This year for my Groundhog Day Resolutions, I’m taking an idea from Chris Brogan. Each year, Chris uses three words to guide and direct his focus for the year. For me, I chose these three words:
- Deploy
- Serve
- Connect
Deploy
I’m full of good ideas. Have I ever told you I invented XML back in 1994? Too bad I never did anything with the idea; I could be rich like Al Gore after he invented that Internet thing.
I have these great ideas, but often don’t deploy them into the development stage. Those I do develop often languish in the last 10% of completion. I don’t deploy them into the wild. I think they stay there because I don’t like to ship imperfection, and it’s always imperfect.
How arrogant.
It’s better that I deploy something not quite right than to never deploy at all.
The story of Flickr is pretty interesting and relates to this, I think. The founders of Flickr, it’s said, were working on an online game. One of the features they created was a way for players to share photos with their friends. The photo sharing piece got such rave reviews by the players that Flickr became what it is today. The game? Discarded.
Had the team built their game and not deployed until it was perfect they would have their big opportunity.
So for me: I need to focus on deploying. It doesn’t matter whether it is a code project, website redesign or blog post; I need to ship earlier than I do now. Or, I need to ship. Period.
Serve
The church we attend here in Indiana does a Weekend of Service each fall. The doors of the church are closed and services are cancelled. The congregation goes out into the community and serves. The impact is amazing, both to the community and those who have served. I want to focus more on serving others; both outside and within my family. It is important to spiritual balance and well-being. It’s an example I want my boys to see and participate in.
Connect
In the next few months, we will be leaving Indianapolis and moving to Chicagoland. It’s a big step for our family just as it was a big step moving to Indy two years ago. There are many new things for us: New schools and friends for the boys, a new territory for my wife, and a new marketplace for me. It is primarily about meeting new technology partners, networking, and getting to know the community in which I’ll be working. In Indianapolis, it took nearly two years for my connections to start paying dividends in the form of referrals. I would like to reduce this time in Chicago. Surely, they can use a good freelancer there!
We also need to connect into a church, community, and neighborhood. We are moving to Chicago for the long term and I want to make sure we’re embedded and get to know those around us. I’ll be looking for ways to connect with others in my neighborhood, community, church and marketplace.
The specific goals
I read an interesting blog post at the Church of the Customer. Ben McConnell writes about creating a 1-page strategic plan in the form of an info graphic. He believes this allows you to visually see the Objectives, Goals, Strategies and Tactics that will move you forward. In the next few days I will create my strategic plan for "Deploy / Serve / Connect". These will then translate into Groundhog Day Resolutions I can monitor.
You can follow a special Twitter account I’ve created to document my successes: @2010_3words
Keynotes
I’m here at the Smaller Indiana blogging unconference, BlogIN. We’ve been through the keynotes, two break-out sessions, and are now in the third. I’m a horrible live blogger, apparently. Granted, I hosted a "Blogging 101" session, so I didn’t take many notes in that one. For the keynotes, Chris Baggot, Kevin Makice, and Douglas Karr talked about their blogging experiences. Here’s the few chicken-scratch notes I took in the keynotes.
Chris Baggott
Chris has been blogging since late 2000. His main motivations were, honestly, selfish: He felt he had ideas worth hearing.
Had some goals … you should have goals too.
Employees are 5 times more credible as bloggers than the CEO.
How do you measure conversion in corporate blogging. That’s the important thing.
Kevin Makice
(blogshmog.net)
Kevin has been writing a personal blog since 1999. Started doing this as a way to introduce the world to his son (or was it vise versa?).
He uses his blog to build connections with other people.
What’s great about blogging is that it connects lots of different people providing lots of different perspective. No one has the right answer and that makes it powerful.
Blogging is about transparency.
Need to understand that blogging is something that is a new medium. You should not be afraid to make mistakes and learn from the best.
Douglas Karr
Google is essentially the web.
Blogging is about spheres of influence We have different areas where we have conversations and things ripple out from there.
Analogy of Burj Dubai building – blogs are built on a wide base.
Some advantages of blogging:
- Transparency
- Consistency
- Passion
- Participate
- Momentum – steady consistent effort.
- Committee
- Coordination
- Measurement
Disadvantages to blogging:
- Transparency
- Time
- Hypocrisy
- Anonymity
- Conflict
- Measures
Why does he blog? For fulfillment and answering questions for other people. "Great podium to communicate with people I’m already connected to."
One website I read on a regular basis is the Shane and Peter blog. These gentlemen are entrepreneurs and when preparing a series of questions to interview other entrepreneurs, they asked their readers to comment on their own blogs as well. This was a post I started some time ago but busy-ness got the better of me. Here are the questions they asked and my answers.
My sister was telling me about an opportunity she had recently to market her photography studio through an event at her church.
Each Halloween, her church puts on an event for the kids to come in costume and celebrate in a safe non-threatening way. Instead of going door-to-door to ask for candy, the kids go car-to-car instead. Each adult with a vehicle decorates the trunk of their car in a Halloween or Fall theme and hands out candy to the kids who ask.
My sister decorated her trunk as a photography studio. As each family came to her car, she offered to take a picture of the kids in costume. Using her photo printer — conveniently in the trunk — she printed off a copy for the parents and stuck a sticker on the back with her name, phone and address. Brilliant!
Next year, she should offer to email a copy to the parents instead. By taking two pictures, one with the kids in costume, and another with a piece of paper on which the parent’s email address is written, she’ll have an instant warm lead to follow up with as the holidays approach. Sending the picture by email also builds a rapport between her and the family for future business.
Good thinking, sis!
I am a software programmer by trade. As the owner of my own company, however, I wear other hats as necessary. Recently, I found myself playing the role of marketing guru and graphic artist when I placed an ad in a local niche phone directory. I don’t pretend to be an expert in this area, but here is the inspiration and thought process I went through to design the advertisement (and subsequently a logo) for my business. I hope this post will help other programmers see the process from a non-designer perspective. I have probably broken every rule in the advertising handbook, but I still say promotions was my favorite marketing class in college.
Today marks the six month anniversary of Red Bit Blue Bit. That’s right, I’ve been in business for about 180 days. I wrote my thoughts on the first 30 days; now it is time for a follow up. Without further ado, here are my thoughts on business:
Read more…
The State of Wisconsin has announced the cancellation of yet another IT project. This project, according to the Wisconsin Technology Network was a $42 million project. Fortunately (I guess), they halted the project after wasting only $23.6 million on the project. This is on the heels of a failed project by the UW system that cost Wisconsin taxpayers $26 million over 5 years.
I dug up an article I read last year as I was preparing to leave my job for the adventure of entrepreneurship. It’s the Top Ten Reasons People Quit Their Job. My favorite quote is near the end:
“Employees don’t quit their companies, they quit their bosses.”
An astounding thirty-five percent of surveyed employees said their managers were the reason they quit. They quit for reasons that could have been easily prevented.
My problem is much, much worse. I can’t get rid of my boss; he’s the president of the company. He watches *every* *single* thing I do, and offers his opinion on everything even when he doesn’t have a clue.
I came across Immigrants big in tech startups, an article in the Seattle Times. The article discusses a study conducted by Duke University on the founders of tech startups in the last ten years. The study found that one quarter of technology companies founded during this time period had at least one foreign-born senior executive.
Having recently started at a new client site I found myself sitting at a fresh PC. With an empty machine, I suddenly realized how many productivity tweaks I use. It was daunting trying to remember all of the tools that were seamlessly integrated into my workflow. By the end of the first day, I had most of the tools installed, but it was only when I realized I was missing them that I remembered what they were.