Postcards

Power Point: Get customer-facing!

"If you're interested in an entrepreneurial career, find yourself in a customer-facing job."

-- Greg Waldorf, CEO of eHarmony. I had lunch today with Waldorf, who was was a founding investor in the online-dating pioneer long before he rose to the top of the Pasadena-based private company. Besides telling me a few funny things ("Everyone thinks their town is the worst place for dating," he said--and in every new country MORE

One social-networking player making real money

by Jessica Shambora

Are there green shoots of profitability in the land of social networking?

Last week Twitter announced deals with Microsoft (MSFT) and Google (GOOG) to make its posts available on the Bing and Google search engines--and this could be a reliable source of future revenue. Though as Adam Lashinsky writes in the current issue of Fortune, Twitter co-founders Evan Williams and Biz Stone are still less focused on making MORE

Power Point: The relationship trumps the issue

"The relationship trumps the issue."

--Premal Shah, President of Kiva, the microfinance website that connects citizen lenders with entrepreneurs around the world. I interviewed Shah for Fortune's list of 40 under 40 in the current issue--he's No. 31 with Kiva CEO Matt Flannery.

While Shah's passion for microfinace drives him, it can also be a stumbling block. "Like a lot of entrepreneurs, and especially social entrepreneurs, I get pretty fired up and MORE

Are you situationally aware?

Situational awareness: being aware of what's happening around you to understand how information, events, and your own actions will impact your goals and objectives.

This is how Wikipedia defines this concept that's been bandied about a lot lately, since those Northwest (DAL) pilots got distracted on their laptops and flew wayyyy beyond Minneapolis, their destination. Whatever the rogue navigators were viewing or doing on their mini computer screens, they were oblivious MORE

Power Point: It's never too late to start over

"Basically, he's just starting 'A.I.G. Two' and raiding people out of 'A.I.G. One."

--Douglas A. Love, an insurance executive whose company employs former AIG (AIG) talent. Love, speaking to The New York Times, was talking about Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, the 84-year-old former CEO of AIG who ws pushed out in an accounting scandal in 2005. Now the irrepressible octogenarian is using his hard-won billions in AIG stock to start a firm MORE

40 Under 40's dearth of women--Discuss!

by Leigh Gallagher, Fortune Senior Editor

Why do women lag men on Fortune's 40 Under 40 list of the most influential rising stars in business? Yesterday we delved into this question and shared insights from two experts: Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and McKinsey director Joanna Barsh. Sandberg's and Barsh's opinions provoked some interesting comments, including one from David in New York City, who declared that women "have all the brains and MORE

Power Point: Life is long but time is short

"Life is long but time is short."

-- Google (GOOG) CEO Eric Schmidt, on acting boldly and taking risks. This line—along with points about passion and vision and keeping customers first—is one of 10 lessons that author Ken Auletta says he took away from researching Google for his new book, Googled: the End of the World as We Know It. Auletta's book is due out next week from Penguin Press.

40 Under 40: Where are the women?

Just look at Fortune's annual Most Powerful Women list to see the strides of women in business: Today an executive, to make the cut, generally needs to oversee some $6 billion in revenue, vs. about $1 billion 11 years ago when we launched the list. Still, the debate rages about why women aren't moving up the ranks faster. My theory: Women tend to view power horizontally and live their lives MORE

Morgan Stanley's Mack speaks about survival

My Fortune colleague Carol Loomis passed on this YouTube video of a talk that Morgan Stanley (MS) CEO John Mack delivered last week at Wharton. It's a remarkably candid play-by-play of living through the global economic meltdown.

Mack talks about being pushed by Tim Geithner, then head of the New York Fed, to do a deal with JPMorgan Chase (JPM) or Citigroup (C) or another partner that might stabilize the teetering MORE

Most valuable companies: Top 10

by Jessica Shambora

Yesterday we told you that Google (GOOG) tops the list of heavyweight stocks in terms of "market capitalization per employee." There's $8.6 million in stock-market value riding on every Googler who works for the company.

It's an odd metric, yes. The post generated some amusing comments. David Emery in Reston, Virginia wrote, "This seems to be a good justification for Google's well-known investment in/pampering of their employees. Happy MORE