belong.

The institution is relocating from Dominica to Barbados.

“It just proves that we are like crabs in a barrel,” Prudent told St Lucia Times in an interview Friday.

“We are continually fighting each other for a little bread, for opportunity, whereas we should be standing with each other and at least saying to this University ‘Listen, this is a sister Island. You can’t just pick up and go and just come into another Caribbean Island because you believe that the terms aren’t favourable to you anymore in that particular country.’”

The LPM leader asserted that countries within CARICOM need to speak with one voice.

He expressed the view that the Ross University issue demonstrates that foreigners and investors understand the disunity and weakness in CARICOM and Caribbean Islands.

According to Prudent, the investors understand that all they have to do is “put a carrot before us and we will jump for it, not mindful if it is going to cost the other nation or country which is a part of CARICOM. ”

He said CARICOM has not lived up to expectations, including speaking with one voice on the international stage and adopting a unified foreign policy.

“Right now we are in a situation where everybody is looking after themselves and it is not about the region as a whole” the LPM leader lamented.

He told St Lucia Times that under such circumstances, it is easy for investors to disrespect the Caribbean.

On Tuesday, Barbados Prime Minister, Mia Mottley was quoted as denying that there was anything underhanded by her administration, in accepting the Ross University School of Medicine’s move to the island from Dominica.

Mottley asserted that the hands of her administration are clean, local media reports said.

Last Friday, Dominica’s Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit announced that Ross University, which had been forced to relocate its operations to St Kitts and the state of Tennessee in the United States following the passage of Hurricane Maria last September, would be leaving the Eastern Caribbean nation after 40 years.

Source: Posted August 10, 2018; retrieved August 23, 2018 from: https://stluciatimes.com/2018/08/10/prudent-ross-university-saga-an-indictment-on-caricom/

As related in the foregoing, these words by a St Lucian Opposition Party Leader is quite an indictment:

“… foreigners and investors understand the disunity and weakness in CARICOM and Caribbean Islands”

Our disunity is a joke … to the rest of the world!

No doubt, there should be regional integration. In fact what is needed is a Single Market. The spirit of CariCom – attempting integration – is a good one; but the execution is failing. The book Go Lean…Caribbean – available to download for free – opened with an honest assessment of CariCom; it stated (Page 14):

In July 2013, the Caribbean Community (CariCom) celebrated its 40th anniversary of ascension to pomp and gallantry… and much criticism. Many political and social commentators expressed how the CariCom had disappointed so many in their delivery of any reasonable success for economic integration. One commentator, Caribbean icon Sir Shridath Ramphal, (who served as the second British Commonwealth Secretary-General from 1975-1990; Foreign Minister of Guyana from 1972 – 1975; and previous stints as Chancellor at the University of the West Indies – until 2003 – and of the University of Guyana), charged that the leadership in the Caribbean region has “put the gears of the CariCom Single Market in neutral and the gears of its Single Economy into reverse”.

The movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean seeks to reboot and relaunch the integration effort. But this time, with all Caribbean member-states (30), not just the English-speaking, but partnering with the French Antilles and Spanish-speaking states as well. The Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), an elevated entity that graduates from CariCom. The CU is design to reach greater heights than CariCom ever contemplated; see Appendix CU > CC below.

There are a lot of issues that affect the economic landscape that are too big for any one member-state to contend with alone. Category 5 hurricanes are one of them. The facilitation to restore and recover should be a regional effort and not just a national issue. Obviously, Dominica failed in its delivery for Ross University; see the encyclopedic details on that school history and recovery here (and the Appendix VIDEO on Ross 40th Year Timeline below):

Title: Ross University School of Medicine
History
The medical school was founded in 1978 as The University of Dominica School of Medicine by Robert Ross, an entrepreneur.^[2][3] At the time, it was housed in leased facilities at The Castaways Hotel, with an inaugural class of 11 students. In 1982, the University of Dominica School of Medicine formally changed its name to Ross University School of Medicine at the request of the government of Dominica.

In 1985 California state medical licensing officials (the Board of Medical Quality Assurance), began investigating RUSM, along with other medical schools located in the Caribbean.^[4] The officials released a report stating that RUSM at that time had nearly no admissions standards, and that the school was in the business of providing medical degrees to “everyone that wants one.”^[4] RUSM agreed to implement a number of changes recommended by the board and has since graduated over 11,000 practicing physicians.^[4]

In the late 1990s, RUSM expressed interest in opening a new medical school in Casper, in the U.S. state of Wyoming, but accreditation was denied by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education, the organization that accredits MD-granting medical schools in the United States.^[5] Some local individuals welcomed the economic impact of a new medical school on the town, but critics questioned the quality of education at a for-profit institution.^[5] In 2003, RUSM was acquired by DeVry Education Group,^[6] which has since renamed itself Adtalem Global Education.

The school was impacted by Hurricane Maria in 2017, when the Category 5 storm made landfall on the island of Dominica. The hurricane knocked out communications, effectively isolating RUSM from the outside world. The campus suffered moderate damage from the effects of Maria. Students and faculty were located through a university-initiated roll call, and then were evacuated from the campus to the U.S. mainland.^[7]

In October 2017, the university announced that classes for the fall semester would resume mid-October aboard the GNV Excellent, an Italian ferry that would be docked off the coast of the island of St. Kitts. The ship was reconfigured as an educational venue. ^[7]

In November 2017, Ross University School of Medicine announced plans to relocate temporarily to Knoxville, Tennessee for continuation of medical school classes. Lincoln Memorial University (LMU), based in Harrogate, Tennessee and with operations in Knoxville, will provide the necessary operational capacity and the technical capabilities to support RUSM faculty, students, and staff. ^[8]

Ross University School of Medicine has announced that the main campus will be relocated from Dominica to Barbados for the beginning of the 2019 Spring semester. ^[9] ^[10]

Source: Retrieved August 23, 2018 from:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_University_School_of_Medicine#History

Poor Ross University and poor Dominica.

The governance in this Caribbean region is so poor that these institutions could not anticipate the worst-case scenario of a hurricane. Sad! 🙁

The Caribbean as a region and the nation-state of Dominica has an inadequate status quo for providing the needs of the people and trading partners in these homelands. We are also inadequate for dealing with the challenges of nation-building. As a regional construct, we must do better! We must convene, consolidate, collude, confederate and collaborate, not compete.

The CU is designed to be a technocratic intergovernmental entity that shepherds economic growth for the full Caribbean region and mitigate against related security challenges – including preparation and response for natural disasters. The goal is to use a regional focus to reboot and optimize the region’s societal engines. The Go Lean/CU roadmap will employ strategies, tactics and implementations to impact its prime directives; identified with the following 3 statements:

Optimize the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establish a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Go Lean book stresses that the required reform to transform Caribbean disaster preparation may be too big for any one country (think: Dominica); the solution must be a regional delivery (think: CariCom). This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society, for better preparation for natural disasters. Consider this specific implementation the book, where the functionality of the Emergency Management Agency is described; this is a subset of the Cabinet-level Homeland Security Department. This is described in the book as follows on Page 76 with the section title:

B – Homeland Security Department

B4 – Emergency Management

This area is perhaps one of the most important functions of the CU. The Emergency Management Department will coordinate the planning, response, rebuilding and recovery before, during and after natural disasters and other emergency events. This is the risk management arm of the CU Trade Federation. As such, the scope of Emergency Management will also include education, mentoring, monitoring, mitigation, licensing and coordination of all volunteer activities.
…
Emergencies also include the man-made variety as in industrial (oil spills, factory accidents, chemical spills), explosions, terroristic attacks and prison riots. The purpose of the Trade Federation is to enhance the economic engines of the region.

While the # 1 economic driver in the region is tourism, any poorly managed episode of “man-made” emergencies will have devastating effects on tourist bookings. Therefore, the CU must respond quickly, forcefully and professionally to contain the physical and image damage that can occur from these incidents.

Though not exclusive, this agency will coordinate its specialized services, skill-sets and occupations like Paramedic, EMT, Search-and-Rescue, Canine (K-9) with other governing (law enforcement) entities. Regional training will therefore be coordinated, licensed, and certified by this CU Emergency Management Department.

This Emergency Management agency will also coordinate the training and management of animal responders, in conjunction with the other federal agencies of Justice, Agriculture, Interior (Parks). The animals will include bomb sniffing dogs, cadaver dogs, drug dogs and mounted police horses.

There is also an economic/financial scope for this department. As the effort for a comprehensive property-casualty fund to cover the entire Caribbean region will also be coordinated by this agency. The classic solution is a large pool of premium payers and claims filed by the affected area. Beyond this model, there are also advanced products like re-issuance side-cars for market assimilation. The public can then invest and profit from the threat/realization of regional risks. This derivative product is a bet, a gamble, but in the end, the result is an insurance fund of last resort, much like the Joint Underwriters Agency (JUA) in Florida.

The Caribbean must foster a better disaster preparation and response apparatus. Systems of commerce are at stake. So the Go Lean roadmap address “this” as a Prime Directive, asserting that the region’s security and economics must be managed with the same priorities. This Go Lean movement has previously detailed many related issues and advocacies for regional disaster preparation and response; consider this sample of previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15059	Regional Tourism & Disaster Coordination – No Longer Optional
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15031	“Profiting” from Hurricanes – Disaster Risk Funds
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15012	In Life or Death: No Love for Puerto Rico
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14832	Example of Manifesting Environmental Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13391	After Maria, Destruction and Defection for Puerto Rico
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12996	After Irma, Failed State Indicators: Destruction and Defection
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12977	After Irma, Barbuda Becomes a ‘Ghost Town’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12900	The Logistics of Disaster Relief
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12879	Disaster Preparation: ‘Rinse and Repeat’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9455	Fix ‘Climate Change’ – Yes, We Can
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6893	A Meteorologist’s View On Climate Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1817	Caribbean grapples with intense cycles of flooding & drought

In summary, the Caribbean has a problem. So many of our people – and institutions – flee their homelands, especially in the aftermath of disastrous storms. The reasons they leave are defined as both “push” and “pull”. “Push” would refer to the resultant deficient infrastructure forcing stakeholders to abandon the community, and “pull” would refer to the perception that there are better economic opportunities elsewhere, so these ones are lured or pulled to make a living elsewhere.

Ross University was pushed from Dominica and pulled to Barbados! This is a direct product of deficient recovery!

In general, 70 percent brain drain rate has been reported among the professional classes., so our problem experienced by Ross University in this case is not unique. This lack of recovery ability emerged before Hurricane Maria and will continue long after … if the region do not implement better recovery systems and schemes.

It is time now to deploy the practical measure of a better recovery system and scheme – think Regional Risk Reinsurance Funds. This starts with the concepts of confederation and collaboration; not competition. This is our best hope for the future.

So we must reform and transform the Caribbean’s societal engines to better allow for our tropical realities. This is the quest of the Go Lean roadmap. These practical measures are conceivable, believable and achievable.

All Caribbean stakeholders – governments and citizens alike – are urged to lean-in to this roadmap for change … and empowerment. We can make our region a better place to live work, learn and play. 🙂

Download the e-Book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————

Appendix – CU > CC (CU Greater Than CariCom)

There have been some efforts at regional integration, but only for individual language groups.

The Caribbean Union is the next evolution from the structured economic integration that became the Caribbean Community, but now for all neighbors. The globally accepted 7 degrees of economic integration, which spurned CariCom, are defined as:

Preferential trading area
Free trade area, Monetary union
Customs union, Common market
Economic union, Customs and monetary union
Economic and monetary union
Fiscal union
Complete economic integration

CariCom was enacted in 1973 as Stage 3; but Stage 4 was ratified in 2001 and branded the Caribbean Single Market & Economy. This effort sputtered – see Anecdote # 1. The CU is a new manifestation of Stage 4; a graduation for CariCom.

Source: Book – Go Lean … Caribbean Page 3

—————

Appendix VIDEO – RUSM 40th Anniversary Timeline – https://youtu.be/R62eushQSdE

Ross University School of Medicine

Published on Jun 22, 2018 –

Category: Education

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The 45’s of Hip-Hop – ENCORE

Posted on August 11, 2018 in Ethos, Implementation, Social

On this day 45 years ago, Hip-Hop was forged as a musical genre …

… and Caribbean fingerprints were all over this origination. This was the assertion of the previous blog from August 11, 2016, on its 43rd anniversary. But for this 45th anniversary, we need to “spin” at a faster speed.

… 45 revolutions per minute (RPM) is the speed to play “Singles” on a record-player.

Record-players and 45’s are now all gone, but Hip-Hop is here to stay. In fact, in the past year, Hip-Hop exceeded Rock-n-Roll as the Number 1 consumed genre of music. People are celebrating …

VIDEO – Ne-Yo, Zaytoven, and more discuss their Favorite Era of Hip-Hop – https://www.fuse.tv/videos/2018/08/hip-hop-at-45-favorite-era-of-hip-hop

Hip-Hop at 45 – From Tribe Called Quest to Jay-Z to Cash Money, it’s hard to say what the best era of Hip-Hop is. As apart of Fuse’s Hip-Hop at 45 celebration, watch as these all star artists talk about their favorite era of Hip-Hop.

Now, is a good time to re-visit the historicity of Caribbean founders for Hip-Hop – yes, the father of Hip-Hop was Jamaican. See the Encore of that previous blog-commentary here-now:

=============================

#GoLeanCommentary – This Day In History: Jamaican Innovation for Hip Hop

This day – August 11 – in 1973 …

… a member of the Caribbean Diaspora – Jamaica – may have changed the world … for Hip Hop. On this day in 1973, Clive Campbell – better known to history as DJ Kool Herc – helped out his sister by “DJ-ing” her birthday party in a recreation room in The Bronx. History shows that he used his inspiration and influence from his Caribbean musical roots to innovate a music style and performance that would subsequently change the world … for good …

… or bad.

It’s music; you be the judge.

Musical taste is like “beauty” … in the “eye of the beholder”. The main thing is that the music made you listen and maybe learned something about the urban experience of America … and now the world.

See the story of Clive Campbell aka DJ Kool Herc here:

Title: This Day In History: 1973 – Hip Hop is born at a birthday party in the Bronx

Like any style of music, hip hop has roots in other forms, and its evolution was shaped by many different artists, but there’s a case to be made that it came to life precisely on this day in 1973, at a birthday party in the recreation room of an apartment building in the west Bronx, New York City. The location of that birthplace was 1520 Sedgwick Avenue, and the man who presided over that historic party was the birthday girl’s brother, Clive Campbell—better known to history as DJ Kool Herc, founding father of hip hop.

Born and raised to the age of 10 in Kingston, Jamaica, DJ Kool Herc began spinning records at parties and between sets his father’s band played while he was a teenager in the Bronx in the early 1970s. Herc often emulated the style of Jamaican “selectors” (DJs) by “toasting” (i.e., talking) over the records he spun, but his historical significance has nothing to do with rapping. Kool Herc’s contribution to hip hop was even more fundamental.

DJ Kool Herc’s signature innovation came from observing how the crowds would react to different parts of whatever record he happened to be playing: “I was noticing people used to wait for particular parts of the record to dance, maybe [to] do their specialty move.” Those moments tended to occur at the drum breaks—the moments in a record when the vocals and other instruments would drop out completely for a measure or two of pure rhythm. What Kool Herc decided to do was to use the two turntables in a typical DJ setup not as a way to make a smooth transition between two records, but as a way to switch back and forth repeatedly between two copies of the same record, extending the short drum break that the crowd most wanted to hear. He called his trick the Merry Go-Round. Today, it is known as the “break beat.” [(See Appendix VIDEO below).]

By the summer of 1973, DJ Kool Herc had been using and refining his break-beat style for the better part of a year. His sister’s party on August 11, however, put him before his biggest crowd ever and with the most powerful sound system he’d ever worked. It was the success of that party that would begin a grassroots musical revolution, fully six years before the term “hip hop” even entered the popular vocabulary.
Source: History Channel – This Day In History – Posted & Retrieved August 11, 2016 from: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hip-hop-is-born-at-a-birthday-party-in-the-bronx

Can we – in the Caribbean and from the Caribbean – change the world again?

Yes, we can!

This consideration is in line with the book Go Lean … Caribbean. It serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). This CU strives to advance Caribbean culture with these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance.

This will not be the first time a Caribbean personality has changed the world through music (and hopefully not the last). Previously, this blog-commentary detailed the influence of music icon Bob Marley. Today, his name is synonymous with Reggae and socially-conscious music. RIP Bob Marley (1945 – 1981).

The Go Lean book identifies, in total, 169 different musical/national combinations of genres throughout the Caribbean. From these styles, Hip Hop has had its origins and roots. And then the transformation continued, with more inspiration back to the Caribbean sounds and more social messaging (classic of Reggae) going back to the Hip Hop sound.

Music does not stand still; it evolves. An excellent example of this cross-meshing is the musical genre of Reggaeton:

Reggaetón is a genre of music characterized by its repetitive beat rhythm that originated in Puerto Rico. Its roots can be traced back to the “underground” music of the island during the late 90’s, when music borrowing elements of reggae, rap, and hip-hop was being performed (in Spanish) in small, unofficial venues. Bootleg recordings and word of mouth were the means of distribution for this music until 1997. In 1998 eventually that music coalesced into what today is known as Reggaeton. The music’s popularity skyrocketed in the early 2000s as it spread to North American, European, Asian, and African audiences.^[1] Source: Retrieved 08/11/2016 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reggaeton.

See sample Reggaetón song here: https://youtu.be/uHgnebZ_jYo

The movement behind the Go Lean book asserts that “one person can make a difference”. So just like Bob Marley, Clive Campbell aka DJ Kool Herc, should be recognized for his contributions to music, culture and Caribbean identity. This one Caribbean character has made a difference while residing as an alien in a foreign land. He has forge an example and a sample of how other Caribbean stakeholders can do more in the arts and impact the world – we can build a city on “rock-and-roll”.

Too bad he made this impact after leaving his Caribbean home of Jamaica.

Alas, we now bring the quest for change to Jamaica and all of the rest of the Caribbean. And that quest includes music and the arts. Early in the Go Lean book, the contributions that music can make is pronounced as an community ethos for the entire region to embrace, (Declaration of Interdependence – Page 15) with these statements:

xxxii. Whereas the cultural arts and music of the region are germane to the quality of Caribbean life, and the international appreciation of Caribbean life, the Federation must implement the support systems to teach, encourage, incentivize, monetize and promote the related industries for arts and music in domestic and foreign markets. These endeavors will make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play.

This Go Lean/CU roadmap recognizes that a prerequisite for advancing society is a change in the community ethos – the fundamental spirit of a culture that drives the beliefs, customs and practices – in that society. Music should be appreciated for the truth of its power; it “can soothe the savage beast”. It can communicate culture and impact the economics for a people. One person, or a group of people can do this, can make a difference.

The following list from the Go Lean book details the community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster the next generation of artist:

Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Happiness	Page 36
Community Ethos – Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Unified CaribbeanSingle Market	Page 45
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Patents & Copyrights	Page 78
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Culture Administration	Page 81
Implementation – Ways to Impact Social Media	Page 111
Advocacy – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 131
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Hollywood	Page 203
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Music	Page 231
Advocacy – Ways to Re-boot Jamaica	Page 239

Thank you Clive Campbell aka DJ Kool Herc; see Appendix VIDEO below.

Thank you for setting the pathway for success for new generations of talented, inspirational and influential artists – musical geniuses of Caribbean heritage – who are sure to follow. These artists, too will “rock the world”.

We are hereby “banking” on it here in the Caribbean, as communicated further in that Declaration of Interdependence – Page 13:

xxi. Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must ensure that educational and job training opportunities are fully optimized for all residents of all member-states, with no partiality towards any gender or ethnic group. The Federation must recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

The Go Lean book posits “a change is going to come” to the Caribbean. The people, institutions and governance of region are all urged to “lean-in” to this roadmap for change and empowerment. Let’s do this … and make our homeland – all of the Caribbean – a better place to live, work and play.

🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

————

Appendix VIDEO – Kool DJ Herc, Merry Go Round – https://youtu.be/Hw4H2FZjfpo

Uploaded on Oct 26, 2009 – Kool DJ Herc describing how he invented the idea of playing two breakbeats together.

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‘Lean Is’ as ‘Lean Does’ – Good Project Management

Posted on August 9, 2018 in Ethos, Government, Implementation, Industries

Go Lean Commentary

Lean Is as Lean Does

This is a take on that expression “Stupid Is as Stupid Does”. But lean is better than stupid.

‘Lean’ is the focus of the book Go Lean…Caribbean – available to download for free. The book identifies the word as a noun, a verb, an adjective and an adverb.

It is good to be lean.

But lean does not just happen, it takes real effort to be lean.

This is the awakening, right now at the Wall Street Big Bank CitiGroup. They are making an all-out effort to “do more with less” and they are thusly investing in “process and people” or “people and process” to be lean. They have launched an all-encompassing program branded CitiLean – a continuous improvement program with tangible and measurable benefits to Citi and its customers. This features “process and people” in every sphere of Citi’s operations: employees, contractors, suppliers and vendors. In fact, they even present an annual Lean Partner Award to recognize the supplier that most embodies the spirit of CitiLean. See this story below in Appendix A announcing the 2017 Award Winner.

This program is working for Citi; they are getting the returns on their investment. They have the results to show; see Appendix B with an internal Memo from the bank’s Global Head of Operations & Technology, and the Appendix C VIDEO below.

The Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. The book asserts that this Caribbean super-national governance must be a lean operation, embracing the best-practices of the Art & Science of lean methodologies. The book opens with this introduction of lean (Page 4):

The CU will also be lean (adjective), in that it will not feature a “fat” bureaucracy. To the contrary, the institutions of the CU Trade Federation will embrace lean, agile, efficient organization structures – more virtual, less physical, more systems, less payroll. This will result in less of a tax burden for the people of the Caribbean.

The Go Lean book explains that with this CU/Go Lean roadmap, we can do more with less; these statements feature the prime directives as such:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies. All CU agencies will be trained and coach in lean methodologies.

The book stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

While this commentary examines CitiGroup as a hallmark of lean ambition, the Go Lean book identified Toyota Motor Company as a role model. That automaker has provided a great track record of deploying agile/lean methodologies in delivering quality in their design, supply and fabrication processes. Since quality delivery is also a mission of the Go Lean movement, we would want to pay more than the usual attention to Toyota’s and CitiGroup’s examples. There is the need to employ agile/lean methodologies to ensure that a small organizational footprint – the federal government will be optimized with only 30,000 staffers in all CU agencies – can provide the facilitations to enhance the region’s economic, security and governing engines.

30,000 people administering for 42 million citizens? Yes, we can … with the support of lean/agile systems and methodologies.

This is doing more with less. The Go Lean book explains how …

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society … to be more lean. One advocacy that relates to community ethos involves embracing the art and science of Project Management (PM); consider the specific PM plans, excerpts and headlines from the book on Page 109 entitled:

10 Ways to Deliver

1	Lean-in for the Caribbean Single Market This treaty allows for the unification of the region into one market, expanding to an economy of 30 member-states of 42 million people, with an economic impact of $800 Billion. The CU is a reboot of the economic engines and security apparatus of the region. There are many projects that must be delivered on time, within budget and with a measurable satisfaction. These include Public Works, Information Technologies, Industrialization and others. Embracing a technocratic ethos means that these projects cannot be left to chance and hope for the best. They must be delivered.The CU envisions strict project management disciplines in the planning and executions of these regional endeavors.
2	Agile – Lean Agile project management is an iterative and incremental method of managing the design-and-build activities for engineering, information technology, and new product or service development projects in a highly flexible and interactive manner. Agile, linked to lean techniques, (delivering more value with less waste) is best used in small-scale projects.
3	PMI/Six Sigma/Kanban Trained Project Managers The CU will actively recruit Project Managers that are trained in established methodologies, like PMI, CMM (Capabilities-Maturity Model), Six Sigma and Kandan (a scheduling system for lean and just-in-time production). The CU’s own Project Management Office will establish local standards.
4	Quality Assurance (QA) QA refers to the engineering activities implemented in a quality system so that requirements for a product or service will be fulfilled. It is a systematic measurement, comparison against standards, monitoring of processes and a structured feedback loop to confer error prevention. For IT, QA includes phases like integrated system testing, regression testing and stress testing.
5	Outsourcing needs Project Management
6	In-sourcing
7	Service Continuity – ITIL
8	Financial Guarantees
9	Big Data Analysis The CU’s embrace of e-Government and e-Delivery models allows for a lot of data to be collected and analyzed so as to measure many aspects of Caribbean life, including: trade, economic, consumption, societal values and macro-performance, and media consumption. This way, “course adjustments” can be made to strategic and tactical pursuits..
10	Legislative Oversight

The subject of project management methodology and deliveries is not new for this Go Lean roadmap; there have been a number of previous blog-commentaries by the Go Lean movement that referenced these concepts. See a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14316	Forging Change with Soft Power, Methodology and Persuasion
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11184	JPMorganChase spent $10 billion on ‘Fintech’ for 1 year
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8306	Women Get Ready for New Lean-In Campaign
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7769	Being Lean: Asking the Question ‘Why’ 5 Times
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7646	Methodology for going from ‘Good to Great’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3956	Art and Science of Collaboration
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3152	The formal process of Making a Great Place to Work®

Yes, we can make our homeland a better place by being lean. This is how the stewards of this new Caribbean can fulfill the Go Lean vision: a better region to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

——————

Appendix A – SHI Wins Citi Lean Partner Award
Sub-title: Award recognizes SHI as a valued partner that helped accelerate Citi’s software license deployment

SOMERSET, N.J.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–SHI International, one of North America’s top 10 largest IT solutions providers, has been granted the Citi Lean Partner Award by Citigroup, Inc., in recognition of SHI’s high levels of service, performance, and collaboration with Citi. The award was announced at the Citi Supplier Awards event held Sept. 25 in New York.

The Lean Partner Award recognizes the supplier that has most embodied the spirit of CitiLean, a continuous improvement program with tangible and measurable benefits to Citi and its customers. It honors speed to purpose (rapid and consistent turnaround time for services delivered), quality, efficiency, controls, and overall customer experience, allowing Citi to pursue growth and economic progress.

SHI partnered with Citi to re-design and implement software solution processes, resulting in a more streamlined environment.

“SHI’s years of software licensing and IT asset management expertise made possible a process that significantly reduced the time and resources it takes for Citi to make its employees productive, allowing Citi to improve its own level of service to its customers,” said Thai Lee, President and CEO of SHI. “Our work with Citi shows what SHI does best: understand our customers’ IT and business needs and create a solution that exceeds their expectations. This award recognizes a true partnership, one founded on shared values of quality, customer service, and continuous improvement.”

For more information on SHI, please visit www.shi.com and blog.shi.com.

ABOUT SHI

Founded in 1989, SHI International Corp. is a $7.5 billion+ global provider of technology products and services. Driven by the industry’s most experienced and stable sales force and backed by software volume licensing experts, hardware procurement specialists, and certified IT services professionals, SHI delivers custom IT solutions to Corporate, Enterprise, Public Sector, and Academic customers. With over 3,500 employees worldwide, SHI is the largest Minority and Woman Owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) in the U.S. and is ranked 9th among CRN’s Solution Provider 500 list of North American IT solution providers. For more information, visit https://www.SHI.com.

Press Resources

SHI Corporate Website: https://www.SHI.com
SHI Blog: https://blog.SHI.com
SHI Twitter Handle: @SHI_Intl

Contacts:
For SHI International:
Gregory FCA
Mike Lizun, 610-642-1435
Mike@GregoryFCA.com

Source: Posted October 12, 2018; retrieved August 9, 2018 from: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171012006506/en/SHI-Wins-Citi-Lean-Partner-Award

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Appendix B – Citi Internal Message From Don Callahan, Global Head of Operations & Technology

May 18, 2018 – I am very pleased to announce more than 80,000 employees have been trained through the CitiLean Digital Training Academy. It was only last March when we celebrated our 50,000 mark!

This is an outstanding accomplishment. More than one-third of the entire organization – and over 90 percent of the EO&T workforce – has an understanding of how to identify and drive end-to-end process change.

To my CitiLean Colleagues, I thank and applaud you for your diligence and dedication to the program. CitiLean is more than just a way to standardize and optimize processes. It’s a way to facilitate remarkable client experiences or, in other words, a way to Be the Best for our Clients.

I urge you to continue to grow, hone, and practice your CitiLean skills. The CitiLean Team has designed and revamped a number of programs to encourage knowledge sharing and application of CitiLean methodologies into projects and daily routines. With the online training modules providing a foundation, you can apply what you’ve learned by completing these new, interactive CitiLean in Action exercises to improve your own personal productivity, receive GLMS credit hours, and earn Collaborate badges.

For our 25,000+ Apprentices, I encourage you to practice and apply your CitiLean skills in the “CitiLean Apprentice Challenge”. This friendly contest encourages you to identify a process to improve using CitiLean and complete a full case study with estimated impacts of the solution ideas. Similar to last year, the winners of the Challenge – which runs through the month of July – will have the opportunity to present their case studies to Citi’s Senior Leaders.

CitiLean, the change it drives and mindset it facilitates, is central to the continued growth and well-being of Citi. There are many programs throughout my time with Citi that I’ve been passionate about, and CitiLean is certainly one of them.

Thank you again for your continued participation, commitment, and enthusiasm for CitiLean.

– Don

SOURCE: Non-confidential Internal Memo

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Appendix C VIDEO – Rewiring Citi for the digital age – https://youtu.be/7UN1q4wdDLE

McKinsey & Company

Published on Dec 8, 2016 – Citigroup’s Head of Operations and Technology describes the bank’s efforts to accelerate its digital transition, as well as the importance of having the right talent and agility to pull it off. Learn more: http://www.mckinsey.com/business-func…

Category: News & Politics

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