CEO Confidence; Spouses; Security
More signs of economic trouble ahead: The Conference Board's Measure of CEO Confidence hit a seven year low, dropping to 39 in the 4th quarter of 2007, down from 44 in the 3rd quarter. It hasn't been below 40 since the last quarter of 2000.
Few CEOs are optimistic: just 17 percent expect business conditions in their industry to improve, down 27 percent from last quarter. On the same day, Deloitte Research released its own "Leading Index of Consumer Spending" for January 2008. It fell to a new low of 2.3 percent, down from 2.61 a month ago. Click on the link for Bernanke's stimulus proposal.
Having a tough time convincing talented managers to accept promotions? Don't just think about convincing the candidate; think about how to convince the spouse. An Accountemps survey of 150 executives said 46 percent "turn to their significant other when evaluating a potential job change." That's up six points from 2002.
Security threats: the new year brings several lists of top security threats, from SANS Institute and from CA. Bruce Schneier's latest Crypto-Gram security newsletter is out; it leads with a study from the University of Texas, Austin on Netflix.
In passing: for an overview of the state of the retail industry, see Deloitte Consulting's latest report on the 250 largest retailers around the world.
