Hip & Sage

Six Pixels of Separation

Check out this post from the folks at 800CEOREAD for Six Pixels of Separation. First, I want to give cudos to the author and/or publisher for a GREAT book title. Titles natter. Second, I would like to encourage all you sage hipsters out there to check this out (and perhaps buy it for your not-yet-hipster friends). This notion of the connectedness of things and the new ways we can and need to navigate through the virtual human web (VHW - you heard it here first) is so critical for our success and hapiness. Well, unless you are independentally wealthy enough that you can buy your own remote island and live off shellfish and coconuts.

Here is the link for the book on Amazon - there is a nice short video clip that explains the focus of the book.

25% of Web Searches are for Video?

I had an SEO expert tell me that 25% of all searches in Google (and like sites) are for video. Wow. What this means is that if you are trying to build your brand or business using online technologies, you better have online videos available for people to find. And if you blog, adding video clips will be a big bonus in terms of traffic.

Because if this, I recently went to a conference breakout session about how to create and upload easy and effective video clips. I need:

• A basic video camera.
• A light or two, maybe one of those light diffusers.
• A microphone - I already have this. I can use the one from the camera, too.
• The class instructor said that for MAC, iMovie does a fine job, and I already have this program.
• Accounts at the popular video sites like You Tube and the like (here is a nice webpage that lists many video sharing sites).

Badda Bing - that's all I need to get started. What about you? If you are a manager, consider using periodic video to communicate measures, plans, changes, thoughts about excellence, or to celebrate successes.

Getting Buy-In for New Technologies

Check out this post from the ASTD blog called, Let's stop making excuses like, "our older workers wil not embrace learning new technologies." I agree that some are too quick to give up on people and make judgments about what's possible. Most of the professionals I know are learners - it might be deep down inside, but it's there.

This posts challenge us all to make sure that WE are not the real barrier. Because having a mature workforce is not likely the most pressing challenge to creating a hip and sage workplace.

Who to follow on twitter.

I am often asked for a starter list of people to follow on Twitter and I am happy to offer my thoughts. In addition, check out this post by Patrick Driessen called 100 Business Execs You Can Learn From on Twitter. Patrick offers a great starter list for entrapreneurs and business professionals. Check it out.

Books That Help You Understand Social Media

If you are a hip and sage wanna-be and feel the need to learn more about social media, check this out. If you are hip and sage and think you understand social media, you should check this post out too, because there is a lot of good context here.

The folks at 800CEOREAD offer this great post called, Books for Understanding Social Media. Check it out - whoever you are!

I like that the books they recommend don't just focus on technologies that we should know about - they focus on how communication and collaboration are changing, fundamentally. This is really what it means to be hip - not that we are using the latest Web 2.0 tool. We are hip when we are communicating and collaborating really well with all generations and cultures.

I was interviewed for a newsletter for CLOs (Chief Learning Officers) today. I was asked the question about succession plans and whether I thought that HiPos should be told they are HiPos. After reading even just one of the books recommended in the 800CEOREAD post, you would likely come to the following conclusion:

YES!!! Tell the HiPo they are a HiPo. 1. We need to have the courage to be transparent. 2. If you don't, you might lose your HiPo.

And for those of you who say that you don't want to set up false expectations or incorrect expectations, this is not a good reason. Don't fix your communication problem by not communicating. There are ways to tell HiPos that they are HiPos clearly and without making promises you cannot keep.

HiPos, BTW, are high potential employees - people who you think have the potential to move up in the organization.

Create your own social network.

Definition: Social Network and Social Networking - A social network is an online-based tool and a utility for connecting with others. Social networking is the term used to describe participation in online communities and online relationship building.  To read more about the basic definitions of social netowrking, here is a great blog post.

There are a lot of new tools out there that allow us to create collaborative work spaces. E-mail groups started the trend, then blogs, then wikis (I like Wet Paint wikis), twitter is a micro-conversation site, and now you can create full blown social networking sites so easy to set up that most anyone with basic computer skills can figure it out.

Ning is one such site (yes, I know, it seems that many of these new tech sites have strange names!). You can create your social network in about 15 minutes. Here's how they describe themselves:

Ning empowers people to create and discover new social experiences for the most important people and interests in their lives.

Ning was started with a simple premise: when people have the freedom to create a new social experience online, uniquely customized for the most important people and interests in their lives with no effort, no cost, and infinite choice, the world is a better, more colorful and certainly more interesting place in which to live.

With Ning, people are creating new social experiences that are:

• Infinitely customizable
• Beautifully designed
• Easily created and moderated

By providing people with a better way to discover and stay connected to the most important people and interests in their life, Ning represents a new chapter in how people create, organize, and communicate online.

And there are many others that offer a similar suite of functionality. And they can bring all your efforts together so that your teams have a centralize place to find documents, blog posts, discussions, and other information. I think these are great tools for work teams - especially those that are cross-functional and geographically dispersed. Give it a try. It is easy-peasy.

If you want to start by joining a ning social network and seeing what's possible, I would recommend the Employee Engagement Network.

CNN did a recent story about Ning here.

Article: Business Professionals Should Be Using Social Media

Here's a link to a great article on Business Week called, An Executive Guide to Social Media. Hat Tip to Amanda over at Talent Revolution. The article is focused on Twitter and Facebook, but I think some of the general points apply across. Too bad they did not include more on LinkedIn and other platforms. There's more to social media. That said it is a great read for those aspiring to be Hip and Sage (My publisher said they'd send me a dozen hot Krispy Kremes every time I mention the book. Actually that is not true, but it seem like a great idea eh Davies Black? Perhaps carrot sticks would be better since I am trying to shape up.).

Staying Current with Social Media - Panic!

A confession - I am feeling a bit behind again. On the eve of Hip and Sage hitting stores, I feel like I am not keeping up. This is not an unusual feeling, I am sure, because things are changing so much. Here are the questions/concerns on my list and that I hope to answer this month:

• Have my sites fallen behind in terms of SEO (search engine optimization)? I am worried that I am not doing key words right or making it easy for searchers to find me and readers to share posts. The rules for doing this well have changed and will keep changing. For example, I saw something that said using WYSIWYG editors for posts lowers SEO because of all the excess code in the posts that get in the way of bots finding the content. How big of a deal is this? I know basic HTML, so I could go back to that if needed. When I search for my own blog posts, sometimes I don't come up - why is that happening? Some of my posts used to come up very high but now don't come up in the first several pages - have I messed something up?
• I am not participating in any posting carnivals - should I get back into that to reach new readers? Blog post carnivals are a good way to find targeted readers because they are topical - the Carnival of HR, for example, shares only HR related posts.
• Should I be paying more attention to growing readership? I am posting and participating, but I have not done much lately (except posting and participating) that would help me grow readership. Perhaps I need to link more...
• What are the NEW rules to growing readership? It used to be that if you offered great content, people would find you and come. But now that there are gazillions of blogs and dozens of competing social networking sites, I think we need to do more to stay in the game. The problem is, I am not quite sure I know what that MORE is and I am a bit panicky about that. I should know!
• How many tools/sites are enough? I am thinking that I should focus a bit more and be a better member to fewer sites. I don't have the time - or the interest - to stay really active with much more than my blogs and one or two social networking sites. What goes? How do I decide? What about all the NEW sites I have not tried yet? Which ones are best suited for me? I think I need a social media selection coach - is there such a thing?

OK, that list is long enough to frustrate me into action. Let me know if you have any ideas for me, OK?

Update on Twitter

I am not sure that Twitter is a good use if my time. I am still using it, but I question whether I should continue. Here's why. There are a few clumps of types of twitterers:

Meta twitterers - people who twitter about twitter. These folks tweet a lot. This is not of interest to me.

Quote hustlers - people who publish quote after quote hoping to get re-tweeted. I like some quotes and I RT (re-tweet) at least one quote daily, but this is not what's most interesting.

Marketers - people who are tweeting to get you to visit their blog, site, conference call, book signing, etc... Most of it has to do with making money online or SEO and is not very interesting to me.

Micro-bloggers - people who write blog-post type stuff, but the posts are 140 characters or less. These folks are often looking for a conversation - a response and then an exchange back and forth. These micro-conversations are fun and this is my favorite kind of twittering.

And there there are lots of folks who are hybrids of these.

I am finding that the meta-twitterers, quote hustlers, and marketers are drowning out the micro-bloggers. Perhaps I could control this by how I subscribe and unubscribe, and maybe I should be better at this. But there are a lot of combo hybrid twitterers and many of my conversations get started there.

What to do....... As I said, the vote is still out. My hope is that this is a place that I can build some relationships and have a few interesting conversations. Those are my only expectations and hopes at this time.

Even if I ultimately stop twittering, it will have been a great learning experience and fun. No regrets at all. Need to stay on the learning curve!

Twittering At Conference Presentations

Here is an interesting post on ION Digital called How Speakers Can Manage Twitter- and Live to Talk About it about the pros and cons of having people twitter during your speech (and have their tweets project on a screen along side your PPT). Golly, this could be tough to get used to at first, but it might also be fun. Hat tip to Kare Anderson (and her blog is here).

If a conference organizer asked you to allow twittering to your speech, would you object? Ultimately, if it is managed well, having real time feedback can only help us.