Global E-Health Forum
TUESDAY 11
17
B Y HANS VILLARICA
ILLUSTRATIONS B Y JAYR PULGA
MONDAY
National Boss’s Day
We’ve all had them—bosses with outrageous demands and obnoxious
habits. To commemorate this Hallmark holiday (and as an exercise in
schadenfreude), we spoke to five execs who have paid their dues by
babysitting unruly kids and tracking down yodelers. Here, the hijinks
they lived through on their way to the top.
Protecting patients’ medical information in the digital age is no
easy feat. The issue, a topic of this
Hamburg, Germany, conference, is
especially a problem in the U.S.,
where patient consent isn’t needed
to distribute electronic health data
to insurers and employers. That can
contribute to some scary behavior:
In 2000, the Department of Health
and Human Services estimated
that 586,000 Americans chose to
forgo early cancer treatment. A top
concern? Privacy. —EH
Actor Mike Daisey spent hree weeks at an Apple factory to prepare for his one-man show.
CAREN MAIO CEO, Nestio
Long before she launched Nestio,
which aims to make apartment
hunting headache-free, Maio’s first
job was as a towel folder at a New
Jersey beach club, which quickly
became a nightmare when she was
told to babysit the three rowdy children of a prominent patron. “The
youngest went to the bathroom on
several of the towels,” she says.
“And my boss insisted that I salvage
them!”
SCOTT FLORA Cofounder, Blik
Most people in a microbiology lab
teeming with volatile chemicals like
tritium and chloroform cover their
feet in shoes and their shoes in booties. Not Flora’s first boss—he wore
only socks, much to the chagrin of
his lab mates. “His feet smelled like
halitosis mixed with a sickly sweet
chemical smell,” says Flora, who
now heads the wall-graphic company Blik. “I thought I might pass
out from the aroma.”
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs
TUESDAY 11
Before your iPad bears your fingerprints, it picks up those of workers in Shenzhen, China. That’s
where storyteller Mike Daisey visited the Foxconn factory, a producer of Apple products. What he
saw—overworked and underpaid
workers—inspired his monologue,
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve
Jobs, opening at New York’s Public
Theater. “I wasn’t prepared for the
institutionalized dehumanization,”
says Daisey, an admitted Apple fanatic who begs consumers to start
demanding better corporate practices. “We’re directly responsible
for this.” —RZA
TOM ADAMS CEO, Rosetta Stone
As a commodities merchant in Switzerland, Adams had a boss who went
above and beyond to impress big clients from the former Soviet Union.
Adams was charged with securing
entertainment—that is, finding and
hiring professional yodelers. “I can’t
tell you how many times I’ve had to listen to yodelers sing ‘Edelweiss’ from
The Sound of Music.”
SAM CALAGIONE Founder, Dogfish Head Craft Brewery
While studying abroad in Sydney,
Calagione, then 21, worked at a bar
where his boss gave employees a
beer after each shift. The catch?
There were just two serving-size
options: a measly pint or a 2-liter
glass in the shape of a German military boot, which Calagione chose
on more than one occasion. “I’d
wake up the next morning with major regrets.”
ALEXIS MAYBANK Cofounder, Gilt Groupe
While working at eBay, Maybank’s
boss sent her to rep the company at
a motorcycle rally in South Dakota’s
Badlands. The term “culture shock”
only begins to describe her experi-
ence. “Everywhere were guys on
Harleys with huge fur hats, covered
in tattoos,” says Maybank, who
found the crowd to be surprisingly
friendly. “Some said, ‘Hey, can I give
you a hug? I love that site!’;”
KEVINBERNE
