Posts Tagged ‘Engagment’

15 Reasons Why You Should Go See To Kill a Mockingbird

A lot of folks give me service about doing so many locally-focused blog posts.  I get that.  I’m supposed to “think global.” Whatever.  For some posts, I’ll continue to “think local.”  That’s me.  That’s my blog.  Okay? I live in and love Columbus, Ohio.  My town and the people in it are important to me.  What they do is important to me too.  Community, right? This week, our friends at Columbus’s Available Light Theatre Company are putting on something special in honor of the 50th year of Harper Lee’s great American novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, on crisis in a Southern community. My friends, Artie Isaac and Ian Short, as well as the many talented folks at Available Light have adapted this classic story to the stage.  I’m going on Sunday and I think YOU should come too. Here are 15 reasons why I think you need a night at the show: You’ll be in good company with both the performers and the audience Ian Short and Matt Slaybaugh are some of the most creative, theatrical minds in Columbus The play’s language may make you uncomfortable.  Good.  We learn better when we are out of our comfort zone. You may get to see Artie with out the bowtie.  That will be out of his comfort zone. It will be a stark reminder of some of the mistakes in our country’s history If you really want to dig in, there are talkbacks every day (except Sunday) 614 Magazine thinks it’s a good idea You might get to meet my mom.  She and Sarah are coming with me on Sunday. Most of you probably haven’t picked up To Kill A Mockingbird since childhood.  Think of this as a hearty refresher. You don’t have to read anything at all.  The cast has that part [...]

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35 Things You Can Do To Have Better One-To-One Meetings

Anymore, I’m selective with the meet-ups and events I attend locally.  I have to be.  However, things out of my own backyard are a different story since I don’t know most of the folks there. I do enjoy going the local events, but time is a scarce resource and I’m forced to limit myself to 5-7 face-to-face meetings per week.  My networking plan, at a relatively high level, looks something like this: Attend larger events to meet new people Use social networks to scout people before those events and stay in touch afterward As much as time and location permits, meet as many of these folks as possible in a one-to-one setting Why does one-to-one matter?  Honestly, the answer to this question could be an entirely separate blog post.  But let me sum it up in a few brief bullets: Real trust is built with one-to-one human connections and undivided attention Some studies suggest that up to 93% of what we communicate happens via non-verbal queues (which also happens frequently in one-to-one conversations) One-to-one meetings help to lay the foundation of context for deeper relationships We, as humans, tend to get closer to one another when we meet in one-to-one settings.  With that said, here’s a list of some of the things I’ve learned over the years that have helped me to grow my network: 1.  Use Tungle or Google Calendar to make appointment scheduling easier and more efficient 2.  Try to be on time.  You’re not always going to succeed.  Life happens.  But try as hard as you can. 3.  If the other person is late, be gracious.  You never know if they or their loved one has been in a traffic accident. 4.  Make sure you have a way to get a hold of your meeting contact.  Make [...]

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7 Outcomes of Organizational Communication & Social Media – A Draft Framework

We seem to have been trained to lump all social media into the bucket of marketing and external communication.  Why is that? I believe that our gravitation towards looking at social media as only a new set of marketing tools has been largely driven by advertising and marketing agency’s quick adoption of them.  Their inrerest, largely driven by potential revenue streams to replace what is no longer working as well as before (like television, for instance), has shifted our paradigm accordingly. For this conversation, let’s shift the paradigm in a new direction.  Will you stand with me while we look at things from the inside out? What about organizational communication?  If social media is essentially a set of new communication tools where sending AND receiving messages is of high importance, where else can we apply the technology?  Even more important, what are the outcomes we should be focused on if we are to use social media inside our organizations?  How can we be better communicators through this technology? Speaking of Outcomes I have to give a hat tip to Jason Baer.  I stumbled across him via Twitter back in January and since that time, he’s become a key influencer in how I see the social media landscape.  The rest of this post was heavily influenced by his post and model discussing 5 Ways to Use Social Media (externally).  Jason is recommending that marketers (external communicators) stay focused on an outcome-driven approach to using social media, rather than on the luster of the shiny technology tools.  He goes as far as to argue that the term “social media” has become almost meaningless.  I agree with him, and recommend that you go back to that link and check out his model. This is what I believe is the other half of the [...]

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