Building A New Future

They both had different plans for their futures . . . until their hearts led them to each other. Michelle Lantz dreams of marrying and starting a family, and now that she’s been dating Korey for over a year, she thought it was only a matter of time before he proposed. But lately, Korey has seemed distant and is far from the attentive boyfriend she once knew. They’ve spent so much time together that she feels she can’t give up on their relationship, but she begins to question her own feelings as his seem to cool. Tyler Bontrager is focused on expanding his father’s roofing company so he can take over one day. He throws himself into his work and thinks he’s too busy to worry about finding a wife. He and his brother Korey find themselves continually arguing: Tyler doesn’t approve of how Korey treats Michelle and Korey thinks Tyler is out to take anything that’s his. When Tyler happens to be around when Michelle needs a listening ear, he is startled to realize that he has feelings for Michelle, so he denies them because his relationship with his brother is too important. But when there’s an accident and lives are at stake, true feelings come to the surface. Is it possible for Michelle and Tyler to put aside their feelings for the sake of their relationships with Korey, or will they find a new foundation on which to build their future? “Amy Clipston once again entertains us with a story that reaches all the way to the heart.” —Vannetta Chapman, USA TODAY bestselling author Sweet, inspirational Amish romance Full-length novel (85,000 words) Second book in Amy Clipston’s Amish Legacy series Book 1: Foundation of Love Book 2: Building a Future Book 3: Breaking New Ground (coming summer 2023) Book 4: The Heart’s Shelter (coming winter 2024) Includes discussion questions for book clubs

From the Foreword: "This book lays out much of what we’ve learned at AT&T about SDN and NFV. Some of the smartest network experts in the industry have drawn a map to help you navigate this journey. Their goal isn’t to predict the future but to help you design and build a network that will be ready for whatever that future holds. Because if there’s one thing the last decade has taught us, it’s that network demand will always exceed expectations. This book will help you get ready." —Randall Stephenson, Chairman, CEO, and President of AT&T "Software is changing the world, and networks too. In this in-depth book, AT&T's top networking experts discuss how they're moving software-defined networking from concept to practice, and why it's a business imperative to do this rapidly." —Urs Hölzle, SVP Cloud Infrastructure, Google "Telecom operators face a continuous challenge for more agility to serve their customers with a better customer experience and a lower cost. This book is a very inspiring and vivid testimony of the huge transformation this means, not only for the networks but for the entire companies, and how AT&T is leading it. It provides a lot of very deep insights about the technical challenges telecom engineers are facing today. Beyond AT&T, I’m sure this book will be extremely helpful to the whole industry." —Alain Maloberti, Group Chief Network Officer, Orange Labs Networks "This new book should be read by any organization faced with a future driven by a "shift to software." It is a holistic view of how AT&T has transformed its core infrastructure from hardware based to largely software based to lower costs and speed innovation. To do so, AT&T had to redefine their technology supply chain, retrain their workforce, and move toward open source user-driven innovation; all while managing one of the biggest networks in the world. It is an amazing feat that will put AT&T in a leading position for years to come." —Jim Zemlin, Executive Director, The Linux Foundation This book is based on the lessons learned from AT&T’s software transformation journey starting in 2012 when rampant traffic growth necessitated a change in network architecture and design. Using new technologies such as NFV, SDN, Cloud, and Big Data, AT&T’s engineers outlined and implemented a radical network transformation program that dramatically reduced capital and operating expenditures. This book describes the transformation in substantial detail. The subject matter is of great interest to telecom professionals worldwide, as well as academic researchers looking to apply the latest techniques in computer science to solving telecom’s big problems around scalability, resilience, and survivability.

“Innovation” is the hottest buzzword in business. But what if our obsession with finding the next big thing has distracted us from the work that matters most? “The most important book I’ve read in a long time . . . It explains so much about what is wrong with our technology, our economy, and the world, and gives a simple recipe for how to fix it: Focus on understanding what it takes for your products and services to last.”—Tim O’Reilly, founder of O’Reilly Media It’s hard to avoid innovation these days. Nearly every product gets marketed as being disruptive, whether it’s genuinely a new invention or just a new toothbrush. But in this manifesto on thestate of American work, historians of technology Lee Vinsel and Andrew L. Russell argue that our way of thinking about and pursuing innovation has made us poorer, less safe, and—ironically—less innovative. Drawing on years of original research and reporting, The Innovation Delusion shows how the ideology of change for its own sake has proved a disaster. Corporations have spent millions hiring chief innovation officers while their core businesses tank. Computer science programs have drilled their students on programming and design, even though theoverwhelming majority of jobs are in IT and maintenance. In countless cities, suburban sprawl has left local governments with loads of deferred repairs that they can’t afford to fix. And sometimes innovation even kills—like in 2018 when a Miami bridge hailed for its innovative design collapsed onto a highway and killed six people. In this provocative, deeply researched book, Vinsel and Russell tell the story of how we devalued the work that underpins modern life—and, in doing so, wrecked our economy and public infrastructure while lining the pockets of consultants who combine the ego of Silicon Valley with the worst of Wall Street’s greed. The authors offer a compelling plan for how we can shift our focus away from the pursuit of growth at all costs, and back toward neglected activities like maintenance, care, and upkeep. For anyone concerned by the crumbling state of our roads and bridges or the direction our economy is headed, The Innovation Delusion is a deeply necessary reevaluation of a trend we can still disrupt.

This publication argues that Latin America and the Caribbean are in a position to move towards a "big push for sustainability" through a combination of economic, industrial, social and environmental policies capable of driving an equal and sustainable recovery and relaunching development in the region. Comprised of five chapters, the publication studies the three crises (slow growth, growing inequality and the environmental emergency) affecting economies and societies around the world, placing particular focus on those of Latin America and the Caribbean. It goes on to present a framework for analysing these crises in an integrated manner and measuring their magnitude in the specified regions. It then examines the quantitative impacts on growth, emissions, income distribution and the external sector under different policy scenarios, highlighting the potential of various policy combinations to forge a more dynamic growth path, with lower emissions and greater equality. Further identifying seven sectors that can drive sustainable development and proposing policies to foster these sectors, the publication concludes with an analysis that links up macroeconomic, industrial, social and environmental policies and the role of the State in building consensus for their implementation.

This book forms the proceedings of the international seminar held by the Institution of Structural Engineers and the Building Research Establishment in Brighton in April 1993. It brings together contributions from 20 countries on recent innovations in building and construction.

About the way we use and reuse the resources in the building industry and ultimately eliminate the concept of waste. The book seeks to provide inspiration for 'building a circular future' by providing a set of principles and bringing forward the best practices from in and outside the building industry. This book presents findings, case studies, background and context for the project ?Building a Circular Future?, and consist of three main chapters: Design for Disassembly, Material Passport and Circular Economy. All content comes from extensive research and through workshops with partners across industries. The book furthermore provides 15 principles for "Building a Circular Future" and a thoroughly calculated business case, which documents that a demolition, that today would cost ?2.151.249,56 can be turned into a ?4.705.858,41 business upside in a future circular building industry.

Why the United States lags behind other industrialized countries in sharing the benefits of innovation with workers and how we can remedy the problem. The United States has too many low-quality, low-wage jobs. Every country has its share, but those in the United States are especially poorly paid and often without benefits. Meanwhile, overall productivity increases steadily and new technology has transformed large parts of the economy, enhancing the skills and paychecks of higher paid knowledge workers. What’s wrong with this picture? Why have so many workers benefited so little from decades of growth? The Work of the Future shows that technology is neither the problem nor the solution. We can build better jobs if we create institutions that leverage technological innovation and also support workers though long cycles of technological transformation. Building on findings from the multiyear MIT Task Force on the Work of the Future, the book argues that we must foster institutional innovations that complement technological change. Skills programs that emphasize work-based and hybrid learning (in person and online), for example, empower workers to become and remain productive in a continuously evolving workplace. Industries fueled by new technology that augments workers can supply good jobs, and federal investment in R&D can help make these industries worker-friendly. We must act to ensure that the labor market of the future offers benefits, opportunity, and a measure of economic security to all.

This book provides a clear roadmap for the roles workers and leaders in business, labor, education, and government must play in building a new social contract for all to prosper. It is a call to action for a collaborative effort to develop both high-quality jobs and strong, successful businesses while simultaneously overcoming the deep social and economic divisions that are all too apparent in society today. Written by two leading and trusted experts in the field of employment and work from MIT and Cornell University, this book is a practical, action-oriented guide. Readers will feel empowered to take actions needed to shape a better future of work for themselves, their employees, their co-workers, and others they may represent. It emphasizes the need to fix America's broken social contract and reimagine a new one. The most important message of this book is that we have the ability to shape the work of the future by harnessing the power of new technologies. The book is essential reading for business executives, labor leaders and workforce advocates, government policy makers, politicians, and anyone who is interested in using emerging knowledge and technologies to drive innovation, creating high-quality jobs, and shaping a more broadly shared prosperity.