Everything About Business Except The Bottom Line: FunnyBusiness

How did Time Wasters become part of the Corporate Patois?

Normally corporate America shies away from any kind of negatively imbued verbiage,preferring instead to use a corporate speak  that is equivalent to  a verbal . That's why all this talk about Time Wasters has me absolutely baffled. It's so un-positive.

Usually I love negative words as much as the next person, but in this case I resent and find it very unproductive to label creative free form thinking as time wasting.

I believe taking virtual breaks on eBay, Jossip, and loopty loop are necessary daily injections required to keep the mind refreshed.

Why hasn't someone done a the study that demonstrates taking small breaks throughout the day actually promotes productivity?

Before people get their undies in a bundle about corporate time wasting they really need to consider that a Internet surfing employee is a happy employee and a happy employee is a more productive employee.

Needless to say I hold a minority position on this issue. According to a survey released sometime( they didn't date the release) AOL and salary.com found that on average- Americans "Time Waste" 2.09 hours a day--not including lunch and breaks. That was about twice as much as HR departments had guesstimated.

Natch, the Internet is being blamed for much of this Corporate Time Wasting. And, we knew that it was just a matter of time before someone would come up with a way to end all the fun.

Earlier this week it was announced that a eTelemetry, a company in the "business intelligence" sector, now has a product that can pinpoint an individuals bandwith usage. As Peejz wrote in a post on the Right Voices,

The Days Of Blogging At Work May Soon Be Over! 

ETelemetry in Annapolis specializes in business intelligence, helping firms to track their own technology infrastructure and people, to find out who’s working diligently and who’s updating a MySpace profile or rearranging a Netflix queue. The bane of office loafers everywhere, eTelemetry’s Metron and Locate network trackers can pinpoint individual “bandwidth hogs” on a company’s network, even tallying the time individual employees spend surfing the net.

So in the spirit that you might as well get time wasting while the getting is still good, here is a list of some wonderful ways to utilize your 2.09 hours of creative thinking today.

Used Wigs  quality workday distractions. Links to other great sites like the Chinese Propaganda site.

Chinese Propaganda Posters
In August, Time Magazine ran an article on listing the 50 coolest web sites in an article called  Time Wasters

Also Check out Milk and Cookies and The Official Time Wasters Guide v 3.0

Check them out, because to paraphase the lyrics to the Days of Wine and Roses,

the days of time wasting laugh and run away like a child at play
Through a meadow land toward a closing door
A door marked "nevermore" that wasn't there before

This  is cross-posted at Blogher

Image Credit: Flickr member magicalxpixie

 

Sounds of Silence on Working Mothers Top 100

It's the type of topic you'd expect bloggers to well, blog about. For the 21st time,Working Mothers Magazine released its list of the Top 100 family friendly places to work. The news was greeted with relative silence--at least among bloggers.

To get on the list,companies have to complete a 550 quesion survey. They are ranked on seven criteria:

The application includes detailed questions about the workforce, compensation, child-care and flexibility programs, leave policies and more. The application checks the usage, availability and tracking of programs, as well as the accountability of managers who oversee them. That means it's not enough to have a great program if no one is using it.

WHAT'S MEASURED Seven areas are measured and scored: workforce profile, compensation, child care, flexibility, time off and leaves, family-friendly programs and company culture.

So what's with all the silence? Is it because women don't care, don't believe the survey, or is it because as working mothers they simply don't have time to weigh in on the significance, gains, surprises and trends listed in the top 100.

The one place that does seem to be having a conversation about the list is in the MOMania, a blog on the Atlanta  Journal-Constitution by Theresa Walsh Giarrusso. It's a conversation we've heard before: working moms should not have special work privileges.

From Brian:

My company is not “mother friendly”… and a good thing, too. I’ve got plenty to do without covering for someone else’s job too.

Now, if you want a realistic accommodation of people’s work/life demands, you could push for a WORKER-friendly company: one that treats all employees equally and recognizes that we ALL have obligations and responsibilities outside the office. But a “mother-friendly” company? Heck no, what a terrible idea.

From Not A Mom

I am a woman who chose not to have children, but I do have a life outside of the office. Why should mothers get extra flexibility in their jobs that I don’t? Personally I feel that ALL employees should have some flexibility in their hours, no matter what their family situation may be. We all have things we need to do outside of work. Not just moms.

From StayInvolved

At my company your schedule and flexibility with hours is not determined by your gender but by your position and business needs.

Sorry NoKidz, sounds like you work with some terribly selfish people. I recently had to balance work, motherhood and caring for a dying parent. Could not have done it without the help and support of my coworkers.

 

Here's a link to the top 100

"This is not a fad":Corporate Blogging

Saying she wanted to write the "uncool" blogging book, blogging consultant Debbie Weil set out to write a "how-to" book for corporations who have heard about the power of  blogs but not sure how it fits into their business model.  Released in August 2006, Weil says her books is targeted to corporate-minded people.

While she is a obvious proponent of corporate blogging, Weil says that there are some pitfalls--particularly if a company promotes customer service on their blog and then customer's actual experiences don't match up.

Weil recently chatted about the book, blogging and where she thinks corporate blogging is headed.You can re

You can read more about Weil's blog on her blog:BlogWrite for CEOS

Corporate Blogging does have its detractors. Amy Gahran, on her blog The Right Conversation   links to a post called Why Jonathan Schwartz should not be blogging  by Dave Taylor  and then shares her thoughts on why most CEOs should not blog.

"As anyone who's worked in or with corporations for more than five minutes can attest, often CEOs are the last people who can speak to the public in a relaxed, human voice. This is especially true for text blogs where you're dealing with the written word.

In my experience, most top-level executives are horrible writers. Worse, they loathe writing and they aren't emotionally prepared to handle open comments. They're more comfortable giving speeches and interviews -- which might make them better candidates for a podcast."

 

As for Taylor's rationale for CEOs keeping being nonbloggers:

The most important issue, however, is that the CEO is not the person in a company responsible for communicating with customers and the marketplace. Indeed, the traditional role of a Chief Executive Officer is to raise money. That's it. They're responsible for contributing to the strategic direction of the company, but most typically not the tactics. Look at this another way: quick, how many CEOs can you name? How many from companies with more than $10 million in sales or more than 500 employees? I thought so.

This is cross-posted at Blogher.

Where did you say that buck stops?.

  Given all the salacious details that are now coming out almost daily about the HP Pretexting Scandal, it's easy to ignore one of its victims...HP's Corporate Culture.

There used to be a thing called THE HP WAY.  When THE HP WAY was alive and well, the pretexting scandel would have been unheard of.

In 2002, Jocelyn Dong, writing for the Palo Alto Weekly reported on the "Rise and Fall of The HP Way". It's a wonderful read . It reminds us that corporate values matter. That  when integrity and ethics are indelibly linked to a corporation good things can happen for employees and for shareholders.

When Packard and Hewlett passed away in 1996 and 2001, respectively, obituary writers noted their enduring legacy was not the multi-billion dollar tech giant -- it was the HP Way.


Dong started her piece by writing,

"For some workers, the HP Way bordered on religion. They considered it inviolable. A management philosophy emphasizing integrity, respect for individuals, teamwork, innovation, and contribution to customers and the community, it earned the abiding loyalty of thousands upon thousands of employees"

Over the next couple of days and weeks, as more stuff about the spying on board members and journalists is revealed, the media will focus on the dirty deeds and the people who did them.

While what was done was heinous and despicable, it is also heartbreaking. How did a company that had such wonderful values, lose its way?

Now that's its lost, can it find its way home again.    The blog Freds House, doesn't think the company can return. But he does believe it can recreate.

You know, sometimes it takes a crisis to precipitate a catharsis -- and maybe our current board crisis can be turned into a vehicle for purposeful renewal of the HP culture and our presence in the world. It would be hard and painful thing to do, and it would take incredible leadership from Mark Hurd and his team and from every person in HP, but I could see it, I really could.

Am I crazy? Inspired? Deluded? Maybe, but I think it's a great question: What would a truly great HP look like, that would be deserving of the term HP Way 2.0?

The Resume Writing Blogs

Sitting with my son Noah, and our cousin Jeffrey in an unpretentious Mexican restaurant near Washington Square on Sunday, we started talking about Noah's job.

Having just graduated in June from the University of Wisconsin, Noah sent out one resume, went on one interview and was gainfully employed 10 days after graduation.

Not so for his friend Sam*. Like Noah, Sam graduated from Wisconsin in June. He was a strong student with a major in marketing. He had several internships. He's sent out 95 resumes and hasn't been called for one interview.

Jeffrey said the obvious. There has to be something wrong with his resume. Or does there?

Just the day before I was chatting with my friend Lynne about resumes. Sitting in a lovely european coffee shop( that's what it called itself, "european coffee shop" ) near 1st avenue and 15th in NYC, I was talking via my cell phone with Lynne in St.Louis who had just landed her dream job-- planning events and managing volunteers for a nonprofit.

Instead of going the tradiitional resume route, Lynne opted to send a "career basket". Lynne had taken 12 words that described the skillset of the position and then filled a bucket with chatchkees representing each skill. For organized, there was  a little dayplanner, for creative,a box of crayons,and so on. Her traditional resume was in the center of all the stuff. She got the job.

Not ready to do a bucket resume but not wanting to end up in Sam's position with no call backs?

There are a ton of resume writing blogs that will either provide you with the confidence to create the world's best resume ,or intimidate you enough to  hire a professional resume writer to do the job for you.

Jennifer Anthony at ResumeASAP Blog offers practical advice like: Eight Essential Proofreading Secrets to Keep Your Resume Out Of The Trash andListing Other Interests on a Resume Yes or No?.

At One Louder Heather Hamilton has a post with multiple links for people who want to brush up on resume strategies.

The Executive Resume Blog offers news on the latest trends, techniques, and issues affecting executive employment and executive resume writing.  Laura, like many of the resume blog writers promotes she is a certified resume writer. Then there's a post from Diane Penna, who asks the question,Are Resume Writing Services Necessary? Her conclusion?

If you are concerned about having your resume get noticed, I would suggest getting help with your cover letter instead. Resumes, while detailed, are not typically written in full sentences, while a cover letter requires excellent English skills. Don't make the mistake of thinking that just because a cover letter wasn't requested that it isn't needed. Do what I did. Spend an extra hour or two and put together your own resume and I bet you'll be pleasantly surprised with the results.

And finally, Lorelle on Wordpress suggests that just as Thursday is the new Friday, Blogs are the new resume.

’For your career, a blog is essential,” says Phil van Allen, a faculty member of the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. ‘’It’s the new public relations and it’s the new home page. Instead of a static home page, you have your blog,” he said. It’s a way to let people know what you are thinking about the field that interests you.”

*Sam is a pseudonym. He is a real person and would love a job interview.

Image Credits: Flickr members spoOman and Pål Løberg

This is cross-posted at Blogher
 

Working Girls Can't Win For Losing

On the right we have Campbell Brown. Although Brown was on the short list for taking over Katie Couric's job on The Today show, Radar Online reported earlier this week that NBC execs say she never had a chance because she isn't a mommy.

NBC brass concluded that Today's core audience of stay-at-home moms would have trouble relating to a female host without rugrats of her own, banter about kids and spouses being as essential a part of Today's mix as cooking segments and Al Roker. (In fact, Brown wasn't even an honest woman until April, when she wed Fox News analyst Dan Senor.)

In writing about the Brown disclosure in  the BROADSHEET Column in Salon.com ( subscription required),Rebecca Traister wrote:

Apparently, the "Today" show's female viewers, including a core of stay-at-home moms, "would have trouble relating to a female host without rugrats of her own." It didn't help that Brown is something of a looker, and that the network felt her less-foxy viewers might have been intimidated by her beauty.

On the left we have Meredith Vieira. who was forced to leave her prestigious job at 60 minutes  in 1991 because she couldn't negotiate a family friendly contract. Vieira is the mom to three teenagers and whose husband is legally blind, has MS and a couple of bouts of colon cancer. She premiered on TODAY last week.  This from The New York Times

"At 52, Ms. Vieira is that rare television woman who doesn’t seem afraid of her age, perhaps because even with sagging skin and rippling smile lines, she looks amazingly pretty and vibrant on camera. She wore a sober black pantsuit that was casually elegant, not stuffy. Her manner, warm and self-deprecating, is easy on the eyes and ears"

And in the center, Katie Couric.  Since her debut earlier this month on the revamped CBS Evening News we have heard about the legs, the botox, the clothes, From Andrea Peyser's review in the New York Post,

Her face was Botoxed beyond normal human endurance, proving that even pampered, overpaid news babes possess the courage to suffer for their art.

And for the first time in history that a female was allowed to deliver a network's evening news alone, Katie chose to wear an unfortunate white blazer - the result, no doubt, of some jokester lying to her face when Katie asked, "Does this make me look fat?"

And the day after Labor Day, to boot!

So much written about nothing. Nothing  or very little written about their qualifications.
Does anyone know anything about Charlie Gibson's wife or kids?  Has it been in a lomg marriage or is he a serial  husband? What about  Brian Williams? Does his wife have any diseases? What about his kids?  Do the men  get spa treatments? A little microderm abrasion? Maybe a touch of botox or are we encouraging a couple of smile lines on their faces to add to their gravitas?

I actually don't have a problem with people commenting on the appearance of TV anchors or how the job affects their family life  as long as men are given the same scrutiny as the women.

It is demeaning, discriminatory and insulting when women are not judged on the same criteria as men. So go ahead talk about insipid white jackets and botox and legs-- and now let's put that same micrsocrope on the men.

It won't happen because to do so would be to marginalize their effectiveness and professionalism. Hey you want to talk about Meredith's smile lines and Katie's Botox? Do it over it lunch. But spending all this oxygen  in the media on who has kids, who'sa more sacrificing mom and who is sexier is on the same level as Forbes hideous article on Why Men Shouldn't Marry Career Women.

While the insights about botox and kids may seem harmless and just part of our culture ( those mommys love to read this stuff), it is irresponsible on the part of the leaders in media to continue to perpetuate covering the fashion and appearance of women news professionals.

If this were just ignorance at play, it would be one thing. But these are smart boys. They know exactly what they are doing.  By encouraging the discourse on Katie's legs, Campbell's childlessness, and Meredith's sacrifice they are sending a message to everyone about the way women need to behave-- the way they, the boys want us to behave.

A couple of thoughts to reporters; How about saying no. No more stories about Katie's Botox if in the same article you don't talk about the other anchors appearances. No more stories about their Mommyness unless you talk about their coworker's daddiness. And no more comments on clothing unless you 're ready to do nightly critiques  on the choice of ties these anchors wear.

Pump It UP Working Moms

Breastfeeding at work  has been on my mind for a couple of months. During the summer I happened to  chat  with a new mom who told me a story about her good friend who was asked to go across the street from her office to pump her milk. The woman worked for a legislator. When I asked if she would be willing to chat with me about the situation, she declined.

Earlier this month, Jodi Kantor wrote a wonderful article about working women and breastfeeding in The New York Times ( subscription required)

"But as pressure to breast-feed increases, a two-class system is emerging for working mothers. For those with autonomy in their jobs — generally, well-paid professionals — breast-feeding, and the pumping it requires, is a matter of choice. It is usually an inconvenience, and it may be an embarrassing comedy of manners, involving leaky bottles tucked into briefcases and brown paper bags in the office refrigerator. But for lower-income mothers — including many who work in restaurants, factories, call centers and the military — pumping at work is close to impossible, causing many women to decline to breast-feed at all, and others to quit after a short time."

Elderberry Jam, a blog written by a Quaker Nurse who lives on a small farm is one of those breast feeding working women.

"I have been back to work as a nurse on an orthopedic/neurological unit since mid-July. Our baby girl has never tasted formula, and she just turned 3 months old. That is thanks to an Ameda Purely Yours breast pump. The hospital has a nice lactation room for employees, but our surgical floor is so busy that I often only get one chance in 8 hours to pump. I have a 45 minute drive to and from work. You aren't supposed to go over 4 hours without pumping. So if it's been 5 hours by the time I get off work, I pump rather than add 45 more minutes. Pumping in the car to and from work would be IDEAL."

As someone wrote (which I cannot find right now) breast pumping while driving does seem like the ultimate parody of multi-tasking. It's also expensive. From a post responding to Kantor's article in Medpundit.

"Wealthier women can spend their way out of work-versus-pumping dilemmas, overnighting milk home from business trips and buying $300 pumps that extract milk quickly, along with gizmos that allow them, in what seems like a parody of maternal multitasking, to pump while driving to and from work. Just don't try it with a real baby."

Radical Catholic Mom has a lot to say about the cost of using a breast pumps.

"It’s not just lactation breaks and a clean place to pump that’s often lacking, but the pump itself. Efficient pumps that can extract milk during a work break cost hundreds of dollars to own; Dr. Lori Feldman-Winter, a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics committee on breastfeeding, notes that her patients can’t even afford the $50 variety. So let’s see: You have no guaranteed pumping breaks, no clean, private pumping space, and you can’t afford a pump. Meanwhile, WIC offers vouchers for formula. Is it any wonder that by six months postpartum, only 29% of mothers whose education ended at high school still feed their babies breastmilk?"

Turns out concerns about breastfeeding for working women is not limited to the U.S. According to an article in INQ7.net, Maila Ager writes about Eduardo Zialcita, legislator who wants breastfeeding rooms available to all working women in the Phillipines. While Zialcita cites health benefits as a reason, he also shares that there is an economic benefit to the legislation.

"Besides, the lawmaker said breastfeeding would not only save lives but it would also impact positively on the economy of the Philippines. The lawmaker said if all lactating mothers would breastfeed their babies, the government could save 57 million US dollars or roughly 2.96 million pesos from milk formula imports every year."

Finally, Cribsheet, a blog for Twin Cities moms and dads hosted by The Star Tribune had a post  from Christy, from a waitress that reminded me why I love the sensibilities of the Twin Cities.

MN has a great law regarding a womans right to pump-as well as tax breaks for employers who provide a special room to mothers-please look up the law–we have one of the best. As for restaurants, I have worked at Old Chicago Uptown for 12 years, and have pumped for a total of 3 years while working there (2 different babies) and they were FABULOUS. I could go every 1 1/2-3 hours (depending on my babies age-I went back to work at 28 days post-partum) while the manager and other servers watched my tables–my husband was even allowed to bring in our baby in case the bottle was rejected that night. Since my experience, I know that there have been many servers at our various locations who have pumped no problem at work. I realize I am lucky to have such a great supportive place to work, I just wish everyone knew about our rights as nursing moms.

Image Credit:Galatically Stupid. This is cross-posted at Blogher.

Just Flock It

   Under the category of Browser Wars, a fellow Blogher who also happens to work at Flock, recently responded to someone's question on an easy way to add photos to their blogs.

I was interested because I have spent considerable time trying to learn the art of including photos on blogs.

Adding photos can be daunting. There's the sizing issue and the copy wrapping issue that sometimes can take longer to resolve than the post itself.

She recommended --sharing that she did work for Flock-- that they should start using Flock as their browser. Given that I am not a techie and that I just converted to FireFox from IE in 2006, I had never heard about Flock.  And, if you are, like I was, of the mindset that a browser, is a browser , is a browser...then I encourage you to take a look at flock.

From Extreme Tech

The Internet is supposed to be interactive, right? It's not just about being a passive watcher of Web sites, but about sharing your input, as well. The Flock browser is an attempt to bring some of the Web 2.0-style concepts right to the application that gives you a view of the interweb. Built on top of FireFox, Flock incorporates "mashups"—the hip buzzword for web service integration—with social bookmarks (with del.icio.us and Shadows), photo sharing (with Flickr and Photobucket), and blogging—with tools built into the browser for posting to your blog. In fact, it's this integration on which Flock's creators intend to build their business model, cutting deals with other web services.

Based on Firefox it does have some dandy features like allowing you to drag and drop photos from your desktop to their photobucket uploader and then a strip of your photos (that black band at the top of the screen shot) is displayed in the browser so you can just drop and drag the photos from your photbucket  onto your post. Very Cool. It magically does all the html coding thing for you. I'm sure it does a ton more that's all I've tried so far.

From Personal Computing World

Setup is easy and Flock will take all of the settings from Firefox, including page history and cookies. This makes the transition the most painless of all browser upgrades, although this will not help those moving from Internet Explorer or Opera. The interface is similar to most browsers, although the most recent browsing history is revealed by right-clicking on the Back button rather than there being a discrete menu. It does feel a little hidden, but is convenient once discovered. On a more favourable note, it is possible to add icons for the blogging, photo and news tools. A search box in the toolbar is nothing new, but the extra twist from Flock is that it searches dynamically as text is entered. The results vary depending on the words but it is a much faster way of searching. Flock is an ideal tool for anyone who wants to record their web experiences on a blog. Simply select an area of text or even an image, and then select the Blog This option. An editor appears with both a Wysiwyg editor and a source editor. It is compatible with Blogger, Typepad and other popular blogging tools. You can see some demo posts at http://ano pensource.wordpress.com.

Did Donald Trump Go Too Far?

There are bloggers who have talked about their bosses. There are bloggers who have been fired for talking about their bosses. But, Donald Trump may be the first CEO to use his blog to share with the world his reasons for firing an employee.

In a post called Carolyn on the Trump Blog, Trump shares the details that led to his decision to tell Carolyn Kepcher"You're Fired!".

The fact is, I like Carolyn very much but she loved her fame and she loved her celebrity on "The Apprentice" and it was affecting her work. She wasn't doing her job like she used to or was capable of doing. So I felt that after 11 years together it was time for a rest.

I told Carolyn in the nicest way possible, "Go out and enjoy your family. Get a new job."

There are some things that deserve to be confidential. Reasons for dismissal, as long as their are no legal violations, deserve silence -not blogging.Most CEOs have more respect for themselves and for their employees and the potential of a defamation of character lawsuit. I have a feeling The Donald could care less.

But what if The Donald is actually starting a trend---The revenge of the CEO. Or as my friend Nancy White calls it " The Firing Blog". Imagine if this trend continues and Firing Blogs  take their rightful place along  with the mommy bloggers, the food bloggers, and the political bloggers.

Firing Blogs are for  all those business executives who have had to sit back in silence as their employees,and former employees gleefully blog their brains out telling stories out of school about the horror of their leadership style.

So far, most agree its unethical and a fireable offense to publicly blog about  your boss or  your place of employment.  So,if that's the case,  could Firing Blogs take off ,or is this just a one-blogger with  The   Donald being able to do it because after all, he's The Donald?

FunnyBusiness is supporting Team Noah

FunnyBusiness is supporting the fight against Leukemia and Lymphoma by encouraging you to donate to Team Noah. This post is dedicated to the memory of Rose Freed.

Shortly after 9/11 I began rethinking my career. For the previous 20 odd years I had focused exclusively on business communications. During those 20 years, I rarely--except for election night-- missed my first career as a journalist.

9/11 changed that. With extra time on my hands,( lots of consultants found themselves with little or no work as corporations canceled contracts and stopped spending on outside vendors) I felt compelled to start writing about stuff I wanted to write about. Like many a hopeful freelance writer before me,  I went to Barnes & Noble, purchased the Writer's Digest ,and began targeting which magazines I would submit my stuff to.

"Remembering Rose" was one of the first pieces I wrote. At the time I thought it might find its way to a parenting magazine. Until today, it's basically stayed in a folder on my computer.  Magazines, I quickly learned, weren't interested in reading my stuff.

The moment my daughter Berit saw me standing on the steps of her summer school dormitory, she broke into a huge grin, and started running toward me. But, within a split second, she stopped dead in her tracks, her shoulders slumped, her grin turned to sobs—she knew why I was there.

            As I came to her with a consoling hug, she said, “Bubba died, didn’t she?”

Rose Freed was my mother-in-law. Lymphoma was just one of the diseases she was living with when she died in 2001.

Last month my son Noah decided to join the Team In Training program for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. His goal is to raise about $5000 and run the marathon in Hawaii this December.He is running in memory of Bubba Rose.

FunnyBusiness is hoping is hoping you will lend your support by donating to Team Noah Freed.

According to their website, The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society has raised over $600 million since 1988 by sponsoring a variety of "endurance events".  Which got me curious about the entire Endurance Events Fundraising strategy. Over the years I have walked for the Race for the Cure, March of Dimes and have supported others efforts as the ran, walked and biked for everything from MS to AIDS.

So it's interesting when I wanted to find out more about this fundraising strategy that I really couldn't. I wanted to know why this is so successful. I wanted to know how much money is being raised through these events. I couldn't find it.

I searched Google, Lexis Nexis, and then called the library. They called back saying they had not found any answers to my questions.

From a business perspective, I find this rather odd considering how prolific they are. Recently, the Daily Show's Dan Bakkendahl did a piece on the "walkanazis"  called "Look Who's Walking Too".( The link is to a page of his videos, scroll down and you'll find this one. It's very funny.) It's the story about a man who is angry because the charity walks interfere with his ability to get to Starbucks.

While I couldn't find specific statistics about the trend for nonprofits to use endurance events to raise money, I did find a blogger who is not a fan of these events. In July, Eric Crampton wrote:

Charity runs provide participants a lot of warm fuzzy feelings about helping folks and showing solidarity with those in need; they also provide an enforced exercise regimen: backing out from the run after having solicited donations from friends would be uncomfortable at best.

Any individual wanting to help the charity would almost certainly do better to spend the time working overtime (or taking a part time job), donating the money to the cause, and asking their friends to match a portion of their contributions. But race organisers would not do better by switching to the "work plus parade" format as doing so would reduce participation by more than would be gained by transforming wasteful training into productive work.

That may be true but as they say in marketing, there's a big gap between the way people "should" behave and the way they "do" behave. Obviously, these endurance events have legs.  Which brings me back to Noah.  Are his intentions purely charitable? Of course not. Running a marathon is a personal goal. Running it in Hawaii is a bonus.

His love for his grandmother was real,too.She had lymphoma. He does care and he is proud that his willingness to train and run can help provide funds to continue to search for a cure.