Usability of a Principles of Marketing Course in the Field of Essay

Ease of use of a Principles of Marketing Course in the Field of Information Technology Project Management - Essay Example Understanding the connection between the two fields in this way includes examination of their extensions for intermingling. The extent of data innovation includes use of innovation in arrangement and the board of data for auspicious and effective correspondence to clients of such data. Such a degree includes investigation of business frameworks, structures, and advancement of answers for correspondence activities. Data innovation likewise includes readiness of calendars and undertaking records, databases, reports and assessments (Churchill and Lacobucci, 2009). The extent of a standard of showcasing course in this way offers data for relevance of data innovation. It for example includes reviews and examination of systems, for example, value, circulation, limited time ideas, and consumers’ reaction to advertising activities. Every one of these viewpoints are quantifiable in numeric information that requires data innovation for proficient account, investigation and correspondence (Churchill and Lacobucci, 2009). Subsequently, a standard of promoting course is pertinent in the field of data innovation in light of the fact that the extent of advertising bargains in information that is dealt with and overseen by data innovation

ClearSlide

ClearSlide INTRODUCTIONMartin: Hi, today we are in San Francisco in the ClearSlide office. Hi, Al, who are you and what do you do?Al: So I am Al. I am the co-founder of ClearSlide and I am an entrepreneur, a lifelong entrepreneur.Martin: Cool!Martin: Tell me about what is your background? What did you do before you started ClearSlide and what is ClearSlide by the way?Al: So I have been an entrepreneur all my life. I came out here to San Francisco in 97 and right out of the school I started the company. So I started Evite which is an online invitation product, it was popular in the days. And really since that I have started a number of companies, ClearSlide being the most recent. so I have never really worked for a company that I didn’t start myself.Martin: What is the connector between those different companies?Al: I think for me; I am excited about companies where using technology to communicate with people. There is a lot of technology that is just for technology sake so a faster hard drive or just to make the technology better. But I am very passionate with connecting to people and the way that you can use technology to tell their story and communicate with your friends, your colleagues what have you. That is something I see as very valuable and it is a thing I can get passionate about.So Evite was about getting connected with your friends offline and create parties, and ClearSlide is about communicating with your customers but in both cases it is people that are connecting and talking together.Martin: When did you have this “Aha” moment “Ok, I want to start ClearSlide”?Al: It was funny actually. So I started with Jim, my co-founder and we had worked together at Evite so we had known each other for about fifteen years. And we started with a different idea actually. We were selling something to advertisers, a media product and we found it very hard to tell our story with these media advertisers. You call them up and they say, “You have 5 minutes to pitch me. That’s it.” They give you very little time, it is kind of very competitive market. And we found that nothing, no technology let us tell the story the way that we wanted to or that was really compelling and so we initially created ClearSlide for our own use. A way to tell our story and we started using it with customers and we found that they were more interested in the way we were presenting. They don’t like actually our product but they ask, “What is that? What did you just use? That was kind of interesting.” And that happened two or three times in a row and we said, “Ok, what is this?”What we discovered was in the space of sales sales communication a lot of work could be done around the back office of storing data by your customers but not actually making that conversation better. And so we decided to shift gears and focus on that.I found too that most of the times the best startups are things you want to use yourself and a need that you discover that if you want t o use it and be the customer of your product you can really understand and be passionate about it. Same with Evite, the same with ClearSlide as well, it was something that we needed.Martin: Did you change the name from your old idea to the new?Al: We did. It was ShieldMedia before. We changed that very quickly to ClearSlide.Martin: And did you have some other investors in before?Al: No, no. So we have been working and it was early so three or four months in and we just started to get the product going so we actually didn’t get that investors in yet.Martin: And then what was the next three or six months looking like?Al: That was just very interesting. We had this ShieldMedia product and we had ClearSlide and it was important for Jim and I to really prove that there were customers willing to buy ClearSlide. So, I have been involved in business before where it seemed like a promise but there was not actually anyone that really wanted to pay you. We set ourselves a goal to find 5 peop le willing to give us money. So this was our goal and Jim arranged some conversations with customers and we went to pitch 5 customers in one day. What we did is we call them up and said, “Hey, here is our product. We are going to be doing a Beta in about a month but if you are interested we need a credit card right now.” And we had 5 out of 5, 100 percent in 24 hours.We didn’t have anyone to put the credit cards so we were just writing them down on paper. But we proved ourselves that there were people willing to put money behind this. And so for the next three to six months we just worked on building the product and talking to customers and just Jim and myself. I have been involved in business before where we raised money pretty early. But we really wanted to prove to ourselves that we can get customers that want to pay for it. I was just us working away for about nine months before we raised any money and by then we really had customers and we had enough revenue we could run profitably actually and then we said, “Hey, this is really the time to scale the business.”Martin: Imagine, I was one of those 5 potential clients. You are pitching to me and you need to convince me that I should not wait like for six months or nine months when you have your really good product ready but I should buy it now.Al: Part of that was to say a couple of things.One was to say, “Listen, we are looking for people to help guide the product and we are looking for feedback from you. Your feedback is going to be instrumental for what we build”and that is interesting for them because they can early be able to guide it.The other thing was kind of a ticking clock when we said, “I need that right now and we are only going to be about ten slots in this beta program and so I need a decision right away”. And that urgency drew up a lot in as well.Martin: So this really mean well in the next two hours or one or two-week time?Al: In that initial point it was on the call. Jim di d most of these pitches and it was basically a full pitch. We had a prototype to show, we walk through the product, walk through our vision because we are trying to do but if you wanted I need it (the answer) now. It worked.Martin: So you had 5 potential customers. What was the next step?Al: We had credit cards and we spent the next month or two building the product so we built it an early, early version and we said to those first customers “Hey, it is available, just to get you in” And In the early days we focused on person to person training, so we call them up and say, “Hey let me get you into the product. Let me show you how it works.” And we spent with each individual user to show them how it works which is time consuming but you also can hear what is working and what is not working, what they need and what they don’t need. That created a lot off product feedback early. We just did that over and over and over again.So in the first couple of months we probably spoke to hundreds of customers just Jim and just the two of us. Hundreds of companies and hundreds if not thousands of users and just over and over again you get them into the product and get them to use the credit card and you learn quickly what they are really reacting on.I think the other issue, sometimes entrepreneurs have a product, but that willingness to pay means that they (customers) actually value. Sometimes people say, “I like it, it sounds good” but then they actually pay you and so asking for the money early you are able to kind of really gauge what they really value, what they see as interesting. So yes, we were just doing that over and over again.Martin: How did you find the first customers and made them sure?Al: Early on we knew that these are sales teams and so we were thinking “Hey, who do we know that are head of sales?” Fortunately, in our previous history we were connected to some folks that were head of sales. And sometimes it was the folks in our network, in J ames network particularly. But other times it was just cold calling. It was just identifying someone who we knew would be a good prospect and just reaching out.Martin: At what point of time did you say, “Ok, maybe we should raise some external funding”?Al: It was interesting. So about nine to ten months in we have hired our first employees. We initially thought we have the budget for one, but we were really stretching to hire two. It was well on my first few sales wraps. And we spent a few months and Jim really trained them and we could develop the product or work with them and once we found that they were also having success, meaning that we were able to reproduce the success we had then we were like “Wow, this Is working. We just need to add more people to it.” And at that point we said, “Hey we should raise. We had something repeatable, scalable that resonate with customers. Let’s raise some money behind it”.Martin: And how long did the fundraising process take you? Al: It probably took about two days, a couple of days.Martin: Two days!Al: Partially though there is a lot of preparation that goes into it. So, first of all it is everything you have done for the company but also those two days were all about researching the best people to talk to, having connections. There are a couple of weeks of preparation before it, so make sure you are talking to the right people and have the right messaging and everything is kind of really tight. And then really in our first or second meeting, where was I and Aydin (our seed investor9, and it was about a five minutes in and he said, “I want to invest. I want to lead this round” And I said, We haven’t even shown you what we do yet,” and he was like “I have seen enough.”At that point we said, “Wow, somebody is really excited”. We met a few other people that were great investors but didn’t really click as quickly as Aydin did and so he let a round and we met with a couple of other people. SO i t was only a couple of days.Martin: I would have assumed that it was more similar to the sales experience in the first place So you got the two days.Al: That is right! I have found that when raising money,it is important to have a tight window because investors want to see momentum so it is helpful to keep it really fast.BUSINESS MODEL OF CLEARSLIDEMartin: Al, let’s talk about the business model of ClearSlide. What are the typical customer segments that you are targeting and what is exactly the value proposition that you are delivering to them?Al: We target sales and marketing teams primarily in enterprise companies. So anything from a couple of sales reps to a thousand of sales reps, for example Comcast. Generally, the verticals are any enterprise team, but we are heavy in media and technology but also in healthcare and financial services, kind of traditional enterprise teams.The value proposition is basically to make you more productive. We are there to help in your conversation s with your customers, to make those go better but also to give you insights to what happened both for the sales rep and for the sales leadership to understand: Is my message working? Is my approach working? Can I improve things or as a company could we have better messaging to improve things? So we spent a long time on insights and analytics to drive better results behind the scenes as well.Martin: So does that mean that you are integrating with other kind of sales funnel management tools? Or is it that you are providing the sales on a management level as well?Al: We are doing it with CRM primarily which keeps the data from your customers. But we found that we really take over ones the sales rep starts to work with an account. So early in the funnel you have marketing tools that are targeting the customer figuring who the right customer is but they haven’t actually started the conversation. So once the conversation starts we can take over.Martin: Good, and can you also describe w hat the ClearSlide product looks like?Al: In the product is a few main features or functions.One is around speaking to a customer and that is called live pitch and you can use it over the phone and in person. We have both web technology and mobile technology so when you communicate you can use all your collateral power points or PDFs, your video files and present it to the customer.We also have e-mail pitch which is for sending content collateral. So after meeting I might send you a deck. And what I do is I send you a link and you will be able to visit it in a web browser or on your mobile device. When you do I get insights that you opened it and you spent time on slides, what was most interesting to you.Those are really the two key interaction methods either in-person or over the phone or e-mail. But there is also a whole suite on analytics and insights where you can understand both is the customer interested but also you can roll that data to the sales team. So you can say which c ontent is working best, which sales reps are being the most productive. We are actually working on predicting type technology where based on all the data we have we can predict which deals are likely to close or not close so we can help leadership understand what is really happening and be able to manage to coach the team.Martin: Al, how is the revenue model working?Al: So that is one of the great things, at ClearSlide we use SaaS in general. It is a very simple model. It is basically per user. It is a subscription model so enterprise SaaS model where we charge per user per year such type pricing. And it depends on various things with the different packages with pricing but it basically scales up based on the size of your team.Martin: Is it really like on a per year basis or on a per month basis?Al: When we quote a customer we will say on a monthly basis, here is your cost per month. but generally, most of our contracts have an annual commitment or multiyear commitment. When we star ted actually in the early days we were more month to month as we started to get the business growing, but at this point it is mostly annual or multiyear commitment.Martin: Can you give us some insights in the organization? What is the typically the functional split so to speak of the people working here?Al: In ClearSlide, two biggest teams are sales and technology. Our sales teams are spread across three offices in the US â€" here, New York and Seattle. We are thinking about international offices as well. We are both inside sellers which sell over the phone and field sellers which sell in person so it is really based on the size of the deal. If it is a larger deal it really makes more sense to meet in person. If it is smaller, we can settle it over the phone.And then on the technology side we have a lots of development talent, operational talent, IT. Because our product is pretty broad into the technology we offer we do both mobile web, we do analytics and insights, we also do conve rsion and we do gmail plug ins, our plug ins. There is a lot of technology behind the stack, there is lots of different types of developers and technology people in the company. That was all wrapped into our technology team.At that point those two teams are roughly similar in size. So I’d say 40 percent of the company is in the sales and 40 percent is in the technology engineer teams and then about 20 percent is in our support functions.Martin: You seem to have a lot of experience in terms of sales. What are the most important ingredients for a great sales pitch to really close it?Al: To close it?Martin: For real in two minutes or five minutes.Al: I think the biggest thing is to show value. A lot of times people will show the product and show features but it is really important to show the value that you provide to that person. What we often have found is that sometimes sales folks start to a cookie kind of approach and they don’t modify or the type of person they are selling to . If you are talking to VP of sales or CMO or head of finance or CEO those are all very different roles and those roles care about different things. As you begin to customize your approach based on who you are pitching to and the kinds of challenges that they are facing.For a VP of sales rather than talking about e-mail pitch you might talk about how the challenges in scaling a team, how you are hiring the right people, or if you have one sales rep that is productive how do you replicate that across other sales reps. Those are the challenges, those are the things he deals with every day. And so we start with those and show benefits against those and then show the value, then show the actual product behind that as well. But you have to get really emotionally connected to the challenge or the problem that you are trying to face. And so that is probably one of the biggest insights.I think simplicity is key. If you are able to pitch it in two minutes or three minutes and have it be effe ctive than that’s where you get to start. You can always make it longer if they want to dig in but you will have to be able to sink the idea in the early days.Martin: So currently the story of ClearSlide sounds to me like very straightforward. Any roadblocks along the way that you needed to shift around?Al: I think one of the challenging things for us was trying to figure out the right customer segment and how we sell to it along the way. In the early days we were selling to teams of five or ten or twenty and now we found success at 1000 or 2000. And the way you sell to a thousand-person team is very different than the way you sell to a small team.And so one thing that is challenging about the business it has been the breath of customer base and to sell over the phone SMB (small mid size business) it is a lot of different skills and a type of organizational approach and the selling approach is very different along the way. So we were kind of fine tuning that and it has been chall enging.I think there are always people along the way as you grow. Initially as an entrepreneur you try to get that product fit. Once you get that then it really becomes about scaling the people organization and it is really about building the best teams, getting the right people. There are always times when it works or it doesn’t work as you grow and as you grow quickly those things can be challenging at points. I think those two are probably the biggest ones.Martin: Can you elaborate on how are you currently acquiring or doing the sales for larger customers or the smaller customers?Al: How are we breaking in?Martin: Yes, because you said that your sales approach is different between those two segments.Al: The biggest thing when you sell to small companies is the users, the sales reps and the decision maker are very close. They might sit in the same office. It might be a small company of 10 people and there might be 10 reps using the product and their manager is right there and ha s a credit card. And it is a more simplified approach or a faster approach. It can be more driven by the users using the product.In a large company, there may be many levels in between the user and the budget owner. What that means is that you have to sell on multiple levels and you have to be able to get users using it but also get a senior leader understand the budget reasons for doing it and the risks and the rewards and the benefits to that level. So what we have found is it is a sale where you have to at multiple levels and do bottoms up selling and also top down selling where you want to break in high and go low or go low and break in high. If you do those both well everyone up and down the chain is a supporter.We have had situations where we don’t do that well, where maybe the users like the product but the leader doesn’t know why it is valuable or vice versa the leader likes the product but the users don’t know why it is valuable. And that will create friction because you don’t get buy in across the organization. A lot of times the approach needs to have a multiple layer approach for to work effectively.Martin: Imagine, you identified the budget owner and you are pitching him so that you convince him. At some point having this really in parallel for me It is quite hard because you first need to get it into their hands and if the budget owns says, “Yes, now you can do it, then you have some kind of staging: signed off by the budget owner, pushing through all the organization, penetrating the users, and making sure that they are using it. And then have this kind of dual track approach. Or do you see this in another way?Al: It hopefully starts that way. If you start high and go down is also a great place to start. The problem can be if you can’t get the attention initially and maybe after starting low you can get attention high.The other thing we found is even if you get the decision makers initially excited we have seen a lot of buyer approac h these days where they are very collaborative and even though the leader might like it they really want to see that their team has adopted it and likes it: So, I am interested, but you have to prove to me that my team will use it and use it well and I am going to see value from it.”So we often do these trials or pilots program to say let’s get a hundred users using the product and will report back up both back up to the user but also what is the value. Here is some deals we have closed with ClearSlide, this is the value that we drove. And once you meet that you really need everyone on board and those leaders will be looking for feedback from their teams in terms of how effective it was.Martin: What is the typical time of having such a trial period because for you showing some tracktion and usage?Al: It varies. It can be anywhere for smaller companies it can be a couple of weeks and for larger companies it can be a couple of months I’d say. And then showing the value really de pends on sales cycles. Sometimes they will sell very quickly in which case you have got short deals, in other cases the sales take longer so you can show pipeline. Here is the customers that have been moving the pipeline and here is how we have generated a value.Martin: Then basically you are doing an A/B test, so here is how you performed before and now look at the sales pattern and the closing rate and so after using our tool it is like that. So here is the value.Al: Exactly. We show the team how they used to sell or that team and some other teams. What has been great is once you have sales that have gone through the process then they know the value of ClearSlide. So sometimes at that point they just buy it because it has been proven to them. But if you try to show credibility then these are some of the steps that we go through.Martin: And are you seeing a lot of recommendations or referrals because if you are like you said targeting some sales department of company A and some of the sales reps is leaving the company, taking this experience to another company and then having something like inbound sales?Al: Absolutely. One that is specific for sales is they are tend to be very word of mouth driven and they very much get credibility value what the other co-workers use or what the other colleagues use or have used in the past. We have very often seen that work very effectively. Actually our program is here to track when users leave companies and where they go so we can then sell to the new company as well. We find that to be very effective.ADVICE TO ENTREPRENEURS FROM AL LIEB In San Francisco (CA), we meet Co-Founder Board Member of ClearSlide, Al Lieb. Al talks about how ClearSlide was founded, how the current business model works, as well as he provides some advice for young entrepreneurs.INTRODUCTIONMartin: Hi, today we are in San Francisco in the ClearSlide office. Hi, Al, who are you and what do you do?Al: So I am Al. I am the co-founder of ClearSlide and I am an entrepreneur, a lifelong entrepreneur.Martin: Cool!Martin: Tell me about what is your background? What did you do before you started ClearSlide and what is ClearSlide by the way?Al: So I have been an entrepreneur all my life. I came out here to San Francisco in 97 and right out of the school I started the company. So I started Evite which is an online invitation product, it was popular in the days. And really since that I have started a number of companies, ClearSlide being the most recent. so I have never really worked for a company that I didn’t start myself.Martin: What is the connecto r between those different companies?Al: I think for me; I am excited about companies where using technology to communicate with people. There is a lot of technology that is just for technology sake so a faster hard drive or just to make the technology better. But I am very passionate with connecting to people and the way that you can use technology to tell their story and communicate with your friends, your colleagues what have you. That is something I see as very valuable and it is a thing I can get passionate about.So Evite was about getting connected with your friends offline and create parties, and ClearSlide is about communicating with your customers but in both cases it is people that are connecting and talking together.Martin: When did you have this “Aha” moment “Ok, I want to start ClearSlide”?Al: It was funny actually. So I started with Jim, my co-founder and we had worked together at Evite so we had known each other for about fifteen years. And we started with a di fferent idea actually. We were selling something to advertisers, a media product and we found it very hard to tell our story with these media advertisers. You call them up and they say, “You have 5 minutes to pitch me. That’s it.” They give you very little time, it is kind of very competitive market. And we found that nothing, no technology let us tell the story the way that we wanted to or that was really compelling and so we initially created ClearSlide for our own use. A way to tell our story and we started using it with customers and we found that they were more interested in the way we were presenting. They don’t like actually our product but they ask, “What is that? What did you just use? That was kind of interesting.” And that happened two or three times in a row and we said, “Ok, what is this?”What we discovered was in the space of sales sales communication a lot of work could be done around the back office of storing data by your customers but not actually making that conversation better. And so we decided to shift gears and focus on that.I found too that most of the times the best startups are things you want to use yourself and a need that you discover that if you want to use it and be the customer of your product you can really understand and be passionate about it. Same with Evite, the same with ClearSlide as well, it was something that we needed.Martin: Did you change the name from your old idea to the new?Al: We did. It was ShieldMedia before. We changed that very quickly to ClearSlide.Martin: And did you have some other investors in before?Al: No, no. So we have been working and it was early so three or four months in and we just started to get the product going so we actually didn’t get that investors in yet.Martin: And then what was the next three or six months looking like?Al: That was just very interesting. We had this ShieldMedia product and we had ClearSlide and it was important for Jim and I to really prove that there were customers willing to buy ClearSlide. So, I have been involved in business before where it seemed like a promise but there was not actually anyone that really wanted to pay you. We set ourselves a goal to find 5 people willing to give us money. So this was our goal and Jim arranged some conversations with customers and we went to pitch 5 customers in one day. What we did is we call them up and said, “Hey, here is our product. We are going to be doing a Beta in about a month but if you are interested we need a credit card right now.” And we had 5 out of 5, 100 percent in 24 hours.We didn’t have anyone to put the credit cards so we were just writing them down on paper. But we proved ourselves that there were people willing to put money behind this. And so for the next three to six months we just worked on building the product and talking to customers and just Jim and myself. I have been involved in business before where we raised money pretty early. But we really wanted to p rove to ourselves that we can get customers that want to pay for it. I was just us working away for about nine months before we raised any money and by then we really had customers and we had enough revenue we could run profitably actually and then we said, “Hey, this is really the time to scale the business.”Martin: Imagine, I was one of those 5 potential clients. You are pitching to me and you need to convince me that I should not wait like for six months or nine months when you have your really good product ready but I should buy it now.Al: Part of that was to say a couple of things.One was to say, “Listen, we are looking for people to help guide the product and we are looking for feedback from you. Your feedback is going to be instrumental for what we build”and that is interesting for them because they can early be able to guide it.The other thing was kind of a ticking clock when we said, “I need that right now and we are only going to be about ten slots in this beta p rogram and so I need a decision right away”. And that urgency drew up a lot in as well.Martin: So this really mean well in the next two hours or one or two-week time?Al: In that initial point it was on the call. Jim did most of these pitches and it was basically a full pitch. We had a prototype to show, we walk through the product, walk through our vision because we are trying to do but if you wanted I need it (the answer) now. It worked.Martin: So you had 5 potential customers. What was the next step?Al: We had credit cards and we spent the next month or two building the product so we built it an early, early version and we said to those first customers “Hey, it is available, just to get you in” And In the early days we focused on person to person training, so we call them up and say, “Hey let me get you into the product. Let me show you how it works.” And we spent with each individual user to show them how it works which is time consuming but you also can hear what is wo rking and what is not working, what they need and what they don’t need. That created a lot off product feedback early. We just did that over and over and over again.So in the first couple of months we probably spoke to hundreds of customers just Jim and just the two of us. Hundreds of companies and hundreds if not thousands of users and just over and over again you get them into the product and get them to use the credit card and you learn quickly what they are really reacting on.I think the other issue, sometimes entrepreneurs have a product, but that willingness to pay means that they (customers) actually value. Sometimes people say, “I like it, it sounds good” but then they actually pay you and so asking for the money early you are able to kind of really gauge what they really value, what they see as interesting. So yes, we were just doing that over and over again.Martin: How did you find the first customers and made them sure?Al: Early on we knew that these are sales teams and so we were thinking “Hey, who do we know that are head of sales?” Fortunately, in our previous history we were connected to some folks that were head of sales. And sometimes it was the folks in our network, in James network particularly. But other times it was just cold calling. It was just identifying someone who we knew would be a good prospect and just reaching out.Martin: At what point of time did you say, “Ok, maybe we should raise some external funding”?Al: It was interesting. So about nine to ten months in we have hired our first employees. We initially thought we have the budget for one, but we were really stretching to hire two. It was well on my first few sales wraps. And we spent a few months and Jim really trained them and we could develop the product or work with them and once we found that they were also having success, meaning that we were able to reproduce the success we had then we were like “Wow, this Is working. We just need to add more people to it .” And at that point we said, “Hey we should raise. We had something repeatable, scalable that resonate with customers. Let’s raise some money behind it”.Martin: And how long did the fundraising process take you?Al: It probably took about two days, a couple of days.Martin: Two days!Al: Partially though there is a lot of preparation that goes into it. So, first of all it is everything you have done for the company but also those two days were all about researching the best people to talk to, having connections. There are a couple of weeks of preparation before it, so make sure you are talking to the right people and have the right messaging and everything is kind of really tight. And then really in our first or second meeting, where was I and Aydin (our seed investor9, and it was about a five minutes in and he said, “I want to invest. I want to lead this round” And I said, We haven’t even shown you what we do yet,” and he was like “I have seen enough.”At that poin t we said, “Wow, somebody is really excited”. We met a few other people that were great investors but didn’t really click as quickly as Aydin did and so he let a round and we met with a couple of other people. SO it was only a couple of days.Martin: I would have assumed that it was more similar to the sales experience in the first place So you got the two days.Al: That is right! I have found that when raising money,it is important to have a tight window because investors want to see momentum so it is helpful to keep it really fast.BUSINESS MODEL OF CLEARSLIDEMartin: Al, let’s talk about the business model of ClearSlide. What are the typical customer segments that you are targeting and what is exactly the value proposition that you are delivering to them?Al: We target sales and marketing teams primarily in enterprise companies. So anything from a couple of sales reps to a thousand of sales reps, for example Comcast. Generally, the verticals are any enterprise team, but we are heavy in media and technology but also in healthcare and financial services, kind of traditional enterprise teams.The value proposition is basically to make you more productive. We are there to help in your conversations with your customers, to make those go better but also to give you insights to what happened both for the sales rep and for the sales leadership to understand: Is my message working? Is my approach working? Can I improve things or as a company could we have better messaging to improve things? So we spent a long time on insights and analytics to drive better results behind the scenes as well.Martin: So does that mean that you are integrating with other kind of sales funnel management tools? Or is it that you are providing the sales on a management level as well?Al: We are doing it with CRM primarily which keeps the data from your customers. But we found that we really take over ones the sales rep starts to work with an account. So early in the funnel you have marketi ng tools that are targeting the customer figuring who the right customer is but they haven’t actually started the conversation. So once the conversation starts we can take over.Martin: Good, and can you also describe what the ClearSlide product looks like?Al: In the product is a few main features or functions.One is around speaking to a customer and that is called live pitch and you can use it over the phone and in person. We have both web technology and mobile technology so when you communicate you can use all your collateral power points or PDFs, your video files and present it to the customer.We also have e-mail pitch which is for sending content collateral. So after meeting I might send you a deck. And what I do is I send you a link and you will be able to visit it in a web browser or on your mobile device. When you do I get insights that you opened it and you spent time on slides, what was most interesting to you.Those are really the two key interaction methods either in-pers on or over the phone or e-mail. But there is also a whole suite on analytics and insights where you can understand both is the customer interested but also you can roll that data to the sales team. So you can say which content is working best, which sales reps are being the most productive. We are actually working on predicting type technology where based on all the data we have we can predict which deals are likely to close or not close so we can help leadership understand what is really happening and be able to manage to coach the team.Martin: Al, how is the revenue model working?Al: So that is one of the great things, at ClearSlide we use SaaS in general. It is a very simple model. It is basically per user. It is a subscription model so enterprise SaaS model where we charge per user per year such type pricing. And it depends on various things with the different packages with pricing but it basically scales up based on the size of your team.Martin: Is it really like on a per year basis or on a per month basis?Al: When we quote a customer we will say on a monthly basis, here is your cost per month. but generally, most of our contracts have an annual commitment or multiyear commitment. When we started actually in the early days we were more month to month as we started to get the business growing, but at this point it is mostly annual or multiyear commitment.Martin: Can you give us some insights in the organization? What is the typically the functional split so to speak of the people working here?Al: In ClearSlide, two biggest teams are sales and technology. Our sales teams are spread across three offices in the US â€" here, New York and Seattle. We are thinking about international offices as well. We are both inside sellers which sell over the phone and field sellers which sell in person so it is really based on the size of the deal. If it is a larger deal it really makes more sense to meet in person. If it is smaller, we can settle it over the phone.And then on the technology side we have a lots of development talent, operational talent, IT. Because our product is pretty broad into the technology we offer we do both mobile web, we do analytics and insights, we also do conversion and we do gmail plug ins, our plug ins. There is a lot of technology behind the stack, there is lots of different types of developers and technology people in the company. That was all wrapped into our technology team.At that point those two teams are roughly similar in size. So I’d say 40 percent of the company is in the sales and 40 percent is in the technology engineer teams and then about 20 percent is in our support functions.Martin: You seem to have a lot of experience in terms of sales. What are the most important ingredients for a great sales pitch to really close it?Al: To close it?Martin: For real in two minutes or five minutes.Al: I think the biggest thing is to show value. A lot of times people will show the product and show features but it is rea lly important to show the value that you provide to that person. What we often have found is that sometimes sales folks start to a cookie kind of approach and they don’t modify or the type of person they are selling to. If you are talking to VP of sales or CMO or head of finance or CEO those are all very different roles and those roles care about different things. As you begin to customize your approach based on who you are pitching to and the kinds of challenges that they are facing.For a VP of sales rather than talking about e-mail pitch you might talk about how the challenges in scaling a team, how you are hiring the right people, or if you have one sales rep that is productive how do you replicate that across other sales reps. Those are the challenges, those are the things he deals with every day. And so we start with those and show benefits against those and then show the value, then show the actual product behind that as well. But you have to get really emotionally connected to the challenge or the problem that you are trying to face. And so that is probably one of the biggest insights.I think simplicity is key. If you are able to pitch it in two minutes or three minutes and have it be effective than that’s where you get to start. You can always make it longer if they want to dig in but you will have to be able to sink the idea in the early days.Martin: So currently the story of ClearSlide sounds to me like very straightforward. Any roadblocks along the way that you needed to shift around?Al: I think one of the challenging things for us was trying to figure out the right customer segment and how we sell to it along the way. In the early days we were selling to teams of five or ten or twenty and now we found success at 1000 or 2000. And the way you sell to a thousand-person team is very different than the way you sell to a small team.And so one thing that is challenging about the business it has been the breath of customer base and to sell over the ph one SMB (small mid size business) it is a lot of different skills and a type of organizational approach and the selling approach is very different along the way. So we were kind of fine tuning that and it has been challenging.I think there are always people along the way as you grow. Initially as an entrepreneur you try to get that product fit. Once you get that then it really becomes about scaling the people organization and it is really about building the best teams, getting the right people. There are always times when it works or it doesn’t work as you grow and as you grow quickly those things can be challenging at points. I think those two are probably the biggest ones.Martin: Can you elaborate on how are you currently acquiring or doing the sales for larger customers or the smaller customers?Al: How are we breaking in?Martin: Yes, because you said that your sales approach is different between those two segments.Al: The biggest thing when you sell to small companies is the u sers, the sales reps and the decision maker are very close. They might sit in the same office. It might be a small company of 10 people and there might be 10 reps using the product and their manager is right there and has a credit card. And it is a more simplified approach or a faster approach. It can be more driven by the users using the product.In a large company, there may be many levels in between the user and the budget owner. What that means is that you have to sell on multiple levels and you have to be able to get users using it but also get a senior leader understand the budget reasons for doing it and the risks and the rewards and the benefits to that level. So what we have found is it is a sale where you have to at multiple levels and do bottoms up selling and also top down selling where you want to break in high and go low or go low and break in high. If you do those both well everyone up and down the chain is a supporter.We have had situations where we don’t do that we ll, where maybe the users like the product but the leader doesn’t know why it is valuable or vice versa the leader likes the product but the users don’t know why it is valuable. And that will create friction because you don’t get buy in across the organization. A lot of times the approach needs to have a multiple layer approach for to work effectively.Martin: Imagine, you identified the budget owner and you are pitching him so that you convince him. At some point having this really in parallel for me It is quite hard because you first need to get it into their hands and if the budget owns says, “Yes, now you can do it, then you have some kind of staging: signed off by the budget owner, pushing through all the organization, penetrating the users, and making sure that they are using it. And then have this kind of dual track approach. Or do you see this in another way?Al: It hopefully starts that way. If you start high and go down is also a great place to start. The problem can be if you can’t get the attention initially and maybe after starting low you can get attention high.The other thing we found is even if you get the decision makers initially excited we have seen a lot of buyer approach these days where they are very collaborative and even though the leader might like it they really want to see that their team has adopted it and likes it: So, I am interested, but you have to prove to me that my team will use it and use it well and I am going to see value from it.”So we often do these trials or pilots program to say let’s get a hundred users using the product and will report back up both back up to the user but also what is the value. Here is some deals we have closed with ClearSlide, this is the value that we drove. And once you meet that you really need everyone on board and those leaders will be looking for feedback from their teams in terms of how effective it was.Martin: What is the typical time of having such a trial period because for yo u showing some tracktion and usage?Al: It varies. It can be anywhere for smaller companies it can be a couple of weeks and for larger companies it can be a couple of months I’d say. And then showing the value really depends on sales cycles. Sometimes they will sell very quickly in which case you have got short deals, in other cases the sales take longer so you can show pipeline. Here is the customers that have been moving the pipeline and here is how we have generated a value.Martin: Then basically you are doing an A/B test, so here is how you performed before and now look at the sales pattern and the closing rate and so after using our tool it is like that. So here is the value.Al: Exactly. We show the team how they used to sell or that team and some other teams. What has been great is once you have sales that have gone through the process then they know the value of ClearSlide. So sometimes at that point they just buy it because it has been proven to them. But if you try to show credibility then these are some of the steps that we go through.Martin: And are you seeing a lot of recommendations or referrals because if you are like you said targeting some sales department of company A and some of the sales reps is leaving the company, taking this experience to another company and then having something like inbound sales?Al: Absolutely. One that is specific for sales is they are tend to be very word of mouth driven and they very much get credibility value what the other co-workers use or what the other colleagues use or have used in the past. We have very often seen that work very effectively. Actually our program is here to track when users leave companies and where they go so we can then sell to the new company as well. We find that to be very effective.ADVICE TO ENTREPRENEURS FROM AL LIEBMartin: Al, you have started so many companies directly after university. What have been the major learnings for you that you would like to share with first time entreprene urs about really starting and building companies?Al: I’d say one big lesson I have learned is that in terms of ongoing process oftentimes an entrepreneur will have an idea and launch the idea whenever the initial phase is. Sometimes that works well, fantastic, sometimes it doesn’t but then ok, it didn’t work. On to the next thing, right, I am not going to do this. And what I have found is that it is very much iterative optimization type of approach where you have to get out there, try something, see what works, listen to customers very well and then adjust quickly based on that and keep that loop between the feedback you are getting and your product very tight and fast. If you do that effectively you can get better quickly and things can go in a positive direction.I have found that actually one of the biggest drivers of success is the ability to iterate in ongoing way, in a way that really listens to the customer needs more so than anything else.Martin: And what other type of learnings did you have, especially with problems and situations that are most likely to occur when you are an entrepreneur?Al: One of the things for starting entrepreneurs is as companies go through different stages the needs of the companies change and the needs of the kinds of people change, and even the way you spend your times changes.As an example, in two-person company it is all about trying to figure out your vision and the product that you are trying to build and that is all that really matters. Then when you are five or ten and fifteen or twenty, a hundred or two hundred things change and the needs change. One example is what I found is at about 50 people you can know everybody and everybody knows everybody else. There is not a lot of need of process or system and those sorts of things. Once you get 60 or a hundred those things start to break down. Someone gets hired and everybody: “Who is the person that.” And you start to have needing processing more efficiently the channels of how things go through.I think to be sensitive to what your needs are right now the way you need to spend time as an entrepreneur or co-founder, or your team needs to spend time it can change very quickly. And if you are looking for it you can be effective, but if you are not you can get caught behind it and something that was working two weeks ago sometimes isn’t working anymore.Martin: And how did you feel once you have crossed like 50-60 people coming to your office and say, “Actually, I don’t know these people. Is this my company?”Al: I think it started happening around 100-150. Particularly when you are going quickly. Jim and I and other founders definitely wanted in the early days to interview everybody. So up until 50 or a hundred we had interviewed everyone or at least knew it was part of the process. And then there was a point at which you stop doing that.It is tricky too when you do sessions around the vision of the company and we have meetings where we tried to connect with all new people but sometimes on those meetings you go around and you would ask: How long have you been working here?, and they would say: Four months. And you are like “How have we not met yet?” It is a weird feeling for sure once you come across that stage.Martin: Al, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge. It was a pleasure.Al: It was a pleasure to meet you. Thanks for having me.Martin: Thanks, awesome!

Anxiety and Anxiety Related Disorders - Free Essay Example

Introduction Anxiety. Anxiety is an evolutionarily adaptive response to danger that helps facilitate avoidance behavior, but it becomes maladaptive when it interferes with daily life[1]. Maladaptive anxiety is characterized by excessive and enduring fear and avoidance of threats (out of proportion to the threat or to nonexistent threats) [2]. Current scientific evidence indicates that anxiety arises from disruptions in the neural circuits used to process sensory stimuli and determine threat from those stimuli, leading to a state of high arousal and negative valence [3]. There are noticeable differences between fear and anxiety; fear responses are due to clear and perceived threats, with an immediate fight or flight response, and it subsides as the threat is removed. In comparison, anxiety responses are due to unknown threats, and they last longer than fear responses [4, 5]. Epidemiology. Anxiety related disorders are the most prevalent form of psychiatric illness in the world, and one of the leading causes of disability [6, 7]. One in four individuals is likely to have or be diagnosed with an anxiety disorder in their lifetime [8], and the 12 month prevalence of anxiety disorders in Europe is 14% [6]. Disability is exacerbated by a relatively early age of onset in comparison to other psychiatric disorders [1, 9], along with a high likelihood symptom recurrence [1, 9, 10]. Anxiety is highly comorbid with other mental disorders which can complicate treatment and diagnosis [9, 11]. Anxiety disorders can disrupt cognitive development and social rules, and can reduce quality of life by causing problems including school failure, underachievement, unemployment or underemployment, and social problems [2, 12]. Diagnosis of Anxiety. The diagnostic criteria for individual anxiety disorders varies across disorder and diagnostic manual used, either the DSM-5 or ICD-10. Genetic markers, blood tests, and psychophysiological testing lack the sensitivity or specificity to be used for the diagnosis of these disorders, so a trained physician must rely on the clinical interview, screening questionnaire, and subjective judgement [2, 4]. Distinguishing anxiety from other medical conditions is a major challenge to the proper diagnosis of anxiety, as presence of other mental or physical conditions are commonly associated with anxiety[13, 14]. Treatment of anxiety. Behavioral therapies are the first line treatment, but pharmacological treatment can be used as an alternative or adjunctive therapy[2, 15, 16]. Some of the pharmacological targets in anxiety include serotonergic, adrenergic, glutamatergic, neuropeptide, and endocannabinoid systems [15, 16]. Antidepressants, such as SSRIs or SNRIs, are the first line treatment for anxiety because of their efficacy, but they are associated with some adverse effects, including common side effects similar to symptoms of anxiety, discontinuation syndrome, and risk of increased suicidal ideation in youth [17]. Brain Regions Associated with Anxiety. Many regions, including amygdala (BLA and CeA), ventral hippocampus (vHPC), ventral tegmental area (VTA), medial dorsal thalamus (MdThal), nucleus accumbens (NAc), and several areas in the prefrontal cortex (cingulate cortex CingCx, prelimbic cortex PrL, infralimbic cortex IL) are important for anxiety[18-27]. Brain Region Actions Amygdala (BLA) identification and interpretation of threat as aversive or dangerous [3], positive or negative valence, predicts whether something will be threatening [28-30] Amygdala (CeA and BNST) directly invigorate anxiety response, influence threat appraisal likelihood [31] mPFC (Cingulate Cortex) regulator of anxiogenic activity: resistance to extinction of fear memories [32] PrL PFC fear memory acquisition and freezing response to cues [33-35] IL PFC Fear memory extinction [34, 36-40] NaC and VTA adjusting motivation for appetitive behaviors: cost/benefit analysis, providing reward for behaviors, suppression of anxiety behaviors when benefits are estimated to outweigh costs [41-46] Call to Action In the field of psychiatry, multiple challenges affect diagnosis and treatment of anxiety disorders. Diagnosis and treatment are only sought between 3 to 30 years after onset of symptoms, varying by country, with the median globally being 21 years[47]. This delay can be due to a lack of mechanistic diagnostic tests [4, 48], patients presenting with somatic symptoms that are complications of anxiety[48], underuse of systematic application diagnostic criteria [49] and that symptoms overlap considerably among different diagnoses while varying significantly among patients with the same diagnosis [50]. Previous research has found anxiety to be partially heritable, but exact replicable loci have yet to be found [2, 51, 52]. Brain based taxonomy is lacking [53], and efforts to find new therapeutic targets have languished due to the lack of a mechanistic understanding of these disorders [3]. The goal for research in the future, then, is to identify neural substrates of anxiety and develop clinically relevant predictors. Utilizing and understanding the electrophysiology of pathological anxiety will allow for better diagnosis and treatment of anxiety disorders. Rodent models in particular hold promise in understanding the conserved circuits that underlie anxiety [3] We postulated that a neural signature predicting anxiety related behavior exists at the network level. To test this hypothesis, we tested multiple forms of anxiogenic drug (Fluoxetine, FG-7142) in C57Bl/6J mice in the elevated plus maze (EPM), injected fluoxetine in these mice while in the homecage and conducted multi-circuit in vivo recordings from a subset of anxiety related regions including the prelimbic cortex (PrL_Cx), infralimbic cortex (IL_Cx), NAc, central nucleus of the amygdala (CeA), basolateral amygdala (BLA), VTA, and VHip, then used machine learning to elucidate the anxiety related signature. Experimental Background Electrophysiology. Local field potentials (LFPs) are measurements of pooled brain activity of neurons within 1 mm of an implanted electrode, their inputs, and their outputs [54]. They are neural responses to experimental events and are analyzed by decomposing the spectrum into frequency bands[55]. LFPs have been used to study mental illnesses, including anxiety [citation needed]. [Note: will be further completed next semester when LFP work is conducted] Elevated Plus Maze as Measure of Mouse Anxiety. The elevated plus maze is a widely used behavioral assay for anxiety, that has been well validated across several measures. The elevated plus maze is assumed to be an ethological and unconditioned model that, unlike other anxiety tests, does not rely on noxious stimuli or conditioned responses [56-58]. Previously, the EPM has been used to assess drug effects, including anxiolytics and anxiogenics [59, 60], to determine brain site or mechanisms associated with fear and anxiety [61-67], as a measure indicative of altered emotionality in animals subjected to biochemical or gene manipulation [68-71] and subtypes of anxiety disorders [61]. Specifically, it has been used to measure the anxiogenic effects of FG-7142, and fluoxetine [69, 70, 72]. The maze has four arms, two open and two closed, all with open roofs. The arms are arranged in a plus shape with the same types of arms opposite each other [57, 60]. Anxiety is traditionally assessed by using the ratio of time spent on the open arms to time spent on the closed arms, and percentage of entries [56, 57, 69]. The aversive open arms are avoided, and freezing and defecation are increased in the open arms [59]. Behavior is typically recorded and scored for the first 5 minutes of the test, with time spent and entries made on the open and closed arms are measured, as well as avoidance behaviors and risk assessment [56, 61]. Open Field Test as Measure of Mouse Anxiety. The open field test is a simple measure of anxiety, ambulatory motion, and other behaviors. In measurement of anxiety, it is similar to the EPM in that it measures the innate avoidance of open spaces, which indicates anxiety. Mice who spend less time in the center of the open field test are coded as more anxious [73]. Beta Carboline FG-7142. The beta carboline class of molecules acts as an inverse agonists on the benzodiazepine site of GABA-A receptors[74]. Inverse agonists as a class are convulsant or pro-convulsant and have shown anxiogenic properties by self report [74]. FG-7142 (N-methyl-b-carboline-3-carboxamide) is a partial inverse agonist of benzodiazepine receptors that causes anxiety in both humans[75] and mice[69], has kindling effects [74], upregulates adrenoreceptors, and decreases subsequent actions of GABA and beta carboline agonists [72]. The molecule is not selective, but does have higher affinity for the ? ±1 subunit-containing GABA-A receptor than other ? ± subunits [75, 76] . FG-7142 has several effects on the brain, including activating of the basal forebrain cholinergic neurons, related to attention and vigilance, and activation of mesolimbocortical dopamine output to the PFC leading to increased sensory drive output from the BLA [72, 77-79]. While FG-7142 is a convulsant as well as an anxiogenic, the dose required for anxiogenic purposes is lower than that required for convulsive purposes, allowing for usefulness for experimental induction of anxiety sans convulsions [69]. In the elevated plus maze, FG-7142 decreases the amount of time spent in open arms [69, 72], and its anxiogenic action may be mediated by the 3 subunit of the GABA-A receptor [72]. Fluoxetine. In clinical populations, chronic SSRI treatment is useful for the treatment of anxiety and depression, but has been shown to paradoxically increase anxiety and depression upon acute treatment [80, 81]. The treatment lag and anxiogenic effect of SSRIs in the acute phase may contribute to treatment noncompliance[81]. In preclinical animal research populations, namely mice and rats, fluoxetine, an SSRI that acts as a selective 5-HT reuptake inhibitor [71, 82-84], has been shown to increase anxiety related behaviors in the EPM[85-87], open field test [71], light/dark test [71], the free exploration test [85] and will also potentiate defensive behaviors[84]. In C57Bl/6J mice specifically, fluoxetine has been shown to be anxiogenic in the EPM at a concentration of 20 mg/kg [70, 88]. Methods Subjects Subjects were adult male C57BL/6J mice, purchased from Jackson Labs. The mice were housed in groups of 5 per cage, housed in a humidity and temperature controlled environment, with a standard 12h light/dark cycle where lights are on at 7 am. Water and food were available ad libitum. In the testing of FG-7142 and fluoxetine in the EPM, mice weighed between 20-35 g and were 9 weeks at the time of Elevated Plus Maze testing. All mice were nave to the EPM. In the testing of fluoxetine in the home cage, mice were implanted at 9 weeks, and were tested at 11 weeks in the home cage. Studies were conducted with approved protocols from Duke University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee and were in accordance with the NIH guidelines for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals. Drugs FG-7142 was suspended in physiological (0.9%) saline containing 3% Tween 80 and injected i.p. at 10 mg/kg [69]. Fluoxetine HCl (Sigma-Aldrich, USA) was dissolved in physiological saline and injected i.p. at 20mg/kg [70]. Apparatus The elevated plus maze apparatus has black plexiglass walls and flooring, with white tape on the floor of the arms. There are no walls on the open arms, but cm of tape is on the edges to prevent mice from falling off the arms. The maze is mounted in a plexiglass pedestal on the floor and is 40 cm tall with 305.08 cm arms; walls on closed arms are 15.25 cm high. General Procedure of the EPM All experiments were conducted during the mouse light phase. Mice were habituated to handling and injection for 7 days prior to testing, with either saline for 5 days and vehicle for 2 days (FG-7142) or saline for 7 days (Fluoxetine). Treatment conditions were randomly assigned, and the experimenter was blind to treatment. Mice were tested in order of cage and mouse number. Light intensity was low light (50 lux) for all experiments. Mice were brought up to the testing room at least one hour before testing to allow for acclimation to the testing environment. After injection, mice were either placed in a new cage (FG-7142) or in the home cage (Fluoxetine) and allowed to acclimate for 30 minutes. In the elevated plus maze, mice were individually placed on the central square, facing a closed arm, and freely allowed to explore for 10 minutes (FG-7142) or 5 minutes (Fluoxetine). Between each mouse, the apparatus was cleaned with Rescue wipes (Virox, Oakville ON). Fluoxetine Injections in Home Cage Mice were handled, injected with saline, and habituated to single housing for 30 minutes after injection for 7 days prior to testing. On the day of testing, mice were habituated to the room for 60 minutes prior to testing, connected to a headstage without anesthesia (Blackrock Microsystems, UT, USA), recorded 5 minutes of baseline LFP activity, injected with fluoxetine, then placed in a separate cage and singly housed. Recordings were initiated immediately, data was used after 30 minutes. Experiment was conducted under low light (50 lux) conditions. LFP data was collected using Cerebus system (Blackrock Microsystems, Inc., Salt Lake City, UT), animals were video recorded using Neuromotive software (Blackrock Microsystems, Inc., Salt Lake City, UT) and analyzed for time spent standing still using Ethovision XT 7.1 software (Noldus Information Technology, Wageningen, Netherlands). Open Field Test Open field testing was conducted immediately after completion of home cage fluoxetine recordings 1 hour after fluoxetine injection. Mice were placed in a 17.5 in long x 17.5 inch wide x 11.75 in high chamber for 5 minutes. LFP data was collected using Cerebus system (Blackrock Microsystems, Inc., Salt Lake City, UT), location of animals was recorded using Neuromotive software (Blackrock Microsystems, Inc., Salt Lake City, UT) and analyzed for time spent in the center using Ethovision XT 7.1 software (Noldus Information Technology, Wageningen, Netherlands). Neurophysiological data acquisition Neurophysiological data was acquired at 30kHz using the Cerebus acquisition system (Blackrock Microsystems, UT, USA). LFPs were low pass filtered at 250 Hz, and stored at 1000 Hz. Voltage was measured by comparing data from each wire against a wire within the same brain area that had a SNR 3:1. Electrode implantation surgery Mice were anesthetized with 1.5% isoflurane, placed in a stereotaxic device, and had screws implanted above the cerebellum and anterior cranium. Bundles were stereotaxically centered based on coordinates measured from bregma (AMY: -1.4mm and 40.86 AP, -2.9mm and 22.91 ML, -3.85 and 8.57 mm DV from the dura; NAc: 1.3 and 45.56 mm AP, -2.25 and 20.91 mm ML, -4.1 and 8.72 mm DV from the dura; PrL: 1.5 and 45.76 mm AP, 0 and 23.16mm ML, -2.25 and 10.57 mm DV from the dura; VTA: -3.4 and 40.86 mm AP, -.25 and 22.91 mm ML, -4.25 and 8.57 mm DV from the dura; VHip: -3.3 and 40.96 mm AP, -3 and 20.16 mm ML, -3.75 and 9.07 mm DV from the dura. Histology was performed on implantation sites after testing was complete to confirm recording sites used for analysis. Behavioral testing was performed when all animals had stable weights, at approximately 1.5 weeks after surgery. Statistical Analyses We ran the Shapiro Wilkes test for normality, the F test for equal variances, and two sample t tests for equal and unequal variances depending on the F test for equal variances. LFPs We used in vivo recording to quantify local field potentials (LFPs). LFP data was analyzed using non-negative matrix factorization, which is predictive of behavior and extrapolate across different subjects. It quantifies spectral power and coherence in certain frequency ranges to identify network level signatures.

Neighborhood Watch - 1179 Words

Neighborhood Watch Proposal Neighborhood Watch Proposal Introduction A Neighborhood Watch Program is a community-implemented program that assists with preventing crime. This program was started in the 1970’s by the National Sheriff’s Association to encourage members of various communities to observe and report on suspicious activities within their neighborhoods. The Neighborhood Watch Program’s purpose is to improve safety within a neighborhood. Providing a study on communities that are utilizing the Neighborhood Watch Programs will give insight into a neighborhood that should be able to come together to fight against crime and attempt to retake their community from criminals. This proposal will promote some†¦show more content†¦Neighborhood watch meetings may be held in places such as a local high school gym, a community center, or even in a resident’s home. The Benefits of a Neighborhood Watch Program Resource programs implemented through a neighborhood watch would be beneficial to public safety and help to unite citizens with public safety officials. The two groups would have the opportunity to work together and combine their individual strengths and knowledge. This joining of the two would help to improve the lifestyle within the community and allow for issues occurring in these urban areas to be addressed. Assistance from the police department would also help the effectiveness of the program because law enforcement would build a partnership with the community’s members. Residents of the community will have more faith in the safety of their neighborhood as well as restore their faith in the police officers working with them. Other departments play an active role within the neighborhood watch programs; the department of transportation, the fire department, city council, and animal control departments. If these d epartments would unite and accept responsibility in eliminating and decreasing the crime issues within the community, residents’ fears would be reduced and they would aid in improving the quality of life significantly. The residents in the community will eventually start to view the city and public safety officers as beingShow MoreRelatedCommunity Policing And The Neighborhood Watch Program883 Words   |  4 Pagesis forming neighborhood watch programs which benefit both police and citizens. Citizens and police work together to discourage criminal behavior and find solutions to crime (Take Action, n.d.). Neighborhood watch entails educating members on security and suspicious behaviors such as a person screaming for help, strange noises, a person looking in cars widows, strangers in cars talking to children and property being taken out of a house when the resident is not home. Neighborhood watch members areRead MoreNeighborhood Watch1074 Words   |  5 PagesNeighborhood Watch: Let’s Partner with Law Enforcement: Let’s Be Vigilant: Let’s Legislate! By: Shelly Ray Date: 07/15/13 Over the weekend, the nation watched and listened as the â€Å"Not Guilty† verdict was read for second degree murder and manslaughter charges in the case of George Zimmerman. Mr. Zimmerman is the 29 year old neighborhood watchman man and man who fired the fatal shot of 17 year old Trayvon Martin on the evening of February 26, 2012 in Sanford, Florida. The subject I will bringRead MoreThe Neighborhood Watch626 Words   |  3 PagesThe Neighborhood Watch Functions and Goals Stresses instruction and common sense to members Teaches people how to help themselves by identifying and reporting suspicious activity in their neighborhoods Provides people with the occasion to make their neighborhoods safer and advance the quality of life (The Role of Traditional Policing in Community Policing, 2008) Issues Addressed Focus on surveillance and awareness as a means of preventing crime Endorsing social interaction among members andRead MoreThe Shooting of Trayvon Martin at the Hands of George Zimmerman2018 Words   |  8 PagesTrayvon Martin at the hands of George Zimmerman. This was a polarizing trial for it pitted gun rights activists against gun-control activists and people who were generally against the new gun rhetoric that is in Florida. George Zimmerman was the neighborhood watch for the gated community and would always do his job diligently. However, one night he witnessed someone in a grey hoodie walking on the sidewalk wearing a hoodie. Zimmerman thought this person was suspicious and continued to follow him. AfterRead MoreNeighborhood Watch Essay1967 Words   |  8 PagesIntroduction Crime happens in every neighborhood, whether it is an upscale community or a rundown slum. It is a beautiful idea to think that if a community comes together and neighbors watch each other’s back, then we can eliminate crime completely. However, we all know that as wonderful as that would be, it is simply unrealistic. On the other hand, it is possible to reduce the number of crimes to the minimum if the community come together and work with each other. Therefore, it is important toRead MoreCommunity Policing And The Police Essay2008 Words   |  9 Pagesin which the essential hierarchical objective is working helpfully with individual natives, gatherings of nationals, and both open and private associations to recognize and resolve issues which possibly impact the reasonableness of particular neighborhoods, ranges, or the city overall. Community based police offices perceive the way that the police can t viably manage such issues alone, and must join forces with other people w ho share a common duty regarding settling issues. Community policingRead MoreStand Your Ground Laws Are Relevant For American Society s Perception On Self Defense1124 Words   |  5 Pagesjustifiably serve to protect the public. The laws are relevant to American society’s perception on self-defense. On February 26, 2012, one of the cases that made a disturbance in many communities occurred. George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watchman in Sandford, Florida called police to report a suspicious individual in the area. According to a Feb. 7, 2016 CNN report, while Zimmerman is on the phone with a dispatcher, the dispatcher â€Å"asked him if he was following the teen. When ZimmermanRead MoreNeighborhood Watch and Its Effect on the Community1540 Words   |  7 PagesNeighborhood Watch and its Effect on the Community The Neighborhood Watch program is one of the oldest forms of organized community crime prevention in the United States. Its history dates back as far as the late 1960s. As a method of fighting and preventing crime in residential communities, this program has shown to be very effective. This paper will cover the beginning of the Neighborhood Watch program, its growth up to the present day, and a few of its success stories. Neighborhood WatchRead MoreThe Community Of The Cherry Hill Community1250 Words   |  5 Pagespolice decrease the drug activity. After reviewing all of the new and old issues with the Cherry Hill community there has been a few new programs we would like to start in the community. The first program would be a Neighborhood Watch program which will have a community coordinator, watch coordinator as well as a block captain or street captain who will all work together on a common goal to get their community back the way it once was before the drugs moved into the community. All of these people willRead MoreAre Neighborhood Watch Programs That Effective?1699 Words   |  7 Pagesthis activity. This fact alone is what has made neighborhood watch programs so well-liked within the last couple decades. Due to participation in neighborhood watch programs the numbers has almost doubled over the past decade according to the crime survey that was taken in the UK. Regardless of the large number of neighborhood watch programs, there still has not been a drastic reduction in the crime rates. This poses the question: Are neig hborhood watch programs that effective? In order to answer this

Hiding from Reality Essay - 953 Words

Hiding from reality The American Dream for many it means the ideals of freedom, equality and opportunity traditionally held by every American. A life of personal happiness in short terms. However this â€Å"American Dream â€Å"is different for everyone, and it is now being threaten by many factors such as the economy, which is a big part of it, employment and our education as well are being demolished. In â€Å"Hiding from reality† by Bob Herbert, he explains his view on how the American dream is slowly become less and less reachable and what we need to focus on in order for the restoration of the American Dream. Herbert states, â€Å"whenever you choose to look-at the economy and jobs, public schools, the budget deficits, the non-stop warfare†¦show more content†¦In my opinion this deficit reduction program will help our economy in some ways because were spending more than what we’re receiving. With this deficit reduction program the government will be able to spend less than what we’re receiving. Herbert states that proof of the recession is all around us, his statement is true. One example he provides is the war we’ve been fighting all these years in Iraq, that we don’t have the money for all the military expenses, yet we still persist on fighting. Herbert makes a good point on America not having the will to raise taxes to pay for th e war overseas or to simply end the war. From my point of view Herbert is right why not just end the war? Or raise taxes in order to help pay for the expenses? Instead they still insist on fighting and rather have our country in a economic decline. Not only is our economy being affected but even our special services centers are reducing or changing their services to the American people. Herbert states that state and local governments are reducing services that many people rely on such as work forces, health and pension benefits, and raising taxes and fees. In my opinion this is bad because many people rely on important health services mainly children, disabled people and the elderly. Not only is our money in danger but Americans have to also worry about their health now and their children’s education also. With cutbacks inShow MoreRelatedInternet Addiction : Is It Just Bored Or Hiding From The Reality?1144 Words   |  5 Pagesinternet addiction could be serious. In these day, what is the purpose of using technology? Was it just bored or hiding from the reality? How does technology associate in our life? This image appearance the impact of cyberculture. I took this photo in front of a bus stop. It is clear to see how cyberculture has involve in our daily life - everyone is holding an electronic device and most people are focusing on it. In my experience, this has become ordinary situation in every developed countries.Read MoreThe Language of the Black Condition and All Conditions: Paul Laurence Dunbar’s â€Å"We Wear the Mask†984 Words   |  4 PagesPaul Laurence Dunbar’s poem, â€Å"We Wear The Mask† cleverly talks of the black condition in a language so universal that it could apply to any race of people that tries to hide their emotions from the world in order to survive. Dunbar argues for the reality of the black man’s plight in America, the black mans struggle for equality in the world, and the struggle for peace within. These are circumstances of the poet’s life that influenced his writing of the poem. PARAGRAPH 2: Background informationRead MoreNew Life Has Been Breathed Into George Orwell s Novel Of The Dystopian Novel1281 Words   |  6 Pages He finds solace in his hiding spots, away from the seemingly inescapable eyes of Big Brother, reassuring himself with the phrase â€Å"No telly screen, no one is hearing or watching.† In actuality, Winston’s most damnable and intimate moments in the eyes of the Party, such as writing in his illegal diary or having sex for pleasure and love, are clearly expressed on stage, giving the audience the ability to peer into his life in a way that Big Brother only could. Even from the beginning, the audienceRead MoreWilliam Shakespeare s Romeo And Juliet And A Midsummer Night s Dream1580 Words   |  7 Pagestrustworthy are only misinterpretations of reality created by our perspective, which make common illusions. Characters in Romeo Juliet and A Midsummer Night s Dream also experience this idea, demonstrated when they are tricked by their own perspective and only see what they think is the best scenario. Illusions are created based on people s perceptions of reality. It is then clear that in Romeo Juliet and A Midsummer Night s Dream, perspective creates reality. This perspective creates a version ofRead Morea gothic short story1746 Words   |  7 Pagesaccepting it or hiding from it. In the play â€Å"A Streetcar Named Desire† by Tennessee Williams, the author mainly focuses on Blanche Dubois, a woman who moved to her sister’s house due to the loss of Belle Reve, her family home. She is a deceptive and selfish person, who cannot a ccept the occurrence of agony in her life. She mentally deteriorates due to the lost and rejection of love, and due to her selfishness. She chooses to hide from the truth. When an individual hides from reality, it will only resultRead MoreFrozen : Feel The Magic942 Words   |  4 Pagesbest films by Disney productions since Tangled in 2010. It is craftily animated with catchy songs for all ages to enjoy. I really liked how they made the main point of the movie based around two sisters bond with one another. They also steered away from the typical Disney happily ever after and lastly, it also empowered girls to be critical thinkers of who they meet and trust. Disney’s Frozen is an animated musical featuring two fearless princesses, Elsa and Anna. It begins in a snowy Norwegian-likeRead MoreThe Death Of The Red Death By Edgar Allan Poe1351 Words   |  6 PagesProspero and the narrator, death himself, to illustrate that death befalls all. Prince Prospero spends most of his time hiding in his castle, trying to escape death. Most of the population has died from the Red Death, a mysterious plague that kills victims immediately. Prospero, not wanting the same fate, settles for staying in his castle, away from the disease and away from death. Poe creates a paradox by allowing death to enter the prince’s castle; the very thing he has tried escaping is theRead MorePassing, By Nella Larsen950 Words   |  4 Pagesthe impression that everything is in order when in reality everything is falling apart. Passing in this novel refers to the ability of a person to be classified as one thing, normally a social group, while belonging to a different group. Passing is usually done to gain class or acceptance by groups other than one’s own. The primary focus of the novel is on racial passing which is the ability to look white and belong to a white group when in reality the person is an African-American in order to gainRe ad MoreAnalysis Of Anne Frank971 Words   |  4 Pagesthe country and went into hiding living under strict rules, in fear of being found. A young girl named Anne Frank lived during this time. While in hiding, Anne wrote down all her experiences in a diary and her story went down in history. Three different genres of information help describe Annes life during the war. Anne Frank Beyond the Diary is a non-fiction text explaining about Anne’s life and influence she left behind after the war. Anne’s diary entries are excerpts from Anne’s actual diary sheRead MoreComedy From Tragedy, Or Life From Death Essay1408 Words   |  6 PagesSeparating fact from fiction, comedy from tragedy, or life from death is often a more complicated task than one would expect. True juxtapositions are seldom composed of two entirely separate entities. Instead, they have a point of convergence—a gray area in which two seemingly defined opposites lose their distinction entirely. B ruce Bechdel, as depicted in Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir Fun Home, exemplifies several such points of convergence; he constantly straddles the lines between worldliness

Brain Injuries, Sports, And The Military Essay - 3500 Words

Brain Injuries, Sports, And the Military My topic of choice for this paper is traumatic brain injury. Traumatic brain injury is another word for concussion. I wanted to exhibit how this type of injury affects sports and the military. Sports and the Military are similar in that they can cause traumatic brain injuries. In this paper I will describe types of injuries, how injuries are acquired, and how to treat individuals with brain injuries. Some of the types of head injury include a diffuse axonal injury, concussion (which is also called a TBI), and second impact syndrome. Strong rotation or shaking of the head as with Shaken Baby Syndrome is one cause of diffuse axonal injury. Car accidents may also be a cause of the injury (Brain Injury Association of America). A concussion may be caused by blows to the head, gunshot wounds, violent shaking of the head, or force from a whiplash type injury (Brain Injury Association of America). ?Second Impact Syndrome, also termed ?recurrent traumatic brain injury,? can occur when a person sustains a second traumatic brain injury before the symptoms of the first traumatic brain injury have healed? (Brain Injury Association of America). TBI?s cause an altercation of the brain function because of external force. Dr. Robert Lehr mentions that depending on what part of the brain the injury occurred it can lead to a variety of altercations in the brain function. If the injury occurred in t he frontal lobes, patients will have difficultiesShow MoreRelatedThe Total Helmets Riley Uses For All Sports1050 Words   |  5 Pagesuses for all sports and to find the total amount of concussions per sport. Background: Concussions are one of the most serious, yet overlooked injuries in the world. The term concussion is defined as a temporary unconsciousness caused by a blow to the head. The term is also used loosely of the aftereffects such as confusion or temporary incapacity. Although concussions usually are caused by a blow to the head, they can also occur when the head and upper body are violently shaken. Injuries like theseRead MoreThe Effects Of Concussions On The Brain1164 Words   |  5 Pages[ABSTRACT] Concussions are complex cerebral injuries that result in a series of metabolic events within the brain. The changes are seen in the fragile neuronal homeostatic balances where changes in the elevations of glutamate and potassium have been identified. The effects of concussions have also been seen in the functioning of the brain rather than in the structure of the brain itself. Being identified as mild traumatic brain injuries, occurring due to a bump or jolt to head or neck, concussionsRead MoreAthletes Essay1617 Words   |  7 Pagesthat are coming from all the brain injuries involved that are leading to most of their deaths due to all their muscles weakening. A disease associated with athletes is Amyotrophic Lateral sclerosis (ALS) which is also known as Lou Gehrigs disease, it is a disorder in the nervous system that causes the death of nerve cells and destroys Motor neurons. Another disease associated with many athletes is Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) which is an irre versible brain disease caused by multiple hitsRead MoreThe Effects Of Repetitive Head Impact On Athletes Essay1462 Words   |  6 Pagesathletes has been an uprise in the sports medicine field. 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His focus was mainly towards American football but it was helpful to othersRead MoreAthletes Essay1557 Words   |  7 Pages Athletes play sports for the competition and fun of it knowing they will get hurt or develop a disease overtime, but still choose to participate because of the rush certain sports give. A disease associated with athletes is Amyotrophic Lateral sclerosis (ALS) which is also known as Lou Gehrigs disease, it is a disorder in the nervous system that causes death of nerve cells and destroys Motor neurons. Another disease associated with many athletes is Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) which isRead MoreALS Essay1190 Words   |  5 Pagesweak also difficult to speak, swallow, and breathe. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy known as (CTE) is also described as brain degeneration. It is coming more common now in the word that athletes are now more likely to get CTE or ALS. People need to become aware of what might happen if changes are not changed in the world of athletics. All measures should be taken to make sports safer, in doing this rules need to changed dramatically to not cause C TE or ALS in athletes. Amyotrophic Lateral SclerosisRead MoreTraumatic Brain Injury Issues Regarding Causes, Symptoms, And The Public s Awareness1304 Words   |  6 Pages Traumatic Brain Injury Issues Regarding Causes, Classifications, Treatment, Symptoms, and the Public’s Awareness Camilo J. Montoya Thomas Nelson Community College Traumatic Brain Injury Issues Regarding Causes, Classifications, Treatment, Symptoms, and the Public’s Awareness Research Findings: Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) has continually garnered concern from the public. Effects of a TBI range from headaches to loss of motor functions in more severe cases. Normally when one hears thatRead MoreTraumatic Brain Injury And Post Concussive Syndrome964 Words   |  4 PagesTraumatic Brain Injury and Post Concussive Syndrome Neurological Degeneration Dementia produces physical changes in the brain and some areas shrink and other widen. Dementia is a term used to describe symptoms of mental or communication impairment found in a variety of brain conditions including Alzheimer’s disease (AD). In approximately 20% of the cases dementia can be reversed with the other 80% being irreversible. Dementia is generally marked by memory loss, forgetting appointments, forgettingRead MoreImprovement in Football Helmet Technology664 Words   |  3 Pageswith the face mask and energy- absorbent padding. In addition, the concern over preventing concussions, have led to helmet changes, impact testing methods and reconstruction of injuries during play helping to provide insight on concussions(4). Helmets have been successful in decreasing the risk of traumatic brain injuries, but there is much concern over concussion; therefore, scholars argue the importance of technology development to address concussion(5). As the author(s), David Vian o and David

Dr. Kant s Argument - 1060 Words

Savulescu’s argument also has some flaws in regards to his responses to a few possible objections he talked about. One objection that Savulescu responds to is the objection that genes are pleiotropic meaning they have different effects on different parts of the body (The Ethical Life, 454). The example given was that a gene that prompts depression might also be responsible for heightened creativity and productivity (The Ethical Life, 454). Savulescu s response to that was that we would have to â€Å"limit interventions until our knowledge grows† and we would have to do moreâ€Å"adequate research† before expanding the types of interventions (The Ethical Life, 454). The problem with that is that it requires experimenting and testing on children and embryos which would be treating them as a means to an end rather than an end in itself. Kant would agree and say that these children â€Å"exist as an end in itself, not merely as a means to be used by this or that wil l at its discretion† (Kant, 96). Savulescu is suggesting research on children and embryos in order to reach the goal of allowing genetic enhancement. He is using them as a means to his end result. This is a major flaw as Kant would argue that treating people as an end is showing them the respect they deserve while treating them as a means is just dealing with them so that they can help to achieve the person’s goal (Shafer-Landau, 174). Therefore, a child should never be treated as a means to an end to help reach a goal for eitherShow MoreRelatedThe Sunday Night Blues : A Case About 59 Essay1700 Words   |  7 PagesA highly credible philosophical professor named Dr. Gordon Marino, made an entire article arguing why it would be inadequate and unethical for someone to quit a job that is necessary in order to provide for something bigger than oneself, that working or indulging in comfortable positions makes people miss out on the traditional connection of talent and duty. In Dr.Marino s article, A Life Beyond Do What You Love, he creates an effective argument about the traditional standard of self-fulfillmentRead MoreA Life Beyond Do What You Love Essay1698 Words   |  7 PagesA highly credible philosophical professor named Dr. Gordon Marino, made an entire article arguing why it would be inadequate and unethical for someone to quit a job that is necessary in order to provide for something bigger than oneself, that working or indulging in comfortable positions makes people miss out on the traditional connection of talent and duty. In Dr.Marino s article, A Life Beyond Do What You Love, he creates an effective argument about the traditional standard of self-fulfillmentRead MoreUtilitarianism : A Philosophical Concept That Was Taught By John Stuart Mill931 Words   |  4 PagesJoseph Morrone Dr. Kaspar Ethics 13 March 2016 Utilitarianism is a philosophical concept that was taught by John Stuart Mill in which he explains that every person always act and make decisions that maximize their utility. Mill gave a clear explanation that utilitarian often aim at maximizing utility because it is morally right. All actions that individuals perform in their own initiatives are to make their lives better in the long run. This essay is aimed at explaining the way in which utilitarianismRead MoreAnselm s Argument On The Ontological Argument1614 Words   |  7 PagesStephanie Iwaszkiw PHL 101 Dr. Wiitala Final Paper In the Prologion, Anselm argues that God exists, otherwise known as the ontological argument. 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In studying numerous ethical theories, I have found one that, to me, makes the most sense to liveRead MoreRacism - A History : The Color Of Money1063 Words   |  5 Pagesdehumanized for the benefit of commerce and trade. Although slavery existed for years before the slave trade, the documentary illustrates it was the enslavement of Africans that led to racism and the color of skin was used to distinguish races. According to Dr. Barnor Hesse, Associate Professor of African-American Studies at Northwestern University before this time, skin color was not associated with racial attitudes before the colonial powers’ slave trade. 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