D

    University graduates Mallorie Brodie and Lauren Hasegawa, who invented a smartphone app that tracks construction defects for commercial builders, had a tiger by the tail.

    Bridgit, which they founded in 2012, launched a cloud-based communications platform that helped manage defects on construction sites, which can delay projects and result in costly repairs if left unchecked. The smartphone application lets site supervisors take photos of cracks or damaged paint, share them with employees and track the problems to solution.

    More than 600 subcontractors used the pilot version in many building sites before the commercial version, called Closeout, officially launched.

    Feedback(反馈)was so good that they began to wonder: Why limit their invention to a specific industry? Why not turn it into some kind of a handy tool for consumers too? This became their dilemma. In other words, should they stay the course or look for wider applications of their app?

    The experts polled all agreed Bridgit should stay focused on its original goal. Ms. Hasegawa and Ms. Brodie took that advice.

    As more business customers signed on, it became clear that they made the right decision. Since then, the company's growth has been rapid.

    Earlier this year, Bridgit launched Closeout ,which is designed so that even the least tech-savvy can use it easily. Today, the app is being used on sites across Canada and the United States and even by top general contractors.

    In October, Bridgit was named to the Canadian Innovation Exchange's top 20 list of Canada's most innovative (创新的) companies working in digital media and information and communication technology .

    But Ms. Hasegawa and Ms. Brodie are not resting on their glories. They have also been collecting feedback on Closeout from customers, and they'll launch a new version in the spring. It will target not only general contractors but developers and building owners, too.

    According to a recent study out of the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, men with shaved heads are considered to be more manly, powerful, and successful than those with longer hair or thinning(稀少的) hair. Besides, in some cases, they are considered to have greater leadership potential (潜力). That may explain why the power-buzz look has become popular among business leaders in recent years.

    Albert Mannes, Wharton management lecturer, said he was encouraged to do the research after noticing that he was treated with more respect when he shaved off his thinning hair.

    Mannes did three experiments to test people's impression of men with shaved heads. In one of the experiments, he showed 344 subject photos of the same men in two versions: one showing the men with hair and the other showing them with their hair digitally removed, so their heads appear shaved. In all three tests, the subject report found the men with shaved heads are more dominant(占优势的) than their hairy counterparts(对应的人).

    The study found that men with thinning hair were viewed as the least attractive and powerful. For those men, the solution could be as cheap and simple as a shave.

    New York image consultant Julie Rath advised her clients to get closely cropped when they start thinning up top. “There is something really strong, powerful and confident about laying it all bare(光秃的),” she said, describing the thinning look as kind of raunchy(不修边幅的).

    Not everyone needs a bare head. Rick Devine, 55, the CEO of Devine Capital Partners, advised executive candidates attracted by their clippers to keep their hair closely cropped, rather than completely shaved. “It is way too much image risk,” he said, “The best thing you can do in a business meeting is to make your look not an issue.”

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    We walked in so quietly that the nurse at the desk didn't even lift（抬起）her eyes from the book.Mum pointed at a big chair by the door and I knew she wanted me to sit down.While I watched,mouth open in surprise.Mum took off her hat and coat and gave them to me to hold.She walked quietly to the small room by the lift（电梯）and took out a wet mop（拖把）.She pushed the mop past the desk and as the nurse looked up.Mum nodded and said,"Very dirty floors."

“Yes.I'm glad they've finally decided to clean them,”the nurse answered.She looked at Mum strangely and said. “But aren't you working late?”

    Mum just pushed harder,each swipe of the mop taking her farther and farther down the hall.I watched until she was out of sight and the nurse had turned back to writing in the big book.

    After a along time Mum came back.Her eyes were shining.She quickly put the mop back and took my hand.As we turned to go out of the the door,Mum nodded politely to the nurse and said.“Thank you.”

    Outside,Mum told me, “Dagma is fine.No fever."

     “You see her,Mum?”

     “Of course.I told her about the hospital rules,and she will not expect us until tomorrow.Dad will stop worrying as well.It's a fine hospital.But the floors!A mop is no good.You need a brush."

    I had an experience some years ago, which taught me something about the ways in which people make a bad situation worse by blaming themselves. One January, I had to hold two funerals on successive days for two elderly women in my community. Both had died “full of years”, as the Bible would say. Their homes happened to be near each other, so I paid condolence(吊唁) calls on the two families on the same afternoon.

    At the first home, the son of the deceased(已故的)woman said to me, “If only I had sent my mother to Florida and gotten her out of this cold and snow, she would be alive today. It's my fault that she died.” At the second home, the son of the other deceased woman said, “If only I hadn't insisted on my mother's going to Florida, she would be alive today. That long airplane ride, the sudden change of climate, was more than she could take. It's my fault that she's dead.”

    You see that any time there is a death, the survivors will feel guilty. Because the course of action they took turned out bad, they believe that the opposite course would have turned out better. After all, how could it have turned out any worse?

    There seem to be two elements involved in our willingness to feel guilty. The first is our pressing need to believe that the world makes sense, that there is a cause for every effect and a reason for everything that happens that leads us to find patterns and connections both where they really exist and where they exist only in our minds. The second element is the view that we are the cause of what happens, especially the bad things that happen. It seems to be a short step from believing that every event has a cause to believe that every disaster is our fault. The roots of this feeling may lie in our childhood.

    A baby comes to think that the world exists to meet his needs, and that he makes everything happen in it. He wakes up in the morning and summons the rest of the world to its tasks. He cries, and someone comes to attend to him. When he is hungry, people feed him, and when he is wet, people change him. Very often, we do not completely outgrow that childish view that our wishes cause things to happen.

    All over the world people enjoy sports. Sports help to keep people healthy, happy and help them to live longer.

    Sports change with the season. People play different games in winter and summer.

    Games and sports often grow out of people's work and everyday activities. The Arabs use horses or camels in much of their everyday life; they use them in their sports, too.

    Some sports are so interesting that people everywhere go in for them. Football, for example, has spread around the world. Swimming is popular in all countries near the sea or in those with many rivers.

    Some sports or games go back to thousands of years, like running or jumping. Chinese boxing, for example, has a very long history. But basketball and volleyball are rather new. Neither one is a hundred years old yet. People are inventing new sports or games all the time.

    People from different countries may not be able to understand each other, but after a game they often become good friends. Sports help to train a person's character(性格). One learns to fight hard but fight fair, to win without pride and to lose with grace(体面).

    Chinese has overtaken French, Spanish and German to become one of the most promising foreign languages for job seekers in the UK. Research shows graduates in Chinese earn an average yearly salary of 31,000 pounds or more.

    Chinese students set themselves up for a different university experience from others who take traditional subjects. While an English student may have as little as six hours of a week, those studying Chinese are in class for most of the day. "I had a lot of friends on other courses who didn't do much in first or second year. You can't play at Chinese. You have to spend hours and hours writing characters," says Hannah, who graduated in Chinese Studies from Sheffield University. "The first year was really difficult. Most of my friends admitted at one point to crying because of the pressure. I was almost told at one point that I might want to reconsider and drop out. "

    So are the evenings in learning characters while your friends are at the student bar really worth its Despite the painful studying experience, most of the graduates think so. They use Chinese in their chosen careers, and would not have been in the jobs they do now without their knowledge of the language.

    Liberty now works for the civil service in Beijing. She earned a place on the Department for International Development graduate scheme with a salary of over 30, 000 pounds within two years. "The degree was absolutely worth it. Looking around at people I know who have studied French or Spanish at university, there's not such a chance to use it in the workplace."

    Hannah has set her apart in the workplace, but she warns ambitious students to think about whether they would really want to live in China in the future." Some people think they are going to learn Chinese and then be a big success, but I think it's important to be quite realistic about that. "