The document outlines multiple Challenge-Initiative-Benefit (c.i.b.) cases across various contexts, including education, fundraising, and international development. Each case presents specific challenges faced, initiatives implemented to address those challenges, and the benefits achieved as a result. The document illustrates a wide range of strategies employed to improve educational outcomes, secure funding, and enhance operational effectiveness in various sectors, particularly in challenging environments like Afghanistan and Iraq.

1. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #1: American University of North Africa
Challenge: start-up university with many problems, particularly in the
teaching of core business management skills to students
Initiative: implemented system of reciprocal mentoring to leverage uneven
skill levels within the same class-room for thirteen courses in widely diverse
academic disciplines to:
• de-fuse endemic cheating by turning a particular event into a learning
opportunity to deepen individual knowledge and by implementing an
honor code with signed pledges for tests, examinations, and papers;
• use TEDtalks and films (e.g., The Caine Mutiny, 1954) to cover five
dimensions of leadership and to instruct students on how to detect
inflection points in fluid situations as future senior managers;
• applied risk management concepts to real-life, current situations
outside of team projects to show trade-offs between theory and
necessity (e.g., Afghanistan as a risk management exercise);
• enhance students’ leadership skills by nudging them into teaching
each other to understand, and apply, core managerial project-and-
innovation management skills; as well as,
• focus accounting instruction to three constituencies, by allocating
three classes per week with one each for an overview, an applied
statement analysis, and a deep-dive into accounting concepts.
Benefits: Balanced class-room innovation and academic principle to:
1. signal respect for students through an honor code, encouraging
students to contest my assertions, and crediting them when they
outargued me, often humorously.
2. enable students to escape the rote learning of French pedagogy by
staking out a thesis, managing knowledge, and arguing it.
3. increase the self-confidence of the students challenged by limited
facility in English or their past academic performance.
4. drive home key life-concepts (e.g., ethics in groups) through humor
and making direct amends where necessary; as well as,
5. coach (¿coax?) students into new and neglected skills (e.g., writing
research papers).

2. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #2: Independent Fundraising (free-lance, looking for a new
position)
Challenge: Local entrepreneur unable to raise start-up funding for a
rehabilitation center for a behavioral addiction
Initiative: Within one month, executed the following:
• formulated multi-scenario forecasts to track proposed use of funds
and exit strategy for funders;
• researched the market for such rehabilitation facilities;
• assessed local, state, and national regulatory regimens of treatment
of this behavioral addiction;
• investigated niche for the treatment tailored to specific needs of
upper-income, publicly prominent patients;
• developed a fund-raising speech and a template for written appeals;
• composed a detailed term-sheet; as well as,
• integrated the above into a complete business plan.
Benefits: co-presented with entrepreneur to the initial funding source to
secure $200,000 of start-up financing.
NOTE: offered to be operations head of the facility but did not pursue due
to my lack of belief in the underlying concept of the particular addiction.

3. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #3: EMERIO
Challenge: No documented base in place for fund-raising with no one
experienced in the area
Initiative: Within two months, devised the following:
• formatting one-page sales sheets;
• implemented valuations of pre-revenue, pre-research start-ups; and,
• provided written support of investment premise.
Benefits: First round of fund-raising facilitated by contributing the following:
6. one-page valuations (one side text; one side notes) of three
prerevenue, pre-tested concepts welcomed by those who received
them;
7. integrated three distinct valuation methods into well-grounded due
diligence (start-up factors analysis, comparable values and
multiscenario discounted cash-flow analysis);
8. composed readable narrative of the persistence of classic portfolio
theory in BIG-DATA, algorithmic trading;
9. drafted a thirty-second elevator pitch for the hybrid product and
enterprise concept (crawl, walk, run); as well as,
10. published promotions of Birmingham as a technology center, with
15,000+ reads across the world.

4. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #4: WSI-McDigital (Tijuana)
Challenge: Technology start-ups with little-to-no support in Tijuana
Initiative: Over fifteen months:
• composed 31 essays, in English and Spanish, on technology transfer;
• composed 29 bi-lingual essays on digital marketing; as well as,
• authored and disseminated materials to promote digital marketing for
technology transfer in Tijuana.
Benefits: Legacy including, but not limited to, the following:
1. readership of 75,000+ in Mexico and the United States; and
2. use of materials to deploy digital marketing to enable start-ups by up
to 1,600 people across Mexico and the Americas.

5. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #5: Peace Corps (Querétaro, México) Centro de Ingeniería y
Desarrollo Industrial (CIDESI)
Challenge: zero capacity for transferring R.&D. to the market
Initiative: Two specific and sole initiatives
• implemented product development cycle for new product under
development; and,
• crafted technology transfer techniques to CIDESI’s constraints.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. priced product competitively, per learning curve strategy, at 500%
initial profit and 100% mature profit margin;
2. gathered intelligence through 139 weekly disseminations;
3. devised market-fit strategy per lean product development model;
4. reviewed 1,000+ pages of Mexican laws in Spanish to create an
inhouse incubator for CIDESI
5. created tactics to alpha / beta test product by two distinct
demographics of early adopters;
6. levelled playing field for all participants inside CIDESI to fundamental
radical re-structuring in process through 100 essays – with a total of
15,000 PAGES read – disseminated through CIDESI, the Tech
Transfer Program of the Peace Corps and Querétaro;
7. mapped out transfer of technology beyond Mexico with off-shore
sponsorship; as well as,
8. authored a five volume series in Spanish – core being an 84 page
book – on a program for transferring technology; widely praised.

6. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #6: USAID (Kunduz, Kondoz; Afghanistan)
Challenge: collapsing road potentially lethal to children and dangerous for
U.S. Army obligated to mount foot patrols in contested area
Initiative: Upon notification by foot patrol of the U.S. Army 10th Mountain
Division (Fort Hood, New York):
• surveyed dangerous site within an hour;
• reported necessity of meetings to German Army commanders,
outside of common development framework;
• continued relaying strengths and results of the German mission to
U.S. Embassy; as well as,
• secured necessary meetings and resources within one day.
Benefits: Legacy including, but not limited to, the following:
1. protected foot-soldiers of the U.S. Army from confronting Taliban
without knowing the landscape of Pashtun enclave;
2. knowingly anticipated and faced severe and public criticism of
German officers and other U.S. civilians;
3. supervised and expedited repair of collapsed sewer in less than a
month to save lives;
4. noted by U.S. Embassy as one of the few senior field officers to cite
and credit contributions of I.S.A.F. (International Security Assistance
Force) of partners (i.e., Germany);
5. gave credit to U.S. Army alertness and local partners rather than
myself at local shura (a town-hall meeting led by elders); as well as,
6. increased credibility of civilian advisors with the U.S. Army platoon
tasked with attacking and eliminating the Taliban infiltration of
otherwise peaceful province.

7. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.l.B. #7: USAID (Kunduz, Kondoz; Afghanistan)
Challenge: Lack of communications among key stake-holders
Initiative: Upon receiving notification:
• understood the earth-quake risk brought to my attention by
environmental engineer deployed with Georgia National Guard;
• sought funding for infrastructure emergencies across the province; as
well as,
• supported German Army officers frustrated with lack of U.S. financial
commitment.
Benefits: Legacy including, but not limited to, the following:
1. secured funding, despite six rejections, to safeguard the lives of more
than 100,000 Afghans from seasonal water flooding;
2. convened secret emergency summit, against various institutional
protocols, among ten senior officials (officials of the Georgia National
Guard, the U.N. mission in Afghanistan as well as the provincial and
local governments);
3. preserved the productivity of the Province’s fertile agricultural basin;
4. catalyzed the initiation of civil preparedness measures against
earthquake risks;
5. protected Pashtun (from which Taliban are recruited) village against a
flash flood; as well as,
6. submitted twelve projects for the German Army civil affairs command.

8. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #8: Multi-National Security Transition Command MNSTC-I
(Baghdad)
Challenge: Commanding Officer in Baghdad (General Raymond Odierno)
did not understand the mission of the Partnership Strategy Group
Initiative: Over three days: 8
• reviewed formal agreements underlying treaties of alliance;
• reviewed Status of Forces Agreements (S.O.F.A.s);
• reviewed other lower-level state-to-state agreements; as well as,
• clarified differences and similarities among types of agreements.
Benefits: Briefing including, but not limited to, the following elements:
1. carefully noted details and provisions of 300+ agreements;
2. summarized said 300+ agreements;
3. classified agreements by type (i.e., level of state-to-state interaction);
4. separated agreements by cultural settings (Muslim versus European);
5. developed a matrix to match specific provisions to unwritten cultural
norms and expectations; as well as,
6. gave General Odierno the facts and feel required to make strategic
inter-agency recommendations about the U.S. Army’s post-2011
posture.

9. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.l.B. #9: U.S. State Department (Tikrit and Balad, Iraq) Provincial
Reconstruction Team-Salah ad Din Province
Challenge: Terrorist attack in Ad Dujail, Salah ad Din Province
Initiative: On one hour notice:
• joined the 101st Airborne artillery battalion to investigate;
• walked through the town and blast site for a day;
• confirmed the identities of 33 victims of attack by Al Qaeda;
• conferred with commanding officers and city leaders to understand
the general panic among local citizens; as well as, over the
subsequent two days,
• prepared the grant application for condolence payments.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
• completed, edited and submitted grant application over seventy-two
hours;
• won first grant for condolence payments under new program in Iraq;
• attained such payments due to terrorism as opposed to accidental
killings by U.S. or coalition troops;
• 15+ families received restitution equal to at least five years of an
average salary; as well as,
• potentially contested area won over to the U.S.

10. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #10: WorldVest Capital Markets Division of Trump Securities (N.Y.)
Challenge: New private equity fund not receiving adequate attention from
investment bank overseas
Initiative: During a one month period:
• established contact network across the Middle East;
• wired private equity fund into high profile events;
• prepared a strategy, with tactics and activities, across the region; as
well as,
• studied the economies of the region and their investment appetites or
availability of investible funds.
Benefits: Comprehensive plan including, but not limited to, the following:
1. sold the concept of the fund, its philosophy and portfolio allocation to
key financial figures through the region
2. activated independent network of twelve local investment banks and
broker / dealers in eight countries;
3. scheduled head of fund to speak at a high-profile private equity
conference for the Middle East held in Dubai; as well as,
4. tailored fund’s presentation to each venue.

11. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #11: Iraq Reconstruction Management Office (Baghdad) United
States Embassy; Iraq Ministry of Interior (M.o.I.)
Challenge: Lack of capacity in M.o.I. for budgeting as well as unaddressed
and escalating payroll corruption.
Initiative: Outside of regular duties managing contracts:
• created financial modelling program;
• facilitated requisition of ground truth on equipping needs;
• elevated activity and profile of police credentialing committee; as well
as,
• integrated best elements of military and civilian teams previously not
communicating.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. comprehensive budget with 200 cost inputs (updated periodically for
two hours’ time);
2. narrowed down to 5-10 inputs as value drivers;
3. 95% accuracy versus 10-40% accuracy previous year;
4. re-used over next five years, as updated;
5. cited for best civilian contribution and most professional civilian
presentation to military in 2004 or 2005;
6. needs assessment protocol for 500 separate police facilities deemed
best practice by British commanding officer;
7. cited for excellence by Generals David Petraeus and Martin
Dempsey;
8. cut the time required for the collection of personal information and
manufacture of identity cards for 150,000+ policemen by 80-90%;
9. integrated said program into payroll budgeting to develop a reform
program aimed at eliminating 25,000+ ‘ghost employees’; as well as,
10. quantified forecasted set-asides for ‘martyr and honor payments’ to
families of policemen disabled or killed.

12. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #12: Friedman Billings & Ramsey (F.B.R.)
Challenge. January 2003 article in Barron’s highly critical of F.B.R. and
implying conflicts of interest in leading a public stock offering for a client
weeks prior to the revelation of financial difficulties that collapsed the stock
price
Initiative. Per instructions of senior management, set out to publish highly
critical analysis of the customer, to maintain F.B.R.’s company credibility,
over the following three weeks:
• researched the industry fundamentals and the financial statements of
the client, focusing on the problems cited across Wall Street as
evidence of imminent bankruptcy with significant losses;
• de-constructed intricate financials of the company and those of 18
affiliated trust accounts for a composite entreprise-wide cash-flow
analysis; as well as,
• created detailed forecasts, based on liquidation and various degrees
of a going concern.
Benefits. Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. determined that client faced a liquidity crunch, not insolvency;
2. mapped out a route to return client to full liquidity and, therefore,
operating health;
3. persevered despite significant push-back from the sales team for a
critical analysis;
4. detailed rescue scenario to be engineered by bond insurers and
investment banks specializing in financial engineering;
5. realized 40-50% return on investment for investors within two weeks;
6. distinguished by client publicly as the first publishing analyst among
recognized Wall Street analysts to map out escape route; as well as,
7. produced highly regarded primer on securitization to break down a
seemingly ‘black-box’ arrangement into specific institutional roles and
conceptual building blocks.

13. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #13: Deutsche Bank-Alex. Brown (New York City)
Challenge: Deutsche Bank ineffective in credit and other derivatives due to
back-office red-tape that delayed approvals for 7-10 days.
Initiative: Over two weeks:
• investigated relative default loss rates of various Moody’s / S&P
ratings over time horizons ranging from three months to twenty years;
• researched historical credit appetites for Deutsche clients; as well as,
• identified key value and cash-flow drivers for insurance companies.
Benefits: Legacy including, but not limited to, the following:
1. created and used risk scoring sheet;
2. devised debt appetite measurement tool;
3. quantified marginal risk assumed for given trade based on credit
quality and expected life of the trade;
4. permitted adequate due diligence in real-time;
5. established preliminary risk amount in real-time;
6. enabled back office to take the time over a week to calculate the
eventual value at risk (a lower amount than previously granted);
7. allowed same-day trading in derivatives;
8. elevated Deutsche’s trading productivity by 3-5x to make the bank a
market-maker.

14. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #14: Deutsche Bank-Alex. Brown (New York City)
Challenge: International banks panicking over the prospective impact of
the mass-murder in New York City on September 11, 2001.
Initiative: Over four days:
• investigated the various lines of life and property & casualty
insurance to be impacted by the mass murder;
• drilled down on various insured exposures affected by the event; as
well as,
• aggregated granular bottom-up estimates for each line into overall
loss estimate.
Benefits: Legacy including, but not limited to, the following:
1. estimated insured losses within 5% of aggregate losses after six
years for an anticipated reduction of industry tangible net worth of
1015%;
2. integrated unique loss valuation perspective into tactics toward the
insurance industry;
3. allied with insurers expected to be vulnerable but transparent about
deteriorating risk profiles;
4. took unusual course of not changing the strategy or credit policies
toward the industry; and,
5. used the catastrophe to prune portfolio of under-performing
relationships.

15. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #15: Commerzbank (New York)
Challenge: lack of returns generated from traditional banking products
Initiative: Over a year:
• researched certain cash-based contracts approved by the S.E.C. as
money-market equivalents (time-line of 90 days or less);
• investigated the intricate S.E.C. and insurance regulatory accounting
standards;
• studied uses and flexibility of certain bank lending products; as well
as,
• worked closely with best legal experts in insurance to test out
possible product concept.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. developed regulatory structured arbitrage product;
2. enabled insurers issuing these contracts to invest in riskier assets
maturing later than three months;
3. increased spread earned on these product by 300%; as well as,
4. pitched the product to five of the top ten issuers of cash-equivalent
cash investment contracts.

16. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B.#16: Miscellaneous (Crédit Suisse; New York)
Challenge: accountability for project financing and structured finance
transactions shifted from originators to credit department.
Initiative: Over one month:
• audited project financings (primarily, co-generation projects) and
structured financings (primarily, loans factored through the capital
markets of auto-loan or retail credit receivables);
• provided detailed data on each transaction to indicate completion or
shortfalls of requirements;
• performed compliance analyses of lending conditions and covenants;
as well as,
• drafted documentation to place accountability for such compliance
and documentation back onto the originators of these requirements.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. eliminated three year back-long in one month;
2. audited and performed compliance analyses on more than fifty
structured and project financings; as well as,
3. enforced signature requirement of the loan officers responsible;
4. created new rules for credit accountability.

17. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #17: Miscellaneous (Hillman Investments; Pittsburgh)
Challenge: inefficiencies evident in gathering various financial data for
start-up investments news-letter.
Initiative: Over three months:
• examined richness and accuracy of data from most accessible
sources;
• authored a training manual reinforcing flat organizational structure;
• trained and supervised four financial data researchers;
• devised incentive compensation system;
• provided follow-through guidance for particular analysts; as well as,
• implemented quality control program to assure clean data.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. cut data research time by two-thirds;
2. reduced research costs by 50%; and,
3. enabled magazine to publish on schedule.

18. C.I.B. (Challenge; Initiative; Benefit)
C.I.B. #18: Miscellaneous (Sen. H. John Heinz III; Pittsburgh)
Challenge: U.S. Navy nurse being rail-roaded out of career despite:
• satisfactory performance reviews by patients;
• strong testimony by other nurses;
• strong references made by former Navy base commanding officers;
• spurning by direct superior of direct appeals by Representative
Douglas Walgren (D-PA) and the top aide of Senator Heinz; as well
as,
• hang-up by direct supervisor on me.
Initiative: Over two weeks:
• investigated why the chief nurse would hang up on a U.S.
Congressman, Senator and me;
• discussed the case closely with other previously thwarted
stakeholders to understand the soft power of Chief Nurse in issuing a
dishonorable discharge;
• investigated unwillingness of base C.O. to intervene;
• discussed case with the nurse and two of her colleagues, pressing
her to ascertain the dirt on her side of the street to determine whether
or not to go forward; as well as,
• checked the committee assignments of the Pennsylvania
Congressman and Senator.
Benefits: Including, but not limited to, the following:
1. targeted Senators open to reciprocal support for constituent’s
problem in the areas covered by committee and sub-committee
assignments of the Pennsylvania legislators;
2. negotiated investigative support from two Senators influential with
military spending, Messrs Henry Jackson (D-Washington) and Barry
Goldwater (R-Arizona);
3. refused compromise proposed by mid-level Pentagon official of an
administrative versus dishonorable discharge;
4. negotiated directly and heatedly with the Deputy Secretary of the
Navy for Personnel to permit an exception-to-policy to permit nurse to
stay in the Navy and transfer to another Navy hospital; as well as,
5. gave public credit to Senator Heinz and Representative Walgren for
their “joint intervention” on the nurse’s behalf.