A year in review: The most important security stories of 2009

This is an excellent article by Leischen Stelter with Security Director News. A year in review: The most important security stories of 2009

By Leischen Stelter -

YARMOUTH, Maine—As we approach the beginning of a new year, it’s important to stop for a moment and evaluate what happened over the course of the year. What were some of the biggest issues facing security professionals this year? What can we learn from them and how do we move forward into a new year? A theme that resonated throughout 2009 was money, or rather, the lack of it. It was a tough financial year for most organizations and, unfortunately, when it comes to reducing expenditures, security is often on the slashing end. In a continuing trend from 2008, reports indicated that more than 50 percent of security practitioners experienced budget cuts due to the current economic crisis. But despite these budgetary cuts and economic hardship, it was also reported that the salaries of security professionals continued to rise in 2009, with the average compensation up 2 percent from 2008. And while most security professionals indicated an increased need for security due to economic conditions, the FBI reported a significant drop in violent crime and theft in most parts of the country for the first half of 2009.  And not all sectors fared equally in 2009. Read the full story here

Planning for the new year and a new decade!

I wanted to share an article from my good friend who is an author and successful personal coach about how to plan for the year and the next decade.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

A New Decade Dawns
by Joshua Aragon

In just a few hours (some are already there) the year 2009 comes to a close, and with it another decade – the first of the Millennium. I can still remember where I was when we arrived in the year 2000 – feverishly at work along with countless others ensuring that our technology dependent world ran smoothly into the New Year.

People often take an opportunity at the end of each year to take stock of where they’ve been, what they’ve accomplished and then set out to set new goals and objectives for the year ahead. Oftentimes the days fly by so fast for us that we arrive at the end before we know it, and rarely are we able to accomplish everything that we set out to. Many of the things that we decided were important either lost their importance, were replaced by more urgent matters, or were accomplished and never recognized.

As this year and decade draw to a close I would love for you to take a few hours to reflect back on all that you have accomplished throughout the past 10 years – from 2000-2009. Pull out a notebook and begin to chart out your journey by writing down all of the successes, big or small, that you’ve achieved.

Look at where you were and what was important to you in the year 2000 – as compared to where you are now – see the growth, enjoy the victories and then close your eyes to savor each moment that you were too busy to celebrate at the time and just soak in the excitement, joy, tears, gratitude and other emotions that surface as you reconnect with your past.

After you’ve written everything down and gone through the exercise above take the notebook and on the front cover write ‘Victory Log – 2000-2009’ and place it on your bookshelf for safe keeping.

Now I’d like you to take out another book – label this one ‘Victory Log – 2010-2019’. Open the book up, close your eyes and envision what this next 10 years will hold in-store for you. Feel the feelings, experience the emotions and then open your eyes and write down as many things as you can remember in the first couple pages of the notebook. You might also spend some time putting together some goals and objectives you have for the year ahead and write those down as well.

Once you have completed this exercise with your new ‘Victory Log’ I want to you place this somewhere where you’ll be able to see it everyday – and each night before bed spend 2-3 minutes writing down your daily victories and once again experience deep gratitude for each experience that you had the opportunity to have.

Commit to doing this daily for the next 45 days and I can guarantee this 10 year ‘Victory Log’ will fill volumes and volumes more than the one you just filed away.

Decide to spend the next decade in Gratitude – and the books will write themselves…

© Copyright 2009 Joshua Aragon

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Joshua Aragon, a leading authority on life meaning and purpose, is a contributing author of the best-selling book, Overcomer’s, Inc., Inspiring Stories of Hope, Courage and Inspiration. Access the ebook, Overcoming Adversity with Grace; Secrets to Rise Above Virtually Any Obstacle Life Puts in Front of You with insights from over 30 visionary experts at: http://www.JoshuaAragon.com