The AIM Blogger

I just read this report by UBS entitled " Prices and Earnings 2009  (PDF)" and I think it's a fantastic report full of insights. The report is about the UBS survey of the cost of living in major cities in the globe,  from developed (New York, Tokyo, and London) to emerging economies (Manila, Mumbai, and Jakarta). While the report is full of numbers and indeces, there was one section that caught my attention and I figured is worth reflecting on. That section is entitled "Working Hours and Vacation days" and it detailed how much hours on average people from the surveyed cities are spending for work and the number of paid vacation days each person has. Here are some excerpts from the report: People work an average of 1,902 hours per year in the surveyed cities, but they work much longer in Asian and Middle Eastern cities, averaging 2,119 and 2,063 hours per year respectively. European cities had the lowest working hours per year. On average, empl...

Since yesterday, The AIM Blogger can now be accessed at http://www.theaimblogger.com . There's no need to update your bookmarks, as the old URL http://theaimblogger.blogspot.com will forward to the new domain. Actually, the domain is almost a year old (I registered the domain last year). The little story behind is that when I was featured in a magazine , the publication erroneously printed that this blog's URL was http://www.theaimblogger.com, instead of http://theaimblogger.blogspot.com. So to avoid any confusion, I bought the domain and forwarded it to the more accurate URL. It took me a few months to realize that I was paying for a domain that just forwarded, so I figured that I might as well use the domain for its intended use. Besides, the domain helps in the branding aspect. The only drawback is that it will take some tome before the search engines will recognize this domain.

Since launching the Asian Institute of Management page in Facebook last October 2008, AIM has reached the 1,000 fans mark last week. :D So if you're in Facebook, the Number One online social network today , support AIM by becoming a fan. :) Asian Institute of Management on Facebook

I'd like to the the bloggers for accepting the invite to the Blogger's Round Table in our Winning Internet Marketing Strategies and Tactics sessions. The Blogger Round Table is intended to give the participants a glimpse of how professional and hobbyist bloggers work and give an idea how internet marketers can engage bloggers without coming off as a corporate lackey out to buy the bloggers off. We had two sessions (one for the MBA elective and another one for the EXCELL program) and we had to find several bloggers who would be available at odd hours (one in the morning and one in the afternoon.) Again, my deepest thanks to the following bloggers: Noemi Dado of Touched by an Angel Jonas Diego of The Comic Blurb Jane Uymatiao of Here's to Life Jonel Uy of Let's Go Sago Fritz Tentativa of Fritzified Melo Villareal of Out of Town Blog Coy Caballes of CokskiBlue Karla Redor of Rockers World Aileen Apolo of An Apple A Day Juned Sonido of Baratillo Special th...

AIM students/geeks should be happy because the institute got a big boost with its internet bandwidth. (5 times more I learned.) The internet improvement is so significant that AIM is inviting all the students to use the internet to the point that it would cripple the network. Here's a snippet of an email I got inviting the AIM community to "stress test" the new internet connection: we are requesting that you put the new system through a stress test.  Try skyeping, downloading video or megabyte sized files.  Of course, students will happily oblige to this challenge. :)

The Winning Internet Marketing Strategies & Tactics class I'm co-teaching had its Internet Marketing plan presentations last Monday. While MBA students at the Asian Institute of Management are used to presenting (I'm pretty sure that the average MBA will present at least 20 times in the course of the 16-month program), it was the first set of presentations where I'm on the other side of the fence, so to speak. There were 13 groups that made plans for 13 companies, but since the class was over subscribed (we initially envisioned 8 groups), 5 groups were not able to present. Too bad. As for the plans, over-all they look promising, but most of them disregard the fact that they only have one month to run their respective campaigns. The objective of the project is to have the students try out practical campaigns on real companies, but also keeping in mind the results. Another limitation is the budget. All groups were given at least PhP1,000 worth of online advertis...

The whole Philippines is saying its last respects to former President Corazon Aquino , who passed away last August 1, 2009. Unbeknownst to many, Mrs. Aquino was a former Board of Governors member of the Asian Institute of Management . She was part of the institute's leadership from 2002-2006. In the AIM lobby, a little tribute is placed in honor of one of the well-respected leaders of the Philippines.