Archives for April 2019

April
30, 2019

5 min read

Most Americans are aware of China’s one-child policy, the population-control rule that from 1979 to 2013 sharply limited the number of Chinese births. Less well known outside China is an offshoot campaign currently being run by the government that targets and shames sheng nu (leftover women) for the “crime” of being an unmarried educated professional woman older than 27. 

The systematic disparagement and discrimination these women face is the subject of Leftover Women, an affecting new documentary by Israeli filmmakers Shosh Schlam and Hilla Medalia which had its New York premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival this week.

Related: 4 Mistakes We All Make to Perpetuate Gender Bias

Due to its one-child policy, China today has 30 million more men than women of marriageable age. The government views this gender imbalance as a threat to the social order. In an interview with Entrepreneur, the filmmakers detailed its effects. “One side effect is women trafficking,” said Shosh Schlam. “Another side effect is that more men will not have the traditional role of head of the family,” meaning the opportunity to father children and continue the family name. The government, Schlam said, fears that a glut of unmarried men could cause violence or, worse, that these men might “turn” gay — which is illegal in China and subject to harsh penalties.

Whatever the government’s motive, sheng nu is stigmatizing urban professional women who want to start businesses or pursue careers in law, media and academia as being selfish.

“When these women [from China’s educated class] are growing up, they have a lot of pressure to succeed — to be the best in their class,” said Hilla Medalia. “And their parents really push; the whole society pushes them to succeed and go to university. Then they start their career. But then they have to stop everything and get married. Their entire value is based on this one thing.”

Related: Sexist Job Ads Discriminate Against Women in China — Even Specifying Applicants’ Required Height, Weight and Facial Structure

To document the impact, Shlam and Medalia returned to China, site of their first, 2014, collaboration, Web Junkie. They conducted a lengthy search for single women using Weibo, China’s version of Twitter. Dozens of women came forward, the filmmakers said, but the vast majority wanted only to discuss their woes with sheng nu off camera, for fear of bringing shame to their families. Ultimately, the filmmakers found and focused on three ambitious and brave Beijing women:

Qiu Hua Mei, age 34, is a lawyer who faces an uphill battle for finding an educated mate given her (socially lower) rural village roots. She is cruelly criticized by her family (“Schooling makes you dumb,” her illiterate father says, expressing regret for having paid her university tuition). In another disturbing scene, a dating counselor tells her, “You’re not beautiful in the traditional sense. You have a tough personality and need to soften yourself.” A prospective match, meanwhile, who’s similarly well educated and similarly from a rural village, announces that once he marries, he intends to be the “dominant” spouse.

Xu Min, 28, is a radio talk show host who lives with an overbearing mother who tells her, “You’re not old. You’re not a ‘leftover woman’ yet.”

Gai Qi, 36, is an assistant professor of film. She does marry and has a daughter during the course of the film, with a husband the filmmakers call “extraordinary” for his social faux pas — marrying a woman older than himself — and for his willingness to follow her to a better job in Guangzhou.

Over the span of three years, Hua Mei and Xu Min are individually followed by cameras as they attend a massive government-sponsored “annual blind date event,” check out a Valentine’s Day dating party and visit a gynecologist’s office (where Hua Mei is told it’s illegal to freeze her eggs). Then there’s the “relationship expert” Xu Min consults, who ends up delving deeply into her emotions. Breaking into tears, she admits that she is so obedient to her mother, she can’t actually date a man her mom dislikes.

A happier note is the joyful wedding of Gai Qi, who tells the filmmakers she was so worried her marriage might threaten her career that, “I was not planning on a happy ending.” That happy ending, however, is short-lived; later in the film, Gai Qi admits she finds marriage boring.

Hua Mei, meanwhile, is the polar opposite. She wants to date, but not marry, she tells her parents back home in their impoverished village. But, after months of sitting alone in desolate bars and getting the third degree from mothers of sons in public parks advertising their sons’ eligibility, Hua Mei gives up: She abandons her home country altogether to study in far-off France: “There are voices all around me,” she tells the filmmakers. “I want to have a life without those voices, just to live my life.

“I could live a wonderful life,” Hua Mei continues. “All this [grief occurs] because I’m not getting married. I live in a constant fight, a life of exile.” She even compares sheng nu to China’s infamous practice of foot-binding: “I have big feet,” she sighs, describing herself and her ambition, borne out by the fact that she has recently moved to Munich to start a business.

Related: China Considers Law Against Sexual Harassment at Workplace

April
29, 2019

2 min read

This story originally appeared on PCMag

Mark Zuckerberg will forever be associated with Facebook and social networks, but we can’t forget he’s also an engineer and he just put his talent to good use helping his wife get a good night’s sleep.

Posting on Instagram, Zuckerberg explained how he spent some time recently building a light-emitting wooden box. It sounds strange until you hear why he created such an unusual object.

His wife Priscilla knows that their children usually wake up between 6-7am, so she got into the habit during the night of checking her phone to see what time it is and whether she needed to get up. The problem is, knowing the time “stresses her out and she can’t fall back asleep.”

The solution, as Zuckerberg viewed it, was to create a new device that indicates when it’s the right time to get up for the kids, but isn’t a distraction at any other time. The end result is a “sleep box.” It’s a very simple wooden box that emits a faint light focused downwards, but only turns the light on between 6-7am each morning. If Priscilla wakes up and the light isn’t on, she knows to go right back to sleep, where as the light being on won’t wake her, but if she wakes and sees it she knows it’s time to get up.

By solving the problem in this way, the time never needs to be known and the physical process of interacting with a phone (and its very bright display) is no longer required. It’s true that Priscilla could oversleep, but the same was true of checking the phone. It’s also easy to avoid oversleeping by simply setting an alarm that goes off at some point after 7am each morning as a last resort.

With the experiment deemed a success, Zuckerberg has responded to his friends wanting their own version by putting the idea out there for “another entrepreneur” in case they want to run with it. It seems likely the sleep box will be turned into a product now, although I suspect it may get a few smart home feature upgrades in the process.

April
28, 2019

2 min read

Disclosure: Our goal is to feature products and services that we think you’ll find interesting and useful. If you purchase them, Entrepreneur may get a small share of the revenue from the sale from our commerce partners.

Stress is inevitable when you’re starting your own business. Long hours at your desk, lengthy drives to meet new clients and high-energy brainstorming sessions in front of a whiteboard can leave you with sore, overextended muscles.

Regular massages can cure your muscular woes, but it’s tough to find an hour (and the budget) to spend on a masseuse when you’re getting your feet wet with a new venture. These four personal massagers will relax you from head to toe at home, so you’ll be at your best at work. Plus, they’re all on sale.

Shiatsu Portable Back Massager with Heat – $56.99 (56% off)

This massager targets the stress points in your shoulders and neck. It fits in most office chairs and car seats. Three speed levels, a heating element and a convenient remote help you tailor this massage to your needs. It also has a 15-minute auto-shutoff to prevent over-stimulation.

Belmint Heated Shiatsu Foot Massager – $99.99 (28% off)

Chronic foot pain and aggravation from stiff shoes and long days of walking don’t stand a chance against this heated Shiatsu foot massager. It’s engineered with powerful massage nodes for a deep tissue foot massage that dissolves knots and promotes circulation. It’s easy to choose your mode with the built-in toe control panel.

10-Motor Full-Body Massage Mat with Heat – $59.99 (14% off)

This luxury massage mat can beat any knot or tension. It’s perfect for fighting aches and pains throughout your body after a long day. The flexible plush mat comes equipped with 10 massage motors, targeting all of your pain points from your neck to your legs. The built-in heater and interactive controller give this mat a spa vibe every time you unroll it.

Full Body Stretch Massage Mat – $109.99 (26% off)

Combine the health-boosting effects of yoga with soothing vibrations with this full body massage mat. After you’ve finished your invigorating yoga session, just lie back and let precision-controlled air chambers help you emulate yoga-style stretches. It’s pre-programmed with four relaxing functions that target acupuncture points. Use it to relieve fatigue and improve circulation as part of your self-care routine.

April
26, 2019

7 min read

Five years ago this July, Hannah and Marian Cheng took a big leap and opened the first location of Mimi Cheng’s in New York City’s East Village.

The pair had decided to open a restaurant dedicated to the delicacy they most loved, growing up: handmade Taiwanese dumplings. They missed their mom’s cooking terribly and figured that if they were hungry for those dumplings — and couldn’t find them — others might share that culinary plight.

But their parents, who had been the inspiration for their choice of cuisine, weren’t exactly thrilled. Hannah and Marian told Entrepreneur, their parents were “horrified”  at the prospect of their girls leaving solid jobs — Hannah was a VP at JPMorgan Chase, and Marian, an account executive at the luxury fashion brand Burberry — to jump into the food world, an industry fraught with uncertainty. 

“You both have your dream jobs; you worked so hard to get there; and now you’re leaving to open a takeout restaurant?” Hannah recalled her parents saying. “You didn’t have to go to college to do that.” But with the conviction of their vision, they forged ahead, and named the restaurant Mimi Cheng’s, after their mom Shirley’s nickname, Mimi. 

After about a year, seeing that their daughters were serious and committed to making their business happen, Mom and Dad came on board, too.

Related: What’s the Biggest Challenge of Starting a Restaurant?

The learning curve

With their family in their corner, the next big hurdle was the steep learning curve the sisters needed to master for actually opening and running an operational restaurant. The Chengs say tht it took about three years to get a handle on the process, right up to the point they were poised to open their second location, in Nolita, in 2016.

Mimi Cheng’s Dumpling Making

Image credit Nicole Franzen

Flash-forward to today: The sisters now manage both locations and oversee a team of 40 but say there are always new surprises and challenges to deal with. “When we were opening our second location, it’s like you have a newborn and you have to pay attention to the newborn a lot, so it’s trying to balance both of them,” said Marian. “And when we were opening up the first location, [we tried] to get insight from other restaurateurs and others in the industry about things like  contracting, licenses and permits. Everyone says it’s a nightmare dealing with the city and stuff — but you have to go through it yourself and learn what the nuances are.”

Along the way, the sisters knew they couldn’t do it alone, given their lack of restaurant experience. So, they worked with a city organization, the NYC New Business Acceleration Team (NBAT), an initiative that helps new restaurants and bars get up and running. Before launching Mimi Cheng’s, Marian also took a detour of her own, leaving the fashion world to gain direct experience in hospitality by joining salad chain Sweetgreen’s opening team.

Opening up

The sisters say that one of the biggest early challenges of opening that first location was, quite literally, keeping the lights on.

They were set to open in May of 2014 but actually opened the doors in July. The reason? Not enough electricity to power everything. Their wait for a promised electrical upgrade stretched from weeks into months. They were frustrated. But then came help: their community of fellow restaurateurs advised them to end the waiting game by contacting their local representatives, who connected them with the right Con Edison supervisor who made the upgrade happen.

Mimi Cheng’s Dumplings

Image credit Nicole Franzen

In the weeks leading up to opening day, sleep was in short supply, the sisters remember. They also remember the mixed benefit that a teaser write-up in the New York Times gave them — the day before they opened.

“It was very exciting. But we also didn’t know what that meant,” Hannah recalled. “And what that meant was hundreds of people showing up at our door the first day of opening. It was amazing, but also terrifying. We could not wrap dumplings or cook dumplings fast enough to meet the demand. We actually had to close in the middle of the day, because we knew that there were going to be more people coming in at night.

“We said to ourselves, ‘If we keep selling at this pace, we’re going to be sold out before everybody shows up.’ So we had to close in the middle of the day to restock everything. We are so thankful to the people who still came after they had been there the first day. There is no way that was a good experience, and no way did everything meet our expectations.”

Hitting their stride

At this point, with Mimi Cheng’s having been on the books now nearly five years, the Cheng sisters say that their main advice for entrepreneurs feeling discouragement in their own early stages is to “listen to your gut” and then do the due diligence to back it up — no matter what advice you hear from your support system, no matter what the naysayers believe.

“If it’s something that you can’t stop thinking about, then you also have to realize that these people are speaking from their own point of view. And nobody’s in your shoes, with your experience, with your dream, with your passion,” Hannah said. “So nobody will ever be able to speak to that.

Related: There Are 2,000 Empty Restaurants During the Day in New York — and This Startup Is Doing Something About It

“You have to also realize that they care about you, but they are only speaking from their perspective. We’ve had so many people tell us, ‘Don’t open a restaurant, you have no idea what you’re doing.’ — which is all true. But at the end of the day, it was something that we couldn’t stop thinking about. And I’m glad we did it without that knowledge because it would have been scary. Once you’re in, you realize, ‘Crap, I don’t know anything.’ But once you’re in it, you’ve figured out how to do it.”

That philosophy extends to their hiring approach: they don’t feel beholden to bring on only those with two to five years’ restaurant experience under their belts. “It’s the same with hiring some of our team members,” Marian explained. “Some of them don’t have experience in the food industry. But we give them a chance if they seem like they’re very quick to learn and they have great personalities — because you have to start somewhere.”

The sisters say that their partnership works because they each bring different skills to the table — Hannah often focuses on scheduling, finances and payroll; Marian’s specialties are inventory and ordering. The two, meanwhile, handle day-to-day operations and recipe development together.

The key ingredient, they say, is implicit trust.

“I wouldn’t recommend every sibling [duo] work together; it really depends on the kind of relationship you have. But even growing up we were never competitive,” Hannah said. “We’ve always been on the same team.

“And because of that, and also because we’re siblings, we trust each other inherently. So we always know that we have each other’s best interests in mind. And I think, when you’re starting a business with somebody, that is the hardest part: finding a business partner you can trust completely.”

April
26, 2019

6 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Starting a new business is both an exciting and daunting experience. The typical entrepreneur is racing toward the goal of being successful, but the truth is,he or she will likely struggle to get there. If you consider yourself an entrepreneur, you need to understand your customers’ psychological profile, as well as how you can manage, even manipulate, your own psychological state to become a more productive business owner.

Related: 5 Brain Hacks to Boost Your Motivation

Below are some of the ways you can start your business on the right foot by delving into some excellent brain hacks to improve your chances of creating a worldwide recognized brand.

These hacks are gaining ground owing to the scientific research surrounding them. When you combine more than one of these methods together, you have the chance to drastically improve your odds in what today are so many overpopulated industry segments — with so much noise.

Now, here’s how to dive in to those hacks:

1.Use your brand’s colors to your advantage.

Color plays an important role in the way we perceive companies and their functionality. A revealing study by the University of Winnipeg found that 62 to 90 percent of buyers surveyed said they make up their minds whether they are interested in a brand, or its offerings, based on the colors used in the brand’s design.

Related: Neuroscience Tells Us How to Hack Our Brains for Success

How can you use colors to convince your customers that your product is the right choice? Here is a chart that shows colors and what kinds of emotions they evoke.

Image Source: CoSchedule blog

You should think about the kind of product you’re creating, and how you expect customers to feel when they see your brand. In the example above, the brands that promote creativity or have products designed to increase creativity have used the color purple. The SyFy channel, which thrives on creative (and sometimes hilarious) ideas, uses purple to create a brand that is instantly recognizable.

2. Make complicated topics easy to understand.

One of the best ways to win over your audience is by explaining a process or idea in terms that virtually everyone can understand. Think about the last time you had a question about a topic, looked up what other people were saying and found some articles that left you scratching your head even more than when you started.

You never, ever want to leave potential customers more confused than they were before. Use the power of storytelling in combination with simple language to make complicated topics easy to understand.

If the topic you’re covering requires multiple pieces of content, don’t forget to intertwine the content as it comes out. If readers come to your business site and get an answer to their question bolstered by facts and confidence, they are more likely to convert — because they trust your brand.

3. Make an impression, using imagery.

We have all heard about how first impressions are everything. This rule applies to your business, too! According to a study titled Behaviour and Information Technology, most users decide whether or not they are going to stay on a website in 50 milliseconds! In other words, you have to let potential customers know exactly what your product does when they land on your website.

Along with the first impressions advice, we’re also told throughout life that a picture is worth a 1,000 words. It turns out that this is true! You can tell your customers more about what your product or service does, how it will make them feel and what problems your product will solve — using just your imagery.

Quick, check out the following image.

Image Source: Crazy Egg blog

What did you think when you merely glanced at this Coca-Cola ad?

As it happens, the color red encourages feelings of excitement. But this imagery manages to do so much more than that. At first glance, the image is of two happy people. At the same time, the word “happiness” is right next to the Coca-Cola logo. If someone, for whatever reason, has never heard of Coca-Cola, his or her first experience with this ad will promote positive emotions and, hopefully, create a positive customer.

4. Keep your inner monologue in check

As someone who wants to start a business, you’re probably feeling confident and excited. Sadly, however, more of us struggle with feelings of self-doubt, even if we are doing something well. You need to learn to hack your mind and keep your inner monologue in check when it starts hampering your progress as an entrepreneur.

The best way to keep your self-doubt in check is by focusing on the positive outcome you hope to achieve. It’s a difficult process, to be honest. But here’s the thing. When you start focusing on positive things, you train your brain to push out negative feelings and emotions.

Obviously, we are only human and sometimes have doubts and negative emotions. But learning to control our thinking and focusing on productive, positive thoughts can breed positivity and increase our chances of success.

5. Hack your time-management abilities

Time management is one of the most challenging, but important, aspects of any business. You’re going to have a million things going on at once and you’ll need to learn to manage your time properly.

One great way to manage your time is by using The Pomodoro Technique. Basically, the Pomodoro technique involves your managing your time by working in short bursts of extreme productivity, followed by a short break.

Related: Science-Backed Brain Hacks to Crush Your Goals

When you use this schedule over time, you’ll hack your brain into entering productivity mode when the timer is going; and then you can relax on your breaks. The Pomodoro method helps you build discipline and use your time wisely, which helps you get things done in a timely manner.

April
25, 2019

7 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Today, April 25, is national Take Your Daughters and Sons to Work Day for 2109. Created 26 years ago by the Ms. Foundation, the event (slightly retooled from its former name Take Our Children to Work Day) is designed for girls and boys ages 8 to 18 to learn new lessons about the workplace, then take those lessons back to school the following day.

The observance “focuses on expanding future opportunities for all our children, in both their work and family lives,” according to the website.

But what if your particular company dismisses the whole idea of welcoming kids into the workplace to observe what Mom and Dad or some other adult in their lives actually does all day? For answers, I turned to Sarah Johal.

Related: Bring Your Child to Work Day Is Too Valuable to Limit to Once a Year

Johal is a mother and marketing professional with experience advocating for parent-friendly programs and activities at high-profile organizations. She’s built brand experiences for Pandora Radio, Lyft and Workday and is the current editor of the weekly newsletter exploring parenthood in media and tech, Underbelly.

In our conversation, Johal recalled her experience three years ago as a marketing manager at Lyft, and the rideshare company’s lack at that time of a parenting employee resource group.

“I had a pretty toxic experience when I returned to work after maternity leave,” Johal began, referring to a previous job. “A few months later, I decided to join Lyft, which seemed to provide a way healthier support system for all workers.”

Even though some women within that organization were pregnant, Johal said, she saw signs that Lyft hadn’t created an inclusive culture for working parents.

Evidence for that statement? “All-hands meetings started at 5:30 pm.,” Johal remembered. “I’d see other parents get ‘stink eyes’ when they had to bring their kids in for the day, but no one batted an eye when a colleague brought in their dog.”

Ever the workplace volunteer, Johal decided to turn her pain into progress and voluntarily formed an employee resource group, or ERG, for parents and caregivers within the company.

Related: To Raise Exceptional Children, Teach Them These 7 Values

She’d assumed the organization would be concerned enough to at least listen to the needs and perspectives of caregiver employees. But working parents at Lyft at the time had no ERG to call home.

One reason might have been Lyft’s then still-recent startup status. (It was founded in 2012.). But support for working parents was one goal that needed to be accommodated, Johal told me. She cited the value for both the organization and the employees who join ERGs, illustrated in a study by the Employer Assistance and Resource Network on Disability Inclusion.

“I also wanted to ensure no one else experienced biases — conscious or unconscious — simply because of their parent identity and ways of working,” Johal said. Under the branding #UpLyft, Lyft had already adopted a framework for creating ERGs, she said. At the time, the company also had other diversity and inclusion resource groups such as #UpLyftWomen for women in tech.

Sarah Johal and her daughter

Image Credit: Courtesy of Sarah Johal

So Johal made her move; she founded #UpLyftParents in February 2016, and under her leadership, the company hosted its first “Take Our Kids to Work Day” across all domestic Lyft offices and changed its paid leave policy for all employees. Johal transitioned from Lyft to the marketing company Workday early last year, but Lyft still benefited from the effects of her hard work after her departure.

Just two months later, Lyft ranked 12th on Father.ly’s “Best Places for Dads” to work. Though Johal and her ERG corrected the course of operations at Lyft, the group never would have happened had she not striven for incremental, quick wins. “Take Our Kids to Work Day” (Lyft’s name for the event) was one of those wins.

Google, Facebook and Visa are just a few of the organizations that have received praise from their employees and the media for their Take Your Child To Work Day activities. Unfortunately, however, due to a lack of proper event planning, budget or liability fears, many companies don’t encourage employees to bring their children into the workplace n– even just for one day.

This year ‘s observance has the theme “Workforce Development for All.” And in this regard, Johal offers advice to organizations on how they can explore launching a local observance of their own in just under three weeks and develop inspiration and skill sets for tomorrow’s leaders. The tips she offers include:

Communication is key.

“Regardless if your company only has two parents or 2,000, it’s worth expressing how your company embraces working families,” Johal says.

For companies, communicating that employees can bring their children in for the day is key. Employees, meanwhile, should remember to express their interest in that event to their company’s human resources department or employee resource group, as one or both may already have programming plans. If not, employees can volunteer to serve as consultants, volunteer for various tasks and provide additional programming.

Assess the landscape.

“Audit [whether] it makes sense to celebrate the actual national holiday in April, or if it’s easier to execute in summer when more kids can likely visit on a weekday,” Johal advises, noting some parents’ reluctance to take their children out of school.

Also, if the first year’s celebration is limited just to a communique to employees, assess participation levels and feedback, determining if a larger, grander event would be well received.

Money isn’t everything.

“Zero-budget ideas are endless,” Johal says. One could be launching your organization’s first official parents’ ERG to mark the date, she says. Another could be a parent-buddy mentorship program to foster relationships between non-caregivers and parents. A third could involve posting a group selfie with leadership on your social handles.

Simply participate and share your authentic stories (internally and externally)! Just remember to use release forms for families to approve the use of their likeness and especially that of their minor-age children for any captured content.

Consider what innovative programming looks like for all ages.

“If you have the budget, have a variety of programming that expresses your core values,” Johal says. “At Lyft, we created career development and time-management panels for parents with newborns, led by executive sponsors. For older kids, we hosted themed Lego engineering workshops where families could design and build their visions of ‘future cities’ and autonomous car designs. 

“We also ensured temporary onsite child care was available in case parents needed to step away for an important meeting or phone call, and still enjoy the celebration.”

Related: An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Explaining Your Job to Your Kids

As to what benefits might result through steps like those Johal advises, worker satisfaction might be one, and increased productivity, another. Then, increased employee retention might be a third — geared to giving the phrase “child-friendly” new meaning.