There are just some people who seem to know everybody. Maybe they’ve been in their industry a long time. Maybe they are “collectors”. Maybe even both. What are “collectors”? They are people who have mastered the art of connecting and they meet people and add them to their network in a meaningful way. They just seem to know that this person will fit in somehow.

Inspiring connector as well as co-host and founder of the Twitter chat, #kaizenblog, Valeria Maltoni led the way with this conversation. As usual, there are a lot of great contributions from everyone in the conversation and you may want to look that the transcript here Transcript for #kaizenblog – CommunityBldgConnection There was an interesting side conversation started by Yann Ropars (@yannr) about makes a good community leader. Definitely worth checking out!

Maltoni started the conversation on her site with the post, “Why Believing is the Most Important Thing You Can Do” By using her experiences with others, she illustrated how making true connections with another person leads to expanding one’s understanding of the world and thus, leads to opportunities for each of us. These opportunities could be for personal growth, philanthropy, or even business. But…it starts with the connection with another person.

What makes connecting important to you? Responses seem to center on how connecting with another human being is central.

• Stephen Denny (@Note_To_CMO) ” ‘Satisficing‘ -  we look for shortcuts because we’re busy. Connections are shortcuts.”
• AngelaDunn (@blogbrevity) “Q1 I find inspiration from connecting others, finding synergies between people & ideas”
• Amy Blake (@BlakeGroup) “IMO, one aspect of being human means wanting to connect , in biz + life”
• Bruno Coehlo (@bcoehlo2000) “In an Era of mass cold communication, warm human interaction has become even more important!”
• Patrick Prothe (@pprothe) “Forming meaningful, relationships/Rising above superficiality”
• Bernd Nurnberger (@CoCreatr) “learning, helping, exchange, trust, trade – make connection important to me”

Maltoni summed it up, “Shared interests, emotional investments are the fuel that makes connecting work!” Many of the comments followed this theme. It may be that we spend a lot of time in the online world but that hasn’t changed our need and desire to deepen the relationship with those we meet.

How do we help others succeed? The interesting piece is that truly connecting opens us up to want more for others. Sure, we start relationships wondering about what the person may offer us. This can be as simple as an enjoyable conversation to a benefit for our business. However, when (and hopefully not if) you move past that initial stage, you begin to want something for the other person. What do you have at your disposal that could be helpful?

• Caroline Di Diego (@CASUDI) “contributing/communicating U name it > OUTPUT = other 50%”
• Yann Ropars “Be present and create meaningful space for participants”
• Jerry Evans (@inspiredtrain) “Knowledge, sharing, empathy, sympathy, encouragement, leadership, clear strategies and policies”
• Rob Petersen (@robpetersen) “Add show willingness to help, make connection in return to your list; could be long list”
• Heidi Cohen (@heidicohen) “Consider what others need/want 1st”
• Rick Alcantara (@jerseycoach) “Q2-You help others succeed by providing them with the ideas and tools to achieve/become something greater”
• Amber Cleveland (@ambercleveland) “Connect others to success by listening to their goals and providing insight on how they can achieve them. Share yourself”

Helping others in an altruistic way seem to resonate very much with the #kaizenblog participants. There were several tweets that echoed deeply listening so you can hear what the person might need and/or want. Providing one’s insights and experience was another thing that people wanted to share to foster others’ success.

As she often does, Maltoni brought the conversation into an unexpected place with the third discusssion question. How to give power away? She clarified the question when she tweeted, “Q3 clarification = another way to let go of control.” Building community is less about the leader per se and more about how the group can gel and move as a unit. There were many ideas of how the leader could set the stage for enabling the community members to have power.

• Amy Blake “Q3 This is where mentoring kicks in…sharing away power while maintaining direction.”
• Lizzie Pauker (@lizziepauker) “Q3-power in numbers. motivation skyrockets when people feel greater purpose & satisfaction”
• Namrata Rana (@futurechat) “Community is built by enabling, enthusing and empowering. This builds trust and a self fulfilling cycle of relationships”
•  Cathy Larkin (@CathyWebSavvyPR) “Q3: Power is often tied to or tied up in Ego. Let that go. Earn trust, yes, but let ego go – & the energy & workflow grtr”
• Joe Sanchez (@sanchezjb) “Q3 Power is not “given away.” It’s authority that’s delegated & while authority can b delegated, responsibility cannot”
• Bruno Coehlo “Define clear & measurable goals. Praise good performance and redirect them when they go off track. Build leaders!”
• Torrey McGraw (@torreymcgraw) “Q3 Don’t be afraid to be wrong as “expert”. Ask, listen & throw preconceptions out the window to achieve goals”
• Lois Martin (@LoisMarketing) “Q3 Key is being open to new ideas, new voices, new perspectives”

So the conversation ended with an opportunity for everyone to turn the focus onto their own actions and how they build their own communities. What are 3 things you do regularly that help you build community? It was fascinating to see the myriad ways people engage with their communities.

• Caroline Di Diego “I mentor small biz to be sustainable =help local community”
• Diane Court (@dc2fla) “Q4 Ask questions, Listen, Recognize & appreciate contributions w/out judgement <= require my constant attention to improve”
• Rick Alcantara “Q4: Send articles about interesting topics, mentor young professionals, connect my biz contacts with one another.”
• Cathy Larkin “Q4 3 things 2 build commty: ID community needs, be the connector 2 help solve needs, be positive/upbeat”
• Joe Sanchez “Q4: Engage (two-way comms w/ feedback), assess (how r we doing towards achieving our goals), recognize (reward/incentivize).”

This week’s #kaizenblog conversation had a lot of energy! For many of our participants, asking questions is a favored strategy to discover what community members are thinking, feeling, and doing. It seems, from this conversation, that egotism is  community killer. There were many references to managing one’s ego and insecurities as being important to having effective communication as well as understanding what needs and wants are present in the community. Writing this recap is part of how I help build the #kaizenblog community and it’s a pleasure to highlight both our regulars and our newer members.

How do you rate the importance of serving others to build communities?

What could this mean for your business/work?

What 3 things do you do regularly that helps you build community?

Before reading this post, think about an action you’ve been putting off. What is so daunting about this action? What is easy about this action?

In our last Twitter chat, #kaizenblog, we discussed the “Dangers and Advantages of Taking Action”. As always, it is well worth reading the transcript Transcript for #kaizenblog – AdvantagesDangersofTakingAction

The most interesting thing about taking or not taking action is what is going on in our thinking. That’s where this chat’s conversation focused. Most of us have the tools or know where to find them (or someone who can tell us where to find them). Taking the first step really is based on our thinking.

What are the dangers and advantages of taking information? Deb Morello jumped in with her response, “Believe advantages of when to take action and when not to take action is part instinct and part “learned skill” from experiences.” Patrick Prothe (@pprothe) Some don’t take action to keep their options open. For fear of making wrong decision vs. iterating, learning from mistakes. Also avoid action until they uncover one more data point to support their cause. & then delay further b/c of new info.” Prothe’s two themes were echoed by others as potential dangers. Josip Petrusa (@josippetrusa) tweeted, “Danger: A backlash, wrong decision. Advantage: leadership, strength. The circumstances of the situation are also important.” Stephen Denny added a further follow-on with this delineation, “Taking action subsets: taking an option (low risk, uncertain confidence), all-in (high risk, high confidence). Big diff”

There was a lot of discussion about how not planning ahead and not having enough information. The catch with not having enough information can be doubled-edged. The first is that not having enough information does limit good decision-making and critical thinking about a situation. On the other hand, as Patrick Prothe pointed out, it is easy to delay when you use your perceived inadequate information as an excuse to avoid moving forward.

Underlying much of this is a lack of confidence. But as Chanelle Schneider (@WriterChanelle) pointed out two other fears that may be behind a lack of action, “…fear of backlash or lost support.” With this in the background, there were recommendations to use critical thinking and do a risk assessment. Some of this may depend on the size of your organization and the type of task you are avoiding.

There were two other perspectives that were important to include with the advantages and dangers of taking action. Diane Court (dc2fla) reminded us, “It’s essential to put considered action in perspective. Most of what we can do can be adjusted (not final, not devastating)” An additional aspect to what’s behind the choice to take action or not was put forth by Tom Asacker (@tomasacker), “Lack of action reveals lack of passion and purpose.” Mr. Asacker’s point is one that is commonly overlooked. How often have you not done something simply because it didn’t light your fire? Or you went through the motions because you thought you were supposed to?

The first part of the chat seemed to skew to the negative. Why do you avoid making decisions? Lizzie Pauker (@lizziepauker) answered, “So many responses go back to our emotions. Decision making sometimes  requires making check of emotions & be objective.” Josip Petrusa added partly serious, partly humorous response, “because it is easier to avoid them than deal with them, ha”  Ah, true! On the same vein, Alfonso Guerra (@huperniketes) stated, “Fear of success is powerful: people afraid of seeing what they’re more than they ever imagined.”

But what if our environment discourages taking action. There are many big corporations (and small businesses) who put bureaucracy ahead of anything else. This can be very daunting as Stephen Denny remarked, “Often in corporate situations, fear of approval/process/accountability/mgmt, etc” Makes you wonder how much is lost every day.

As I pointed out in my framing post, choice overload can act as a paralyzer. Sometimes it can feel as if all choices are the right ones. You want to do right. As Diane Court explained, “Choice overload…isn’t so much fear of action, as wanting to the “right” or “best” action 1st time out.” Deb Morello reminded us, “In the end u r true to yourself, yes, in whatever context – 4get about choice overload, what was your first instinct?” Is it that simple? Are we overthinking our choices of actions?

However, if we’re trying to act “correctly” due to passion, purpose, or some psychological issue, emotions are going to get caught up in the process. Stephen Denny tweeted, “Often huge diff betw dreams + execution. Preconceptions of outcomes/difficulty turn out differently.” Laura Crum (@LauraLCrum) pointed out, “Advantages [of taking action] are worth the effort but not until we can overcome our emotions.” Josip Petrusa added, “What’s interesting is right/wrong changes in every situation. Our ability to read situation first will decide our outcome.” So getting past all of this may lead to what we’re willing to tolerate. Some of the #kaizenblog participants stated they were willing to tolerate uncertainty, sleeplessness, and hard work. Perhaps if you aren’t willing to tolerate some or all of these discomforts, you aren’t ready to take action? As Caroline Di Diego  (@CASUDI) pointed out, sometimes we put of action because we’re not ready to handle the consequences of our choices.

 Alfonso Guerra’s earlier point about fear of success and the focus on the negatives of taking actions led to the third question of the conversation. What does success REALLY mean to you?

I5Design (@I5Design) responded, “The difference between leading and managing. Letting people succeed and fail (controlled failure) and guiding them to growth.” Other responses included feeling pride in one’s accomplishment, financial wins, feeling valued by organization, and making positive contributions to someone else. Bringing a holistic viewpoint (after all, we’re not always working), Tom Asacker contributed, “Success=love, pray, eat. In that order”

Given that we were talking about taking action, I offered the #kaizenblog participants (and the quieter members a well, aka lurkers) a challenge: State one action you will take this week that you’re putting off

• Chanelle Schneider: Pitiching ideas to “some major news outlets”
• Deb Morello : Taxes
• Patrick Prothe: Connecting with one person outside of regular network “F2F” and write more consistently
• Laura Crum: Work on my life/work/play balance
• M Zayfert (@mzayfert): Connect with those who I met during network mixers and conferences

For those that didn’t publicly accept the challenge but are doing it anyway, feel free to tweet or send a direct message about your progress. For those who publicly stated their challenges, I’ll check in with you later this week.

For additional tips on how to take that first step:

• Patrick Prothe: “To help with taking action, perhaps check out Action Method”  http://www.actionmethod.com/ 
• Alfonso Guerra recommended the Pomodoro Technique http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/
• I added, set a timer for 20 minutes so you can focus on your task. When the timer beeps, you can stop working or set the timer for another 20 minutes.

What do you believe are the advantages/dangers of taking action?

What does success really mean to you?

I invite you to take the challenge: Stated one action you can take this week that you’ve been putting off.

Taking action seems to intimidate a lot of people in business. Sure, we all know someone who seems to never procrastinate or doubt a decision. But for the rest of us…

There are loads of reasons why we avoid making  choices. In some cases, it is simply the phenomenon known as “choice overload.” Research is pointing to people faced with many choices and becoming unable to make a decision. Remind you of the menu at The Cheesecake Factory? If you haven’t been to that particular restaurant, they have a book for a menu.  A book?!

However, this could be very bad for your small business.It’s hard to take action when you have so much information to process but taking action is really about productivity. We tend to think productivity is great. We can enhance it with efficiency. We can measure it. And yet, if you change the word from productivity to action, some of us do the deer-in-the-headlights freeze.

Are there dangers in taking action? Of course there are! You could end up changing the world as you know it. It doesn’t even have to be on the end-world-hunger scale. Our individual worlds have value as well. There are people in our lives who depend on us. We may be in an enviromnent where rocking the boat is strongly discouraged.

It works something like this. You start off with a predictable circle of comfort. No risk. Vanilla.  And then, you come across a very good reason to expand this circle of comfort. Its not nice and tidy. Change can be awkward and uncertain. Do you want to to rethink who you are and what you can do? This is dangerous!

Then again, maybe there are very distinct advantages to taking action. Your small busines grows into what you meant it to be. You discover you are powerful and talented. People acclaim your actions. Your ability to cope with change is strengthened. The possibilities are endless since our actions bear all kinds of fruit. Our perception that something would be too painful to manage turns out to be a complete nonevent.

This is where you sing the chorus to REM’s “It’s the End of the World as We Know It”

                                                                    “It’s the end of the world as we know it

                                                                     And I feel fine.”

The thing with taking action is it triggers our fears, our hopes, and our beliefs about our efficacy and our self-worth. There may be inertia because we’ve tolerated some kind of discomfort for a long time. There may be very good reasons to choose inaction. If you avoid decisions, do you avoid life as proposed by Jeff Stibel?

In this week’s #kaizenblog chat, we’ll be exploring “The Dangers and Advantages of Taking Action” so join us on Friday, August 20, 2010 at 12 pm ET/9am PT/5pm BST. Come join in on this conversation!

What does taking action mean to you?

What dangers or advantage do you see in taking action?

What keeps you from acting on what you desire most?

 iStockphoto BookMama

For any business owner or leader (and their PR person), a PR crisis is not something you want to deal with! With lots of crises in the news lately, there are many examples of how these things can take on a life of their own. Certainly, BP got lots of black eyes during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. #kaizenblog’s co-host, Valeria Maltoni shared in her post, Live Crisis in Digital a few other situations that need some PR finesse.

But the spotlight really goes on Danny Brown, our guest host for #kaizenblog, this past Friday. His post, Saving Face When Your Company’s Doors Are Blown Off, began the conversation that was lively and full of resources and advice of what to do when things go haywire publicly for your business. You can find all of the tweets and links here in the transcript Transcript for #kaizenblog – SavingCoWhenDoorsBlowOffpdf

We jumped into the conversation with our first question…How does social media really change the playing field during a PR crisis?

Brown explained, “It helps immensely. Folks look at negatives, but SM offers huge scope to “correct” crisis.” Perhaps this answer was not what most people expected as one thinks how stories can go viral online. However, it can give you an opportunity to connect with people in real time. He also added, “It allows you to address negativity head-on, and on the “complainers” turf – great pacifier”

Other perspectives that were offered:

• Same Day Repair (@samedayrepair) “It’s vitally important that solid relationships are built before a crisis happens.”
• Amber Cleveland (@ambercleveland) “Q1 gives fast, responsive way to state position and fast track cos PR during crisis”
• Stephen Denny (@Note_To_CMO) “Social media gives a crisis a human face with immediacy. A 1 to 1 opp to have a dialog in the midst of the noise”
• Heidi Cool (@hacool) “SM also lets biz speak directly to customers/public not just to (and through) media”
• Mitchell Schecter (@MSchecter) “As a brand, I think it can help to tell your side of the story if you are already there and have a relationship.”
• Patrick Prothe (@pprothe) “SM offers immediacy of response, but it also requires one to stay on top of it; you must engage or others will take the floor”

These seemed to really resonate based on the number of retweets and comments that went back and forth. Amy Fowler (@amyfowler) added this caution, “Social media spreads crisis info like wildfire — but in “telephone game” way. What’s being spread isn’t necessarily true. But fortunately, you can monitor all those “telephone game” messages and respond, instead of just wondering.” Go Media Center (@goprotools) added “SM is having a conversation with the consumer not at the consumer…two way conversation! Listening is required”

With the frequency of messages focusing on relevancy of messages and listening to consumers, it seemed to make sense to ask the next discusssion question. What can you do while you evaluate the situation? Responding with too little information or from an angle that leaves people feeling unheard or disrespected tends to provide fuel for a difficult siuation to get magnified. So responding properly is important but frequently information is needed to make the best choices. Brown recommended that you “Be open as to what you’re doing (as far as you can legally) and show progress all the way through” Not being sure if he was referring to a specific area of legality, I asked him to elaborate. He reminded us that there may be “people’s privacy and livelihoods” as well as intellectual property issues.

This was echoed by others in the chat:

• Caroline Di Diego (@CASUDI) “listen first. understand second. respond third”
• Meg Fowler “Monitor key voices, gauge tone, check where messages spread fastest, and then start there.”
• Laura Crum (@LauraLCrum) “A2 – don’t stop communicating. traditionally it’s looking down upon to be weak, to be wrong, but SM should be more open”
• Heidi Cool “1st thing is to publicly state you are evaluating the situation. Keep folks updated step by step. “
• Amber Cleveland “Let people know you are assessing, that you are trying to get to the bottom of a given situation (then figure it out FAST)
• Deb Morello (@debmorello) “Ah, listen, listen, communicate internally – Respond, listen again, respond again. Repeat”

Danny Brown summed up this way, “I’d rather be dealing with a company that screws up but acknowledges and talks to me where I am (where poss) and collaborate with the key “complainers” and work with them, their audience, to work and resolve.”  

Some of the tweets were starting to trend towards what is happening internally within the company with the crisis. Kristin Judd (@kwjudd) noted, “Co’s seem to feel it’s not okay to say, ‘We don’t know but we’re committed to finding the answer.’ ” A sub-question of the second discussion question sought to illuminate what’s going on. What are the beliefs/thinking hazards when your company when your company experiences a crisis?

• Amber Cleveland “1 limiting belief is that in an emergency everyone needs to be running around screaming. Focus and calm are key.”
• Stephen Denny “Co’s need more than acknowledgement of crisis. Need to provide movement, accountability + commitment to fixing”
• Heidi Cool “A2 – make sure to involve more than top execs in response strat. cust svc., sales and others may have better feel for audience
• Cathy Larkin PR (@CathyWebSavvyPR) “Q2a - beliefs/hazards – If co gets to defensive, “lawyers up” too early = equals suspicion from other side”

It seems that it is important to not let emotions run your decision making and send out the wrong message. This goes for non-profits as much as for-profits. Cathy Larkin tweeted an interesting situation she was involved with when she worked for a non-profit. Also, keeping flexibility in the plan makes a difference as well. Crises don’t really lend themselves to cookie-cutter responses so listening to your market audience helps you engage them in a conversation that leads to solutions.

It’s a given that companies don’t always get it right when interacting publicly during a PR crisis. How do you recover from a botched reaction? Danny Brown advised, “First, allay fears that you are taking seriously and looking into it, and if it *is* your fault, own up”

There were a lot of tweets that suggested that a botched reaction could be salvaged:

• Stephen Denny “The public has the attention of a fruit fly. If your 1st response is wrong, make your 2nd and 3rd right. Learn from it”
• Meg Fowler “You admit your mistake to  the depth of your mistake. Don’t self flagellate on your customer’s behalf”
• Patrick Prothe “RE: Q3 – apologize, admit the botch & move on-helpfully, authentically. But never w/ more spin. The cover up=what gets you”

At the end of the chat, Brown reminded us that we can ”…feel safe that in knowledge that you’re not first, you won’t be last. See how others dealt and act accordingly.” Taking the time to review the process after the crisis has passed seems like a practice that would make sense. If you’re interested in being in business for a long while, you’re bound to encounter a crisis. It could be small or large. The question is, how do you want to handle it?

How do you answer the discusssion questions?

What would you do if an A-lister blogger or media person talks about your situation?

Did you know there is an economic recovery happening all over the world? It’s hard to tell some days. As I wrote in Who Are You Supposed to Believe? perception is created by biases in our thinking. This is not a matter of being right or wrong. It really is a matter of managing how you make decisions and act on your perceptions.

We act on our beliefs all the time. We have certain lenses with which we see the world. With all of the stories about the national and global economies, it seemed natural (my perception, of course) to take the topic to the #kaizenblog folks. You can read the transcript Transcript for #kaizenblog – PerceptionKeepingYouFromEconRecovery

With Henry Ford lurking in the back of our minds (thanks to my friend, John), Valeria Maltoni(founder and co-host of the Twitter chat #kaizenblog) and I opened the conversation with the first question, Do you look at the economic indicators? There were mixed answers to this question with a “yes but” kind of reaction. It seems that most people look at the economic indicators but there were references to how there has been so much contradicting reports and analyses as well as they don’t fit the size of the business or they were just too crazy-making. Stephen Denny (@Note_To_CMO) added a dose of humour to this when he tweeted, “No. Like talking to my mother, looking at econ indicators is only something you do once in a while for sanity’s sake.” Meg Fowler (@megfowler) added this bit of wisdom ( which sounds really good advice for those who have to keep track of the economic indicators as part of their work), “You can be AWARE of something without being controlled by it. Knowledge is power.”

It seemed to make sense to go a little further with this question as our participants are all over the business spectrum from small businesses all the way up to major corporations. Are big companies more susceptible to economic shifts vs small business? Does it affect you? It seemed likely that our perceptions could be more influenced by our environment.

• John Reddish (@GetResults) “Broad indicators are not always applicable to sm biz – niches, locales, often perform differently”
• Stephen Denny “Yes, big co’s (by virtue of big-ness) feel macro trends broadly. Small co’s affected by local/niche”
• Media Collective (@MediaCollective) “Typically sm businesses are more nimble and can adjust more quickly to market”

It certainly seemed logical that variables such as niches, locales, and size matter in how our businesses are affected by the economy as a whole. Tom Asacker (@tomasacker) brought in the importance of the taking a holistic perspective when he tweeted, “Macroeconomic trends important as they relate to cultural trends and subsequent market decision-making.” However, it was interesting to see how #kaizenblog participants returned to the theme of how perceptions affect performance.

• Frederique Murphy (@IrishSmiley) “whether big or small, we control our own actions and results, so it really does affect us all in some way”
• Cathy Larkin PR (@CathyWebSavvyPR) “For solopreneurs – econ indicators are too Macro.They seem true when biz pickup/slows down”
• Meg Fowler “If you regularly use the economy as an excuse, you’re looking for limits more than opportunities.”

With perception, performance, and the acknowledgement that different businesses are responding to the economic recovery in a number of ways, it was time to parse apart how corporations versus small businesses are focusing their attention. Some say focus on your business versus the national financial news. Wise or unwise?

• Mary Ann Halford (@MaryAnnHalford) “Focus must always be on your business – Nat’l economy is just a factor to respond to – not react to”
• ‘Bahadur’ Sridhar (@AntarYaami) “Wise would be to keep the focus on the biz but keep spare eye on nat’l financial info too.”
• Thomas Kuplic (@tbkuplic) “Sadly many hunker down and try to weather it. Hard to lean into wind in tough times.”
• Amber Cleveland (@ambercleveland) “Always focus on your assets/your biz source positively for them…”
• EJ Ellis (@EJEllisTweets) “Focus on your biz, but keep track of nat’l news. Can’t discount influence of econ news on others.”

A constant theme throughout the conversation was the idea of positive thinking. To bring it into the conversation more consciously, we asked, Do you find a positive outlook creates more opportunity? As Amy Blake (@BlakeGroup) pointed out with her example, bad economic times can come at any point. She explained, “1 of my worst days was when biggest client announced merger. Saw it in paper -no advanced info. Started looking for more clients!”

• Mary Ann Halford “A3 positive attitude always makes a difference – it’s not what happens to you but how you respond to it.”
• Stephen Denny “Pragmatic outlook improves opportunity. Always being open to alliances/opp’s/different structures helps”
• Lois Martin “A3 Positive attitude definitely helps you spot new opportunities, see things in perspective. You do not react, you RESPOND.”
• Tom Asacker “Positive outlook is fine, but need to experience pain WITH customers. Anger with status quo drives change/innovation.”
• John Sternal (@SternalPR) “A3 Also helps to surround yourself with positive ppl, which can open up critical opps.”
• John Reddish “Positive doesn’t mean Pollyanna!”

Frederique Murphy probably summed it up best, “Being positive/negative does not mean we don’t get negative things happening, but  it does mean we are taking charge.”

For our last question, we decided to find out what plans the #kaizenblog folks had. How are you planning the next 12 months? We got a variety of answers that included hiring or using coaches, accountability partners, diversification, focusing on customer experience, referrals, looking for what others may miss, networking, and staying flexible. As often happens in these conversations, there is so much good information and wisdom embedded in the chat that I can’t fit it all in the recap. There was a wonderful conversation about how sailing is a great metaphor for handling adversity as well as how managing your emotions is a valuable business tool.

Valeria Maltoni issued an interesting challenge towards the end of the conversation when she suggested we share examples of expansive thinking. What are your examples?

What are you planning for the next 12 months?

How can the #kaizenblog community help you?

The economic bad news seems to be piling on lately. Ben Bernanke says we have a long way to go and there is still anecdotal evidence that people are losing jobs. And yet…there is growth and the US economy is not in recession.

But it doesn’t feel that way as Dawn Rivers Baker explained in her analysis in Small Biz Trends. If you’re the owner of a small business who is looking for financing and can’t get it, your perception is that things are very hard indeed. If you are a business owner who had one big client who has either cut back or ceased to do business with you, your perception is that people are slow to spend their money. If you are in an industry less affected by the economic turmoil, your perception of the current business climate will be on the other end of the spectrum.

I asked on LinkedIn,

Would you describe the current small business climate as sluggish but positive, chaotic, or anxious?

There seem to be contradictory news reports, indicators, and advice as to how to lead and manage your small business through the recovery. How does this affect the business vision and how you plan to go forth in the last quarters of the year? Have you changed any goals? And…how do you maintain your morale so you don’t burn out?

 The answers were positive in nature, even enthusiastic. Ed Moloney responded:

To me it is simple. If the small business owner is looking at his or her business often from the outside in and asking for others to give their opinions to the best way to change things then I think the climate is good and opportunities are endless. I think people get caught up in the media or the negative of the government or the economy. They also focus to much on getting the work done and not enough on working on the buisness. The fact is most business owners are great at what they do IE accounting, car cleaning, cooking etc but may not be great business people. Fact is most business owners spend way way to little time prospecting for new business

Both Mike Welch and Gwen McCauley echoed the theme that small businesss owners have to work on their businesses. I’ve written about this in the past in many posts. Without taking time to keep track of the big picture of your business, how do see opportunities or keep your strategic plan fresh and timely?

 That’s what’s interesting about perception. Perception is created by our biases in our thinking. Our culture, gender, experience, and temperament contribute to how we see the world. Our perceptions feed our perspectives so we start seeing nuances in just how full or empty the proverbial glass is.

And these nuances in our perception are what makes it possible to weather bad and good times. Basically, we tell ourselves stories about our experiences. For example, if you perceive that your prospects are too reluctant to buy from you, you will change your behavior towards them. Maybe you’ll keep approaching them until you  become a spammer. Maybe you go through the motions but stop listening for when the person is leaning towards your product or service. Maybe you don’t even follow up with your prospects. The opposite perception could be that there are customers everywhere and they want to work with you. Your behavior will correspond to that perspective. When I asked a similar question on Facebook, Deb Carducci and Kate Hannisian both answered that they look at their customers to get information that will inform their perceptions.

Who should you believe? Your perceptions are important. It seems if you add an open attitude to gain additional information such as analyzing your action plan to see what can be improved or connecting with successful business owners, you are more likely to perceive what is possible.

How do you perceive the current small business climate?

Does keeping track of the big picture of your business keep you focused on how to maintain and/grow your business?

What strategies do you use to keep a positive perspective when facing adversity?

Join us for the Twitter chat #kaizenblog too discuss “Could Your Perception Keep You From Economic Recovery?” on Friday, August 6, 2010 at 12pm ET/5pm BST/9am PT

One of the great things about co-hosting #kaizenblog is how much I get to learn! This week’s Twitter chat was no different! What do you think about branding for your business? Can you say if your brand is self-defining? Stephen Dennywas our guest host for this week. He had written an intriguing post about Eigen Values and branding, “This Sentence has 5ive Words”. According to Denny, Eigen Values are “a concept from the field of cybernetics that describes a thing that is self-defining.” In fact, Eigen is a German word for innate.

This has relevance for business as well. Denny explained in his post that “Eigen Values are what we, as businesspeople, do when we’re doing our best work.  We produce work that is synonymous with our brand values, our mission and our strategy. Always. In everything we do.” But how do we share that with our customers or even the world? And is this beneficial?

So we asked the #kaizenblog folks to explore “Make Your Brand Self-Defining.” There were a lot of interesting ideas exchanged during the conversation so it’s a good idea to check out theTranscript for #kaizenblog – SelfDefiningBrand_! Also throughout the chat, people offered examples of brands the do and do not self-define like Apple, Southwest Airlines, 3M, and many others.

How does creating a self-defining truism help/hurt your brand’s process of creating outputs? Stephen Denny began the conversation by explaining, “Self-defining outputs-websites, logos, etc.-that are absolutely unique/like fngerprint solidify a brand’s ID.”

• Caroline Di Diego (@CASUDI) “A self-defining truism like logo/slogan can help distinguish your brand from all others ~ like biometrics”
• John Reddish (@GetResults) “the more effort committed to brand clarity thru self-defining stmts the easier 2 remember brand’s central focus”
• Joe Sanchez (@sanchezjb) “Self-defining ‘truisms’ communicated externally, will be judged on authenticity and consistency. That can help/hurt”
• Eric Tsai (@designdamage) “branding=communication & meaning of ur communication is the response u get, visuals r subjective, words/actions mean more.”
• Chris Fife (@chrisfife) “With different medium limitations, selfdefining gets tricky. Like personalized license plates/handles are often misunderstood.”

Stephen Denny reminded us that “Truth is, we’re (as consumers) very busy. We don’t care much abt “brands” So consistency/Eigen behaviors R critical.”

There are often side threads that deepen the conversation about a topic. This follow up post by Stephen Denny picked up some interesting thoughts, ”Three Keys On Creating Self-Defining Brands-Kaizenblog, Eigen Values, + the Crucible of Public Debate”       

To make this conversation clearer, it seemed that examples would help. Which brands are so consistent that their stuff is identifiable even when you don’t know it’s theirs? Apple came up several times as was previously mentioned. Other brands that were mentioned were Tiffany’s, Target, Rolex, Starbucks, Mercedes, BMW, Google, and Beano.  On the other hand, Lois Martin (@LoisMarketing) and John Reddish noted that brands like Xerox and Kleenex have lost their ability to be identified in a unique way because we use the brand names as a generic reference to like products.

When is it okay to break away from from your core brand elements? This seems to be a process that has to be thought out as it can disconnect companies from their markets. There were a lot of thoughts about whether breaking away was a productive or destructive act for your brand.

• Amy Blake (@BlakeGroup) “Q3 Must have dedicated users, huge branding identity. Your brand is like “seal of approval” when extend products/services”
• Mary Ann Halford (@MaryAnnHalford) “Innovation and market changes make it ok to break away – e.g. IBM from mainframe to enterprise solutions”
• Tamsen McMahon (@tamadear) “A3: When what you are or what you do is no longer relevant. A good brand is an evolving brand.”
• Chris Houchens (@shotgunconcepts) “When you break away from core brand elements, you have broke the brand.”
• John Reddish “Launching new brand is often function of perceived market permissions – if + =brand extension, if – =new brand”
• Tom Asacker @tomasacker) “Brands are evolving, living ideas that add meaning and value to people’s lives. Nokia started in boots, paper.”
• Sametz (@Sametz) “Core elements aren’t a  brand prison. They are a brand foundation. You can pretty much build anything on a solid foundation.”

It was clear that everyone agreed that a brand reflected the organization. Becoming self-defining depends on interaction with one’s target market so you are distinguished from others like you. Your Eigen value depends on what happens internally as much as how you interact with the customer. Disconnects can happen with how you provide customer service as well as when you break away from your core brand elements. Stronger brands are consistent with their Eigen values because you know what you get when you interact with the business from pre-purchase to customer support.

Where can you make your Eigen Value stronger in your organization?

If your brand is really defined by you and your customers, how is your organization identifiable?

What’s your opinion about breaking away from your core brand elements?

iStockphoto VCTStyle

Failure is such a loaded experience and usually very negative.  However, we all make mistakes and they have varying repercussions on our businesses. But could you ignore failure?

We had the pleasure of welcoming our guest host, Taylor Davidson (@tdavidson) to this week’s #kaizenblog Twitter chat,  “Ignore Failure At Your Own Peril”. My co-host, Valeria Maltoni (@ConversationAge) and I got curious about some of Taylor’s ideas about failure and how to learn from it. Taylor set the stage for this conversation with his framing post, “Ignore Failure At Your Own Peril” with the premise that the “seeds of success” lie in the experience of failure.

(Here is the Transcript for #kaizenblog – Failure)

So, we started in with the first question, What are the temptations of ignoring failure?

• Stephen Denny (@Note_To_CMO) answered, “Invidious comparison. Ego. We want to win, be perceived as winners by others.”
• Caroline Di Diego (@CASUDI) was succinct, “~FEAR OF PAIN”
• Jeff Gibbard )@jgibbard) observed, “I think we are conditioned to fear failure vs embrace it.”
• Meg Fowler (@megfowler) added, “If you ignore failure, you rob yourself of the refinement process essential to success.”

Following these answers about the temptations, everyone started to describe what accompanies failure in business. Laura Crum (@LauraLCrum) observed that, in business, failure is often not really examined due to a “competitive market and a less than nurturing environment.” On the other hand, Stephen Denny reminded us that “learning from failure requires detachment – separate failure from ego/person. Other inputs helpful, too.” This theme was picked up by others and yet, Marc Meyer (@Marc_Meyer) seemed to add a cautionary tone that “there is ‘failure’ and then there is ‘failure’ -To me, 2 entirely different things. But both should be motivators.” Could there be distinctions between one failure and another?

It is hard to shake off failure. And culture can play a part in this as well. A more interesting question was whether or not  to even use the word, failure. Some tweets suggesting finding other words with less intense nuances to describe failure. Taylor shared a link with us, “The Failure of Failure” Different types of failure seemed to bring different levels of avoidance. How did this experience get verboten in business (at least in the U.S.)? Inventors fail constantly. Scientists experience it on a regular basis when their researdch yields any result other than the one desired.  Maybe Eric Fulwiler (@EFulwiler) has something when he commented, “[e]xcept failure denotes a loss of some kind. You can mitigate losses and take away positives, but still loss…” Are we training ourselves to avoid feeling loss?

But whether we feel loss or fear of how others may view us, there are times when things just go badly. How do you know when a project is going bad and  is unsalvageable? While Stephen Denny reminded us that we use our judgement based on data to end a bad project, Sian Phillips (@whatswhat_sian) considered, “I don’t think that it can be universally answerable. Each project/job is different. But you should know when it is going bad.” Meg Fowler added, “A2: there are different failure metrics for different actions/projects –no one way to know when things have gone awry.” Eric Tsai (@designdamage) boiled it down to “when all indicators pointing to a lack of motivation/ROI, dots not connecting, people stop caring.”

Towards the end, a theme emerged about listening to your gut. Could this be an opening for self-doubt, as Taylor observed? While this is possible, we’ve talked about doubt being useful on #kaizenblog. It was fascinating that there wasn’t any specific consensus about how much gut or even if using your gut was a good practice.

• Laura Crum “I think gut is probably built from observations we lack the vocabulary to define.”
• Joe Crockett (@JoeCrockett) “You can’t just rely on your gut. Relying on your gut says that you’ve abdicated URself from objective data and reasoning.”
• Alfonso Guerra @Huperniketes) ” ‘Gut’ is the internalization of both metrics and the indicators of our environment.”

So maybe our gut reactions and instincts could be  biases in our thinking or acts of arrogance but they do also provide us with a consciousness that something is present. In failure, it could be an inkling of a solution or it could the beginnings of how understand not to repeat bad decisions.

Overall, it seemed that ignoring failure is perilous for businesses but that doesn’t mean that it won’t happen anyway. The experience of failure challenges us to examine our organizational and personal systems which could reveal us in a negative light. If we are surrounded by messages that failure is not allowed, we are likely to repeat previous misjudgements and mistakes. Is the cost worth it? Would acknowledging failure and keeping the review process focused on the actions rather than the character of the person make a difference? This chat seemed to leave us with more questions than answers so please add your comments.

 How dangerous is it to ignore failure?

 Is failure just too loaded for businesses to use it productively? 

Influence is an interesting thing. You can shape behavior when you make a recommendation. In some places, age gave one influence. Sometimes social status (financial and/or class) bestowed A automatic must-listen environment.  A carefully built reputation of solid results could give you a megaphone. I still remember the old E. F. Hutton ad, “When E.F . Hutton talks, people listen.”

The effect social media has had on how one builds and maintains influence is simply tremendous. Small to big businesses are trying to figure out how to get influencea and how to use it. So, influence is greatly sought after and is probably one of the least understood aspects of how one is perceived online. We try to measure our influence by the numbers of followers (or friends or connections) or with sites like Klout. But is this it? Does this define all of our influence?

Influence has been a topic of recent conversation due to events like Fast Company “The Influencer Project”. Between Valeria Maltoni (@ConversationAge as well as founder and co-host of #kaizenblog) and myself, we have read a number of posts about influence. I guess you could say we’re influenced by our friends and colleagues as we read a lot of different blogs. For framing posts, Valeria wrote “Connecting With Real Influence” and “Like It Or Not, You Want Influence”. When I tweeted an invitation to my friend, Danny (@DannyBrown) to chime in on this topic, he pointed me towards a post by Susan Murphy (@SuzeMuse) which really fit into our theme like a glove, “Why Are We So Hung Up On Influence?” We did notice that this was a topic people had a lot of thoughts and opinions about as we had 627 tweets and 81 contributors by the end of the conversation. Here is the transcript: Transcript for #kaizenblog – Influence

With the stage set, we began talking about “What Defines Influence in Business” in our latest #kaizenblog chat with our first question, What is deeper purpose of influence? While there were some answers, there were also a lot of questions that referenced popularity, targeting an audience, and how our numbers do play a role.

• Sean Williams (@CommAMMO) “Q1 Influence is the ability to gain a hearing for your perspectives, when then changes someone’s thinking or actions.”
• Stephen Denny (@Note_To_CMO) “A1 Deeper purpose of influence? Compliance? (Cynical?)  We want influence so we can direct the actions of others?”
• Caroline Di Diego (@CASUDI) “A1 Influence bringing about action cos people are inspired to do it ~ (not forced to)”
• WDYWFT (@WDYWFT) “So hopefully it’s compliance and significance.”
• Joel Foner (@JoelFoner) “Q1-”So what is the deeper purpose of influence?” | Many mention actions. Influence key results  changes opinions and beliefs too.”
• Scott McWilliams (@macengr) “Deeper purpose varies according to the individual and goal of same. Could be good or bad.”

There was some back and forth between several participants about whether or not influence is limited to changing beliefs and opinions or includes action. By the end of this thread, there seemed to be agreement that changing how someone thinks about something could lead to action or inaction, depending on the message. Alfonso Guerra (@huperniketes) reminded us of that the “Whuffie Factor discusses the importance of influence in social capital, how to earn it and spend it.” This certainly would play a role in how effective an influencer might be to inspire action or refrain from action.

I also posed the question if influence could be more than something used for marketing. Diane Court (@dc2fla) suggested mentoring and it was pointed out that there are people in our immediate circcle that we influence and are influenced by (e.g. parents).

There was also a fascinating theme about popularity and influence. Are they synonymous? Does being popular lead to greater influence? This discussion threaded its way throughout the entire chat. There seemed to be some who outright rejected popularity as having any part in influence. Others didn’t completely reject influence. As John Reddish (@GetResults) pointed out, “Celebrity and/or popularity does impact influence, in varying degrees & among different groups – it’s selective.” However two names came up as effective influencers in their spheres, Ashton Kutcher and Oprah Winfrey. But…aren’t influencers effective in their particular spheres? Joe Crockett (@JoeCrockett) tweeted, “But if you put popularity and influential together in 1 spot you have a powerhouse”

So, we returned to the discussion of influence and business with our next discussion question, What is the bridge between your business vision and becoming an influencer?

Tom Asacker (@tomasacker) pointed out that “influence more subtle process today. Experts disagree, so people don’t trust experts.” If the process is more subtle, that could make things very challenging for accepted influencers to maintain their positions while up and coming influencers may find a skeptical crowd saying, “show me.” What does it mean to be an expert now? Do you need different strategies to create a critical mass so people start to talk about your core message? Stephen Denny offered Jim Koch of the Boston Beer Company as an example, “Bridge between biz vision and influence. Jim Koch/Boston Beer Co. ‘Want to change how American public thinks of beer.’ “

Other thoughts about the bridge between one’s business vision and becoming an influencer:

• Amber Cleveland (@ambercleveland) “Q2 The bridge between business vision and becoming an influencer is the mission of the biz and the vision of leadership.”
• Caroline Di Diego “Doing excellently or in our design business ~ one of a kind design/leader/influencer of new”
• Alfonso Guerra “Building on your relationships, inspiring confidence in your values and decision, building trust”

For the #kaizenblog participants, ethics and mission seemed to be important to influence whether the mission was to change how American public thinks about beer or some great humanitarian cause. Influence is less about ego and more about urging minds to change and actions to follow. Meg Fowler (@megfowler) cautioned, “many think influence=a lot of people paying attention…but trainwrecks attract attention too.”

Finally, we ended the conversation with this question, What has worked for you to build influence?

• Scott Williams “Developing personal relationships (trust is key) and demonstrating competence”
• Marketwire (@marketwire) “To build influence=provide interesting, relevant content, be authentic, build relationships first’
• Stephen Denny “What has worked for me to build influence? Building relationships, 1 at a time.”
• Tom Asacker “Passion and other focus at the expense of self”
• Derek Edmond (@derekedmond) “Demonstrate expertise and successes while being available to help, coach, and/or provide assistance”
• Diane Court “Worked for me? learning from being a parent – learning to listen to my children (seriously)”

It’s clear that relationships are important. It would have been interesting to learn why relationships build influence specifically but we ran out of time. Knowing your specialty fully seemed to also add credence to messages you send out to your audience/customer base.

This is one of those chats that had so many interesting side threads that it would be well worth your time to read through the transcript.

How would you have answered the discussion questions?

What is specifically important about building relationships that adds to one’s influence?

Have you ever thought about coincidences? It would seem that they are around us all of the time. You’re thinking of someone and they call you or you were wondering about a particular topic and you discover an article about that very same topic. So, what is this anyway?

As a basis for conversation, we used Creating Coincidence, a post by Gavin Heaton (@servantofchaos) which described the story of how a letting go of a balloon with a note introduced two girls named Laura Buxton to one another and how details of a story are included and excluded to create a pattern of information which we call coincidence. A little background scientific information for you…the human brain is wired to seek out patterns, causality, and correlations. So, even if there is no actual relationship between two events, we create a story of coincidence. (Of course, there are times when humans do come up with some wacky stories to explain things that happen to them.)

Diane Court (@dc2fla) contributed to the conversation by sharing an article, Enterprise 2.0: Infrastructure for Synchronicity written by Paula Thornton (@rotkapchen). How does Jung’s idea of synchronicity add to the discussion of coincidence and is there a place for all of this in business?

You can find the whole transcript for the chat-Transcript for #kaizenblog – Coincidence in Business

People seemed very engaged with this topic as the conversation started within seconds of people joining the chat when Bruno Coelho (@bcoelho2000) remarked, “I believe the best way to create Coincidence in Business is to plan for it.” Dana Meyer (@QuantFun) gave his summation with “Creating Coincidence=Collaboration +lots of INCIDENTS=try stuff+share stuff”

So with those articles in the background and people anticipating where this conversation would be going, we started with the first question. Are we co-creating the stories we think are coincidences. If yes, why? If no, what instead?

Not sure if it was a genuine coincidence or not but stories were brought up it in the first few minutes of the chat before I asked the question.

• John Reddish (@GetResults) gave his answer to the overall topic question- “From framing doc-All storytelling-campfire, marketing, branding – are episodic – designed to sell – yes you can create it!”
• Stephen Denny (@Note_To_CMO) “Interesting reading abt brain science why we gravitate towards stories. We shut down our motor systems + believe what we see.”

After I asked the first question, people just jumped right in with how stories do correlate with the phenomenom of coincidence.

• Stephen Denny- “Q1 When we “consume” stories, we know we dont have to act, makes us open. Yes, we help it along + fill in gaps”
• Tom Asacker (@tomasacker)- “In ‘How Pleasure Works,’ Bloom writes: ‘What matters most is not the world as it appears to our senses.’ “
• John Reddish- “Every branding initiative should reinforce “good stories” & coincidence among aspects so market can accept”

These tweets seemed to reflect Heaton’s point that we screen out information that doesn’t fit the pattern we consider a coincidence. There may very well be a way to manipulate the experience of coincidence since we are more likely to believe our perceptions.

The concept of synchronicity was woven into the conversation at this point.

• Rayna Fagen (@RaynaNyc)- “Seeing coincidences means u r present in those moments.”
• John Reddish- “synchronicity (particularly Yungian) is more “universe” intentional, conveyed coincidence more a creation.”
• Kay Whitaker (@KayWhitaker)- “We are absolutely co-creating these stories with our intentions.”
• Diane Court- “…synchronicity shares qualities w/ so-called coincidence.”

Overall, it seems that coincidence and synchronicity were not entirely exclusive of one another in this chat.

The idea of intention continued to pop up in other tweets. While it was not always framed as such, the idea of a focused idea and plan seemed to our participants to lead to fortunate coincidences.

• Andrew Mueller (@andrewmueller)- “Recently heard Philip Kahn Speak (borland) say he was very lucky..’the harder he works, the more luck he has.’ ” In fact, Andrew Mueller seemed to sum up this part of the chat when he tweeted, “hard work focuses energy and puts one on a path when unexpected connections happen.”

With the general stage set, it was time to get specific with how one might create specific coincidences in business. Are there consequences for this?  If we focus on marketing, what consequences are possible when creating coincidences?

• Rayna Fagen- “I believe behavioral targeting falls into that ‘Marketing manipulated coincidence.’ “
• Dana Meyer- “Coincidence breeds familiarity = stronger brain connections = more top-of-mind. Good gets better.”
• Bruno Coehlo- “A coincidence occurs when the unexpected happens. In Marketing this happens if you let your customers experience your product”
• Stephen Denny- “Comes down to letting your customers see themselves in your branding/experience. Let them fill in their own gaps.”
• Amber Cleveland (@ambercleveland)- “Specifically related to Twitter, sharing that really takes hold on subconscious level, that can result in biz relationships.”

For the most part, it seems that coincidence is in the eye of the customer. There seemed to be responses that were mainly positive but some tweets seemed to reflect some uneasiness with manipulating customers.

So, to see if coincidence plays a part in another aspect of business, there was a sub-question, Where is coincidence in strategic planning?

• Andrew Mueller- “It doesn’t exist. it is perception every connection is manipulated by your every action.”
• Bruno Coehl0- “Coincidence in strategic planning when you’re designing your dream Customer Experience.”

There seemed to be a lot of passion about marketing, coincidence, storytelling, and customer experience. This is worth looking at in the transcript!

We came to the final question for this chat, What role does synchronicity play in coincidence?

• Dana Meyer- “dictionary: coincidence almost = synchronicity. Synchronicity is time-focused; coincidence can be pattern match”

So, maybe there isn’t a role for synchroncity in coincidence as they seem to be very different experiences. And did we determine that you can create coincidence in business? It seems that the answer is yes. There is the role of planning with intention and taking action. This appears to lead to opportunities that might be experienced as coincidences. As for marketing, there seems to be ways to tell stories that encourage customers to view how they experience our products and services as coincidences.