A Boston Technical Recruiters Blog

Article Title: Easy Networking Tips
Author Byline: Easy Networking Tips
Author Website: Easy Networking Tips

I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to have a network and keep in contact with the people in it, but many people don’t know how to do this well. So, today’s video post is on networking. Not how to meet and talk to people one-on-one (that’s later), but how to have a pool of resources. Here are 4 major points to keep in mind for medical sales, pharmaceutical sales, clinical diagnostics sales, biotech sales, laboratory sales, DNA products sales, cellular and molecular products sales, imaging sales, medical supplies sales, surgical supplies sales, hospital equipment sales, although it applies to everyone.

You do have current contacts. Make sure you have current e-mail addresses. These don’t have to be close relationships–acquaintances are fine. It should be people who you have something in common with: you used to work with them, your spouse works with them, you went to school with them, you were/are in some kind of a group with them, you get the idea. Every 3-6 months, send an e-mail to those contacts. It should say something like, “Hi, this is Peggy. It’s been a long time since we’ve talked. I’m still at ____________________, still doing _____________. If you need anything, please give me a call. Here are my phone numbers if you need to get in touch with me or give someone else my contact information if I can assist them. If your personal e-mail has changed, please let me know.” If you can (but you don’t have to), offer them something. This will keep you in their minds so that when an opportunity DOES come up, they are likely to think of you. You haven’t asked anything of them, you’ve just said “Hello.”
Get more contacts. You can do that by signing up for LinkedIn, FaceBook, or other social networks. You can join specific groups, where you can get posted on current blog postings, or join conference calls where you can give or get information. You need to be on those so that you can be found by recruiters who might have the perfect job for you. (We do look online for candidates.) As you add contacts, add them to your e-mail routine.
Big Tip: When you leave a company, ask your boss if he will give you a positive reference. If he will, get a personal e-mail address. If he leaves the company, you won’t be able to get in touch with him when you need the reference.
Be honest with your network. Everyone has problems–we all know that. I’m not saying we need to hear all the sordid details, but being honest about issues you have or situations you’re dealing with just might lead to an opportunity you wouldn’t otherwise have. We don’t always think of someone who tells us “everything’s fine,” but we all like to help someone if we can.
I have a lot of opinions and ideas about networking…some are on the video, some not. (Here’s some stuff I’ve posted before.) Do you have any networking tips or tricks to share?

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

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Author Byline: Liz Handlin
Author Website: Liz Handlin

Practically every time I turn on the news these days I hear about how “bad” the economy is. I am not sure if the economy is officially “bad” unless you are in the mortgage business but it is most certainly a time of change. There have been lots of notable mergers and acquisitions recently which are good for my business because as soon as employees get a whiff of major changes in management they hurry to update their resumes. Keeping your resume updated is a smart move of course and when changes are imminent it’s a good idea to reach out to your network to find out what the job market is like for someone with your skills. But, don’t jump to a new company too quickly. It’s a good idea to wait and see what the new regime’s goals, vision, and culture look like before making a career move.

While it’s often true that when a company is acquired the acquiring entity often combines jobs and/or replaces employees from the old company with new talent. However it is also true that the cream usually rises to the top and if you are a talented, hardworking individual, who is also willing to accept a new culture and new management style you might be able to thrive in a changing organization. The key to figuring out if you should stay or find a new job is to listen carefully while not panicking.

Listen to what the new management team has to say while (if you can) reading between the lines. Do whatever you are asked even if it is different than the kinds of things your old boss asked you to do. Don’t argue or resist the changes because, at least initially, the new management team is going to be watching and listening to you as carefully as you are to them. They are trying to figure out if the old employees can and will adapt to the new culture that they are bringing with them. Unless you find some aspect of the new culture or new management repellent to you it makes sense to do what you can to stay in your job until the dust settles and you can figure out if you can succeed in the new environment.

If you decide to stay in your job you have to embrace the new culture and work environment even if it is very different from what you are used to. The most common and immediate changes that affect employees in an acquisition are changes to benefits including vacation time/usage, flexible work arrangements, and healthcare. If new management reduces or modifies your benefits but you still want to keep your job you will just have to get used to the reduction. Sometimes, however, new management eventually changes its mind and re-instates benefits after a period of time so if you are otherwise happy with your new job situation it’s worth waiting to see if things change for the better.

You may even find that your new boss offers you better opportunities for challenging work and advancement than your old boss did. But you won’t know until you spend some time getting to know your new boss and figuring out if you can work well together.

The point of this post is to remind you to exercise patience if your company is merged or acquired by another. Don’t rush to quit and find a new job until you are certain that you don’t want to adapt to the new environment. Change can be a little scary but it’s not always a bad thing.

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

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Author Byline: the medical sales recruiter
Author Website: PHCConsulting

The “80/20″ rule is very important in sales: medical sales, healthcare sales, pharmaceutical sales, clinical diagnostics sales, laboratory sales, medical device sales, pathology sales, imaging sales, cellular products sales, molecular products sales, and biotechnology products sales. Really, it’s a universal principle that can be applied/interpreted any number of ways: 20% of the people do 80% of the work; 80% of the sales come from 20% of the customers; 80% of the sales are made by 20% of the salespeople….you see what I mean. Knowing this principle and how it works is very useful in deciding where to focus your effort and what to plan for. It makes you more effective.

The “80/20″ rule was created by Joseph Juran, who passed away recently (at the age of 103–wow!). Juran named this rule the Pareto Principle, after an Italian economist who observed that 80% of the wealth in Italy was held by 20% of the people. Juran applied that idea to quality management issues in manufacturing, and it became one of the most useful tools available for modern-day managers as well as a general principle that the rest of us can depend on.

Dr. Juran’s contributions to sales, marketing, and mangement through his ideas and insights are tremendously important. I just wanted to pay my respects, and give you all a little education about where that “80/20″ rule you all use came from.

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

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If you have ever seen Ghost in the Shell or have read some of the Ender’s Game Series by Orson Scott Card, you will be familiar with the notion of a network that grows so large that it gains self awareness.

Do you think that such an advent in AI is a possibility within the next 20 years? Do you think it will ever be possible to deposit your memories into the global network and thereby gain a measure of immortality?

Clarification added:

I’d like to thank everyone who has replied so far. Joost provided a very interesting site http://www.singinst.org/ that speaks about this very issue. When I asked about depositing memories and gaining immortality, I almost thought it far fetched, naively as I found out since apparently many people hold to this future vision.

The questions the really becomes not only can AI create better intelligence, but will that AI realize the huge question of what it means to be human and what will happen when it chooses to emulate the humanity and perhaps become human? I have no doubt that we will transform into androids at some point in the future: we can hardly live without our blackberries, imagine if that input could go straight to your brain…

Steve Kunstman

Applications Consultant at USBank

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This was selected as Best Answer

The biological path to awareness likely began with a single-celled creature, only aware of simple environmental changes happening microns away . . . changes that provided clues about the location of nearby nutrients.

Like the organisms themselves, awareness evolved to become what we humans experience today. But biological awareness seems to have plateaued. There is more we could discover about ourselves, using only what we were born with. However, except for a few, mostly marginal individuals, we’ve taken the “easy” route of extending consciousness through technological tools. As marvelously subtle and complex as these tools have become, human consciousness is many orders of magnitude more so.

I believe digital or network awareness will also follow an evolutionary process. The first steps are already underway. Consider the evolution of computer viruses, worms, etc.

Early biological organisms had no ability to modify their own “programming.” But they did have a strong drive to spread and reproduce, something which computer virus programmers have already given their creations. For that matter, some antivirus systems exhibit that kind of behavior, too. Self-modifying software also exists that reprograms itself in response to changes in its environment. At some point–which may already have happened–self-programming and reproductive behaviors will come together, and we’ll have the first true digital lifeforms.

As with biological evolution, not all of these will survive. Those that do will have gone beyond what their human programmers provided, and found ways to exist and reproduce that are hidden from the “antibodies” we invent to destroy them.

Human intelligence has been claimed to be holographic…existing as a whole in every part of the brain, and capable of being intact after incredible amounts of damage. Perhaps that’s how digital awareness will evolve, too — existing throughout the whole network, yet not apparent in any one node.

Once begun, evolution in the electronic domain will progress quickly, although not necessarily as quickly as some believe. A limiting factor of our own awareness is the speed at which nerve and neurons communicate. A digital consciousness whose nodes span a significant part of the globe would be limited by the speed at which its network communicates, especially the bottlenecks in that network.

Download our own memories and personality? I’d have called it impossible a few years ago. The storage technology required seemed to defy the laws of physics as we knew them. But the first RAM upgrade I did nearly 20 years ago was from 4K to 16K, requiring four fair-sized chips. Later tonight I’ll be installing a single smaller chip with more than 60,000 times the capacity. A short time ago, I saw 1.0 Terabyte storage units on the shelf at my local Best Buy.

And don’t get me started on the potentials of quantum computing . . .

The question is, when we have that capability, will there already be a conscious pervading our hardware. And will it be inclined to let us in?

Brian MacLeod

Marketing, Business, Web, Startup, Strategy - Hire me! - - - - - - - -> See more in my Specialties section

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Hi Gene,

Not a cat’s chance in the next 20 years. I suspect that we will be able to map and copy some brain patterns in the next three decades. That will be like copying a few sectors off a disk. The real challenge will be cracking the operating system and I’d guess 50 years at least for that. We’ll need the work of the upcomming crop of neuroscientists plus their successors.

Regards

Brian MacLeod

Peter Laudenslager

Technical Evangelist / Manager

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The fundamental problem in answering questions like this is that we don’t have a good definition for what intelligence or self-awareness really is. The closest we come is to identify behaviors of an intelligent, self-aware being, and attempt to duplicate those. The Turing test for artificial intelligence basically says that if a human cannot tell if he is interacting with another person or a machine, then the machine is effectively intelligent.

We already do a lot of this. Google search seems intelligent when it finds what you want from vague search terms - even correcting your spelling. But as we see what a machine can do, we start to make more refined distinctions about what a human can do that a machine cannot.

We also put a lot of our memories into the global network, via blogs, flicker, shared calendars, etc. Many people document their lives on-line, and this record is more or less permanent. I imagine, though, that this isn’t what you meant, and this point reinforces the definition problem.

What you might have meant was to ask if we can put our awareness into a machine (or network). Since we don’t really know what awareness is, it is hard to reproduce.

As an engineering problem, we are chipping away at it. As quickly as we can define the elements and behaviors, (e.g. store and retrieve images and data and relationships, recognize and correct errors), we find ways to recreate them artificially. The internet can “see”, and “remember”, and “speak”, and to a limited extent, even “reason”. Is is alive? Is it aware? Probably not, and probably will not be soon - but who knows? In the SF stories, the network builders don’t know how to create awareness either - it just arises from the chaos.

We don’t really know where our awareness comes from, so we can only guess where a new awareness might appear.

Petra Goltz, PMP

Project Manager CSBU, Southern Europe, at SITA

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In short: No

Longer answer:
In their book ‘On Intelligence’, Jeff Hawkins and Sandra Blakeslee argue that yes, we can build intelligent machines (and I am extending their argument to systems), but they may not be what we expect, i.e. they would not behave like humans or interact with us in humanlike ways.
The authors argue that, first, as the human mind is created not only by the neocortex but also by the emotional systems of the old brain and the complexity of the human body, to be human we need all of our biological machinery, not just a cortex. Secondly, given the effort and cost necessary to build and maintain humanoid systems, this would not be practical, as even though they might be ‘intelligent’ they would not have the kind of rapport and easy understanding we have by virtue of being fellow human beings.
In view of the above I do not think that we would be able in our lifetime (whether this extends to the next 20 or 50 years) to dump our memories into a global network within the context that created them, and the most we could expect to obtain for posteriority are documented threads of thoughts and anecdotes that would not mean much to anyone (but ourselves).

Eylon Israely

Co-Founder of Eco-Libris, Digital Strategist, Consultant

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The idea that the internet will think and behave like a single human organism, in a way that is recognizable to us, is quaint and entertaining but not very realistic. If users generate content then aren’t we also part of this Machine now? So how can we recognize the shift from within?

Glynn Pearson

Sales Director - Powervision Software

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If it does wake up it’s going to be one F*CKED up entity!

Joost Trijssenaar

Senior .NET Consultant and Contractor

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Hi Gene,

Interesting question.

The growth of the internet in itself does not relate to the intelligence or self-awareness of it. I can not imagine a network gaining spontaneous self-awareness.

Curious .. how much do we need to store for you? If you are really really stupid, like me, it just might work “Scientists With Supercomputer Simulate Retarded Mouse Brain”: http://everycoolidistaken.newsvine.com/_news/2007/04/28/689195-scientists-with-supercomputer-simulate-retarded-mouse-brain

Storing your brain online not only requires a data structure to store it in, you need a method to transfer your brain to the digital one. I doubt AI will have advanced to simulating a human brain in 2025. But if it has we can let a simulated brain or a few figure out how to do a copy-past of our memories.

Have a look at the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (link below).

Joost.

Links:

• http://www.singinst.org/
• http://everycoolidistaken.newsvine.com/_news/2007/04/28/689195-scientists-w…

Ty Peterson

Account Manager at MQSoftware

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It can wake up, absolutely. But only after 6 AM and several cups of coffee. Really is a slacker.

Messages from Ty Peterson (1):

Rich Tatum

Editorial manager at Zondervan. (Also: media enthusiast, technologist, speaker, editor, freelance writer, photographer.)

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I suspect not. If digital neurons were all that is required we probably would have seen something like this by now. Similarly, just slapping a bunch of meat together and zapping it with electricity doesn’t turn a Frankensteinian creature into a live being.

Something more seems to be required.

Rich

Clarification added 6 months ago:

By the way, thanks for referenceing OSC: what a delightful set of books! I love his exploration of the AI character, Jane, and what kind of entity she would be.

Messages from Rich Tatum (2):

Joerg Fritsch

Information Security Officer, IT Security Planning, CISM at NATO C3 AGENCY

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I recently answered a similar question (concerning web2.0) here in LinkedIN (see below). I still have not changed my mind.

In general I think it is possible in the next 10 to 100 years. I think the more important question would be: “Will we recognize it when it wakes up?” Looking at the internet I think there is no doubt that it is very different to ourselves / humankind. However, even with animals we do have difficulties to determine wether a certain species shows intelligent behavior or not.

Interestingly we are always looking for things which are similar to ourselves: similar brain architecture (what if the whole body is a brain [like the octopus]?), having had a long time to learn from its mom (what if something has never seen its mom?), examining the ground (what if something can fly or swim?) … .

An other factor is time. Just imagine the Rocky mountains or the Alps were self aware beings trying to communicate with us by spelling out one word over a million years. The neighboring mountain would hear the full text but we … .

Links:

• http://www.linkedin.com/answers/technology/web-development/TCH_WDD/85765-26…

Daniel Figueroa

Legal Search Consultant

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I believe that it is plausible. Just a few weeks ago there was an AI convention where leaders in the subject gathered to discuss such possibilities. although, admittedly we are still far off, i believe that it is possible, although maybe not to the extent of Jane in the book, yet maybe someday

Karl Garrison

CTO/Owner Intelligent Fusion, Enterprise Architect, Business Strategist, PhD

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Hey - I’ve actually seen Ghost in the Shell and read Ender’s Game which probably makes us about 0.01% of Linked In.

Anyway, I think this largely depends on how you define ‘wake up’.

You will definitely see it becoming increasingly self-aware and self-repairing and probably increasingly analytically intelligent. I dobt there’s ever a literal point it ‘wakes up’ as much as just continuing to evolve.

I recently saw a fascinating video about how we live in exponential times and they predict by 2013 super computers will exceed the capacity of the human brain. This seems quite believable in an analytic capacity, but the next question is what will they program it with?

Could you teach it to learn? That seems somewhat realistic for some areas that require reasoning - one could see it learning to become a universal translator or expert gamer, although I think intuition will be very challenging.

That said, the concept of a truly intelligent net is a bit far reaching since there is such a compelling need for secrecy between countries, companies, and individuals. And I seriously doubt we’ll ever deposit memories into the global network in the sense that it truly captures awareness and perceptions, although our lives may be documented in great detail.

Carl Jablonski

Graphic Design for the Digital Age

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How do you know it isn’t already awake?

Human consciousness is an emergent property of millions of neurons. Each neuron is independently alive, but is unaware that it is a unit of a larger consciousness.

Perhaps the internet consciousness has already achieved an emergent intelligence, but we view it on too macro a level to perceive it.

Ken Lovely

Software Development Manager at Harleysville National Corporation

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I read all the responses thus far; interesting…

In 20 years I have not doubt there will be true AI, we might even have robots like Rosie from the Jetsons. But the Internet, I doubt it very much. The net will end up being the communication and library source.

Yes, people will start storing their entire bank of memories; the question is will these data files remain after their death…. Since commerce is live and well, who will pay to store these memories forever?

Douglas Stevenson

Principal Consultant & ENMS Propellor Head

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Hmmm… An interesting topic… And somewhat technically challenging.

First of all, we build applications that do things. We don’t build applications that learn how to do things. So, at its very core, our own software is being fed individual fish and is not structured to learn how to fish.

We, as human beings, enjoy continuous input from a variety of sources. Smell, Taste, hearing, sight, touch… Our computers are not so multi-dimensional. So, our computers don’t have the input or even feedback necessary.

What if a memory cell could store something beyond a 1 or 0? What if a single memory cell could store 1 of 256 shades of gray? Could we achieve enough memory density for all of the potential input? Dunno.

The other thought is that with anything good comes a segment that tends to do stuff like create Viruses, worms, etc. I think that the security aspects of whats possible in applications is curtailed because a new approach may present new and unknown risks.

You know, I think that given a shot, I could do this! An application that analyzes event horizons - Studies the causes and effects and emulates what it learns. OK… Who’s ready to send me some capital so that I can eat for a few months?!!

Of course, I can see the purists going crazy… Self modifying code!!! HA! Code that writes more code. I could probably break a half dozen other “defacto rules” Comp Sci folks are taught!

Dougie!!!

Marc Mengel

Software Engineer/Systems Adminstrator

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It sems to me improbable, with one exception. It is unlikely to happen on the basis of n triliion transistors interconnected, because the components are not sufficiently dynamic — except at the level of say, computer viruses being pushed around the network. If so, it would probably be treated as a malfunction by network users/owners and get stomped out.

The other possiblity is the _The_Adolescence_of_P1_ scenario; where an AI researcher develops an actual artificial intelligence, which learns to spread itself like a virus/trojan horse, and takes over large chunks of the network. This scenario seems also unlikely (the initial creation), but once over that initial hurdle, it could proceed. So overall, it seems the more likely of the possibilities to me.

Salman Khan

Sr. Project Coordinator at Mondo A/S

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It would be interesting to see that happen. I doubt it would though. Mainly because the internet as we (I) know it is information. There is no high level decision processing available anywhere. Everything is simple straight forward basic logic.

Here’s a scenario where it could happen.

Some genius kids get together, build a small worm-ish program that travels the network, mapping it together. It gathers information by not storing this information in some big huge database, but actually makes a small copy of itself where the information is located. This child of worm-ish will have similar functionality to the parent, but limited to it’s own “domain”. When the Worm-ish reaches a piece of information that is being monitored by a previously created child under a different subject, it instead of making a copy, will communicate with the child and tell it to look after this other reference also. All children and the Worm-ish will talk to each other periodically.

At this stage we have an information marker program, this only marks information based on subject, topic, title etc. In a sense, only creating references and cross references to the information is organized.

Now another set of geniuses, working on artificial intelligence, think of using this worm-ish, they build another similar program that has built into it some sort of decision making and semantic understanding of information.

Soon Worm-ish and Seman-worm are heavily linked. Seman-worm starts to multiply itself and building basically a neural network of seman-worm.

Eventually different parts of the Seman-worm evolve and specialize themselves into different areas. these learn to communicate with each other on an abstract level.

…..

How long would this take. Would this actually happen? How can a machine learn a sense of self?

As far as your second question… “gaining a measure of immortality” well frankly, I personally believe that our brains are more robust than machines. Basically because take away a single transistor out or a machine and it’s wasted, take away a number of neurons from the brain and the brain will adapt.