World's Best CEOs by By ANDREW BARY

As Warren Buffett sees it, the best CEOs always think like business owners. What he means is that great leaders combine passion, commitment, creativity, and an entrepreneurial drive. That mix isn't easy to find, but Buffett definitely is onto something. So, as Barron's drew up its annual list of the 30 best CEOs around the world, we looked hard for ownership mentalities.

Buffett certainly has one. Berkshire Hathaway is his baby, with Buffett having created $200 billion in market value from a floundering business purchased in 1965. Buffett is working because he loves the job, and so are other wealthy founder/CEOs likeAmazon.com's Jeff Bezos, Starbucks' Howard Schultz and FedEx's Fred Smith – men who could easily have followed the lead of Microsoft's former CEO Bill Gates and gone into philanthropy full time.

Our list includes a mix of familiar names, like JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon andOracle's Larry Ellison, as well as some deserving but lesser-known leaders likePriceline.com's Jeffrey Boyd, Perrigo's Joseph Papa, and Hyflux's Olivia Lum, who heads a high-growth Singapore company with a strong position in water-treatment technology. There's more turnover on this year's list than usual, with 12 new CEOs joining our pantheon. Besides Papa, Boyd, and Lum, the newcomers include Coach's Lew Frankfort, Salesforce.com's Marc Benioff, TD Bank's Ed Clark, and Intel's Paul Otellini. Some of the departing CEOs left as a result of retirement, including Cummins'Tim Solso and IBM's Sam Palmisano. And Apple's Steve Jobs died in October. We removed Netflix's Reed Hastings because his company is having a hard time turning rapid expansion into significant profits. While Wynn Resorts' Steve Wynn has been a huge winner for investors over the past few decades, we dropped him after he had an acrimonious business dispute with a Japanese partner.

It was a tough call to remove several other former members of our club, like Gordon Nixon of Canada's Royal Bank and Daimler's Dieter Zetsche. We felt Ed Clark of TD Bank, Royal Bank's rival, was more deserving after Royal Bank sold its flagging U.S. banking operations last year; a customer-focused TD continues to produce some of the highest returns in the industry from banks both north and south of the border. Instead of Zetsche, we opted for BMW's chief, Norbert Reithofer. BMW remained profitable throughout the downturn, and it maintained its No. 1 position in the luxury-car market while generating some of the industry's best margins.

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Our list is global. Eighteen CEOs come from the U.S., seven from Europe, three from Asia, and one each from Australia and Canada. To see Profiles of all 30 leaders click here.

Our selection process isn't based on any formula. It reflects the views of theBarron's staff, drawing on insight from investors, analysts, and executives. Of course, as an investment-oriented magazine, we do look closely at stock-price performance. The best CEOs deliver for all "stakeholders" -- customers, employees and investors. There's no better example of that than Schultz, who provides health insurance and retirement accounts even to part-timers in an industry not known for good treatment of workers. With Starbucks shares up 50% in the past year, shareholders aren't complaining.

We require a CEO to have been on the job for at least three years -- and we prefer five years -- because it takes time to have an impact on a large organization. We generally want companies to have market values of at least $5 billion.

It takes a global perspective to run any big company, and the most successful CEOs tend to be those that have a winning international strategy.

Yum! Brands, which is the parent of KFC and is headed by David Novak, might as well be based in Asia rather than Kentucky -- it gets almost half its profit and much of its growth from China. Rival McDonald's hasn't done as well as Yum! in China, but it produces more than 50% of its earnings outside the U.S. Even Starbucks, a fixture of the American landscape, gets nearly a quarter of its revenue overseas. Priceline quietly has become the leader in the online travel business -- and developed a market value of $35 billion -- by becoming the top site for European hotel reservations.

Notable innovators include Marc Benioff, the brash founder of Salesforce.com, which pioneered the delivery of software over the Internet and created a $20 billion company from the cloud. Joseph Papa has turned Perrigo into the leading supplier of generic over-the-counter drugs -- and generated one of the best shareholder returns in the Standard & Poor's 500 in the past five years. His obsession with quality control is paying off at a time when makers of branded products like Johnson & Johnson have suffered manufacturing problems.

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Lew Frankfort has worked for Coach for three decades, and led the company since it was taken public by Sara Lee in 2000. He has created one of the world's top luxury-goods brands and rewarded investors with a 40-fold gain since the IPO. We were wrong to remove him from our list during the financial crisis in 2009; now he's back where he belongs.

The little-known Tadashi Yanai of Fast Retailing has become Japan's richest man, with an estimated net worth of $10 billion, by upending Japan's staid retailing business with the Uniqlo chain. It offers fashionable but budget-priced clothes -- an Asian version of Gap . Now Uniqlo is trying to win over American consumers in select big cities, including New York, with a big store on Fifth Avenue.

Intel's Otellini has done a lot to make the pioneering chip maker relevant again -- and less reliant on personal computers. It's a closet play on the cloud because it makes the bulk of the processors used by servers that store a soaring amount of data, and it's also getting traction in mobile, long a weak spot. Intel's combination of an ample dividend and stock buybacks is a model for how tech companies ought to return cash to shareholders.

We put Larry Fink of BlackRock in our first list of top CEOs in 2005, when he wasn't well known outside of Wall Street. He has rewarded that selection by becoming an industry leader and a go-to guy for policymakers when they need an honest view of business and finance.

Fink isn't afraid to speak his mind. BlackRock may be one of the globe's largest bond managers, but that didn't stop the firm from running recent newspapers ads highlighting the risk in U.S. Treasuries: "2% isn't a return; it's a retreat."

If you think we put the wrong people on the list or want to make a suggestion for next year, please write to editors@barrons.com. We take advice seriously.

Berkerja Sebagai Suatu Ibadah Untuk Membangunkan Agama, Bangsa dan Negara - Tn Hj. Junaidi Muslim

Sepanjang pagi tadi saya menghadiri mesyuarat Unit Projek M & E, Pejabat Pembangunan yang dipengerusikan oleh Tn. Hj. Junaidi Muslim, Ketua Timbalan Pengarah. Beliau memulakan mesyuarat dengan membaca umul kitab dan memberikan nasihat-nasihat dan kata-kata mutiara kepada semua warga unit projek M & E.

Nasihat beliau ..." masa terlalu pantas berlalu, dalam diam-diam beliau telah berkhidmat selama 21 tahun di UiTM, pelbagai cabaran telah dilalui, ada rakan seperjuangan yang masa dahulu berkerja bersama tapi mereka telah pergi selama-lamanya menemui Ilahi bila seruan Izrail datang menjemput. Justeru berkhidmatlah sebaik mungkin untuk meninggalkan jasa kepada agama, bangsa dan negara sebelum kita pergi buat selama-lamanya, lakukan dengan ikhlas kerana Ilahi, semoga keikhlasan dalam menjalankan tugas itu bakal menjadi amal jariah yang Insyaallah diperkirakan Allah sebagai amal jariah di padang masyhar kelak..." demikian nasihat beliau.

Semoga nasihat itu dapat saya sematkan dalam hati saya dan menjadi amalan yang konsisten sepanjang hayat selagi berkhidmat di UiTM.

Wacana Siri 12 : Rasuah Politik, Persepsi atau Realiti Tegang?

29-3-2012, 2.00-5.00 petang di Auditorium Karangkraf, Seksyen 15, Shah Alam berlangsung wacana siri 12 bertajuk Rasuah Politik, Persepsi atau Realiti yang dipengerusikan oleh pensyarah Universiti Islam Antarabangsa Malaysia, Dr Maszlee Malik manakala panelistnya ialah Timbalan Ketua Pesuruhjaya SPRM, Datuk Mohd Shukri Abdul; Ahli Parlimen Kota Belud, Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan, yang juga anggota Jawatankuasa Khas Parlimen Mengenai Rasuah; Pengarah Strategi PKR, Rafizi Ramli dan penganalisis politik dan Presiden Just, Dr Chandra Muzaffar.

Datuk Mohd Shukri Abdul semasa sesi pengulungan menegaskan bahawa "Jangan politikkan rasuah, rasuah tidak boleh dipolitikkan". Orang politik selalu menggunakan isu rasuah untuk menimbulkan persepsi negatif kepada pihak lawannya walaupun tanpa bukti yang kukuh. Justeru, Beliau mencadangkan usah politikan isu rasuah.

Timbalan Ketua Pesuruhjaya SPRM itu menzahirkan rasa gembira kerana umumnya masih ramai rakyat Malaysia perihatin terhadap isu rasuah dan menganggapnya sebagai musuh utama negara. Tidak seperti dinegara ke-3 yang lain dimana rasuah telah menjadi satu budaya dan amalan sehingga ia telah mendarahdaging dalam negara dan dibuat secara terbuka. Malaysia tidak sampai ke tahap itu.

Dr Chandra Muzafar pula menegaskan semasa sesi pengulungan bahawa usaha kerajaan untuk memerangi rasuah perlu dipertingkatkan lagi dan tindakan itu perlu dilaksanakan dengan lebih bersungguh-sungguh dan konsistant kerana persepsi amalan rasuah berlaku dalam kerajaan masih menebal dikalangan masyarakat.

Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan dalam pengulungannya menyelar Pakatan Rakyat kerana bersikap double standard terhadap isu rasuah kerana memejamkan sebelah mata jika pelaku rasuah itu dari Pakatan Rakyat tetapi membuka dua-dua mata jika yang melakukan rasuah itu Barisan Nasional. Beliau menegaskan Pakatan Rakyat sering mempolitikan isu rasuah dan membuat tuduhan-tuduhan yang tidak berasas kepada kerajaan semata-mata untuk mewujudkan persepsi negatif terhadap kerajaan. Fitnah dan pembohongan menjadi peluru untuk menembak.

Pengarah Strategi PKR, Rafizi Ramli, semasa sesi pengulungan menyatakan bahawa rasuah politik memang wujud dan ia diamalkan oleh Barisan Nasional, iaitu kerajaan yang memerintah. Umpamanya, Perdana Menteri pernah berkata " rakyat tolong saya, saya tolong rakyat" dan beliau mengumumkan pelbagai projek pembangunan yang menelan jumlah jutaan ringgit disetiap tempat yang beliau lawati disaat-saat pilihanraya semakin hampir. Itu adalah contoh rasuah politik untuk meraih undi.

Resolusi yang dipersetujui bersama oleh panelist pada penghujung forum tersebut ialah tanggungjawab memerangi rasuah adalah tanggungjawab semua pihak, masing-masing perlu berperanan mengikut kapasiti masing-masing, kerajaan, pembangkang, NGO, ketua masyarakat dan rakyat. Semua panelist bersetuju rasuah perlu diperangi disemua peringkat.

Bangunan Suria KLCC Terbakar

Ramai orang berpusu-pusu keluar daripada KLCC kerana ada kebakaran berlaku di dalam Suria KLCC petang tadi. Kebakaran dipercayai berlaku di dapur Restoran Chinoz On The Park. Buat masa ini pihak bomba sedang berusaha memadamkan kebakaran. Berikut adalah beberapa keping gambar yang dapat diambil.

Tidak dapat dipastikan samada ada mangsa terlibat dalam kebakaran tersebut. Berita selanjutnya akan menyusul kemudian.

Foto kredit Malikridhwan

Universities leading the way with education technology

by Steven Schwartz

Georgia Institute for Technology's Center for 21st Century Universities(C21U) is a self-described living laboratory for fundamental change inhigher education. Its mission: to foster and accelerate the innovation, validation, adoption and deployment of disruptive ideas-particularly those involving technology in the service of teaching and learning, industry wide.

Accelerate is just the right word. When it comes to change, we are reaching warp speed.

Sebastian Thrun's Udacity courses in building a search engine and programming a robotic car have attracted thousands (including me). Apart from teaching, Thrun has set himself the goal of democratising education; education should be free. Accessible for all, everywhere, and any time.

While I have your attention, drop in to the Khan Academy which, with a library of more than 3,000 videos covering everything from arithmetic to physics, finance, and history and 315 practice exercises, you will find that it too is on a mission to help you learn what you want, when you want, at your own pace.

For another glimpse of the future pop in to MITx where 90,000 people are studying 6.002x (circuits and electronics), and which has set itself the modest goal of organising and presenting course material to enable students to learn worldwide.

Writing for The Guardian's Higher Education Network, Matthew Draycottdeclared himself surprised that the impact of "disruptive technological methodologies" was not top of mind in UK higher education circles.

He is right to be surprised. I am surprised that he is not thoroughly gobsmacked. The future is all around yet many of us in universities have our eyes wide shut.

There is no need to go all apocalyptic over the technological 'disruption'. Bricks and mortar universities (particularly those made of very old bricks and ancient mortar) are not about to disappear.

But if they don't 'do something' then their hallowed halls (and their mischievous postmodern equivalents) will in some distant time reverberate to the sound of a melancholy, long, withdrawing roar (to borrow Matthew Arnold's peerless phrase) as many students leave to seek alternative forms of higher education.

And what will be the hallmark of these alternatives (or perhaps replacements)?

They will put students front and centre of all they do. Agrarian-legacy lengthy holidays will end and teaching will take place year round to cater to the increasingly busy lives of students. They will be able to study any time, night or day.

Students will study what they want to study, not what academics wish to teach.

Technology will be tailored to students' needs. Online offerings will be as familiar as YouTube, but they won't merely be images from a camera plonked in front of a traditional class with a traditional lecturer fumbling with a traditional Power Point presentation. They will be bespoke, well made, smartly edited videos or other visual presentations designed with the student in mind.

Universities will increasingly share resources with other universities – perhaps students at University A will study electronics by video from University B, which specialises in the field; while students at University A will study, say, ancient history presented by the specialists at University B.

These are just some ideas. What else do we need to do to adapt to the future that's already arrived?

Steven Schwartz is vice-chancellor of Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia

Khairy dilantik Pengerusi PUNB

2012/03/27

KUALA LUMPUR: Perbadanan Usahawan Nasional Bhd (PUNB) hari ini mengumumkan pelantikan Khairy Jamaluddin sebagai pengerusinya yang baru, berkuat kuasa 1 April.

"Pelantikan itu dibuat oleh Yayasan Pelaburan Bumiputera dalam mesyuarat Lembaga Pemegang Amanah yang dipengerusikan oleh Perdana Menteri, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, pada 8 Mac tahun ini," menurut PUNB dalam satu kenyataan di sini hari ini.

Khairy yang juga Ahli Parlimen Rembau, mempunyai pengalaman dalam sektor perbankan pelaburan dan sektor perkhidmatan awam.

Ketua Pergerakan Pemuda UMNO dan Pengerusi Pemuda Barisan Nasional itu mempunyai kelulusan Ijazah Sarjana Muda Falsafah, Politik dan Ekonomi dari University of Oxford pada 1997 dan memperolehi Ijazah Sarjana Perundangan dan Teori Politik dari University College London pada 1998.

Khairy akan menggantikan Tan Sri Abu Bakar Mohd Noor yang menamatkan perkhidmatannya pada 29 Februari tahun ini selepas berkhidmat sebagai Pengerusi di PUNB sejak 1998.

PUNB turut merakamkan setinggi penghargaan kepada Abu Bakar di atas segala jasa dan khidmat beliau semasa menerajui PUNB. - BERNAMA

Dato' Onn Jaafar - Negarawan Yang Mendahului Zamannya

Malayan Union (Kesatuan Malaya) adalah sistem politik yang diperkenalkan oleh British untuk Tanah Melayu selepas ia kembali berkuasa pada 13 September 1945. Secara rasmi ia diinstitusikan pada 1 April 1946 dan mampu bertahan sehingga 31 Januari 1948. Sir Edward Gent menjadi Gabenur pertama dan terakhir Malayan Union. Idea Malayan Union telah difikirkan oleh British supaya semua negeri-negeri Melayu disatukan dibawah satu kesatuan pada Julai 1943 apabila mereka berkeyakinan dapat menewaskan Jepun semasa perang dunia ke-2. Dibawah Malayan Union, kerajaan-kerajaan negeri tidak lagi wujud, yang ada hanya kerajaan pusat yang diterajui oleh Gabenor. Raja-raja melayu berada dibawah Gabenor kecuali hal ehwal yang berkaitan dengan agama islam dan adat resam orang melayu. Mereka hanya menjadi ex-officio dan tidak mempunyai kuasa eksekutif dan perundangan.

Reaksi orang melayu terhadap perlaksanaan Malayan Union pelbagai, umumnya mereka membantah Malayan Union. Persatuan Melayu Selangor (PMS) yang diterajui oleh Zainal Abidin Ahmad atau dikenali dengan panggilan Za'ba dan Pergerakan Melayu Semenanjung Johor yang dipimpin oleh Datuk Onn Jaafar adalah diantara pencetus awal membantah Malayan Union diikuti oleh pelbagai pertubuhan-pertubuhan melayu dinegeri-negeri lain. Za'ba mengutus telegram kepada kepada Pejabat Tanah Jajahan Inggeris di London membantah perlaksanaan Malayan Union. Susulan daripada itu, satu Kongres Melayu Semalaya dicadangkan pada 1 sehingga 4 Mac 1946. Ia dianjurkan oleh Persatuan Melayu Selangor bertempat di Kelab Sultan Sulaiman di Kampung Baru.

Sebuah Jawatankuasa Induk untuk menjayakan kongres ini ditubuhkan dimana Za'ba diberikan mandat untuk mempengerusikan Jawatankuasa induk ini manakala Mohamad Yunus sebagai setiausaha. Pada masa itu jutawan melayu belum ada lagi, kedudukan ekonomi orang melayu masih daif, namun demikian dalam masa yang singkat mereka berjaya mengumpul sebanyak 9,000 ringgit untuk membiayai kongres tersebut. Malah selepas kongres berakhir sebanyak 50,000 ringgit berjaya dikutip dan wang tersebut digunakan untuk membiayai perhimpunan pertubuhan Melayu selepas itu sehinggalah UMNO ditubuhkan secara rasmi pada 11 Mei 1946 di Istana Sultan Johor.

Kongres Melayu SeMalaya itu berjaya mengumpulkan 115 pemimpin melayu yang mewakili 42 pertubuhan melayu yang mewakili 11 buah negeri. Za'ba selaku pengerusi Jawatankuasa Induk kongress mencadangkan Datuk Onn Jaafar untuk mempengerusikan perjalanan kongres pertama itu. Kongres ini mendapat sokongan daripada Sultan Selangor sendiri yang sanggup mencemar duli merasmikan kongres tersebut. Diantara resolusi kongress ialah mendesak British menarik balik cadangan Malayan Union.

Bagi memastikan Malayan Union gagal, pada 29 sehingga 30 Mac 1945 satu persidangan tergempar kongres diadakan 48 jam sebelum pengistiharan Malayan Union. Ketetapan yang diambil kongres ialah (1) orang-orang melayu hendaklah memulaukan istiadat melantik Gabenor Malayan Union (2) Memohon Raja-Raja melayu supaya tidak menghadiri majlis istiadat perlantikan Gabenor (3) Orang melayu menunjukan tanda berkabung dengan memakai kain putih disogkonk selama 7 hari (4) Melantik Datuk Onn Jaafar, Dato' Panglima Bukit Gantang, Dato Hamzah Abdullah, Dato' Nik Ahmad Kamil untuk menyembah ketetapan kongress ke-2 kepada Duli Yang Mulia Raja-Raja Melayu (5) Meminta ahli-ahli melayu yang duduk dalam Majlis Mesyuarat Negeri, Negeri-Negeri Selat dan Majlis Undangan Persekutuan memulaukan majlis tersebut.

Hasilnya, Raja dan rakyat sepakat mengagalkan Malayan Union walaupun British meneruskan pemerintahan Malayan Union mulai 1 April 1946 namun ia diboikot oleh orang melayu dan akhirnya British menamatkan pemerintahan Malayan Union pada awal 1948. Mulai 1 Februari tahun itu, sistem politik Persekutuan yang mengembalikan kedudukan Raja-Raja Melayu dan dengan itu kepentingan melayu terpelihara.

(Bersambung)

Which countries have nuclear weapons?

There are an estimated 20,000 warheads in the world's combined stockpile of nuclear weapons.

Of these, almost 5,000 are considered operational and about 2,000 belonging to the US and Russia are believed to be ready for use at short notice.

Although the exact number of nuclear weapons in each country's possession is top secret, the Federation of American Scientists has made best estimates about the size and composition of national nuclear weapon stockpiles based on publicly available information.

Their sources include the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and theStockholm International Peace Research Institute.

Countries and their nuclear weapons
Country	Operational and strategic weapons*	Total arsenal**
SOURCE: FEDERATION OF AMERICAN SCIENTISTS, AS OF 6 MARCH 2012
Russia	2,430	10,000
US	1,950	8,500
France	290	300
China	0	240
UK	160	225
Israel	0	80
Pakistan	0	90-110
India	0	80-100
North Korea	0	Fewer than 10

*Strategic weapons are designed to target cities, missile locations and military headquarters as part of a strategic plan

**Total arsenal inventory includes non-strategic and non-deployed weapons as well as stockpiles

(Sources - http://www.bbc.co.uk)