05/25/2007 - 05/26/2007

MoD makes diversity pledge

The Ministry of Defence and the Armed Forces have shown their commitment to improving representation amongst ethnic minority communities by signing up for the Next Step Foundation's Diversity Mark scheme.

The MoD is the first public sector organisation to commit to the Diversity Mark. Holders of the Diversity Mark actively encourage job applicants from ethnic minority backgrounds, and help with their career development.

Foreign volunteers bring etiquette to Qingdao

A total of 17 foreign volunteers have begun their teaching mission to explain their various national etiquettes and cultural taboos to around 100 residents of Qingdao city in eastern China.

The students are part of a volunteer network that will provide support during the 2008 Olympic Sailing Competition to be held in Qingdao. The 17 foreign volunteers are from eight countries, including Singapore and the Philippines.

National Business Etiquette Week (June 4-10, 2007)

According to the recent PSOW(R) Pulse Poll 2007 there has been an 80% increase in the need for Biz Etiquette training over the past five years. PSOW(R) Owner & Director Pamela Eyring says, "Our students come from as far away as Ghana, France, England, China, and New Zealand and work in the Fortune 100, universities, the military and entrepreneurs who start their own etiquette school so it's quite stunning and quite universal." The PSOW(R) Pulse Poll 2007 also found that 60% of graduates say they need formal etiquette training to do their jobs right. In response to what Eyring (and many others in the business community) have witnessed lately, PSOW(R) is sponsoring the first PSOW(R) National Business Etiquette Week June 4-10 to spotlight and reverse the decline in business etiquette and help professionals (from interns to CEOs) behave with more civility and professionalism.

Google launches translation feature

Google launched a new feature Wednesday that translates search requests and results in 12 languages automatically.

Mountain View-based Google lets users now enter search requests in their language, and then click on a link to have the resulting Web pages translated. Google said it expects the service to be used extensively outside the United States and the United Kingdom. Non-English languages currently available are Arabic, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese, Korean, traditional Chinese and simplified Chinese.

Word of the Day: fiat

fiat \FEE-uht; -at; -aht; FY-uht; -at\, noun:
1. An arbitrary or authoritative command or order.
2. Formal or official authorization or sanction.

He found a provision in the college constitution that said there were to be no executive committees, and arguing that those stodgy impediments to serious change had grown up only by convention and tradition; he abolished them and ruled these faculty meetings by fiat, using each as an occasion to announce what he was going to do next that was sure to stir up even more resentment. -- Philip Roth, The Human Stain