Center of Excellence

How many computer devices do you have?

2009-12-29T21:02:00.003-06:00

We just returned from our holiday visit up North and I observed something very interesting... My mom and stepdad are both close to 70; between the two of them, they have 5 computers and my stepdad also has an iPhone. He's really into his GPS in his car and he also has his car wired for wifi access which came in very handy on our 8 hour drive to visit my brother. My brother and his wife have at least 4 Macs and they both have iPhones. At one point, I looked around the kitchen and there were 7 computers and 5 iPhones.

Is this normal? I'm just curious if other extended families have that many devices? I'm not including our DS, PSP, Wii, 360, etc...

In preparation for the tablet invasion that is allegedly coming next year, I can't help but wonder when our handhelds, laptops, desktops, & tablets will all merge into something that can be resized when necessary. Perhaps we just carry a chip around that can be small when we need to make a phone call, but can enlarge to laptop, desktop or even movie screen size when necessary.

Workflow Management at the Speed of Light

2009-12-12T20:47:00.012-06:00

Having worked on the client side most of my career, I've always been aware of the swiftness with which folks expect to get things done. It's a constant tug of war -- the people at the top (who don't have to actually DO the work) always want the work to get done faster. Whereas the people who are doing the work always wish they had more time to produce the work.

Now that I oversee process on the agency side, I'm realizing that a client's lightning fast demands force agencies to move even faster than the client; particularly because the approval process on the client side eats up valuable time for all - so the agency must over accomodate or risk under delivering. And this forces the ultimate challenge for the agency -- deliver to your client's rapid-fire expectations and maintain or improve the quality of the work you are delivering. It always amazes me that more people don't understand the complexity related to cramming 43 steps into a 3 day period. "That doesn't sound impossible"; sure it doesn't (keep telling yourself that), if that's the only thing you and everyone involved in those 43 steps has to do in the 3 day span. Multiply that 1 request times 20, 30, or 40 other assignments, and it is entirely possible that there are 1720 tasks or activities happening at the same time for one client.

In my previous role overseeing Marketing Operations on the client side, I spent years implementing a robust 3rd party application to help the Marketing department manage all the work. The system was considered the best in the marketplace and yet, from my current vantage point I have been able to recognize many of the shortcomings in the system. I've evaluated many applications at this point (dare I say all of them), and I don't think any one of them is the "end all be all" that they claim to be. I actually believe that the best move may be to develop your own customized solution that meets your business needs and follow one rule, KEEP IT SIMPLE.

The biggest opportunity I see, and I've been watching Google Wave for this very reason - is real time workflow management. Bear with me for a second as I describe what I've envisioned as a potential to the future of project & workflow management. Picture the air traffic control room at O'Hare in Chicago. There are multiple activities happening all over that airport: people coming and going; people waiting for friends & relatives; flight attendants & pilots moving from one plane to the next; airport employees managing luggage, and seat assignments, and disgruntled passengers. Now imagine if the flight status board was a computer that you had to physically log on to, remember your flight information, search for it, and dive deep into the system to actually determine when your flight arrives or departs. Most of the 3rd party workflow apps do exactly that. They want people, who are already strapped for time, to stop what they are doing and dive into the belly of the beast to retrieve the information they are looking for.

These systems are touted as time savers. They actually suggest you'll be able to reduce your headcount after you install it. I call b.s. on that. People don't have enough time to dig; so most of these apps are only moderately useful and in many cases, they're a hinderance to productivity.

My vision revolves around the Twitter/Tweetdeck/Facebook concept, using Google's search result methodology to help the most important information appear at the top (cue eye roll). As a project moves into the rapid-fire process of final execution, a lot more activity is happening within that project. Tasks are occuring faster and faster - so if that's the case, wouldn't it be logical that this particular project is one that should be easier for someone to access because more people are touching it? Wouldn't it make sense that this project should be automatically bubble up to the top of the leader board?

I recommend using the Facebook template idea, where every project has the same shell format; and then you use a Twitter-like activity stream that manages the communication regarding each individual assignment that is aggregated in a Tweetdeck matrix so that all the activities are easy to access based on level of activity on the leader board. The information is actually available in a variety of matrix views - all clients, one client, teams (creative or copy), individuals within the team; everyone will have their most pertinent information available to them depending on what view they access.

The Power of Good Twitter Customer Service

2009-12-10T04:51:00.003-06:00

We recently moved down to New Orleans from Arkansas and as a result had to open a new bank account because Bank of America has no bank branches in Louisiana. Since opening our new account at Chase, my husband and I have had a heck of a time closing our BofA account. We've made an effort to close all our automatic account charges to BofA, but frustratingly enough, a few of them would continue to show up and then our account would end up negative, we'd get an overdrawn charge, and have to move money from Chase to BofA to correct the issue.

We contacted BofA a while back when this was happening, and were told that we needed to get our account to a positive balance and then we could close the account. After doing that, we called BofA again to close the account and we were then instructed that the balance needed to be ZERO not positive, not negative, but zero. Our fear in doing that, was that the longer this goes on, the more likely another extraneous charge would show up and we'd end up with a negative balance again. Additionally, we had just been told 2 weeks prior, that we needed a positive balance, not a zero balance.

Here's where Twitter comes in. I posted my frustration on Monday of this week. Within 2 hours, I had received a tweet from @BofA _Help. We traded some tweets back and forth, I DM'ed them my phone number, and the next morning I received a call from the woman who had been tweeting with me, Kasey. Based on @BofA_Help's Twitter account, Bank of America appears to have 6 customer service reps in place to manage issues they find on Twitter. When I spoke with Kasey yesterday morning, the discussion took about 10 minutes; she had my account up prior to calling me so she knew who I was and likely saw the activity on my account. She assured me that she would close my account, refund our last overdraft fee, and FedEx me a check for the remaining balance, which I should receive today. She ended the conversation by saying they were sorry to see me go, but understood our reasoning considering there are no physical BofA's here and she said that she hopes we will consider their bank again in the event they do open branches in Louisiana, to which I said absolutely. In all honesty, we've never really had an issue with BofA since opening our account in California 8 years ago (BofA's online banking site is alot more user-friendly).

As for this experience, since this has happened, I've told everyone that I work with about it. All in all, I give BofA's customer service major kudos for empowering their customer service reps on Twitter the authority to act appropriately and swiftly to control the damage and rectify the situation. I'm willing to retract my original BofA post, and that's why I'm sharing this - much more positive experience.

Everything I need to know in business I learned from Howard Stern

2009-12-05T21:53:00.007-06:00

I've been listening to Howard since I was 12 and I would drive to my dad's work with him. Every once in a while he'd listen to Howard after getting bored with NPR or some other AM station. My dad owned his own printing plant, so he definitely was a fairly savvy businessman and someone who I still to this day view as being on a pedestal that no other can touch. I would imagine even the mere mention of a female admiring Howard will turn a few folks off - some may even decide to stop 'following' me; and I'm OK with that. I suppose this is my coming out party.

I'm 40 now, so that means that Howard has been some sort of influence on me over the past 28 years. Wow. I've never really waivered from my loyalty ~ when he went through his divorce I think I had a little bit of trouble with him because I felt that he confirmed for me what I thought he wasn't. But he's brought himself back to superhero status in my eyes and here's why...

1. Howard is exceptionally loyal. He has had the same core folks with him for years upon years; Fred, Robin & Gary (some know him as bababooey) have been his trusted inner circle for well beyond my years. Even the folks who have only been with him for 20 or less years he stands behind, perhaps even to a fault - but I don't think so. It really is hard to find true leaders that are loyal to their subjects.

2. Howard is strategic & methodical. He could have easily jumped the shark (a John Hine reference) much earlier in his career opting for the quick payout. But he has taken his time - set his sites on the ultimate goal and been very calculating in his approach. I think of the Rolling Stones, who I love by the way, but who have so sold their soul to the merchandising devil they will never get it back. I will always love the Stones' music, but they're a different band to me now than they were before. Howard never sold his soul - if anything he demonstrates the opposite...

3. Howard has integrity. I'm sure this one will provoke the most angst for some. How could I possibly say that Howard has integrity. The joke is actually on those who don't know this. Howard stands for what he believes is right - no matter what. So, when he has a member of the KKK on; he does it because he believes unequivocally in freedom of speech and far be it from him to NOT allow a KKK member to speak because Howard disagrees with their viewpoint (and I know that he does indeed disagree). I believe that it's hard to be certain your position is the correct one if you don't actually hear the other sides point of view. I would imagine there are very few opposing points of view, if any, that Howard wouldn't at least listen to.

4. Howard is shrewd. He is a shrewd businessman. Who else would role the dice on their own career and leave a pretty lucrative gig for some unknown "satellite radio" idea? Howard bet his brand on that idea and I think it paid off. Sirius may not be the cash cow that Howard envisioned (what is nowadays); but it has offered him the freedom to be exactly who he truly is. I'm sure the persona he represents on the air is very different from his normal life. He's married; he has 3 daughters; and he's self conscious to the point of being recluse - all very different from who he is on the air.

Howard has always inspired me to aim for the stars but even more so, to identify what it is I stand for and never waiver. That approach has always served me well and for that I'm very thankful. Knowing him, he'll see this at some point and I sincerely hope he knows that I mean everything I say. Thank you, Howard. No matter what people say, there are so many of us who have been influenced by you in a truly profound way.

Conversation Friday - aka Empowering Friday

2009-11-14T06:48:00.008-06:00

Yesterday, Michael Calienes came by the agency to speak with around 10 of us from within the agency and a few influential folks from the social media scene to discuss topics. Michael conducts what he calls Conversation Friday more frequently in Tallahassee, where he lives, but he was in town for the weekend and suggested that we gather for a chat.

What I found so interesting, was how powerful I felt, as a consumer and citizen in controlling my destiny in the future. Our discussion began around product placement - and how we felt about the Cisco product placement on 30Rock. We all discussed how product placement is acceptable provided it is natural. I mentioned the Project Runway where they went the LA Times and made clothing out of paper - I felt that episode went too far and Project Runway actually lost credibility with me. And what a sad sight to see that folks are no longer reading the newspaper but are now being forced to wear it... The points that were made were around how you can actually blog & tweet this point of view and get enough traction to actually make a difference.

This case in point was reinforced with our discussion around brands, products, and ideas that do or do not get it. If you're not paying close attention to what folks are saying on Twitter and beyond, then you don't get it. One person's frustration around a product can quickly spread to the masses particularly if their frustration isn't an isolated incident.

When the discussion turned to politics in New Orleans - a very hot issue in this town - we talked about the mayoral candidate pool. Is it possible for someone to actually win an election through social media (yes, we do recognize how influential the web was for Obama - and vice versa)? My point of view is that it's 100% possible if you have a fucking strategy. Just announcing you're the social media candidate and then flailing about on the internet is not going to win you an election via Twitter - if anything, it can do damage if you proclaim you're something that you clearly demonstrate you are not. We had some incredibly influential folks in the social media space at this discussion - Champ Superstar, Liz Money, Austin Lavin. They have alot of influence on the NOLA Twittersphere and with greater influence comes great responsibility. Could they choose a candidate they support and drive that candidate toward a successful election - I believe absolutely. Even down to the $$ drive, which we pointed out can now come from well beyond New Orleans.

It all supports the power that we all have for good or for not so good. The challenge, and this is where strategy comes in, is to put a plan together and to know what you will and won't do with your brand, your product, your election. I think it's really exciting that individuals have finally been given some power back - in the wake of our financial crisis compounded with the misdirection of our federal government, citizens will now be paying much closer attention to who is or isn't acting appropriately. And 'they' don't - they'll certainly be called on the carpet.

My thanks go to Michael for starting the conversation, Addie King for organizing the conversation, and everyone that attended for participating - I loved the dialog and feel pretty empowered. Here's hoping we do it again AND perhaps extend it to 2 hours.

John Winsor is badass

2009-10-29T20:39:00.003-05:00

First and foremost, if you don't know who John Winsor is, here he is. If you've ever read my posts previously, I've got a deep interest/fascination with the crowdsourcing concept and John is one of my favorite forward thinkers in the space. He also works (err, worked) at CP+B, which is an agency I admire simply because they take risks and they push their clients to take risks.

I was at a local conference here in New Orleans this morning listening to a speaker and checking my iPhone's Twittelator app when I saw the following tweet posted by @AgencySpy.

"Crispin alums start their own shop, also in Boulder. It's crowd-sourcing
centric http://bit.ly/18qh7y"

My first thought was, well this can't be John Winsor because he just wrote a book with Alex Bogusky called Baked In, Creating Products and Businesses that Market Themselves. But low & behold it is John Winsor and I'm so psyched to see him pushing the envelope and taking a risk to see if a business grounded in the crowdsourcing idea can be successful long term. In one of my previous posts, I pondered whether there could be a day when a large majority of people are no longer employed by one employer, and instead are open for business to whomever is in need of our services, experiences, and expertise. John's new company, Victors & Spoils, appears to be provoking that concept even more.

So check this out, John's new agency is crowdsourcing their logo design on crowdSPRING - seriously badass - they're putting their money where their mouth is. If Victors & Spoils does this right, and I think they will, they'll be able to really drive down their operational costs AND their overhead, by crowdsourcing assignments. And then, just when you think they're starting to crack one of the nuts attributed to the high cost of advertising (media placements is one I'd love to see them tackle!), they leverage that same crowdsourcing model to determine whether the concept or design is any good. So, rather than having a bunch of muckity muck brainiacs who think they know what customers will want/like, they will use their crowdsourcing business model to drive closer to the right concept leveraging the collective voice of the customer. It's incredibly powerful stuff, especially when you're trying to convince that really intelligent client of yours that the direction they want is wrong.

This is why I follow John Winsor. He truly believes in the power of "we" to make a better decision than the power of "me". I'm really looking forward to watching how this unfolds.

Is web 2.0 the new black?

2009-10-10T13:06:00.002-05:00

Funny, I was reading this article today because I'm a huge Raconteurs fan. When I came upon this quote -

"The placements in TV shows these days are about as big a thing as you can do anymore," says Chisel. "It almost is the new radio. It's the new way people are finding out about a lot of music. And there are a lot of really great shows like 'House' or 'Mad Men' or 'True Blood.' We were assured by the people that it was going to be a poignant moment. I was happy and felt like it advanced the plot. A lot of people heard the song and we see people almost every night that that's how they heard [of] us."

Which got me thinking... Is the internet replacing TV as the dominant communication vehicle? And if so, is every other channel below essentially dropping a level in stature? So, TV is now dropping to radio level importance; and radio dropping to print level importance and print dropping to... 8 track level importance (moderately kidding).

Just a thought I had.

When will executive salary's recalibrate?

2009-10-03T08:12:00.002-05:00

With all the news about the jobless rate hitting 10% following closely behind the Forbes richest list, I can't help but wonder when these absolutely ridiculous executive salary's will level off and become more reasonable. Maybe I'm completely naive, but in my opinion, if these execs would reduce their salaries to something that is more in line with what they actually need to survive year to year, their salary sacrifice would enable those same businesses to hire back some of our unemployed. The have and have not divide is getting wider and wider right now. The entire economy is deflating -- how is it that executive salaries are spared?

Am I mistaken? Am I missing something obvious?

How fast is too fast?

2009-09-22T05:33:00.003-05:00

In my new position working on the agency-side, one of my big assignments is to make things run more efficiently and my other big assignment is to identify a systematic way to enable this efficiency and to help us go faster.

Based on my 8 week observation, we move really fast. I actually have a completely radical idea for creating a system that helps us move extremely swiftly, but it could potentially have us moving so fast that the only thing slowing us down will be humans and I don't know how much faster I can make a human go (short of pumping them full of caffeine). So, I'm wondering what the ramifications would be to making the process and the system go that fast. As much as we all want to be able to multitask, the fact of the matter is it's really hard to do 10 of the same things at the exact same time. For example, if I have 10 things to be proofed by 1 person, that 1 person cannot physically read all 10 at the same time. The only solution is to add another body. Unless of course, I identify things that a computer could be doing before it goes to the proofer so the proofer isn't proofing quite as much - spelling could be proofed by the computer; tone of voice cannot.

If the system moved that fast, would the humans rebel? Will they start to shut down because there's too much pressure to keep up with the system?

Crowdsourcing continues to get more sophisticated

2009-09-06T09:14:00.002-05:00

I'll write more on this later, had to throw it on here...

Checkout this article in the New York Times from September 2, 2009"Groupthink, Inc". It refers to Quirky.com; a phenomenal little business idea that allows anyone to submit their product idea for $99 with the chance of being picked by the crowd for further development.

What a cool idea!

Who doesn't love to be validated?

2009-08-15T07:48:00.000-05:00

I can't quit you, Google

2009-08-03T04:56:00.003-05:00

I'm in a weird love/hate (stronger on the love side) relationship with Google right now. I have been thinking alot about how far we are progressing with computers and technology and how close we are to a Terminator like scenario where technology actually can outwit us -- I believe the NYT wrote an article about this just recently but I haven't been able to find it. With everything that Google knows about me right now, it has got me thinking 'what if Google wants to control the world' and what if their plan turned evil. With all the information I've provided to them about myself, they very likely know everything there is to know about me digitally. My social, my credit cards and bank statements, my employers past and present, my upbringing, what I'm interested in, where I shop, who I'm friends with, what my schedule tends to look like, etc. At this point, I've given Google all this information through a variety of forms - iGoogle, Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Analytics, Google Maps, as well as Google Checkout. And lets not forget Google Wave and Google Voice, both of which are just rolling out but show alot of traction and promise.

I love how easy Google and all of it's products is to use. And I haven't stopped using Google as a result of my fear. I keep telling myself they'd never use my information against me - that's ridiculous. I'm no conspiracy theorist. On the flip side, if they're not going to use my information against me, what's the harm in giving them all this information if they can help me organize and manage my world? With all this information and knowledge at my finger tips, I still haven't found a way to aggregate, organize and manage all my info in a way that really makes sense and makes it easy for me to find what I'm looking for -- if I give Google all my information, they seem the most likely to help organize it in a way that will work for me.

Yet I can't help but wonder why they keep creating all these great applications and then giving them away to consumers? Is it just to hook us so we turn to them for all our application needs or is it something more sinister? As I said, I'm still using Google -- this hasn't scared me away completely, but once they have my information it will be very difficult for me to get it back from them so the longer I use them the more embedded we are together.

Crowdsourcing Backlash?

2009-07-18T06:09:00.004-05:00

I love the idea of crowdsourcing. It's so exciting to see all the great sites popping up enabling crowdsourcing. Heck, Best Buy is actually crowdsourcing the job description for the Emerging Media specialist because they took some heat from folks based on their initial job description. At first I thought it was a bit overkill, but when I read through the idea and the crowdsourced submissions, it made alot of sense. So, of course in my mind, crowdsourcing is a great idea but I've been wondering what the potential backlash could be. Particularly if crowdsourcing really becomes the next wave of the future. Here are a couple potential negative outcomes I forsee...

1. People stop being able to make their own decision about things, even small things. At this point we are all so connected with our digital devices and I wonder if young kids who can easily ask their friends for their opinion via these devices will not learn how to make decisions on their own. I may be taking this to the extreme, but I'm talking in years to come. Not tomorrow.

2. People get frustrated with crowdsourcing overkill because businesses rely so heavily on the crowd to make decisions that people start to wonder 'why am I paying you for this' or 'why isn't the price going down if I'm the one participating in giving you all this direction'.

I still love the idea of crowdsourcing. I was wondering this morning if you could crowdsource a movie script or a TV pilot. TV in particular is so marginal these days (sidebar: Big Brother is in it's 11th season? WTF?!) they might actually develop something entertaining if they leverage their viewers to help shape the concept and the scripts. I just hope that businesses approach crowdsourcing judiciously -- I could see us reach the tipping point rather quickly if everyone jumps onto the crowdsourcing bandwagon and begins to use it for every dingdongdecision that they need. Knowing big business brands, this is what I anticipate - "how many 'plys' should we have on our toilet paper"; "what food should we serve next at our fast food chain"; "how late should we stay open", etc. There are wonderful benefits to crowdsourcing; particularly as it relates to creating a dialog with the group you are trying to serve, I just hope we don't overdo it and here in America, we are the land of overindulgent overdoing.

Give me something I can actually use!

2009-07-14T05:19:00.005-05:00

Lately, when I am watching TV, I've found myself more and more distracted during the advertising. I either fast forward because I've DVR'ed it, or I surf online while the ads are on. I get frustrated with the ads entirely and I've noticed that ads that give something more to me, advertisers who give something more to me, get much more of my attention and subconscious appreciation. Seth Godin wrote about this in his blog as well. Providing people with real tangible value, and doing it prior to them becoming a customer - that is, in my opinion, how to hook them. Those that don't provide that value, and just try to disrupt at this point it is noise to me. Like Charlie Brown's teacher -- I don't hear it.

Websites are great for providing something more to a potential customer but I don't see alot of TV ads that really make me feel like they're giving me something more. The Hyundai ads come to mind; they're more than just an obnoxious car advertisement; they actually seem to care about me as a potential car buyer. If I were to lose my job, they'd help me out. Those ads have gotten alot of attention in the advertising world and rightly so; but it's interesting how there's been very little copying of that concept/model. I'm talking outside of the auto industry. Businesses need to continue to communicate their value to customers but if you're value is always the same time and time again, it might be time to shake it up a little and identify additional customer value propositions that are outside of your comfort zone. If you really want me as a customer, you need to give me more than what everyone else in your business gives to me.

Because TV advertising is such a passive medium, it's hard to create an engaging ad that provides additional value to a customer and gets them to actually do something with it. You can educate them/make them smarter but most of the time the engagement will need to come in other ways; online, mobile widgets, twitter activation, etc. The great thing about Twitter or Facebook is that it is relatively new in comparison to traditional media so it's naturally more disruptive and attention grabbing. But it also helps brands and businesses take their customer relationships much further. Does it matter that TV advertising doesn't do that? Maybe not, but I hardly pay attention to ads anymore which makes me wonder how relevant they are and how relevant they will be if they don't give people more than just background noise.

I get my morning news from Twitter

2009-07-13T07:10:00.002-05:00

These past few weeks I've noticed a change in my morning media ritual. In the past, I always had CNN on in the background and watched the morning news while I surfed the internet for a while or worked out on the treadmill. Lately, (particularly with the completely overblown MJackson news), I've found myself forgetting to turn the TV on entirely and instead, I am on Twitter reading the news stories that folks post. Most of the news I have on Twitter is business news related to my profession, but I find I'm learning alot more about the things I actually care about. Occasionally, NYT breaking news will come through my email in the event there's something I need to know about from a national or global perspective, but I actually wonder if broadcast news will be the next to tumble after newspapers. There certainly is an overwhelming number of news programs -- do we really need ALL of them?

How I landed my new gig...

2009-07-02T05:57:00.002-05:00

It's been a while since I posted lately. A long while. The truth is, we are in the midst of some major changes for my family so it's been hard to give the 'ole blog the care and feeding it needs.

My husband was accepted to vet school at LSU for the upcoming Fall semester, so we've been trying to determine how to make all the pieces work so he can pursue his dream. I've spent the past close to 9 years working for Walmart where I've been given the incredible opportunity to learn and grow. I've been fortunate enough to move up the chain fairly quickly to Senior Director of Marketing Operations; I helped lay the infrastructural foundation and implement a system to manage all of Walmart's marketing initiatives. In some ways, I feel like I should have been paying Walmart for all the on the job learnings I've acquired.

In the midst of all of this, I've taken a fair amount of lumps. Perhaps it's equivalent to what anyone would take in a job - but for me, it's worn me down a bit and I haven't felt that fire and drive that I used to feel. As a result, I began to look around in the Louisiana area to see if there was anything that might be a good fit for me and would really excite me again.

How does one go about finding a job in Louisiana when living in Arkansas? I tried to reach out to executive recruiters and got one response from a gentleman at Egon Zehnder. He was great, but told me he probably wasn't going to be able to help me find something in New Orleans. So, I took to the internet and did all the research I could. I searched for the best places to work in Baton Rouge and New Orleans. I read their city papers online. I started to ask the folks I've worked with. Honestly, the biggest success story belongs to LinkedIn. I must admit, having Walmart as my employer definitely helped open some doors. I sent alot of messages via LinkedIn to people and surprisingly enough - they actually responded to me. Not only that, but they responded with advice and referrals. I must have contacted at least 20 - 30 people in Louisiana via LinkedIn, and I'd say 75% of them responded to me.

There are two key things that impressed me about my job search - one is the power and ease of using LinkedIn to help me search for my next gig; and the other is how incredibly helpful and forthcoming everyone in New Orleans has been. What I heard the most from the folks down there is "we need people like you in this business community".

I was referred to my upcoming employer, Peter A Mayer advertising, by someone else in the advertising business. He recommended I contact them because they might need someone with my skillset. I sent them an email and within that week I heard back. We started a dialog that eventually led to me accepting a position.

I share this now because I've realized in my search for solutions that I truly control my own destiny and no one else is going to tell me what path it is I should take. In many aspects I'm crazy to be leaving the safe and comfortable place I've created for myself at Walmart. But every once in a while you need to shake things up a bit and for me, I feel the time is right to thank Walmart profusely for everything it's given to me and try something a little crazy.

I start August 1st at PAM - so stay tuned!!

The Secret to Their Success

2009-06-07T17:22:00.005-05:00

There's been a lot of exciting new things happening lately, even in the midst of this recession. Things like iPhone, Twitter, Hulu, and more recently Bing, the PalmPre which everyone seems to be fawning over, and of course, Google Wave - which I blogged about below. These are just the ones that pop to mind, there are a ton of other technologies and ideas in development. And all of this has prompted me to think about open source. Many businesses that have been around for a long period of time are absolutely petrified of people being able to take their secrets and capitalize on them. Yet, these more recent technologies are not just OK with others having the ability to access their trade secrets, but they're inviting folks to take their idea and make it better. iPhone has allowed anyone to create an app that can be downloaded through iTunes; Twitter has done the same thing -- there are many other applications that have been developed to utilize the basic Twitter concept in new and exciting ways, Google Wave hasn't even been released yet, but Google has unveiled it to all the geeks who are interested in playing with it and making it better. Even Zappos is a fascinating case study in sharing - Tony Hsieh is notorious for his open source style of management and leadership.

This is crowdsourcing at it's finest and it's fascinating to watch. Whereas, a business like Coca Cola keeps their trade secret recipe locked up in a vault with only a select few that know what is actually in Coca Cola, newer businesses are willing to share their work with others in order to collectively make it better.

It's definitely made me wonder - who is right? Is it better to guard your business secrets with your life or to share them; which could potentially lessen your own personal earning potential.

Doing the Wave across the globe

2009-06-06T07:14:00.005-05:00

Have you heard about Google Wave, yet? It's a personal communication and collaboration webbased app that's a huge developmental step forward for email from the same folks who brought us Google Maps. I'm not sure it's going to get widespread adoption because it's a completely new way of communicating and the masses may not think they need yet another way but it has the potential to push antiquated email toward extinction if enough folks really embrace it.

I have been wondering whether it could be used at the enterprise level to help manage and share information among functional teams and cross-functional teams. It's a combination instant messaging, email, Twitter, and potentially digital asset/knowledge management system. I haven't actually played with the application yet, but from what I've seen this just may be possible.

For now, it's the buzz at the intergeek level...

Reading a Wave - Who's Blogging What
Hands on With Wave: Weird and Quite Wonderful - CNET
Google's New Wave - Reuter's
Wave: Google's Take on the Future of Communication - VentureBeat
Google Wave First Impressions - Information Week
Google Wave: Our First Hands-on Impressions - Read Write Web
Google Wave - the New Facebook? - Gerson Lehrman Group
Google Waves Me Back to Blogging - Four Elements blog

Apparently I'm not the only one thinking about how Google Wave could be applied at the enterprise-wide business level...

Google Wave Surfing the Future of Collaboration The Forrester Blog
Google Wave Will Cause Some Big Ripples in the Corporate World - CapGemini Blog

A Capitalist Flashmob in Animated Action

2009-06-04T14:07:00.000-05:00

Preserving corporate culture for sustained growth

2009-05-28T06:00:00.000-05:00

I'm doing some research regarding the importance of corporate culture and how to perserve a small business corporate culture while continuing to grow the business. While some may consider culture to be a bunch of mumbo jumbo, a strong corporate culture can really be critical to a businesses success and in particular to retaining top talent.

It is hard to maintain the culture as a business grows unless you commit to it's maintenance and that requires commitment from the top to the bottom. If the top doesn't commit to it, the bottom will see the job as nothing more than that, a job. Committing to your culture's maintenance can be a huge competitive advantage and can save the business alot of money. I encourage you to crunch the numbers; how much does it cost to keep an employee; and how much does it cost to hire a new employee? Make sure you include the softer costs of the new hire coming aboard - time it takes to get up to speed, potential risk associated with a 'misfit'.

Spend the time to clearly defining your corporate culture and rallying your employees to participate and contribute to it's continued existence. What does the culture mean to each individual employee? Based on that, what are they willing to do personally to help make sure the culture remains? Here's a tough question: how do you justify the need to change and evolve without inadvertently suggesting the culture needs to change? In that case, I suggest clearly defining the WIIFM's - What's in it for me for each person in the company. Smaller businesses must commit to that time and focus.

Here's the research I've pulled together. As with many of my posts, this will be a work in progress...

Recommended reading:
The Secret of a Winning Culture: Building High Performance Teams -
Good to Great, Jim Collins - For those who aren't familiar with this book, this is an executive mainstay on every bookshelf and Mr Collins just published a new book which is also listed here.
How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In, Jim Collins
Inc Magazine: The Zappos Way of Managing, Max Chafkin - Great article published in the May 2009 issue on how committed Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos is to their corporate culture.

A Corporate Culture Worth Keeping - Small Business Guru blog
Corporate Culture Definition and more... - Answers.com
Corporate Culture in Your Small Business video - Small Business TV

Fun & love to come to work
Teamwork (no cowboys)
Allowed to take risks and fail

Corporate Culture: Can Your Company Think Differently And Tolerate Diversity? - Small Business Coaching and Transitions blog

Includes a list of Four Deadly Corporate Culture Mistakes

Small Business Corporate Culture - Ezine Articles

Hello... Is there anybody out there?! Just nod if you can hear me...

2009-05-19T22:01:00.002-05:00

It's been a while since I posted last. Honestly, I've been wracking my brain for topics but none seem relevant enough for a blog post. I'm tweeting random thoughts - there's a drastic difference between a blog post and a tweet. I feel compelled to post simply because it's been so long and if someone were to happen on this blog and see this particular days post they'd likely never return. Oh well - perhaps this is the sign I need to stop blogging. At least until I'm no longer employed at my current employer. Quite frankly, I'm so paranoid about what not to blog about that I edit myself severely as a result.

Was that benign enough? Hmph.

Luck be a Start-Up Tonight

2009-05-08T05:40:00.003-05:00

I've got a huge hankering to try my 'luck' in the start up space and I've got a business idea that I believe has some real legs - actually, I've had quite a few lately. For anyone who has a desire to start their own business, I highly recommend attending a few conferences - even some that may be outside of your interest or comfort zone. Great ideas can come from anywhere; I love to apply thought-provoking ideas or processes or research to something completely different from what the initial intent was. Being a passionate part of a new business venture that takes on an obsessive role in my life and blurs the lines between work and life. Honestly, I hear lots of talk about work/life balance - I think the perfect job is one that rarely feels like it is a job. Early on in my career I was privileged to be a part of a number of start ups (some were more of a privilege than others). My overall work experience has helped me understand how quintessential knowing thy customer really is. Not just knowing, but also understanding what THEY want. Alot of businesses think they know what their customers want - if you ever hear this 'you know what I think our customers want - this..." Take your ego out and let your customers tell you what they want. They know alot better than you do.

Customer Development at Startup2Startup

View more presentations from sblank.

As an information junkie, I've recently begun to research start-ups and VC's and I continue to have ideas that I believe could have quite a bit of potential. Alot of my ideas relate back to complex solutions that big business faces as large corporations need in order to stay nimble as technology changes the landscape.

This posting is an aggregate of the start-up and VC resources I've discovered. In many ways, I see VC's as the business version of record labels. For unknown bands, the ability to get a record label to back them is quite an alluring thing. But we've heard many a sad tale in which the artists end up making no money because they signed a deal that was lucrative for the record label only.

As with any business venture, make sure you do all your research and know what you're getting yourself into. If your business does take off, you want to make sure that you will benefit from that success and you also want to make sure you have enough of the control to drive the destiny. Here's a little inspiration for you from Pamela Slim via AmEx's OPEN Forum - How to Escape Mundanity.

From a venture capital perspective, here is the first site that comes to mind is AngelSoft (no, not that AngelSoft). I really love this business because it's a very classy solution to the "I want to start a business and need help with the start up phase" problem. I have to admit, at one point I thought of a similar idea that was more of a mass approach - similar to HSN that would help people who have business ideas like the Snuggie, ShamWow, or some of the less brilliant product solutions. Remember those ads that encouraged inventors to submit their inventions? Search for 'invention' on Google and there aren't as many truly mass solutions as I'd expect for the average person who has the next great invention. Here's one that looked interesting - AbsolutelyNew.

Start-up Information:

The Funding Roadmap - An online business plan and due diligence site that provides the training wheels needed for folks who want to start their own business. I haven't used this site, but it looks interesting.

List of VC information resources:

Wikipedia's
definition of Venture Capital
VentureBeat
Top 100 Venture
Capital Firms - Entrepreneur Magazine (this is the 2007 list)

Some of the best resources for VC information are on blogs as well as on Twitter:

Fred Wilson's 'A VC' Blog - Musings of a VC in
NYC. I love what this guy has to say about the business.
AngelSoft blog
Women 2.0 - I'm happy to see women
getting some support in this arena. There definitely appear to be an inordinate
amount of men in the VC new business venture space. Particularly in technology.
There are some women, but not as many as there should be.
Alltop VC Info
Five Years Too Late - I found this blog through Fred Wilson.
Lessons Learned - Eric Ries' blog
Startup Marketing - Sean Ellis' startup blog
Futuristic Play by Andrew Chen
Market by Numbers
VentureHacks
Twitter VC tracking:
@Venture_Capital
@FredWilson

Venture Investors:
RRE Ventures
Sequoia Capital

Delivering what the customer wants

2009-05-05T22:13:00.003-05:00

Saw this post today via John Winsor (I better be careful or John's going to think I'm a cyber stalker - I'm not; just a fan). Regarding Outsourcing - Justin Ketterer.

Here's my response to Justin on his blog...

I don't think anyone in business - particularly marketing, should get so high and mighty as to think they know better what the customer wants than the actual customer. Embracing the change toward crowdsourcing and finding ways to work (and capitalize) with it just may put some folks in a better position than others.

I wonder if there's a way to crowdsource together; as designer & customer. Let the customer help guide you as a designer and a marketer in the right direction. At my company, we learn the most when we actually spend time experiencing what our customer experiences right along side of them. I just don't think there is anything more important right now than delivering what the customer expects (or more) - surprise and delight, as they say.

More on news transformation

2009-05-05T05:46:00.004-05:00

I posted earlier about creating a personalized version of the news giving readers the ability to be their own editor. Amazon has debuted a larger format Kindle that brings us one step closer to personalized news delivered direct to your Kindle. It's rumored that NY Times will announce it is reducing the price of it's electronic subscription in conjunction with this new release.

I also found Newsmap (image at left), via John Winsor. This is exactly what I'm thinking could be the format for personalized news. Imagine having a Kindle-like piece of hardware that receives your news in a format similar to this below every morning. Including professional news, blogs, and other daily refreshed information (stocks, weather, bank account?, etc).

One example of why I love the internet

2009-05-04T18:50:00.002-05:00

What is it you ask? It's an interactive Web Trend map of the internet 2008 from Gizmos for Geeks.

Creating a Completely Customized News & Information Vehicle

2009-05-03T22:30:00.005-05:00

Just saw this article, Big Screen Kindle Coming From Amazon This Week posted on engadget and felt compelled to write some quick thoughts. The NY Times posted this article - Looking to Big-Screen E-Readers to Help Save the Daily Press as well.

I made the mistake of answering our door a few weeks ago and found a young man who was trying to sell newspaper subscriptions in order to help pay for college. I got suckered into giving him $10 for a 2 month subscription. Sure enough, every day that newspaper sits in our driveway and immediately gets transferred to our recycling bin. We never even open it. Ever.

Seeing that newspaper every morning really gets me thinking. I feel bad for the newspaper industry - it's a respectable business and industry and technology is chipping away at it's very foundation. As I've said before, I do blame that industry for being so arrogant to think that technology wouldn't transform the business; but when you're working in one of the oldest professions it's hard to believe your entire industry could be in jeopardy.

If Amazon comes out with the larger format of the Kindle, it is a very real possibility that the future of news publishing could be inside. I've always wished that I could take all the topics and editorial pieces; journalists and creatives that I enjoy - that are specifically geared toward my interests and put them all together in my personal, customized newspaper (might need to rename it newsKindle). Every morning I could wake up and all the news that I will be interested in are in one place. I could pull articles from WSJ, NYT, my local paper, as well as articles from some of my favorite online pubs, like TechCrunch & Silicon Alley Insider, and potentially magazines like Fast Company, Inc, Entrepreneur - pull it all together for me. And then, what if I had the option to also bring in my favorite blog subscriptions as well? My stock info, my weather.

Now, I realize none of this is groundbreaking. iGoogle and MyYahoo help aggregate the links - I'd want the actual news articles to be pulled together for me and formatted just like a newspaper (or, find a better format - I hate having to turn to page 4A to read the rest of an article when I'm not done reading the front page). Having something as easy to manage and carry as the Kindle so that it is receiving my news every morning and adding the bonus of no longer having hands smudged with ink sounds pretty great to me.

My memory chip runneth over

2009-05-03T18:19:00.002-05:00

It's been a few days since I posted and I felt compelled to write something today as the week is quickly creeping up on me and my work days don't provide me any downtime to write witty prose (what's that you say? where is the witty prose on this blog? oh - it's coming I tell ya!).

Anyway, I know better than to mix business thoughts with personal thoughts, but my mind has so much churning right now it's hard to distinguish work from personal. At times I think that's good - why should there be a difference? Except maybe when you're playing with your 2 year old and can't stop thinking about work. That's not so good.

I find myself in the evenings and weekends jamming as much information I can shove into my head. I read everything I can. Well, I peruse - it's not actually a full read. I'm getting good at skimming - although I'm sure I miss really important bits of information as a result of perusing. Who knows, perhaps I'm completely miscontruing and misquoting as a result of my severe ADD.

I've got a business idea in mind. One I've floated by a few folks and they've shown sincere interest and encouragement which is different from alot of my other ideas. It's not a virtual technology idea it's a 'part of life' idea. Usually, those kinds of ideas tend to be very successful IF you can greatly improve the part of life experience and IF that part of life doesn't completely morph into something different in the very near future. I'm doing a lot of research to see if there's a future evolution for this; so far, I think I'm safe. So I'm pulling all the information I can on start ups and bootstrapping and capital raising and 'part of life' info.

In addition to this, we're planning another trip to New Orleans at the end of the month and I need a hotel that can accommodate my husband, myself and our 2 year old. Every time we go down we find nice hotels, but they're not quite what we need for the 3 of us. The last place we stayed was gorgeous and well located, but the bed was awful as was the pullout for our 2 year old. Not to mention the fact that it cost us $40/day for parking including the tip and $15 for internet access/day. Talk about a racket.

Needless to say, my brain is feeling more and more like mush. I think I may need to unplug for a while just to refocus on what really matters which is family and the ongoing development of my daughter. Plus, it may help me get rid of some unneeded information in my brain so I can make room for the next obsessive compulsive idea or assignment that I come up with.

TV vs Internet; which do you choose?

2009-04-29T22:08:00.005-05:00

I'm noticing at this point in my personal technology adoption, it's almost impossible for me to just watch TV. I am usually online researching, tweeting, blogging or emailing and I have my favorite show on in the background. I can't pay attention to both, so I fade from TV to web depending on what is most interesting. It's definitely caused me to ponder how badly this behavior is amplifying my internet ADD. I have noticed that my attention span these days is at an all time low and I have NO patience when I'm in a setting where I don't have my computer or access to my iPhone/BBerry and I have downtime.

How pervasive is this type of cross media interaction? How many other folks are watching TV while surfing the internet? Am I the only one who can't focus on both at the same level at the same time? Apparently not, based on this blog post - 8 Practical Tips to Cure Your Internet ADD.

I predict that it's only a matter of time before Hollywood introduces a show that works to leverage both mediums. MTV is currently doing a version of this with their new show from Justin Timberlake - "The Phone". I probably shouldn't admit this, but I do have a tendency to zone out to a show or two on MTV/VH1, but this show doesn't really pull me in. It's too complicated to follow - particularly if I'm also on my computer. Still, it's a step toward TRUE cross channel integration and interaction. This goes beyond the 'vote' for your favorite American Idol star -- if the show is live, there's the potential that the crowd can direct how the show ends. In the case of a show like "Big Brother", cross channel interaction could help influence what you see at the moment you're watching it.

Shaking Up the Advertising Agency World

2009-04-26T21:42:00.004-05:00

I pulled the presentation below because it is consistent with the point of view I have shared before. Business and advertising/marketing more specifically need to pay close attention to the newspaper industry in order to make sure they don't follow that same path. Be willing to change and innovate the way you do business. Spend the time necessary to strategize what will distinguish your business and identify what your customers really want. That's the main message I get from this presentation. In advertising, customers are finding many ways to avoid traditional ads -- they're tired of being talked at; tired of being talked down to; tired hearing about things that are completely unrelated to them. Imagine a day when your entire world is customized, messages and information are targeted and customized specifically for you.

This presentation is from David Armano's blog: Logic + Emotion.

The Future of Advertising. WTF?

View more presentations from David Armano.

Crystal Ball - What the Future Holds

2009-04-26T12:46:00.001-05:00

More on this video later; I didn't want to forget where to find it...

Refining Marketing Accountability

2009-04-19T22:32:00.007-05:00

I'm prepping for a panel discussion this Tuesday at Ad:Tech in San Francisco called "Media Boot Camp Power Session: Marketing Effectiveness—Improving Accountability and Returns to Impact Business Performance". I'm doing alot of work in this regard currently at the office, so this is good timing for me. Below are some of my notes and thoughts for those who cannot attend.

Here is Wikipedia's definition of accountability.

"Accountability is a concept in ethics with several meanings. It is often used synonymously with such concepts as responsibility, answerability, enforcement, blameworthiness, liability and other terms associated with the expectation of account-giving. As an aspect of governance, it has been central
to discussions related to problems in both the public and private (corporation)
worlds. Accountability is defined as "A is accountable to B when A is obliged to inform B about A’s (past or future) actions and decisions, to justify them, and to suffer punishment in the case of eventual misconduct".

In leadership roles, accountability is the acknowledgment and assumption of responsibility for actions, products, decisions, and policies including the administration, governance and implementation within the scope of the role or employment position and encompassing the obligation to report, explain and be answerable for resulting consequences."

The key to accountability is defining what your expectations are. What do you intend to measure - what kind of results are you expecting? It's important this information is documented and agreed to up front.

Another important component to accountability is creating an environment where being accountable is not considered a punishment. If, as a result of being accountable, your associates feel a real threat to their success or their employment, it will be very hard for an organization to completely embrace accountability and learn from their mistakes.

Accountability is a critical component of a learning organization. If people don’t feel completely free to make a mistake in their job (and learn from that mistake) your people will do whatever it takes to avoid accountability.

One of the biggest challenges we have at my place of work is that we are moving so fast we don't have time to come full circle and conclude the project with an assessment of it's overall success based on the goals. This too is critical to a learning organization; learning and adjusting based on those learnings. Right now, dashboards are a buzzword -- everyone wants a dashboard and everyone's developing dashboards to pull information together. With all these different teams pulling dashboards and reports together, you can guarantee the actual resulting information will be different and you're then faced with the decision of which report to believe. Governance is essential - who owns the information; who is responsible for pulling the reports together; how is that information used to make the organization smarter; how is it disseminated...

I Tweet Therefore I Am

2009-04-18T21:34:00.005-05:00

I wanted to make sure I didn't lose this graphic b/c I thought it was a really clean way of displaying what Twitter is and how it can be leveraged. I'm not sure if Twitter will live on for ever and ever or whether it will fade as soon as the next big thing overshadows it, but for now it seems to be a pretty useful tool. I wonder if they'll ever introduce the ability for people to approve who follows them - like LinkedIn.

Note: This pic is published from Collective Thoughts.

The Impact of Technology

2009-04-18T12:40:00.004-05:00

Zappos' CEO Tony Hsieh posted this on Twitter and I felt compelled to share it because it helps communicate the tremendous impact technology has had on society in a fairly short amount of time. This is from YouTube.

Did You Know

Credits from YouTube:
amybethhale
Fantastic video on the progression of information technology, researched by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Bronman, remixed By the way, I did not create this video! Search on the names above if...
Fantastic video on the progression of information technology, researched by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Bronman, remixed

Leveraging Social Networking For Idea Sharing & Business Connections

2009-04-14T22:09:00.003-05:00

A friend of mine called me last night somewhat out of the blue (we don't call often; mainly text) and was all excited to tell me about a business idea he had. It was clearly something he was passionate about and he was hoping I'd be excited about the concept as well. I wasn't.

In his defense, I sent him an email a week before with a great idea that I had in order to get him intrigued and engaged and he had exactly the same reaction about my idea. Ho hum.

Now that's not to say our ideas aren't good ideas -- they just may be ideas that are better targeted elsewhere. What I am finding lately is you think of an idea and many times you'll find it's already been done. Maybe not exactly the way you'd envisioned or it's not executed as well as (or it's executed better than) you'd expect.

In mulling all this over, I was thinking 'gee, wouldn't it be great if...' there was a site that helped like minded and like interested individuals find each other to actually work together. So, I could answer a few survey questions that helped me specify what type of business I'm thinking of in order to find other people who have a similar idea. That way, someone like me who has the ideas (good, bad or indifferent) but may not have the detailed business plan writing experience could find others with a similar business interest in order to consider developing the project together.

The biggest obstacle is related to IP - whose idea is it, etc. So, the means for the matches to take place would clearly require some fairly robust legalese but this solution could also help with another issue -- the fact that everyone is coming up with ideas that have slight variances. Not all these ideas will move on to great things; in the true spirit of crowdsourcing, it's better to build an extensive network who collaborates.

I've searched for this solution, and I've seen some that come close AngelSoft for startups, VC's, and angel investors; YouNoodle - technology & tools for the startup world.

I still find the current technological environment coupled with society's readiness for change is a fantastic state and time to be developing groundbreaking ideas that in the past may have been overlooked as too 'out there'. No matter what your idea is, give it some time and attention to see if it gels in your mind. If you can't shake the idea, go for it!

out my previous post for means to build out a virtual business.

Building a Cloudsourced Business

2009-04-12T07:15:00.011-05:00

As I continue to expound on the cloudsource concept, I was thinking of demonstrating how to build a completely cloudsourced business. First, you have to determine all the different roles you would need for the business. Legal, accounting, technology, sales, operations, business development, marketing, creative, administrative. Those are the essential business roles that pop to my mind - I welcome other department recos as well as other virtual communities.

What I'd love to see is a site that allows you to consolidate all of these virtual components into one so you can run your entire business off of it. I could see a business management version of TweetDeck that lets you oversee your entire business without having to log in and out of each of the sites mentioned below.

This is a work in progress... Here goes:

All roles -
Guru.com - Web Design;Graphic Design / Presentations / Multimedia; Illustration / Cartooning / Painting / Sculpting; Marketing / Advertising / Sales / PR; Engineering / CAD / Architecture; Networking / Hardware / Telephone Systems; Legal; Fashion / Interior / Landscape / Set Design; ERP / CRM Implementation; Programming / Software / Database Development; Writing / Editing / Translation; Admin Support (Legal, Medical, & Accounting); Sales / Telemarketing (Front-end); Business Consulting; Photography / Videography; Finance and Accounting; Broadcasting.
Elance.com - Creative design/Multimedia; Web/Programming; Writing/Translation; Admin; Sales/Marketing; Finance/Mgmt; Legal; Engineering/Manufacturing.
oDesk.com - Outsourcing services from India, Russia, USA, etc.

Legal -
Legalzoom - Who wouldn't trust Robert Shapiro for legal representation ;-).
Gerson Lehrman Group - Intelligently connecting institutions with expertise.
HG.org - Worldwide legal directory.
ExpertLaw - Legal help, directories, articles & forums.

Accounting -
MyBizHomepage - an integrated series of online business tools includes a financial dashboard that works with QuickBooks.
Quickbooks - Small business accounting software.
Quicken - Personal accounting software.
Mint.com - Online accounting website.
Accountants Online Directory - Directory of Accountants, CPA's & bookkeepers.

Sales -
Amazon affiliate - sell your wares yourself online.
Ebay - another example of virtual storefronts.
Salesforce.com - CRM SaaS solutions.

Advertising -
AdReady - do it yourself advertising.
Adwords - Advertise via Google.

Creative -
Crowdspring - Global marketplace for creative services.
99Designs - Leading designer marketplace.

Web Design -
Dream Template - 4,000 web design templates to choose from.
Stock Icons - Stock web icons.

Marketing/Promotion -
Twitter.com - promote your business and develop leads.
Facebook.com - create a fan page for folks who support your business.

Consulting -
Expert Magnet - Expert freelance consulting.

Event Coordination -
Event Brite - Online event registration service.
Evite - Online invitations.

Administrative -
Tasks Everyday - Business & personal virtual assistants starting at $6.98/hr.
Hire Virtual Assistants - Virtual assistants starting at $4.03/hr.

More on cloudsourcing

2009-04-10T16:41:00.006-05:00

I just read John Winsor's blog post "Will Agencies Suffer Death by 1,000 Cuts Through Crowdsourcing" . To begin with, on a complete aside - I am thankful to Twitter because I wouldn't have even known about John's blog without it.

I was incredibly excited to read his blog because it's driving to exactly what I'm envisioning the future to be. As he says, "The only question is, will agencies wake up from our own delusions or will they suffer the same fate as their print media brethren?"

Once people get over the emotion involved in such a radical change, particularly creative people, I believe they'll be driven by the fact that they can develop much more creative solutions to business problems.

Here's an example -- imagine if there were no more agencies and instead there were free agents. Centers of excellence in their space - creative design, marketing strategy, copywriting, user experience, etc. Imagine if those folks were able to pick and choose the team they wanted to put together based on the specific assignment. Those folks could form and re-form depending on the assignment and the client. They could actually pick their assignments and get more control and leverage over the client because they decide what they want to work on. I think there's potential for this to work in many different businesses and industries; not just marketing & advertising.

The next logical step forward from there is to pull more intelligence from technology - remove the guess work around what the strategy ought to be, what customers will want, and what customers will think looks good. Is it possible (yes it is) for computers to put exactly what customers will want to see without any human advertising/marketing professional involvement? Blasphemy you say? But, I'm just asking the question -- is it possible?

From Cloud Computing to Cloudsourcing (business models)

2009-04-09T05:30:00.003-05:00

I don't have a lot of time this morning to write so I'm just jotting this down for later... I'm thinking of taking the base concept of cloud computing and trying to figure out if it can easily be applied to actual business modeling (poke holes in the idea). Using the internet as the cloud, replace the businesses referenced in this image with actual individual knowledge workers. The power of this type of crowdsourcing is much stronger as a group.

Image created by Sam Johnston using OminGroup's OmniGraffle and Inkscape (includes Computer.svg by Sasa Stefanovic)

Job Seekers Take Notice

2009-04-06T07:09:00.011-05:00

As I've referenced in my earlier posts, I'm quite fascinated with the changes currently underway in the area of knowledge and expertise and how that works with all the hiring cutbacks and layoffs that are taking place. For those who are unemployed it is a frightening time to not know when the economy is going to be back on it's feet enough so that the unemployment rate begins to head down as opposed to it's currenty trajectory.

In addition to throwing your name in the pool for those few coveted jobs that are out there, I think it would be wise for all those incredibly smart folks to identify new ways to find work. Using the current trends in social networking and crowdsourcing, I envision the transformation from traditional employment to untraditional organizations in which folks with different skills and expertise create their own business model and market themselves to employers who cannot hire full time right now, but still need that work and support and thus, are much more comfortable hiring a consulting team. Create a virtual marketplace and business for your new team and make it as easy as possible for organizations to hire you. Find people with similar credentials (or better) to yours and get a simple web storefront up and running. That doesn't take long at all and you can get someone to build out your website for you rather inexpensively (don't be cheap though, or you'll definitely get exactly what you pay for).

The advantages to potential clients include:
1. less risk associated with hiring consultants vs. full time employees (in many cases, job postings are completely off limits right now).
2. top notch talent with all the skills & credentials necessary, if not more, to do the work in question.
3. less expensive than hiring one of the huge consulting firms.
4. ability to create a virtual team that perfectly matches all the needs of the organization. In this case, you will need to ask the client what they need, if you don't have all the pieces or skills they're looking for, go find someone who does and add them to your team.
5. in many cases, larger organizations are so complex that finding easy solutions is difficult to navigate. By hiring a small consulting team to specifically meet the needs of the business, that team is unencumbered by internal politics and can swiftly help resolve issues for their client that may be too challenging to resolve internally.

Find creative ways to make your business offering unique and be flexible enough for your client to exactly match their needs. Adjust your business and positioning as your client(s) adjust and you just may find yourself in an incredibly fruitful relationship for both you and your clients.

Here's a list of additional articles I'm collecting for reference:
When Job Seekers Invade Facebook - McKinsey Quarterly
The New Economics of Outsourcing - BusinessWeek
Innovation is Happening - Can You Recognize it? - Silicon Angle blog
Will Agencies Suffer Death by 1000 Cuts Through Crowdsourcing - John Winsor's blog

Do It Ourselves - Yes We Can

2009-04-02T16:48:00.006-05:00

I was privileged to attend the PSFK conference down in Battery Park. I must say, it was a tremendously inspiring event. There were many great innovations flowing throughout the day. It was really wild to see everyone on their laptop or their iPhone (or both) Twittering or blogging or taking notes while listening to the preso. Instead of the old school attitude around people not paying attention to the presenter if they're on their mobile device - it appeared the technological juggling was encouraged. Mainly, because it was a way to drum up more interest and business for the presenting organizations.

Throughout the day I continued to hear the same thing in my head - businesses better wake up and start changing with the tide or they're going to find their industry has changed and passed them by (ala newspapers). Realistically speaking, huge corporate change will take a long time… But I would encourage businesses and industries to identify ways to lead the change; digging your heels into the past is a sure fire way to cast yourself as a dinosaur in the future.

Piers Fawkes - Psfk.com

When Ideas Create Good: Graham Hill - TreeHugger.com. He threw a bunch of great examples at us that ran the gamut but were based on independent thought leaders leading change in various parts of the world from third world countries, to hippies, to larger businesses.

Building Healthy Brands with Heart: Help Remedies, Richard Fine; HelloHealth, Sean Khozin & Jay Parkinson.
Memorable quote: “Patients pay (doctors) $10,000 to treat Asthma and $300 to prevent Asthma”

Ghost in the Machine – Digital Multiculture: Celestine Arnold. Provocative presentation regarding the large numbers of minorities on video games, virtual worlds and social networking sites and yet the representation of minorities is limited and often very stereotypical.

This Platform Called Everyday Life: Kevin Slavin – Area/Code. Kevin’s point of view is that the cellphone is merely one component of a mobile platform. He also brought up some incredibly thought-provoking ideas on the transformation of inanimate objects into beings that interact with the help of technology (ie: plants that email you when they need water, Nike sneakers that work with your iPod). Kevin said we would eventually have 2 representations of ourselves; the physical being and the online being. I wonder if it's possible for those 2 representations to merge into one.

Reconnect: Sarah Beatty – GreenDepot; Simon Colling – Parsons; Ryan Jacoby – IDEO; Matthew Lusk – Hecho, Inc.
The panel discussed the convergence of sustainability and social conscience with design. Lots of discussion about what sustainability actually means – the definitions led me to define it as continuous improvement.

New Idea Agencies: Bart Haney – fuseproject; Carl Johnson – Anomaly; Ben Malbon – BBH Labs; Robbie Vitrano – Trumpet.
Panel conversation regarding agencies that are actually immersing themselves in their customer’s business or, in some cases, actually acting as customer and agency by creating a product/service and taking it from inception thru to market. How do the agencies balance their pure client interests with the agency’s own product/service work? May be hard to remain agnostic and prioritize. I love the idea – it gives the agency the ability to experience what it’s like as a customer which can only help in building relationships with their customers.

New York New Media: Edward Felsenthal – The Daily Beast.
Discussion around the state of traditional news publishing and what the future holds.

Open to Change: John Geraci - Outside.in; Scott Heiferman - Meetup; Avner Ronen - boxee; Domenico Vitale - PI&C. Fabulous discussion around crowd sourcing. Can’t wait to check out each of these websites; I do know Meetup which is a great way to connect with folks with mutual interests that run the gamut from rescue dog owners all the way to sky divers.
Memorable quote: "the power of self organized groups has always been what's changed the world." ~ Scott Heiferman
Other memorable quote: “There are 30,000 mom Meetups” ~ Scott Heiferman
Last memorable quote (Heiferman was quite quotey yesterday): "Let's make it Do It Ourselves, together as a group" ~ Scott Heiferman

I left after this discussion, so I missed the Wooster Collective, which sounded like it was another great presentation.

Will any of these folks make piles of money - the jury is out right now. Will they have a great time working on stuff they're passionate about? Heck yeah. As society evolves and people are encouraged to believe that anything is possible - imagine the day when we're all doing what we actually love to do and we're being compensated for it. Maybe that's not realistic, there's always going to be crummy jobs that no one wants to do, but perhaps we'll find a way to automate those jobs?!

Create Your Own Publication - you choose the articles you want in the pub

2009-03-29T14:28:00.002-05:00

Very cool idea from Cunning for HSBC Premier. They created an experience at Heathrow for travelers to create their own magazines using a vast array of articles that they had available.

Cool idea to do on a Kindle at the airport, as well. Using their 'People Who Bought This' concept would allow them to recommend other articles that folks might be interested, too.

My question: How would it work for advertisers?

The Future of the Knowledge Worker Economy

2009-03-28T16:20:00.006-05:00

So here's something that's been floating around in my head for the past few days. What if we didn't work for a company or a business any more? What if the vast majority of people were independent knowledge workers (Centers of Excellence) and our knowledge was tapped into by any organization that needed our specific expertise at that time?

I know what you're thinking -- that's not anything new, that's a consultant. But I'm taking it a bit further than that. What if we were all our own business (consulting firms just jack up our hourly rates, anyway) and we marketed and managed ourselves in order to provide service to a wide spectrum of businesses and industries as they needed it. Within this complex business ecosystem, COE's would seamlessly travel and provide value to those who need it. Sometimes that could include a number of assignments at once; other times it could be a solo assignment that lasts indefinitely.

Sounds like a cluster, right. But I actually think that as things evolve, the cluster could get alot easier to navigate and manage and it might help people find roles that are incredibly fulfilling to them without being tied to that role for an extended period of time. Obviously this idea isn't for everyone, but this transition is already taking place to a certain extent as a result of the recession. More and more people are turning into consultants these days - the key is finding the exact organization that needs your knowledge.

The other great thing this enables is the ability for people to pick and choose assignments - some which are paying and some that could potentially be more philanthropic or more risky. It's kind of like an agency that takes on some business that is intended to bring in the revenue and some business that is more a labor of love or a labor of publicity. So a Gen Y'er could find herself doing work to make money for a certain period of time and then find herself working for her favorite cause for a period of time. That favorite cause could also give her the chance to broaden their skillset.

I'll be working more on this idea in the future. I feel there's something to it; but it's definitely pretty rough right now.

PS - if you're interested in reading more about knowledge workers go straight to the source - Drucker, Peter F.. Management Challenges of the 21st Century. New York: Harper Business, 1999

Zappos - Delivering Happiness - 03-24-09

2009-03-27T22:00:00.001-05:00

I'm Really impressed with Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos and his crystal clear vision of how to be successful in business. Looking beyond the dollar to the core values is at the heart of it; as is committing to your culture. Tony appears to be progressive enough in business not to let the old traditions of vagueness and secrecy cloud his vision and clearly he's built a very successful brand as a result. The fact that they will pay employees $2k to quit is pretty impressive. Even his willingness to share this presentation on the internet is progressive.

Zappos - ETR - 03-24-09

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A hotspring of ideas

2009-03-26T22:30:00.003-05:00

With the obvious evolution of business and culture that is taking place right now, I can't help but wonder what changes will actually stick? What business ideas are the next big ideas of the future? I've got a bunch of ideas in my head right now - I tend to come up with ideas during unique times of transition in order to solve the challenges I'm faced with during the transition.

But my lingering question... How would I even go about pursuing any of these ideas? Are they good ideas or would they only solve my problem and no one else would really care? I sure do wish I could find an outlet to vet these ideas - which prompts me to think of an idea/concept to solve just that!

Despite the bleak economic atmosphere I can't help but be optimistic. I think we are all a part of a tremendous shift in the world as we know it. I'm sad to see our newspapers disappearing, but I think they are a metaphor for what is currently taking place economically. We all need to TRULY be open to real change; don't dig your heels and insist that it has to be the way it's always been, you'll be dead in the water if you do. I don't think newspapers will disappear completely, but I do think they're entire business is fundamentally changing and I don't think the newspaper business was willing to accept that. Same as the music business. And the media/entertainment business. There are very few fields that won't have to change and evolve as technology becomes an extension of our personal being. We all need to focus on the future and be prepared for a wild ride.

Future Web Trends - at Innovation series with Jimmy Wales

2009-03-26T07:59:00.001-05:00

I love this kind of stuff!

Future Web Trends - at Innovation series with Jimmy Wales

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What does the future hold???

2009-03-25T22:27:00.005-05:00

I've been wondering alot about what the future holds for us particularly with all the great changes taking place on the web. Where are we headed with this information overload? How will we deal with this economic crisis? How will people find the right jobs to match their experience? How can the information gathering get easier?

So, here's a complete train of thought -- what if everyone has their own personal space on the internet that houses EVERYTHING about us? It's our personal space (could it even be on something like Second Life?) and it has all our health information, all our credit information, banking, investments, our work history and resume, any additional information about us (ie: Myers Briggs score?) and then it also has information related to our interests. It's customized and maintained all the time -- whether we do it ourselves physically or technology is capable of pulling the information from external sources of information - and therefore, it is able to pull all the related information available on the internet and provides it to us in an easy to digest format that's customized just for us. It includes everything we typically receive from the newspaper but the information is specifically related to what we would be interested in...

For employment type needs, it enables businesses and individuals to better hone in on the absolute right job match by allowing for specific information to help drive the right pairing. This one would likely make people nervous, but imagine we didn't have to spend so much time trying to find the right job, or the right employee - and instead the exact right fit was identified electronically and it takes into consideration not just your resume, but your personality type?

Essentially, this is our alter existence online, but it's a realistic portrayal of us that includes all our data points pulled into one centralized location. Rather than 'surfing' the web, we live in this space and the information finds us through our space.

Upping the ante on efficiency in 2009

2009-03-23T21:14:00.003-05:00

With all the changes in the economy and the workforce this year, I'm working to identify more economical and efficient ways to get great work executed without a huge staff. How do we scale the business without adding headcount? I'm finding the knowledge worker mindset to be strengthening significantly in the business world I work within. Doers are not quite as valuable as those who come up with the idea of what to do. We still need help getting the work done, but we're trying to find more creative ways to get that work done. Be it technologies like Saepio or short term, quick turn, independent contractors from the likes of Guru.com or Elance.com.

There are drawbacks to this idea -- with a technology like Saepio, you need a template that can be agreed upon and then easily replicated with the actual content the thing that changes. Who makes those changes is the question? In the case of Guru or Elance, you get what you pay for in terms of quality of service and delivery, AND there are 2 other challenges -- if you're working on something confidential or even moderately proprietary, it may be tough to ensure confidentiality. The second challenge is in ensuring the core basics of your business and your brand are well understood. We haven't used Guru or Elance, thought about it, but I fear the 2 challenges mentioned above are likely pretty big barriers for me. These sites are for access to cheap labor, it will be a lot harder to find the next Steve Jobs, Malcolm Gladwell, AG Lafley, or David Ogilvy.

So, what other efficiency ideas have you seen? I'd love to hear about them.

Portable Social Graphs - Imagining their Potential

2009-03-22T15:51:00.001-05:00

I found this SlideShare Presentation to be a really interesting concept for the retail space:

Portable Social Graphs - Imagining their Potential

View more presentations from shivsingh.

Get on the bus, Gus

2009-03-21T21:53:00.001-05:00

Well, I've tried this blogging stuff before and failed miserably. I figured I'd try again since I'm sucked in to the interweb all the time and I'm reading so many great articles about topics that interest me and this will help me chronical and manage them all.

I hate to admit it, but I'm totally loving Twitter. It's been the rage for a while now and I've been able to avoid it for some time, allowing myself to be mildly entertained by Facebook instead. But the thing I love about Twitter is that I can find information that actually will have a positive impact on my life or my work. Even better, the information is finding me! Facebook is merely a way to fight off boredom, and a lame one at that. I'm now connected to a bunch of people that I only mildly care about, including an inordinate amount of people I used to go to school with and if I didn't keep in touch with them before, why would I want to be in touch with them now? (It's too late now, I guess).

So, back to Twitter - I've got it set up so that I get news reports from the NYTimes, BNET, Advertising Age, and TechUpdate. Not to mention the Onion for my humor fix and Perez Hilton for my stupid human trick fix. I get to keep up with what's going on in New Orleans with a number of NOLA tweets (we've been thinking of relocating), as well as various business leaders that I admire like Tom Martin from Zehnder Communications in New Orleans and Piers Fawkes from PSFK who specializes in trend identification and development. From a tech perspective I've got Mashables tech news as well as Facebook news and Twitter news. And then there's the businesses I get to follow - Zappos, Amazon, Whole Foods. This seems like alot of stuff to have to wade through but Twitter makes it easy to stay on top of everything. My only wish is that I had more time to really dedicate to READING all the great soundbites I'm perusing.

Maybe I haven't discovered it yet, since I'm so new to Twitter, but what I could really use now is a way to catalog all this great information - kinda like the Dewey Decimal System... Remember him?!

And so goes my first blogpost. Lets hope my posts in the future are more thought provoking.