“We have a male employee whose shirt buttons pop open, leaving his skin exposed. We also have a female employee whose tight clothing reveals her undergarments. This is a horribly awkward and uncomfortable situation, but their attire is not appropriate for the office. How should HR address this?”

This year, I’m focusing on “no.” It’s a magical word rarely used when it comes to answering work emails on vacation, committing to stuff you swore you would avoid and attending events that drain productivity from your day. And for what? If you count the number of really valuable nonmandatory meetings, networking mixers and fundraisers you attended in 2014, how many would you come up with?

We are at a critical point in history. Longstanding social issues like hunger, poverty and lack of access to quality education continue to plague the world. All the while, wealth continues to grow at a staggering rate. This global dichotomy has given rise to new philanthropists who approach their discipline in a radically different way.

Today, new passionates are creating a bigger impact than ever. Quite literally, they are changing the world in their image. And the businesses, nonprofits, community groups and governments willing to support and embrace them can also benefit.

At my first full-time job after college, the office manager routinely sorted through the recycling box to ensure that tossed junk mail had been cancelled with the sender. If someone from my department did not write the cancellation clearly enough, there was a lecture. This culminated in a 20-minute rant and the ultimate request to track all incoming junk mail, date of cancellation and subsequent mail on a spreadsheet for review. I refused. And then I quit.

In 2011, Jon Coss was on the hunt for funding. He had an idea for a system that could leverage Google Analytics to detect and prevent fraud and abuse in government programs. But this infrastructure-as-a-service model was new back then, untested and hard to explain to venture capitalists.

What more can your storage cabinets do for you? How can your placemats become conversation pieces? What if sitting down to read a magazine felt a little bit like being at the carnival?

Chris Jarosz is the founder of Broderick Restaurant & Bar and co-owner of the Wicked ‘Wich food truck. This year, he also took on the overhaul of midtown’s Capital Dime restaurant and its sister eatery, Trick Pony, which have been folded into the Broderick Roadhouse family of restaurants. It’s not all glamorous, but it is pretty tasty.

I run a small business. Twice in the past two years, I’ve had employees quit directly after taking maternity leave. Prior to their departures, it was understood that they would return to work. This has caused understandable upheaval in the office. What questions, if any, can I ask employees taking maternity or paternity leave? Can I require them to come back to work in order to take the leave? Are there any options for me to avoid this happening in the future?

I’m a risk taker. Yet this is not so much about my nature, rather I attribute it to the ecosystem where I live and work, the mentors who have shown me the way, and about Sacramento’s new maker culture I find myself enveloped in — where permission to fail is encouraged.