Chocolate sprinkles tell culture differences

Travel to the Netherlands and during your first breakfast or snack, you may notice a strange choice of food among the locals.  Chocolate sprinkles!  Like me, many Americans know sprinkles as those little sugary pieces added to the top of ice cream sundaes.  Never for breakfast.  For me, sprinkles make ice cream look more entertaining IMO, but I never added them for the taste of chocolate. Try chocolate sprinkles made in the Netherlands, and you'll notice that they actually taste like chocolate.  Big taste difference!  And the locals use them on top of buttered bread.  Sound strange?  Well, offer a Dutchman or woman some ice cream with these chocolates sprinkled on top.  Watch their reaction.  Do you see the same surprised face that you had? The beauty of traveling.
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What you may have been taught or be accustomed to is not always how things work.  Discover differences.  Challenge your prejudgments and see if they stand correct after you ventured to the "unknown".  People and medias (TVs, newspapers, journals, blogs) engrave thoughts in our heads whether we want it or not.  Think about it.  I say Amsterdam, most of my American counterparts ask me about pot and hookers.  I still dislike FoxNews for doing such a piece: Point being... Do the unthinkable.  Explore!  You'll be shocked, you'll be amused, and you might find a new way how to eat chocolate sprinkles.  That's a conversation worth sharing 37MFXKNXJFPC

Facebook doesn't destroy work performance....some say

Recently, I gave a presentation at a major pharmaceutical company in Switzerland. The executive room was very nice overlooking the city, but best of all, they had chocolate all over the place. Rock on my Swiss!

My colleagues and I presented research on the so-called "Generation Y" (ppl roughly born between 1980-1995) in which we provided an age based analysis for older generations. Simply idea was that they wanted to understand the youth of today. One particular area I emphasized was the fact of creating restrictions at the workplace, such as blocking social sites like Facebook, do not make employees more effective. I actually argued that it creates negative attitude and gives workers a bad taste in their mouth.

The executives were skeptical and had a hard time thinking that this could be correct. Many people believe that Facebook and other social site slow down productivity. As I use the web a lot, I'm not completely convinced.

I argued that people can be as effective at work even if they can access social sites like Facebook or Youtube. I argued that the a welcoming work environment where people can feel at ease actually encourages workers to get their work done so that they can maintain their job. If employees are able to enjoy work and the environment, then they will be more motivated to do their tasks.

Unfortunately I didn't have any statistical analysis to prove this.

Well thank you University of Melbourne!

Apparently people using the internet for personal usage like checking Facebook are 9% more productive than people that I would label are "in prison"

"Short and unobtrusive breaks, such as a quick surf of the Internet,
enables the mind to rest itself, leading to a higher total net
concentration for a days' work, and as a result, increased
productivity,".....(click for Yahoo article)

It's a small case study, but I think it's make the point.....Restrictions do not motivate

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