Crossroads Dispatches

but first we need to tea, er, eat

I started to write the headline, "but first we need to tea." Whoops, that's a typo. Or, perhaps, a Freudian slip. So I've left this so-called typo in. I'd just concluded reading TwitterPOET's "Saving Web 2.0 From Itself (A Proposal)." And for some reason I was riveted to his last line, "But first, we need to eat."

I know Paul didn't intend it that way, but it evoked that starving artist syndrome, even though now we are speaking of starving would-be social media innovators (certainly artists when they are following the muse foremost, and not the purse.)

And it reminds me of the sticker plastered to the pane of the newspaper stand at 24th and Mission that reads: "Give Me An Art Grant." What? Are you waiting or something? If it's yours to do, come hell or high water, you'd have to do it anyhow.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Go read Paul's proposal in its entirety (and I totally concur that Web 2.0 train is running amok with tons of Gaggoo companies - those me-too's vying to be bought out by patron Google's and Yahoo's of the age) or this snippet (substitute "everyone in the ___ world" with arts, media, food, etc. too):

"Now imagine if everyone in the tech world could afford to pursue their own personal projects, taking risks and innovating on the fly, without ever having to worry about paying the bills, feeding the kids, or keeping the lights on. With the simple introduction of a universal guaranteed baseline income (paid for by restructuring our tax code), we could all spend a little less time working at shitty jobs, and a little more time experimenting and sharing our discoveries with the world without worrying about monetizing it.

Because when you get right down to it, that’s what web 2.0 is about: creating applications which change the world. It’s not about VCs, angel rounds, and getting Techcrunched. It’s about using technology to empower people to contribute to the social good.

But first, we need to eat." - TwitterPOET, "Saving Web 2.0 from Itself (A Proposal)"

At this particular moment, I'm supporting two artists, including myself. Our expenses are less than $1000 a month in San Jose, CA - yes, you read correctly San Jose, California, USA, and not San Jose, Costa Rica. San Jose, "the capital of Silicon Valley" happens to be a city that the U.S. Census Bureau claims brings home the highest median income in the USA, so I'm atypical of neighbors in my zipcode.

I'd been accustomed to close to a six-figure income, and facials at the spa and the brand-spanking newest hardcover books and gee, isn't it the season for eggnog lattes. These days I've made a resolute commitment to buy if and only if it's a "connective transaction" - and not to mention, I'm also on a "fast" of sorts to clear ALL toxins from my life (subjects for another post).

By being thoroughly mindful and consciously alert of whom I'm patronizing and why I'm transacting, I've found it easier than I ever imagined to live prosperously on what most Americans might consider to be poverty level.

Funny, I don't feel improverished. As long as I have a pen, and a scrap of paper - and am using the two to string words together, I am a writer. And even if those two things were wretched away, simply I am would be glorious too.

What many would deem a paltry sum has not stopped me from pursuing my own personal projects on, oh, about roughly 100% of my time. In fact, I'd say it's made it ever easier.

Even if you have a shitty job you can create after hours (and sometimes during hours). Even if you have a shitty income you can create - ever hear of found objects? You'll find that necessity really is the mother of invention. Very often, with money galore at your disposable what is the obvious thing is to throw money at your problems, thus you miss the quirky, the original, and the show-stopping solutions.

Once I was on the founding team of a start-up that had $1.4M in seed capital from very prestigious venture capitalists -- and we whined that it was just not enough. That was the hubris of 1999. Now I know we were just spoiled.

"The following is something to ponder...

If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof over your head and a place to sleep... you are richer than 75% of this world.

If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, spare change in a dish someplace... you are among the top 8% of the wealthy.

If you woke up with more health than illness... you are more blessed than the million who will not survive this week..." - Author Unknown
(via  Elyse Hope Killoran's November 7, 2007 newsletter)

Perhaps it's not an accident that I wrote "but first we need to tea" originally. There was a time in April 2005 that I was experimenting in freedom. (Oh, that's really my continuous exploration.) I didn't want to dip into my 401K then, and my post-tsunami irrefutable wake-up call said "no" to any corporate gig (my integrity to my heart and soul couldn't be compromised readily any longer), thus I found myself surviving on quite a lot of toast and tea. I have to tell you, unexpectedly, it became one of the most sublime and sensual episodes of my life. For instance, I'd spent the better part of an hour discovering the nuances and textures and tastes of a piece of toast. And I wrote exquisite pieces in my journal while being serenaded by morning doves.

No, I'm not trying to sell you on the penniless lifestyle, my point is if you YOURSELF are not absolutely committed, another's patronage so that you can eat is not necessarily going to light a fire under you.  However, maybe it's time to confront head-on the real issue: root fear of starvation -- among other basic "I won't survive" fears. Because this fear will come back to haunt you in some domain at some point at some time if it's not faced once and for all.

Once you've committed and have a willingness to meet your basic fears of survival (which really are fears of separation), there's no problem finding others that will want to chip in. Myself, I've found I'm only interested in helping those who already invest in sharing their gifts as best they can. I enjoy giving them a leg up. I enjoy witnessing expansion. BUT - if you're waiting for me to give you the push out of the nest to begin your project - and you only need begin, begin anywhere, no matter how humble - then maybe It isn't calling you enough for anyone else to be thoroughly enthralled and engaged in watering your seedling project either.

I know enough VCs to know this is pretty much exactly how they think too. I know a filmmaker that shared this secret with me. She told me this was the Universe's matching grant program: If you take a step, the Universe takes a 100 on your behalf.  

These words from Wayne Dyer that I came across recently in my sorting and re-sorting process (part of the move) spoke to the depths of me, and to this topic:

"It's my effort and my goal to live to God realization as I possibly can - oneness. To have conflict, you need two-ness. You need two people, two ideas, two things that go up against each other. I don't go up against anyone or anything. I feel very connected to the Source from which I emanated - a source of perfect abundance. I just never got separated from it, so I've always known that I am that, and it is me. This is something that's with me wherever I go because I never doubt it. Thinking in terms of conflict or being conflicted about the abundance that has come into my life is just not a concern of mine.

I don't believe that I am famous, because fame isn't located in me. Fame is located in other people. Fame is a component of the ego. The ego says, "I am what I have; I am what I do; I am what others think of me." I try to live in a spiritual consciousness, which says that who I am is a divine creation of Source that lives as a divine creation of Source. When you stay in that awareness, then you create what I call the power of intention. You create the ability to be just like God. [I'd add: And create just like God.] We came from love. We came from kindness. We came from perfect abundance. If you see yourself that way, then you'll attract that into your life. If you see yourself needing to have other people love you and care for you or buy your books or whatever, then you'll attract lacks, shortages, and needs into your life, and I don't have any lacks or shortages or needs. If people only knew who or what is with them, in them, beside them all the time, they would never worry about anything." - Wayne Dyer, "Spiritual & Health", December 2005

ART credits Day, by James Griffin; a still from the film The Fountain (2006); The Fountain, by Kent Williams.

inspiration, freedom...which comes first?

Day 12 of everyday inspiration. I spent most of the day enroute to New Orleans yesterday. I could have walked over Cafe Flora & Gallery with my laptop yesterday, yet I didn't. I wandered the neighborhoods instead.

I say you should never ruin anything started as inspiration by making it an obligation.

A gravelly blues singer pipes in while a girl practices on the piano in the room next door. Madame Marigny, wife of Count Bernard Marigny, haunts the house next door to this avant-garde cafe and gallery. Tales of an old widow who strangled her dog, then hung herself from the attic rafters, they say.

I've got twenty-eight more posts to go. And I will not have my library at my fingertips, although I face a complete set of bound Encyclopedia Brittanicas on the shelf. My laptop keys are sticky forcing me to slow down to the pace of molasses and grits, and repeat words again that didn't come out aright the first strike. The cafe WiFi is slower than the satellite Internet in the remote island village of Koh Jum, Thailand, and so I pause to feel the music between saves and surfs.

Perfect.

Just me, the Muse, pastel colored shutters, filigreed wrought-iron balconies wrapping around corners, the calico cat traipsing through the rafters peering down from the hole in the ceiling, flamboyant Caribbean art, thick broadleafed tropical flora, and Bohemia incarnate.

That's plenty.

We're tricked into believing inspiration strikes when the ideal conditions are established. When you have the security of the day job. Or, if you have a day job it'll be when it's not draining your creativity. It's when the kids get older. When you can get away to that tropical isle or the writer's workshop in the desert. Maybe when you are out on the open road then.

I happened to be seated perfectly kitty corner to a fellow passenger's portable DVD player to watch "Easy Rider" for my first time on the flight over. (Alas, no music since I was reading the subtitles from afar.) There's a scene where a younger Jack Nicholson is telling the characters Billy and Captain America aka Wyatt that people hate them because they hate what they represent.

"All we represent to them, man, is somebody who needs a haircut."

"Oh, no. What you represent to them is freedom... That's what's it's all about, all right. But talkin' about it and bein' it, that's two different things."

Of course, Billy and Wyatt are not really free either. Seekers never are completely.

She's in fact waiting for you to quit seeking better conditions, and to stop fidgeting and mumbling that now ain't it.

We've been seeking a sense of freedom first. Yet it's now or never. Freedom comes after, not before, inviting inspiration to work with exactly with what you have, exactly where you are.

She doesn't need you to fix up and thus muck up the raw material of your life as it is. Your so-called limitations are precisely Her fodder.

Sometimes people even impose limitation in order to foster inspiration:

Bernhard Willhelm's philosophy has always been focused on how to make clever projects with no money, and his new project is no exception. The designer's first shop in Tokyo was created by item idem and Asa, a design duo based in the city. The pair imagined a store crafted in the detritus and waste of a consumer-based society, and the avant-garde shop that has resulted from this concept now houses Willhelm's latest collections.

...The design team worked to incorporate Willhelm's widely divergent influences, which range from multiethnic aesthetics to pop culture leanings, culminating in what the duo calls a "junk puzzle interior."

By mixing art and commerce, this concept will evolve into both a shop and an exhibition space, which will live for a few months before evolving into something else. - "Retaliation: A handful of new stores is challenging traditional retail concepts with bold new ideas about how commerce can be conducted", WWDFast, June 2006

One of the most inspirational periods in my life occurred when my car broke down, and I was whining to a friend, "I'm sick of tea and toast" (that's all I could afford for meals). Me, the quintessential restless wayfarer, was also boring of being trapped in Silicon Valley suburbia surrounded by its industrial wasteland without wheels.

It had already occurred to me instead of running from my fear of starvation, that I would face it full on. I'd started to research fasting. I was thoroughly intrigued by Jesus' forty days in the desert, and the thought that man does eat by bread alone, but by every word from the mouth of God captivated me.

My friend asked me to consider each meal of tea and toast as a feast. What if I pretended with each morsel that I'd never ever tasted a piece of bread before or sipped a cup of tea before? What if my neighborhood became the veritable Garden of Eden? What if instead of a complaint, I transmuted my situation into a celebration? And that's how my forty-day fast of tea and toast became the first draft (or, first scribble) for a book and among the richest, freest days of my life thus far.

"What we were all trying for is to get as much freedom, as much liberty of expression, not only in writing, not on paper, not in talk, but in action, and the whole world today is in my mind strangled." - Henry Miller, 1962, at a literary conference (referring to Beat poetry renaissance)

Whatever your complaints are, your resistances, your avoidances, your limitations, your constraints, your frustrations - what if they actually were the necessary ingredients for the alchemical recipe of creation? Whatever you have to work with, why not entertain the thought that those are precisely the threads that She needs to weave Beauty? That our travails is the travel (etymology of the word travel comes from travail)? That's the way of Her open road?

Bonus:  Use everything that comes your way as fodder. You don't have to go on a pilgrimage to be on one: "For one friend who had difficulty remembering details from his travels, I suggested he take on the task of writing a poem every day during his journey abroad. The daily task proved impossible for him, so he decided to focus his attention on a one-week stretch through Paris, Prague and Florence. To this day, his memories of that time are the fondest of all his travels because, as he has told me, "when everything is a possible poem, the world is suddenly far more interesting." - Phil Cousineau, The Art of Pilgrimage

p.s. 'Liberty of expression' in the Henry Miller quote, stumbled upon in a book in the French Quarter bookstore Kaboom, is a big clew. Liberty of expression implies nothing about externals.

I like the Berhard Willhelm interview here: "When he began showing in Paris in 1999, Bernhard Willhelm—a German native residing in Belgium—broke about eight million fashion rules by using colors, volumes and themes that defied categorization... Q: What's your design process? A: It has a lot to do with accident. We [the studio] will get an idea, then move on to the next, working on anything we love at the moment."

images New Orleans photo via California Wine and Food; photo via Laurie Gough's travel and writing website; Parsifal and the Flower Maidens, oil painting by Paul Berenson (of course, Parsifal being the quintessential pilgrim seeking the Holy Grail)

Higher Purpose - Now or Later?

"I’m a firm believer in ensuring one should create a stable and successful position for oneself and one’s family first because it is from there that one is then able to make a greater difference socially (be that for ‘higher purpose or otherwise’)," writes Ben Metcalfe, a former member of Citizen Agency with Tara Hunt and Chris Messina.

I see an interesting conversation about to ensue around higher purpose, calling, and compromising and not compromising art at Tara Hunt's HorsePigCow blog.

"If Al Gore had been interested in the environment from the beginning he probably would have forged a career in politics to become a lowly environmental campaigner. Who knows where he would be now. But I doubt he would have the power and influence to assert his ‘higher purpose’ as he does now given the base he established for himself. Same for Warren Buffet," continues Ben.

I hadn't thought of Buckminster Fuller when I wrote my follow-on comment, but he comes to mind now. I pretty much think of him as one of my own inspirational heroes.

"The minute you begin to do what you really want to do, it's really a different kind of life." - Buckminster Fuller

"In 1927, at the age of 32, Buckminster Fuller stood on the shores of Lake Michigan, prepared to throw himself into the freezing waters. His first child had died. He was bankrupt, discredited and jobless, and he had a wife and new-born daughter. On the verge of suicide, it suddenly struck him that his life belonged, not to himself, but to the universe. He chose at that moment to embark on what he called “an experiment to discover what the little, penniless, unknown individual might be able to do effectively on behalf of all humanity.” - Buckminster Fuller Institute

If you're not familiar with the rest of his experiment, here's a bit more on Bucky Fuller. I also remember reading that he would simply go about his work for a new project, and he trusted that he'd get his funding. And it always worked out - oft times in the 11th hour - but if the vision came, it was conceived.

In my comments in Tara's blog, I start: "Whether what I call what I do ‘higher purpose’ or not, all I know that is my inspirations come from a place that feels greater than myself and my own survival and bigger than just expressing myself. Just feel it can’t be only about me and how I am putting food on the table for myself any longer. Once I had strong inclinations and visions, I couldn’t be sure it was in anyone’s best interests to abort them and pretend them away.

To that end, though, I don’t believe that any sacrifice is in order, and I spent far too long on a renunciate path to know that is misguided as well. As Ben says he “infer[s] that one should sacrifice one’s opportunity to become rich and successful in order to strive for one’s higher purpose.”

I suppose that I don’t really buy into that binary view.

I think being motivated/captivated/enchanted by the higher purpose is in itself the driving force that will get one to wake up in the morning and do everything possible to see it through. It’s hard for me to be motivated by the carrot of future riches and future purpose dangling.

I suppose that I have had this VERY same discussion with a friend of mine that is concerned about me: he says that I should be practical and seek my own stability in wealth, and then I can be a philanthropist later. He doesn’t know me (or believe my stories) from my days when this is PRECISELY what I tried.

I came close enough to being a dot-com millionaire on paper. As luck would have it just about the time the whole house of cards was collapsing that I read Randy Komisar’s book in 2000. Waiting for higher purpose someday later he refers to as the deferred life plan.

This is it folks, you can be hit by a truck or a tsunami any moment.

(BTW, his WONDERFUL book for entrepreneurs is “The Monk and the Riddle,” and Randy is a VC at Kleiner Perkins [interview with Randy at Venture Voice]. He’s one to assert both/and too: values driving success. Just recalled that he is Buddhist [since Ben had mentioned Buddhist philosophy]. Another Buddhist book that is about higher purpose AND wealth that I absolutely loved is “The Diamond Cutter”.)"

p.s. The reason I (and many artists I believe) avoid calling,or higher purpose, hasn't anything really to do with fear around money. That's only the obvious excuse.

image Anthony Ulinski's Still Life with Shadow and Yellow Teapots (for sale)

Update: Should I ever meld together reader comments below (thanks Bruce, A Foolish Guy, and TorAa) and my comments here and over at Tara's blog post on higher purpose and Tara's readers' comments, whew, that'd be one heck of a post.

While running around the high school track I had enough time to get a bit more "out of my head", and remember that after my all-so-serious-and-four-year-long-quest that begain "what is my purpose, or in more plebian terms, why is it I would bother waking up tomorrow?" what I've learned is that the people I know that are living their highest purpose do it so totally, so naturally, so spontaneously that I'm not sure they could even articulate it for me. They act and live in lock-step with their heart - and the heart doesn't explain itself. Anyhow, they don't need to: Art speaks for itself (or in other words, explaining kills art).

"The task is not to find the lovable object, but to find the object before you lovable.” – Soren Kierkegaard, “Works of Love"

Often we discount what we are working this very minute too easily in the search for something that is higher, better, loftier. Later. Bring your best to every task every minute. I don’t advocate stressing about knowing if you have a higher purpose or not. Or worrying if you are doing ‘it’ right or not.

yet another way to Demo, to Launch, to Lunch, to Flock, to Frolic

I want to jump in the fray around Demo this week with a pre-announcement. Since everyone's asking what I'm baking these days, here's a peek inside the oven:

Imagine walking right into a set, a living theater of sorts, a pop-up teahouse and brasserie evoking the artistic foment and intimacy of the Parisian salon.

A laidback running showcase for eclectic installations of provocative and live social art, aesthetic and green designs, Web 2.0 demos (including a boutique digital screening room, etc.)

A convivial spa of conversation catalyzing fertile verges.

A community space for people to commune with people of every stripe. (Devoted but not pushy about transforming "the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.")

Each production comes once around for less than a season, never to be repeated again, to instanteously pop up in another incarnation somewhere else in the Bay Area (initially).

This time, the swirling philosophers and literati of a Vienna coffehouse with Art Nouveau vibe

(exit stage left)

Now, the Silk Road beckons saffron and cinnabar colored plush pillows spice-laden opium den  (sans opium)

(exit stage right)

Now, what does your fantasy fancy?...

"All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players" - Shakespeare, As You Like It

I haven't seen anything quite like it I can point you to. But something about Colette's in Paris reminds. Something about New Frontier on Main at this year's Sundance Film Festival reminds: 

"New Frontier on Main is Sundance's newest venue, showcasing moving-image [video] installations, live performances, microcinema screenings, new media technology, and the Rabbit Hole, a DJ lounge cafe." (more in this great article, "Sundance's New Frontier preserves artistic integrity", Variety, January 17, 2007)

"I've always loved DEMO-style conferences (like the one going on in Palm Desert today) where entrepreneurs show off their creations for the first time to an audience of their peers, the press, and investors." - Jason Calacanis, "Taking the payola out of DEMO-ing: The TechCrunch 20 Conference (or, I'm back in the conference business baby!)

This doesn't replace any expos or conferences, but I'm yearning for gatherings more sassy than a conference, and I'm willing to bet others are too.

I applaud the launchpad that Mike and Jason are giving visionaries to demo their dreams based on merit, not who's able pony up fees:

"It is a well known secret that if you are willing to pay the $15,000+ fee, your startup will really need to suck to be turned down." - Mike Arrington, "The TechCrunch20 Conference"

I don't have my model entirely cranked out, yet. But, claro que si, it's about the artists, innovators, entrepreneurs pushing the edges.

p.s. Comment, blog, email, text, or call 408 513 7324 if you are interested in participating in anyway.

dancers? investors? musicians? VJs/DJs? sponsors? videographers? filmmakers? accountants?  real estate gurus? conceptual artists? chefs? burners? producers? set designers? experimental theater folks? etc. etc?

(I'm notoriously behind on email, but I will get back with you.)

What Are You Earnest About?

What are you passionate, zealous, vigorously resolute (resolute = resolutions) about?

What are you earnest about? (Not so much what you ought to be earnest about, what what are you earnest about now?)

"That which you are most earnest about orchestrates your whole life - inner and outer." - Adyashanti in satsang, November 14, '06

I committed myself - hmmm, that begins awkwardly like the way one is committed to a mental asylum...

I committed myself to run the 100th Boston Marathon in 1996. That doesn't seem like such a big deal, but one doesn't just waltz up and send an application in for Boston.

You must qualify to participate in the Boston Marathon. Qualification for my age bracket at the time meant I needed to run a 3:40 marathon the previous year. That means run 26.2 miles in an official marathon in under three hours and forty minutes. Still no biggie, right?

Perhaps I neglected to mention when I said that I was Ugly Betty, that hanging out at the library (or my room) reading Austen and Salinger correlated precisely with being the last (perhaps second to last, Jimmy Knickerbocker was usually last) person to be chosen for the softball team. P.E. was decidely not for me. At age 14, I thought that bermuda grass edging the asphalt could have been my last dying vision when I had to run manage to go the three laps around the track (yeah, that's less than one mile).

To make a very long story short, I did finish the St. George Marathon in 1994 with a qualifying time of 3:28 (and was euphoric crossing the finish line...this is when you picture Rocky heading up the Philadelphia Museum of Art steps and you start humming the theme song). I went on to run the 99th and 100th Boston, plus many other marathons and quite a few rugged trail ultra-marathons (including a few 50-milers in Texas and California and a gorgeous 41-miler on the wild and scenic Kepler Track in New Zealand).

My running group, the Locomotion Running Club, witnessed the transformation of a mediocre jogger into a Boston qualifier then an ultramarathoner in the space of roughly a little over two years. So they'd ask me once to speak to an audience of newbies before a marathon as if I knew anything really.

You see, I figured if I (aka the-person-least-likely-to-be-or-care-about-being-athletic) could do it, anyone could do it.

The only 'secret' I had was that I knew I wanted it, and I really wanted it. And then I followed the thread until I did it.

"Regardless of the name of this Great Power, or the conscious admission of a God, the Power is capable and willing to carry out to a complete and perfect conclusion every earnest desire of your objective mind, but you must be really in earnest about what you want." - R.H. Jarrett, It Works

My issue is I don't always have that same conviction, that same earnestedness, the same dogged clarity, as I did back when I first said Yes to running the Boston Marathon. I have definitely had that steady earnestness come up in a few scenarios from snagging a CTO spot at a venture-funded startup to what is classically termed 'awakening' (which is contrary to popular opinion only the beginning, not the end of the path). At other times, I drift in not being sure what it is I want or second-guessing that which I clearly do.

"Your objective mind and will are so vacillating that you usually only WISH for things and the wonderful, capable power within you does not function." - R.H. Jarrett, It Works

This year I'm committed to following my heart - wherever it leads me.

I'll say Yes to that which I  feel wholeheartedly committed to, No to everything else, and eliminate Maybe from my vocabulary. (To me, Maybe is vacillating.)

Last night I wrote out four pages in my journal totalling ten conditions or things that I do want in earnest written in vivid detail. 

My list ranges from the fruition of the teahouse to having a personal chef to a new place to live (moving north, either to Palo Alto or the city) to "living completely spontaneously" to the establishment of a social finance REIT that invests in community spaces to collaborating with filmmakers and musicians to being in relationship with a muse-collaborator-playmate-lover partner.

What's your earnest list?

p.s. The etymology of the word earnest:

O.E. eornoste (adj.) from a noun eornost "passion, zeal" (surviving only in the phrase in earnest), from P.Gmc. *ern "vigor, briskness" (cf. O.H.G. arnustarniba "struggle," Goth.  "safely," O.N. jarna "fight, combat") The proper name Ernest (lit. "resolute") is from the same root.

images wild horse running in Desert Run by Robert Dawson; Rangers by Wendy Caro

This is Not a Marketing Blog

Oh dear, I've dropped off the top 25 marketing blogs (yet again). I hang out with a lot of marketing bloggers and I like to write about marketing from time to time.

One could argue quite effectively that Kathy's #3 Creating Passionate Users isn't technically a marketing blog either. It's much more. (And Kathy recognizes that this is much more a marketing blog.)

Actually I don't consider this a marketing blog. I have to even remind myself of this because it's easy to get off-purpose if I listen to what they say.

I started this blog (my second attempt) to have a space to chronicle a pilgrimage-to-become-a-book around the world to the creative class centers of the world. What makes certain regions hot-beds for art movements, renaissances, fecund proliferation of profuse creativity and growth?

It was also an exploration in what Peter Drucker calls the two basic functions of business: "Marketing and innovation produce results, all the rest are costs."

I changed my mind about the yearlong journey, but my original passion around innovation, visionaries and the synergy of collective creation has never waned.

I always feel like I am writing for and talking with...

entrepreneurs (including social entrepreneurs), marketing veeps, CEOs, small business owners, advertising creative directors, inventors, big picture thinkers, visionaries, iconoclasts, filmmakers, screenwriters, writers, poets, sculptors, mavericks, musicians, performers, explorers, weavers, pilgrims, philosophers, conductors, yogis, journalists, research directors, designers, developers, activists, ministers, essayists, actors, dancers, synthesists, monks & passionate creators and innovators everywhere

Once I wrote:

I overheard Robert Scoble last week explain, "Blogs are aggregators for passions." Envision that.

That's why blogs are like places for me. Places for people. What is the place like? What types of people would hang out there? (Nope, not demographics, perhaps ethnographics work here.) For instance, I picture this blog as a salon, or an artist's colony (and I define art broadly). And many tech blogs evoke a sense of BarCamp or FooCamp all year long.

Most creators and innovators actually have a instinctual knack, a very good gut level instinct for marketing. I picture Phil Knight, Howard Schultz, Steve Jobs when I say that. Lately I picture Colette, the owner of "the most progressive boutique in Paris, if not, on this ever shrinking globe:"

"Colette’s sharp wit and scrutinizing eye, which unmistakably picked the “it” items season after season since 1997..." - "Colette: The Fashion Trailbrazer", Factio Magazine

Bottom line, creators and innovators just are not fast followers. We blaze our own trail.

So I notice that the number one culprit that gets in the way, for me, maybe for you, is second-guessing ourselves. "But the SEO consultants says...," "But Advertising Age says..."

The muse strikes 365 days 24/7. Ignoring the muse because it doesn't appear at first glance to sing in lock-step with the rest of the world tune is the real challenge for most artists, designers, entrepreneurs.

"We're so lucky we don't have to create the brand out of thin air. We just tell the truth and the brand builds itself." - Thomas Mahon, English Cut from Hugh's gapingvoid's "Case Study: English Cut"

So if this blog does have anything at all to do with marketing it will be to remind over and over and over again because it's easy to get lost in the noise that it's simpler than you think. Just listen to wee voice.

images Flickr photo by chellyc

 

How Many Lives You Planning to Have?

The recent release  of the very first San Francisco Bay Area Michelin Guide recalled Alan Ducasse and my admiration for him. Currently Ducasse is the only chef in the world to own and operate three signature restaurants each honored with three Michelin stars. 

What really impressed me is he strikes me someone whom lives life to the hilt. No, not speaking about life balance (yech). Rather full - not frenzied, not stressed. Embodying: "Wherever you are, be there totally."

"Even if he appears...to be a very busy man who has clocked up hundreds of flying hours between Monte-Carlo [sic] and Paris, and Singapore and New York, he always takes the time to taste: a new Italian olive oil, a Lebanese cheese rolled in pepper, a leavened bread, or a wild strawberry, for ever [sic] sharpening his senses and his savoir-faire." - Alain Ducasse official biography, via "Turbot Without Genius: The Travails of Alain Ducasse", Caffeine Destiny online magazine (great profile of Ducasse, highly recommend)

In 1984, Ducasse survived a near-fatal plane crash that killed a number of his companions. I can speculate that the scepter of death enhanced his appreciation for life and the deathless. Knowing that winter is around the corner makes the harvest festivals that much more convivial and zesty. Pass the bread with a hearty laugh, pass the wine down the table. This day, this day, this moment, this morsel, this sip...

"I always determine the sexual capabilities of a woman by the way she eats fruit. When testing a potential bedmate, I offer her an apple or pear to see how she eats it. Small mincing bites - the ladylike kind - they are not good. But if she crunches the fruit, salivates with pleasure and crinkles her nose in enjoyment, this girl, my friend, should prove to be a redoubtable love partner." - poet Gabriele D'Annunzio in The Sex Life of Food: When Body and Soul Meet to Eat

Kathy Sierra beat me to a good marketer is like a good lover post that I half-promised as a series. And I've adroitly avoided writing about slow sex, too. Someone that enjoys that pear fully will redoubtably also plunge into life, plunge into business, plunge into sex, plunge without hesitation. They savor the time to know their customer because they enjoy everything thoroughly. In some ways, what can I say about slow sex? It comes down to sheer enjoyment and exuberance. People and food are by far the most glorious, curious things to explore and discover anew over and over again. Why rush through it?

Business is all about people - particularly marketing and sales. Yet for all my exuberance for people I've told myself repeatedly that "I don't want the hectic life that inevitably comes with being a 'successful' owner." I think that may explain why many many other women defer from the highest ranks and CEO status too.

"Men are afraid. They are in hiding. They are attached to values and attitudes that, for women, are peripheral... In close company with women they are caught between an image of themselves that is crumbling and an anxiety about joining woman in her freedom, her courage, her worldly intelligence, her sensorality," says Daniel Odier.

Yes, I nod. But then you read about Ducasse. And then you read about Len Evans. (Ricardo Semler also tops that list.) And I wonder if I've just bought into assumptions about how 'success' is be achieved and why.

And so I've mused: Do I chose a fulfilled life, or a fulfilled business....Why or? Why not and? Why not ingest: I imagine that yes is the only living thing (e e cummings).

Len Evans set the stage for the Australian wine industry by simply wanting people to "drink wine for the sheer fun of it." Sheer fun of it: that's exuberance.

"One summer evening 15 years ago Len Evans grabbed a good bottle of burgundy and led me out to his veranda for the would-be son-in-law conversation. As the sun fell behind the Hunter Valley's Brokenback range, we got to the part where he gauged my prospects. I was struggling with some banal career decision: one path boring but financially secure, the other much more interesting but relatively poorly paid. Seeking approval, I ventured that the sensible thing might be to go dull and safe. Len thought for a moment, turned to me and asked: "How many lives are you planning to have?"
...
Most of the time, the expression "living life to the full" is a platitude. Len turned it into a masterclass, and we were his students. His professional face was that of the wine man, and according to those equipped to judge, he had few rivals in the world for depth of knowledge. Fewer still could match his palate; none could equal his contribution to Australia's wine industry. But to celebrate that expertise alone is to limit him. To my eye, his greatest love was people. His adored wife Trish, his children and grandchildren came first, without question, but I know of no one who took more energetic pleasure in friends and strangers, entertaining them with wine, song, fine food and, above all, laughter. - Steve Waterson's tribute to his father-in-law, Len Evans in "A Man in Full" (via Jill Fallon's Legacy Matters  blog)

Thanks to Alain and Len for simplifying business for me: 1. Simply This. 2. Simply Yes. 3. Enjoy.

Bonus: These two posts totally get to the heart of the sheer enjoyment of people thing. They made my day when I read them this week. Trust me, go read:

Soulful Relationships, by Steve Pavlina. Snippet: "Total strangers would just open up to her and tell her their darkest secrets in the first 10 minutes of conversation – I could scarcely believe it.  I had to ask this woman how she did it, and she explained that it was the result of a particular mindset she had about people."

Give Free Hugs, by Patricia Digh of 37 days. Snippet:

"It is joyous. It gives me hope. It lowers my blood pressure.

My friend, Madelyn, first told me about this video. “Emma might really like this,” she said. “I’m sure you can find it on YouTube.”

My daughter, Emma, did like it. She not only liked it, she loved it. “That really makes me happy,” she kept saying after watching it. “I just love that.” Her face glowed, sometimes a rare event in the universe of studied coolness that often marks these teenaged years."

p.s.  A long time ago I owned a framed calligraphed quote that read: "Life is not a dress rehearsal". Yet this title is just asking for some smart-alecky Buddhist response, eh? "How Many Lives You Planning to Have?"

"Yes, I remember some incarnations, but are they mine?" says one modern day occultist. Hmmm, well what if there is no reincarnation of souls, just reincarnated thoughts spinning....and Nirvana is right here, right Now?

images Winecrush harvest grapes from The Wine Institute; pear from Flickr's Tillwe. I had a yummy Bartlett pear salad with baby greens, gongozola and walnuts for lunch today. The pears from the farmer's market are supple and succulent right now.

Inspiration, or Perhaps We Can Start By Saying What It Is Not

A week ago Saturday I bade one of my best friends goodbye. After 27 years in the Bay Area, he was moving back to the East Coast. Rhode Island to be precise. We spent the day with his nephew, a musician sparking his own version of a local arts renaissance in southern New Hampshire.

We spent most of the Saturday in a hidden beach in Big Sur watching waves tap the pebble landscape like fingers dancing against a taut bongo drum.

After the beach, I insist on crashing the wedding on the lawn of the Henry Miller Library.  I read aloud to my friends from the backseat of the car the pages I've printed from the Miller Library website:

"So, what is the Library?”

Perhaps we can start by saying what it is not.

It is not a Library where you can borrow books, it is not a memorial with dusty relics, it is not a fully stocked bookstore, it is not a trinket store where you’ll find a large selection of glossy photographs of the coast, t-shirts, mugs and baseball caps. It is not Henry Miller’s old home (that was four miles down the road on Partington Ridge), it is not originally built to be a public place,

So if it’s none of those things, what is it?

Well, we can say it is a memorial dedicated to the American artist and writer Henry Miller who lived and worked in Big Sur between 1944 and 1962, and we can say it is Emil White’s old home - Emil founded the Library in 1981, a year after Miller died – but, then…

…Henry Miller said he didn’t approve of “memorials.” Memorials, he said, “defeated the purpose of a man’s life. Only by living your own life to the full can you honour the memory of someone.”

So, is this place a memorial trying not to be a memorial? Maybe. The best way to find out is to come here, browse, look at what’s on the walls, listen to the music, have a cup of coffee or tea, sit down by the fire, read for a while, do nothing…

Beware, some people find it uncomfortable not to have a clear label and end up turning around almost immediately, others fall in love and leave after composing a poem for our guest book…

“It was here in Big Sur I first learned to say Amen!” H. Miller"

I smile reading: "Beware, some people find it uncomfortable not to have a clear label and end up turning around almost immediately..." They're sold. "Let's go." Although theoretically the Library is now closed to the public, we chat with the uncle of the bride arriving the same time as we, and we waltz into the library.

So I think of this blog like the Henry Miller Library. And the salons I'm hosting too.

I love seeing how different people respond to blank canvas, blank pages, or unstructured total boundless possibility.

A friend at a Web 2.0 startup asks, "I am looking to add to our technical team and would like talk to you about anyone you might know." I realize I don't know anyone that is seeking a position within a company anymore, and I write back among the rest of the note: "I tend to hang out with entrepreneur/creator/owner types." Like you, the CEO who wrote me. Like you and dozens of other dreamers, doers, visionaries too.

Lately, my musing carries me to thought that the common thread among designers, creators, start-up entrepreneurs, social enterprise visionaries is that they don't follow formulas, or rules. They follow inspiration.

Last week I recommend that an artist-friend (actually, same who suggested to me the Henry Miller Library on hearing of my trek to Big Sur) launch her venture at an upcoming Women's Health Care conference.

"I thought you didn't care for trade shows much for marketing."

"I don't typically. Yet this is right, right now, for you and what you're trying to do though. Check out the site for yourself."

I keep thinking that you, dear reader, desire formulas. Some iron-clad takeaway -- and I can't deliver that.

Yet I'm reminded as I scramble to figure out how in the world I can acquire an incredible $12,000 painting that stops me still and would be perfect in that cream and gingerbread Queen Anne Victorian arts center that I envision, that it's truly the inspiration which the artist came to the canvas with that pierces my heart. And, in the end, that's what I want to possess. But I know better: you cannot possess what you are. The painting itself - alas, it's already sold - would be a memento of a mutual spark, a neverending communion with that place of inspiration.

Henry Miller was struggling to make ends meet when he first moved to the fog shrouded yin evoking Big Sur coast. In fact, in Paris Henry was nearly penniless and helped along by writers Alfred Perlés and Anaïs Nin. Well it's difficult to be totally down-and-out and wander Paris anyhow: "I have no money, no resources, no hopes. I am the happiest man alive." However, it was on the Big Sur coast that Henry thriived, and where his life situation shifted dramatically and royalties started pouring in.

Living in Big Sur obviously had a profound effect on Miller, inspiring him to write: "Peace and solitude! I have had a taste of it, even here in America." The Big Sur landscape gave him "such a feeling of contentment, such a feeling of gratitude was mine that instinctively my hand went up in benediction. Blessings! Blessings on you, one and all! I blessed the trees, the birds, the dogs, the cats, I blessed the flowers, the pomegranates, the thorny cactus, I blessed men and women everywhere, no matter on what side of the fence they happened to be."

I wonder if people asked Henry what he did for a living back then. When people ask me what it is I do, I think they mean how do I pay rent and cafe bills. But this is truly what I do. I'm a curator. Though it's a very old-old-fashioned kind of curator:

curate:
c. 1340, from Middle Latin curatus "one responsible for the care (of souls),"
from Latin curatus, past participle of curare "to take care of."

On his arrival in Big Sur, Henry Miller wrote: "Here I shall find the strength to do the work I was made to do."  No, this isn't a testimonial for a real estate agent. You don't need to move to Big Sur whatsoever, inspiration is closer than your own breath.

Here, right here, just over yonder the other day the October full moon blushed orange over the horizon signalling the harvest, of creative imagings coming into fruition. Here, wherever you are, is where you start to do the work you are meant to do.

I'm currently finding myself in a very yang phase of my life. From wikipedia, yang: it is happy, active, light, masculine, upward-seeking and corresponds to the day. Emphasis on active. The only way I can thrive at this pace without burning out is to work fully from inspired action, from that unnameable power that the Chinese name the Tao. That same place where inspiration comes from.

On the late night drive back from the Big Sur coast, we listen silently to music. The first time I ingest Imagine wholly.

Imagine? The what-if's were for the audience. I imagine John Lennon knew inspiration first-hand. Listen yourself. Repeat slowly:

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

images Big Sur coast shots 1 and 2 via flickr from cogoldenboy7; Henry Miller's self-portrait (he was also a watercolor painter)

Carnival of the Capitalists - Sept 25, 2006

Welcome! This makes my third time hosting the Carnival of the Capitalists over the last three years.

It doesn't get easier to sort and order the influx in the inbox of business-economics-finance-leadership-marketing-etc submissions even for a seasoned host. Each year, each week brings us more authors, yet more posts.

If you're reading, though, who can complain? That means more business insight and acumen for you to peruse.

Truth be told, CoTC hosts can't complain either. Carnival hosting has many hidden advantages. (Shhhhh....we can't tell.) One fairly open secret about blogging is the quality of connections made. For instance, on this CoTC run - and the day is still young - I've already got an invitation from a fellow tea-lover to visit their cafe in Gothenburg, Sweden (The Blue Chip Cafe): "We have a special blend with three black teas (Darjeeling, Ceylon, Lapsang), vanilla, blue flower and rum." Yum. It's personal email like that that makes it all worthwhile.

So take a sip of your favorite morning brew whether you're in Sweden, Sri Lanka (they call it bed tea there in the a.m.), or Saskatchewan and enjoy yourself as you unfurl the virtual pages of this week's edition of Carnival of the Capitalists.

Oh, and don't forget: respire la vie. - Evelyn, Crossroads Dispatches

p.s. The photo of the bull and bear is from the Frankfurt Stock Market.

FINANCE

Michael Dawson of The Time and Money Group's Blog shares straightforward bond advice: "As interest rates go up, bond prices go down.  As interest rates go down, bond prices go up." Read the whole post to digest Michael's simple-to-understand, A Simple Relationship to Put Money in Your Pocket. He adds in the current position of "the Warren Buffett of the bond world" to apply this education immediately.

David Porter is asked by a reader and answers What do Mortgage Underwriters do? posted at Pacesetter Mortgage Blog. David concisely covers the ins and outs of mortgage loan approval adding a personal story to bring the mortgage loan approval process to life. The hook: "We just sold our personal residence a month ago.  We were given a letter that stated that the buyers of our home were 'approved'."

Value investor (ala Warren Buffet) George over at Fat Pitch Financials generously shares a mini-tutorial on how to properly calculate the annualized return on investment for your various projects in How to Calculate Your Return on Investment. (And I didn't even know about Google Spreadsheets until I read George's post.)

Free Money Finance presents How High Mutual Fund Fees Can Cost You Millions (Another Reason You Should Love Index Funds). Crunching some numbers on Vanguard funds with sales loads and fees, FMF underscores their continued love affair with index investing.

Bill Lopasio uses airplane flight metaphors, such as windshear (also known as microbursts), to illustrate how and why he thinks the current housing market is headed for a crash in his post, Market Microbursts at LWilliamLosapio.com: "The FED’s manipulation of interest and credit creates “windshear” in the economy. Home-buyers and property speculators can be thought of as pilots trying to land in windshear."

Peter Kua presents How to make $1,000,000 in the stock market automatically at RadicalHop.com. Yeah, that's a clickable title alright. Peter presents his own personal experience of trying out the recommendations in the book of the same title. Shoot, it seems automatically means automated rather than overnight: "Of course, if you’re expecting to make a million bucks in a couple of months, then you’re out of luck."

Joe Kristan of Roth & Company Tax Updates blog in No Appraisal, No Charitable Deduction showcases Bruce and Marina Ney who claimed deductions in 2001 of just over $210,306 for the donation of two parcels of appreciated long-term capital gain property to a charity, the Delaware Agricultural Lands Preservation Foundation. Publicly traded securities are simpler, says Joe, as he shows what can happen when the paperwork for appraisals of donated land and/or art aren't handled properly.

Nina Smith of Queercents asked a prominent Bay Area pastry chef and food blogger to get personal about the economics of food, working in restaurants and how money plays a role in both her own life and restaurant life. CoTC often focuses on macroeconomics and macrofinance, but this interview, Ten Money Questions for Shuna Fish Lydon, sheds light on our intimate one to one relationships with money.

Bob Vineyard of InsureBlog says, "Often sold, incorrectly, as a subsitute for real health insurance, medical discount plans are coming under increased scrutiny" by state governments. Get the straight scoop from Bob on the details in Discount Plan Crack Down.

Bryan C. Fleming presents Day #29 of his Million Dollar Savings Club series How to Get Through a Cash Pinch by offering advice on saving in order "to protect you from yourself... You suddenly find you pushed your checking account a little too far and you have no money until your next paycheck. If you don’t think this happens a lot, look at how many pay-day-advance services have appeared in recent years."

HeJustLaughs shares his own personal stock choice in Why reinsurance companies like MRH are the place to be (yep, despite Katrina, he says) at his HJL Money Blog adding, "I'm currently up about 17% on this one since June 13th."

Scott at Scott on Money helps put things in perspective in Your Week Was Not as Bad As...  In his CoTC submission, Scott shares that it's the "worst week I've heard of in the markets" but, hey, at least we're not the trader who lost $5 billion.

Dan Melman of Searchlight Crusade comprehensively breaks down the property market and loan types into common home ('stick built'), condominiums, and then drills down to look at housing loans as one veers away from the "stick built' house starting with the modular dwelling and so on. Check out Manufactured, Modular, and Site-Built Homes: How Lending Practices Drive the Sales Market for a consideration of differing housing properties and how ease of loans affects said sale prices.

ECONOMY

David Tufte of VoluntaryXchange quotes one of his old professors in saying that "we shouldn't knock the fact that "we don't make anything in America" anymore, because A Service Economy is a Rich Economy." And he has the charts from the IMF’s World Economic Outlook to solidify the case that deindustrialization may very well be a very good thing (income is first related to increasing industrialization, and then to declining industrialization; thus the US is ahead of the pack).

McKee Stewart shares his analysis of the California state "global warming" lawsuit (with similarities to the state tobacco lawsuits) against GM, Ford, Chrysler, Honda, Nissan, and Toyota and its implications to the economy and individuals. McKee predicts "depending on the prospects for success, expect other politically ambitious State AGs to try to muscle in for a piece of the action" in his post, What’s the UAW Think About This? at The Boring Made Dull.

James Hamilton of Econbrowser concurs quite a bit with The Boring Made Dull (above) in Environmental Totalitarianism on the California lawsuit against automakers and compares the state's with Russia's politics. James discusses Russia's oil production on Sakhalin Island citing that while "environment concerns about the project are real" essentially the environmental permit annulment appears to be a tactic to "help [semi-nationalized] Gazprom acquire a stake in the venture."

Barry L. Ritholtz of The Big Picture takes a good (and witty) shot at the recent New York Times article on wealth, Life is Better; It Isn't Better. Which Is It? Here's a taste of What is Wealth, Part II: "All temporal arguments are two-sided. The lowest economic strata -- with their indoor plumbing and their color TVs -- are "wealthier" today than long dead royalty of long ago... Sure, we may have Snowblowers, but we don't go to Mars for vacations, or have nano-tech cholesterol bots keep our arteries clean... Hey, we don't even have robotic servants to operate those snowblowers!Why, we are practically impoverished compred with people born merely 100 years from now."

Martin Lindeskog of EGO cheers on talk of The Privatization of Companies in Sweden sourcing an article that forecasts "mortgage provider SBAB, real estate firm Vasakronan, and drinks manufacturer Vin & Spirit (which makes Absolut Vodka) as first in line."

Wenchypoo at Frugal Wisdom from Wenchypoo's Warehouse uses economist F.A. Hayek’s 1945 book as the launchpad for her contemporary essay on liberal utopia, Interstate 5: The Road to Serfdom (L-O-N-G), citing it as a "well-written tome: a post-war warning to the nation about government-centralized planning and wholesale surrender of individual rights and freedoms to it."

BUSINESS - GENERAL

Tom Hanna takes a recent New York Times article to task in Whose fault is an inefficient government program? Wal-Mart's, of course posted at Tom Rants. Whereas NYT berates WalMart, Tom sees WalMart as providing reasonable prescription drug prices for the uninsured such as "290+ generic prescription drugs at a cost of $4/month, including literally lifesaving drugs like the insulin resistance drug metformin."

Kevin Hillstrom of MineThatData crunches the profit numbers and considers the positive implications in Starbucks: Is a Five-Cent Increase Necessary? Kevin points out Starbucks announced product price increase is top of mind for many, including morning fix consumers: "Based on the reaction of the blogosphere (216 unique posts about Starbucks in the past twelve hours according to Google Blog Search), many folks find the decision to increase the price of drinks by five cents to be conversation-worthy."

Greg Manter at the Retail Store Blog had an epiphany at a recent excursion for kitchen cabinets at Lowes: "These stores are self-serve all the way ... and shouldn't be afraid to admit it." The crux of Self-Serve Retail: the trouble with Lowes and Home Depot is about how these retail establishments set up expectations of solution consultants that they can't possibly staff and offers what can be done to better serve customers.

David Chamberlain of Exquisite Safaris discusses business-driven approaches to global problems in Clinton Global Initiative: Inspiring Change, Delivering Results citing for instance Richard Branson of Virgin: "The only way global warming's going to be whipped is if we can come up with alternative energies that are profitable," Branson said. "It's got to be sustainable. You can't just give the money away."

David Maister of Passion, People and Principles prepares for a speech to European business school faculty in Improving Mutual Understanding Between Business Schools and Business. He blogs his thoughts for feedback on biz school-to-biz interaction. Here's number 7 out of 9 ideas he tosses out for consideration: "Focus more on designing educational experiences (not content) that help students develop skills through guided practice (how to function in teams, etc.)"

A. Samuel thinks albeit the plethora of new low-cost airlines opening up routes that "the days of low-cost short-haul flights may indeed be in for a spot of turbulence" and makes a case for why at Talkback Msn Money Low Cost Airlines Part 2 posted at Property Investing. (See cartoon: If you've been travelling much lately, you'll appreciate the chuckle this Monday morning.)

Brian Gongol of Gongol.com offers clear step-by-step instructions in Using Gmail Filters to Control Spam. Brian uses Gmail himself for business mail, "but sometimes good email gets caught in the spam filters." His tutorial will help you sort within Gmail's spam folders so you can sift through and find the few false positives in less time.

David Foster of Photon Courier celebrates an important birth (that is, if you use computers) in his post. The baby? "The disk/computer combination was about the size of two refrigerators, and weighed around a ton." Check out: A WHOLE LOT OF SPINNING:
50 YEARS OF THE MAGNETIC DISK.

LEADERSHIP / MANAGEMENT

Leon Gettler of SOX First puts the people question squarely in front in his post, Marriages and Mergers. Citing Cisco as a role model for successful mergers, Leon deftly delves into the marriage analogy: "Company mergers are like marriages where the parties have to take the time to get to know the potential spouse and decide on money, children, religion, whose furniture survives and which gets turfed out."

David St Lawrence nudges us toward expanding in the first of a series, Moving out of your "comfort" zone over at Making Ripples: post corporate adventures. Says David: "A "comfort zone" is a pattern of behavior that gives you a sense of security... That certainly sounds like a great idea until you consider the following: Growth of any kind involves overcoming the fear of events, ideas, and people who cause you distress."

David Daniels of Business & Technology Reinvention writes in Who Do You Listen To?: "One of the reasons I left a well known technology company years ago was that the organization had shifted from being a focused group of smart people, without barriers, working across all levels through the hierarchy accomplishing amazing things..." David questions the wisdom of execs listening only to peers in a provocative post.

Wayne Hurlbert of BlogBusinessWorld sings a similar tune as Daniels above in his post Building A Creative Company: Embrace New Ideas: "Letting go of control of idea generation often takes a giant leap of faith... Seek out ideas from all employees, regardless of level. Creativity isn't an exclusive property of the executive suite, and doesn't require degrees and credentials."

K T Cat of The Scratching Post presents an employer-employee history lesson in the post, Passchendaele in the Office. Citing anecdotes from the 1917 battle where 310,000 British soldiers were wounded or killed: "A huge part of the problem was one endemic to World War One. The staff officers planning the attacks never visited the front. They had no idea what trench warfare was really like."

Carmine Coyote of Slow Leadership succinctly states the summary in the post title Leisure is the Meaning of Work. Want more of a taste? How's this appetizer: "The restlessness of today’s work-for-working’s-sake culture has more to do with an inability to relax into the leisure we need to be fully human than any innate desire to get more money and possessions."

MARKETING / SALES

Anita Campbell presents Apply for Small Business Awards, But Have A Great Story at her Small Business Trends blog. Being a judge for various small business awards, Anita notes that most award entry's "format begs for a great story as part of the application package." She offers her top six tips for how to tell your business story in a way that will get you to the finalist round, including: "Tell it like a story. Write it like a scene in a play, rather than some dry-as-dust financial analysis."

Starling David Hunter looks at the buzz surrounding Cocaine, a new teen-targeted energy drink. "Redux officials [the manufacturer] must be riding high right about now. But like all highs, this one won't last. The novelty surrounding Cocaine will wear off about as quickly as its buzz does - and without the sugar crash." Why the thumbs down? Read She Don't Lie, She Don't Lie, She Don't Lie at The Business of America is Business.

Jack Yoest was once privileged to introduce Steve Forbes at a fundraising event with 950 of his closest friends. Jack writes, "I was tempted to honor him with the most flattering, and shortest intro by saying, "Here's Steve Forbes, who needs no introduction..." Well, that may work for Steve Forbes and Steve Jobs, but what about the rest of us? Luckily Jack doesn't leave us hanging with that post intro, he freely offers his Six Steps to Your Perfect Introduction From the Podium over at Jack Yoest.

Andrew Trinh of Trizoko Biz Journal shares a pricing strategy tip and research from Northwestern’s Kellogg and MIT’s Sloan in How to Price What You Sell. You'll get a whiff of the breezy post if you start by taking Andrew's "Test Your Bizo-coolio-ness in 3 Seconds". The Game: Name the pricing point that sells more — $81, $83, $85, $87, $89. (Now, you gotta go read the post for answers.)

Jim Logan asks some provocative questions - and raises some good points about credibility and gaming the system - such as: "Do you trust reviewers whose every review concludes something is great?  Or do you value a less than favorable review?" in his post, Are The Recommendations You Receive Sincere? After pondering his thoughts, I think you'll agree: "All this makes me think I ought to have a policy of sorts for reviewing books, courses, programs, and the like."

In Recipe for Presentation Disaster, Pawel Brodzinski of Software Project Management shares his how-don'ts. Or, how to screw up your next presentation, including: "Slides are the king. No matter what you’d say – the slides matter. Good slides will cover poor speaking... just read the slides and everything will be OK." (It'd be funnier if we hadn't made these mistakes ourselves, and learned the hard way.)

Evelyn Rodriguez (that's me) of Crossroads Dispatches shares some inspiration from a recent shopping research excursion in Manhattan in Respire La Vie. Sometimes writers, bloggers - and marketers - can try too hard, explain too much. Perfumery Le Labo eschews "explaining art" and rather successfully relies on the sensory experience of their boutique and a definitive focus on product freshness and quality to sell and to spread the word.

Why Do Anything

I'd decided somewhere recently to get out of the advice-giving business, also known as consulting. Most of my advice is a) never heard (b) summarily dismissed, and if I'm really honest, (c) it's really some wise part of myself sneaking in sage counsel to my own self in the guise of advice to you. For instance, like I told a friend (variation of a theme to three friends same week...and that's a clue it's really about me):

"We usually aren't frightened by being bankrupt/homeless as much as we are at how grand and beautiful and overwhelming the dream/vision/calling is and if we are worthy to execute such a wonder. I think you are getting ready to move from endless possibilities to making a firm step in one."

So what would I write if I wasn't telling you what you should do?

Might explain my huge lapse in blogging. Maybe not. Been travelling lots (and future: NYC Sept 8-13 if you'd like to meet up). Excuses galore. Way busier people like Fred manage to blog everyday. And remind me why we do blog: Voices. People. Yet my voice is radically changing (and I am), and I don't know what that'll mean but it'll make for an interesting trip.

"I wanted to have my own platform to put ideas out there without any barrier between me and the idea and the world, and fashion is just that," says a former new media and marketing guy.

Said former marketing guy is today L.A. menswear designer Scott Sternberg.

So if you're flying on Southwest this month, I highly recommend swiping this month's inflight magazine issue and reading up on Scott and his line, Band of Outsiders (oh, yeah, that's a very bloggy website).

The other day I'm chatting with an elderly couple sitting in their car looking over the bluff at the Pacific Ocean. We're gawking at the surfers catching waves. He's a retired school bus driver. One grandson, now in high school, wants to be chef 'when he grows up'.

The culinary school he wants to go in Campbell is $21,000 a year tuition.

The school even says all the restaurants around here are already fully staffed.

I quietly listen to their laundry list and thinking of a successful chef I know that quit Harvard, "Sometimes chefs open their own place."

But you know the failure rate of new restaurants is 50 percent.

"Yeah, that's certainly true. More than fifty percent of restaurants suck." 

Then we talk about the high school in my neighborhood. Yup, he's driven kids right there. We talk of other things while I wistfully wish I could meet their grandson.

"I came home from work and the girls were drinking champagne in the living room," Dean says..."A few minutes later, Kent came over, and he pulled me aside. He said, 'We can't let this happen. And I said, 'Kent, we're gonna be the good husbands here and let the bank be the evil person. They'll never make it past the bank. No one's gonna loan the girls money when they've never put a restaurant together before." - "They Can Take the Heat", Southwest Spirit, August 2006

So said husband (and celebrated chef) Dean Fearing about his wife's Lynae and her friend/partner's Tracy Rathbun's crazy venture to buy out and renovate a Dallas sushi restaurant. Go figure: bank did loan them the money after all.

"I didn't even have to wear suits at CAA [Creative Artists Agency, former employ]...But I'm 31 now and just thought, 'I need to own a suit.'

Eventually, I started saying to a designer friend, "I'd love to make suits, but I'd have to find the right factory and...'

And he said, 'Shut up and do it. Just figure it out!" And I booked a trip to New York and met the two factories that could do it the way I wanted, and the second I got the first sample of the suit -- which didn't even fit totally right -- once I slipped it on, it was like, 'Omigod. Just keep making this.'"

Scott's suits premeire this fall.

I'm mostly swimming upstream these days in every area of my life. Don't expect kudos. Don't expect others to assuage your uncertainties. But if you have a kick-ass friend like Scott's designer buddy, thank them profusely. They are rare finds.

Me? I'm like that looney friend that sends you quotes in your email inbox when your rent is past-due like:

Make no little plans; they have no passion to stir men's souls. - Architect Daniel Burnham

Or these few snippets from very same Southwest inflight mag about the MacArthur Fellowships:

Most of the time, the first thing they say is, "You know, I'm not a genius."

..."It sort of honors the fact that you've taken risks already, and says, 'Here, take some more' -- which is a pretty amazing thing."

A very amazing thing to be sure.

Band of Outsiders? Naw. We're out there. It only appears lonely when we're in doubt.

Psst...it's not about the suit, anymore than it was about the bike. Uhhhh, is kick-ass inspiration the same as advice...?

p.s. The Shinsei restaurant name means 'pure' in Japanese. There's a Buddhist slogan painted on their avocado green walls: "By absence of grasping one is made free." And seems like the inspiration for the Band of Outsiders menswear, the film by Jean-Luc Godard is tres Buddhist too: "Le narrateur: Franz is wondering if the world is a dream or a dream the world."

image Shirt & tie by Band of Outsiders (Teen Vogue via Band of Outsiders blog site).