Been thinking about getting a VA for awhile. I recently read this article and obviously some of the four hour workweek stuff. But, I’m getting close to the tipping point.
Top contenders:
I’m wondering if any of you have experience or advice?
Practice is the main determinant of success in a particular field.
[ via Scott Adams - The Illusion of Winning ]
Most people I’ve read or listened to recently discussing game mechanics focus on the value of incremental rewards, but I actually believe the correlation between the value of gaming and being “good at life” has more to do with permission (even expectation) for structured failure.
Unfortunately, outside of trying to pwn n00bs or launching a startup, your average person has almost no opportunity to iterate through structured failure. We love games, because that is one of the few experiences where we can practice the next step after failure.
I’m wondering if you could describe one of your core daily functions, and how you might be able to practice failing better to improve – aka “level in life”?
Think about the fact that with this change, there is no reason you couldn’t promote content, videos and contests to LinkedIn’s audience even if you have a relatively small number of followers. Going viral on LinkedIn may provide more long-term business benefit than the short-term page view lifts we see with other channels.
[ via Going viral on LinkedIn – Freesource Agent ]
Uggh.
Personally, I am looking forward to people developing an immune response to virus’ as soon as possible, so everyone can stop trying to infect customers with a tendency to click, and instead provide customers with a reason to love.
photo (cc) by Volker Brinkmann
You probably already know that I am a huge proponent of lean startup and customer development theory and tactics. One of the main reasons I hung up my consultant hat and took this job at Zappos, was to explore practicing customer development in a big company. We still act like a startup sometimes, but after 11 years, 2000+ employees, and a good “exit” (aka next chapter), I think it is safe to say we are more like a big company than a startup.
I can’t wait to share more about what I am learning about applying customer development in a big company, but lets just say I’m happy to be too busy doing it to talk about it. Fortunately, the godfather has some thoughts to share about Solving the Innovator’s Dilemma – Customer Development in a Big Company. (No, really, go read that now.)
“The single biggest reason companies fail, is that they overinvest in what is, as opposed to what might be.”
[ via Gary Hamel ]
The best part for me is, rather than fighting the organization, I’m surfing the culture of my organization. My CEO just sent this article out to the management list:
[Big companies fail] not necessarily because they didn’t see the coming innovations, but because they failed to adequately invest in those innovations. To avoid this problem, the people who control large pools of capital need to act more like venture capitalists, and less like corporate finance departments. They need to make lots of bets, not just a few big ones, and they need to be willing to cut their losses.
[ via The End of Management - WSJ.com ]
thinking about core values on 12seconds.tv
Reading through an interesting conversation where people are talking about discovering their core values. The answers they are coming up with are all very grand and noble.
Which has me thinking two things:
So, why do so many businesses and organizations aim at the least common denominator, rather than aiming for ideals? If people want to be part of something so much bigger, and want to do it for much more compelling reasons, why not give them the opportunity?
I am fortunate enough to work for a company that has a great culture. But, plenty of my friends and colleagues battle the long slow death of a painful relationship with their workplace. The longer I’ve been at Zappos, the more unbelievable their stories have become.
Meanwhile, more and more research is released every day that points to the benefits of providing great benefits to your employees, and taking time to cultivate a great company culture.
Imagine that, happy employees are good for business.
Netflix provides one of my most recent favorites stories in this space:
So if you think people in your organization are predisposed to rip you off, maybe the solution isn’t to build a tighter, more punitive set of rules. Maybe the answer is to hire new people.
To paraphrase one Netflix executive, the company doesn’t have a clothing policy either. But – so far at least – nobody has shown up to work naked.
But for me, the question at the core of all of this that I am most interested in is, WHY WOULD YOU HIRE SOMEONE YOU DON’T TRUST?!?
update: You should probably also read Startup Culture Lessons from Mad Men by Brian Halligan of HubSpot.
I really enjoyed Karen McGrane‘s talk (embedded below). Some of my favorites:
Karen McGrane on Web Content Strategy or “Avoiding the Eleventh hour Sh*tstorm Problem” from UX Melbourne on Vimeo.
There’s no way to guarantee success with a Twitter campaign, but you can stack the odds in your favor by following some simple tips to vastly increase your effectiveness. Here’s how to get the most bang for your tweet…
[ via 5 Secrets of Highly Effective Twitter Users ]
You can go read their suggestions. (I might add, “6. If you write articles about twitter, include a link to your twitter account.” But, that is just me. I’m sure Inc. didn’t give Minda Zetlin a say in the matter.)
Personally, I’d stick with:
And a bonus biased comment: twitter is social, social is relationships, if you need a strategy to your relationships something is broken.
Chris has got me pondering what an attention graph would look like, after reading his thoughts about Internet, Social, Interest, Taste, Financial Trust, Local, and Endorsement graphs.
Maybe, in an attention graph, the nodes are attention sources, and relations are time? But then, the relations would have to be measured in a zero-sum game?
I’m still just thinking out loud here, so I’d love someone smarter than me to help out in the comments.