Partner Up to Create Media-Attracting First-Evers

Meetup and GE’s 

partnership startled many people who wrote about it yet the companies had a sweet spot of mutual benefit. They both serve people who care about clean technology. So joining forces to launch a crowdsourcing contest for best ideas for a smart grid made sense.

Each company has a different “personality” and could reach people in different ways. One was a global corporation (that will reward winners) and the other is a small, young company that enables face-to-face gatherings - many of them centered on outdoor and environmental interests.

There’s something innately interesting to reporters about big/small company partnerships as American Express confirmed years ago when it co-created evening events (turned into ads and a coffee table book) at picturesque diners like San Francisco’s Fog City Diner.

As with the GE/Meetup partnership, a global corporation, American Express, benefitted from the colorful, credible “faces” of smaller, local partners. Plus American Express also became a part of in-person experiences while paying the tab that the smaller partners could not afford – generating more visibility for the credit card firm and for the popular local bistros than any of them could have in a “solo” promotion.

See the movie, Waiting for Superman, in L.A. or N.Y. and get a $15 voucher fromDonorsChoose to give to a classroom of your choice. The movie producers, Participant Media and the online donation portal have an overlapping “mutual market” – people who want to improve education.

Via this campaign the backers of the movie motivate more people to see and talk about the movie while the non-profit gets introduced to a fresh audience of donors, many of whom may stay involved.

This campaign provides a clear, specific and time-limited reason for parents and school administrators and teachers to talk about it to secure money for a classroom.

Want a way to stand out from your competition? Like to attract more “customers” and resources without spending more?Whether you run a business, non-profit or even a government agency you can generate more value for those you serve and more visibility to attract more “customers”, credibility and support. How? By forging partnerships with those who serve the same kind of people as you do.

By partnering with the home value estimater Zillow, Mint, the popular online banking system can offer clients a broader picture of their financial situation so they can make smarter deicisons. Via previous partnerships Mint enabled users to track their bank accounts, credit card spending and loan payments. Each time Mint solidifies its position as a one-stop and one-of-a-kind tool.

Partners benefit by gaining a warmed-up introduction to prospective customers.

What companies or organizations could you partner with to offer customers more value and to achieve a first-ever that reporters and bloggers like to cover?

Plus how can you make it more convenient for customers to use your product or service? Both Mint and Zillow, for example, make their service available via Android or iPhone.

Of course, while  technology makes many new kinds of partnerships possible – and makes the hiccups that happen morevisible too.

Holiday Inn is also partnering up on a trial run to give guests with smart phones more convenience. Guests with an iPhone, Android or Blackberry can use them as room keys, bypassing the front desk.

Is it worth the risk of boldly trying something new?

To create a first-ever with partners, enjoy the success and fix the hiccups?

You’ll know the answer if your stiffest competition launches one first - with some of the most valuable partners -  and you are stuck in a “me too” position.

News Flash: I know from many of the emails I get from readers here that many of you are adept, value-building partners.  You have an opportunity for others to discover your expertise, beginning later this Fall when I co-launch an online portal and community for sharing best ideas about partnering, crowdsourcing, mutual support groups, self-organized teams and other ways to collaborate to accomplish greater things with others than one can alone. I’ll be announcing that launch here.

Accomplishing greater things with others than one can alone

Kare speaks, writes and consults on quotability, storyboarding and collaboration – vital traits in this increasingly bottom-up, complex, connected world. See how much others accomplished in just an hour of phone coaching with Kare http://www.sayitbetter.com/coaching.php - or bring her to speak http://www.sayitbetter.com/meeting_planners.php This Emmy-winning former NBC and Wall Street Journal reporter is the author of Walk Your Talk and Resolving Conflict Sooner. Voted one of Top 5 speakers on Communication: http://speaking.com/top5/ Two of her blogs are featured on http://collaboration.alltop.com/ http://twitter.com/KareAnderson

http://listiki.com/best-list-of-collaborationrelated-sites-and-books/kareanderson

Posted via email from Kare Anderson on Coummunicating to Connect

When Caught Offguard

 

Wincing I glanced down. It hadn’t taken much to make that small blister appear in the hollow of my palm, that most tender of places on one’s hand. It’s my writing hand where a thin flap of skin now folded back. 

I’d just planted 30 daffodil bulbs in my garden but had neglected    to wear gloves. 

Suddenly I remembered a dinner party where the hostess brightly asked the man across the table from me, “How long have you been hunting for a job?” I saw him wince momentarily, then quickly attempt to cover it with a smile.  He made a fumbling reply then someone quickly changed the topic. 

But there is another way.

 • There will always be those who, unthinkingly or deliberately ask questions or make comments that cause us discomfort or worse.

• When someone hits one of your hot buttons or a current topic that you’d rather avoid it’s like creating that tiny blister in a tender place.

• Yet, unlike a blister, the memory takes a long time to heal, if ever.

• Worse yet, because our primitive brain is hard wired with a survival instinct (thank goodness!) we respond sooner, more intensely and longer to the negative things that happen to us than the positive.

• That effect has several emotional implications for strengthening our resilience – our capacity to stay open and connect well with others:

1. The more we dwell on how we feel about the bad things that happen to use, the deeper the rut in road of our brain so that anything that subsequently happens that looks at all like that earlier, bad experience, is likely to evoke a reactive response in us…. again.

1. While we can’t avoid thinking about difficult experiences we can choose to change the channel when we see something similar beginning to happen in a situation.

1. Advance preparation is vital. For example, if the man had thought of the brief, deflecting response he would chooseto make when others asked about his job search, he would be better able to respond in the heat of the moment. (With true friends, he can feel safe to share what is really going on.)

This advance verbal preparation is akin to wearing protective gloves, something I heedlessly choose not to do.

Don’t be surprised next time.   One can never be prepared for any situation yet one can contemplate what topics will cause most discomfort.  As Thedora Wells wrote in Keep Cool While Under Fire, “Don’t let somebody else determine your behavior.

There’s an added bonus.  Too often we presume that when somebody says or does something it means the same thing to them as it does to you. When I first went to northern Europe I realized that they did not smile as often nor as broadly as many Americans do. This sometimes caused consternation on both sides. As Americans would smile more broadly which made some of the people they encountered look away.

Research shows that people who are aware of their hot buttons and have practiced ways to not react against another person are more able to sense that person’s intentions and to behave in ways that connect rather than conflict with them.

That’s an easier way to live - and savor life.

Accomplishing greater things with others than one can alone

Kare speaks, writes and consults on quotability, storyboarding and collaboration – vital traits in this increasingly bottom-up, complex, connected world. See how much others accomplished in just an hour of phone coaching with Kare http://www.sayitbetter.com/coaching.php - or bring her to speak http://www.sayitbetter.com/meeting_planners.php This Emmy-winning former NBC and Wall Street Journal reporter is the author of Walk Your Talk and Resolving Conflict Sooner. Voted one of Top 5 speakers on Communication: http://speaking.com/top5/ Two of her blogs are featured on http://collaboration.alltop.com/ http://twitter.com/KareAnderson

http://listiki.com/best-list-of-collaborationrelated-sites-and-books/kareanderson

Posted via email from SayitBetter

Ways to Share That Benefit You and Others

One Saturday a friend who lives on Nob Hill in S.F.  drove a zipcar over to visit me in Sausalito. He was eager to tell me about his  trip to Istanbul, paid for by renting out his spare bedroom. Earlier that morning, via a freecycle posting, a stranger picked up some clay pots I’d set out by my garage so he could make a deck garden.

Our apparently different actions are, in fact, part of a trend that Roos Rogers and Rachel Botsman dub collaborative consumption in their book, What’s Mine is Yours.

Feeling pinched for money?  Hate waste? Want to get to know more of your neighbors?

These are just some of the reasons that might motivate you to discover fresh methods to save and to share that can also enrich your life – with others.

From bartering to exchanging, fixing, giving away, renting or more efficiently using what you have, this book is the most complete (and lively) resource I’ve found.  You’ll not only read about the better-known businesses and organizations that are tapping into “collaborative consumption” like zipcar and Meetup but many lesser-known groups and methods that you might join or reinvent to adapt to your situation or interest.

They write, “The collaboration at the heart of Collaborative Consumption may be local and face-to-face, or it may use the Internet to connect, combine, form groups, and find something or someone to create “many to many” peer-to-peerinteractions.  Simply put, people are sharing again with their community – be it an office, a neighborhood, an apartment building, a school, or a Facebook network. But the sharing and collaboration are happening in ways and at a scale never before possible, creating a culture and economy of What’s Mine is Yours.”

Collaborative Consumption appears in three “systems” suggest the authors, product service systems, redistribution markets and collaborative lifestyles.

The underlying principles that enable them are idling capacity, critical mass, belief in the commons and trust between strangers.

In keeping with a book on collaboration the authors seemingly productively co-wrote this book.  You can read about the factors in our relatively recent history that caused Americans to shop as a hobby, often beyond our mean or needs and throw away or store our extra stuff  (Americans average more than four credit cards per person while Europeans get by with 0.23 per person)– or you can jump to the many interesting characters, services, methods and stories in the rise of our collaborative consumption.

Some of my favorite stories are about business people who made dramatic changes on how they operated their business such as Ray Anderson who had a “conversion experience” after reading my friend Paul Hawken’s book, The Ecology of Commerce, and transformed his firm, “the world’s largest commercial carpet company” into “the first fully sustainable industrial enterprise.”  There are many fascinating back stories on how company founders backed into starting their business after personally seeing a need to reduce waste or save money – or others desire to share.

As someone who has had a long interest in collaboration I was delighted to learn how many more clever methods people are inventing to get along well on less, often through the use of collaborative technology.  For example, I’ve been a longtime fan and user of freecyle, Zipcar, Netflix and Zilok (and was building up the nerve to try CouchSurfing or Airbnb) yet I’d not heard of many of the others including Snapgoods,SwapTree, SmartBike, TechShop, HearPlanet, iLetYou, SolarCity, UsedCardboardBoxes or OurGoods.

Perhaps like me, you’ll finish this book convinced that sharing in all its forms is a major trend – and not just for the frugal or the greenies. Further you’ll have specific ideas about why and how to share, exchange, rent, swap or ensure that the things you no longer want get into the hands of those who do.

After you’ve read this book visit Shareable and see more stories to inspire you about how we are becoming more inventive about sharing the more we connect with each other about it.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from Kare Anderson on Coummunicating to Connect

Feel you flubbed the last speech you gave?

You’ll feel much better after watching Phil Davison’s emotional appeal for support.

His talk demonstrates that recommending the use of emotion is not sufficiently specific advice for a speaker. Also, having apparently apt credentials like a Masters in Communication, does not necessarily mean one has mastered the skill.

In the apparent absence of their use Davison demonstrates the vital need in preparing for a speech to:

1. Discern, ahead of time, what most matters to your audience.

1. Craft an outline for your talk with a main point, no more than three supportive points, segues between them – each supported by a few relevant and vivid facts or examples - and “bookending” the beginning and ending of your talk with the same point and a call for action.

1. Praise the audience and/or individuals in it for specific, positive actions or beliefs that reinforce the stands you are advocating.

1. Ensure that your metaphors and figures of speech are congruent and make sense.

1. Practice in front of one or more people who are familiar with your audience and who will give you intelligent, candid feedback

 At least Davison probably made Jan Brewer feel better. 

Here's two speaker friends who continue to provide valuable insights about how to connect with your audience, move them to act and make a positive difference in the world: Bert Decker and Nick Morgan.

One final thought. Even if you are not the president someone maybe recording your talk so don’t let something you pledge come back to bite you later. 

~ ~ ~ ~ See links at http://sayitbetter.typepad.com/say_it_better/2010/09/feel-you-flubbed-the-last-speech-you-gave.html

Accomplishing greater things with others than one can alone

Kare speaks, writes and consults on quotability, storyboarding and collaboration – vital traits in this increasingly bottom-up, complex, connected world. See how much others accomplished in just an hour of phone coaching with Kare http://www.sayitbetter.com/coaching.php - or bring her to speak http://www.sayitbetter.com/meeting_planners.php  This Emmy-winning former NBC and Wall Street Journal reporter is the author of Walk Your Talk and Resolving Conflict Sooner. Voted one of Top 5 speakers on Communication: http://speaking.com/top5/ Two of her blogs are featured on http://collaboration.alltop.com/ http://twitter.com/KareAnderson

http://listiki.com/best-list-of-collaborationrelated-sites-and-books/kareanderson

Posted via email from Kare Anderson on Coummunicating to Connect

Ten Books That Can Help You Collaborate

“The bottom-up world is to be the great theme of this century.” ~ 

Matt Ridley

Nobody can know everything, nor do everything well.

Yet you can know someone who does – or know somebody who knows somebody who does.

And that may be the secret to staying sought-after in this increasingly complex and connected world.

In fact, next to honing your top talent your most vital trait to strengthen is probably your capacity to collaborate – especially with those extremely  unlike you.  Seven of the ten trends in how we work involve being adept collaborators.

“Collaboration is the new competition.” ~ Pamela Slim and Michele Woodward

The next trick is understanding exactly how to connect so others want to collaborate with you. It starts with speaking to the sweet spot of mutual benefit.

“A radically different order of society based on open access, decentralized creativity, collaborative intelligence, and cheap and easy sharing is ascendant.” ~ David Bollier

For a project on which I am collaborating on with the remarkable Kris Schaeffer, ably assisted by Steven Toy (expect an announcement in December) here’s some books that helped me discover why and how to collaborate:

Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age by Clay Shirky,Collaboration: How Leaders Avoid the Traps, Create Unity and Reap Big Results by Morten T. Hansen,  Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives by Nicholas A. Christakis and James H. Fowler, The Culture of Collaboration by Evan Rosen, Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers, and Copycats are Hijacking the Global Economy by Moises Naim, The Power of Pull: How Small Moves, Smartly Made, Can Set Big Things in Motion by John Hagel III, John Seely Brown and Lang Davison, What’s Mine Is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption by Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers, TheFirefly Effect: Build Teams that Capture Creativity and Catapult Results by Kimberly Douglas, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable by Patrick Lencioni and Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams.

“Many ideas grow better when transplanted into another mind than in the one where they sprung up.” ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

See other books on collaboration that I recommend at Listiki and please add your favorites. After all its a collaborative list.  I also tweet about  examples of collaboration here.

“Collaborations are strengthened through appreciative relationships.  You know you’ve got it right when you find yourself in a relationship in which you are listened to, dream together, choose to contribute, act with support, and are positive.” ~ Ben Ziegler

Accomplishing greater things with others

than one can alone

Kare speaks, writes and consults on quotability, storyboarding and collaboration – vital traits in this increasingly bottom-up, complex, connected world. See how much others accomplished in just an hour of phone coaching with Kare http://www.sayitbetter.com/coaching.php - or bring her to speak http://www.sayitbetter.com/meeting_planners.php  This Emmy-winning former NBC and Wall Street Journal reporter is the author of Walk Your Talk and Resolving Conflict Sooner. Voted one of Top 5 speakers on Communication: http://speaking.com/top5/ Two of her blogs are featured on http://collaboration.alltop.com/ http://twitter.com/KareAnderson

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from Kare Anderson on Coummunicating to Connect

How Do You Become Genuinely Enthusiastic?

 

“Enthusiasm is not the same as just being excited. One gets excited about going on a roller coaster. One becomes enthusiastic about creating and building a roller coaster.“ ~ Bo Bennett 

Getting enthusiasm is a little like learning to breathe.

Nobody can tell you exactly how to do it, but without it you’re in big trouble. No one but you can discover that compelling purpose or exciting goal that ignites enthusiasm inside you, but you can    learn a great deal from noticing how others use it to get more done while savoring their life.

This is what I’ve learned from some real life experts on enthusiasm; what’s more, I’ve tested them in the laboratory of my own life.

 "It is faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes life worth living." ~ Oliver Wendall Holmes

1. Enthusiasm is born on the inside

In the daily grind of life you can lose touch with what really matters. There are so many routine decisions to make, so many challenges to be met, and so many burdens to carry, that you may get dispirited and act out an unbecoming side in yourself. However, as you connect with the enthusiasm planted deep within you, you’ll feel it begin to grow and grow. Soon, you’ll be back on track.

Hint: It’s not the first mile of a long and arduous journey that gets to you — you’re excited about getting started. And it’s not the last mile — you’re thrilled about getting there.

The miles that can drag you down are the long and tedious ones in the middle where you can’t see where you are coming from or where you are going.

“None are so old as those who have out-lived enthusiasm.”~ Henry David Thoreau

2. Enthusiasm grows when you focus on opportunities, solutions and allies -  not problems, circumstances and critics.

Life for you will always be as you choose to see it.  Focus your attention on the problems and circumstances that surround you, or keep your eyes on the solutions and opportunities.

I read a story that illustrates this approach. Several farmers in Pennsylvania were sitting in a café, complaining about the increasing cost of electricity and the unpleasant task of disposing of all the waste their cows generated.

But the Waybright brothers and their brother-in-law, who run the Mason Dixon Farms near the town where I went to college, Gettysburg, decided to quit complaining about all the manure the cows were generating, and to do some generating of their own — electricity.

They built a power generator that runs on methane gas produced from heated manure from the 2,000 cows. Generating much of their own power, they cut their annual electricity bill from $30,000 to $15,000.

As you might guess, most of the other farmers laughed at the project and called it “Waybright’s folly” (and other even less flattering names). They were satisfied to see their problems and to seek out their Congressmen to complain about their miserable circumstances.

But no one’s laughing anymore.

In fact farmers and agriculture ministers from around the world beat a path to the Mason Dixon farms. Soon the Waybright brothers were selling some of their excess power to their once jeering neighbors.

Enthusiasm — with all the good things that go with it — comes when you turn your eyes from the problem or circumstance and focus on the solution and opportunity. Cash can buy, but it takes enthusiasm to sell – or otherwise sway or collaborate.

“Enthusiasm is the yeast that raises the dough.” ~ Paul J. Meyer

3.  Enthusiasm thrives around positive people

Like smiling, enthusiasm is contagious. Worse yet, negativism and pessimism are far more contagious.  It is always easier to believe the worst than to hope for the best — especially if you are struggling against overwhelming odds.  It’s even worse when you’re tired, or have just suffered a severe setback.

Don’t waste your creative energies on people who are always putting you and your ideas down.  Seek out positive, competent individuals where you can give each other candid feedback – and a boost. Enthusiasm is contagious. Unfortunately, so is the lack of it. .

4.  Enthusiasm recharges itself on momentum

Jerry Reed’s popular song of many years ago is apt: “When you’re hot, you’re hot!”

William Shakespeare put similar sentiments into the mouth of Julius Caesar: “There is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune, omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and miseries.’”

Enthusiasm comes from the inside out, not vice versa. It’s when you feel most enthusiastic that you need to throw yourself into life’s biggest challenge.  Celebrate your greatest victories by plunging into even greater challenges.  Take full advantage of the momentum you gain with each hard-earned step.

Nothing feeds enthusiasm like success, and nothing can hold back enough enthusiasm.

~ ~ ~ ~

Accomplishing greater things with others than one can alone

Kare speaks, writes and consults on quotability, storyboarding and collaboration – vital traits in this increasingly bottom-up, complex, connected world. See how much others accomplished in just an hour of phone coaching with Kare http://www.sayitbetter.com/coaching.php - or bring her to speak http://www.sayitbetter.com/meeting_planners.php  This Emmy-winning former NBC and Wall Street Journal reporter is the author of Walk Your Talk and Resolving Conflict Sooner. Voted one of Top 5 speakers on Communication: http://speaking.com/top5/ Two of her blogs are featured on http://collaboration.alltop.com/

http://listiki.com/best-list-of-collaborationrelated-sites-and-books/kareanderson

Posted via email from Kare Anderson on Coummunicating to Connect

How We Can Rely on Each Other in Our Community

What makes a community abundant in this new new normal world? In this uncertain economy where budgets of local governments and non-profit budgets will continue to get slashed, it is especially heartening to read the mutual-reliance message inherent in this book.

How Communities Can Run Leaner and Better

Rather than rely solely on outsiders and related funding and services, the authors suggest we band together with other locals to come up with our own solutions to problems – and ways to leverage the resources we each have in support of “our” community.

While the authors advocate “no more relying on institutions or systems to provide us with the good life” the community-building they intend should lead to wider adoption. Hopefully some of the ideas that evolve, from the grassroots up, will be honed (with ongoing public input) into systems and sometimes even institutions then adopted in other communities.

That’s part of the ebb and flow of community design.

Mutual Reliance Sparks Innovation

Another reviewer at Amazon notes that the authors advocate our striving toward greater compassion for each other rather than greater systems of efficiency. I believe however that, like natural systems and user-friendly design, collective useage inevitably leads to innovation and thus efficiency.  Yet isn’t that co-innovation an apt way for neighbors to care for each other in their community?

Not only do I feel compassion but usually genuine liking for those in my community who suggest a way to make our community better run and/or close-knit.

That’s compassion in action.

As a long admirer of Block’s ideas who believes that the U.S. economy will be bumpy at best for the decade I am heartened by the several specific ways that bottom-up community-building is happening – and that the models for such local efforts are spreading so leaders in different communities can learn from each other’s local experience.

The more specific and immediately useful the  ideas is  the more “spreadable” it becomes. Often community-building methods are, in fact, more efficient ways to be mutually supportive.

Own Less.  Share More. Get Closer.

Some examples are as seemingly mundane as Freecycle – which is elegantly moderated in my Marin County by “Nicole,” co-working spaces, and The Village Movement, started in Beacon Hill, to enable more people to age in place among tight-knit neighbors.  Shareable is doing a vivid job of covering the evolving ways we are working and playing better together and stretching resources.

When people do discover concrete ways they can be mutually-supportive they tend to adopt them, then modify them and to tell others.

Word naturally spreads.

From my work in forging partnerships to generate more value and visibility for individuals and organizations I’ve found that identifying the sweet spot of mutual interest between individuals and/or organizations is a crucial first step to exploring how to accomplish greater things together than one can alone.

Accomplish Greater Things Locally Together Than You Can Alone

When people collaborate around an explicit shared purpose they tend to bring out the better sides in each other so they inevitably get closer.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the co-authors use their influence to advocate the creation of an online community where we could exchange ideas about what is working to create “abundant communities”?

Some books that I’ve found helpful around the notion of helping each other and learn from each other include What’s Mine is Yours,  The Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity

, Turning to One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope to the Future, Consequential Strangers: Turning Everyday Encounters Into Life-Changing Moments.

It is also gratifying to see the neighborhood-strengthening start-ups that are springing up like Patch and the community and town-wide businesses such as Steven Johnson’s outside.in and the smart phone apps like mycityway that will enable locals to share with other locals and visitors their knowledge of local history, architecture, food, sight seeing places, crafts and more.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

        Accomplishing greater things with others than one can alone

Kare speaks, writes and consults on quotability, storyboarding and collaboration – vital traits in this increasingly bottom-up, complex, connected world. See how much others accomplished in just an hour of phone coaching with Kare http://www.sayitbetter.com/coaching.php - or bring her to speak http://www.sayitbetter.com/meeting_planners.php  This Emmy-winning former NBC and Wall Street Journal reporter is the author of Walk Your Talk and Resolving Conflict Sooner. Voted one of Top 5 speakers on Communication: http://speaking.com/top5/ Two of her blogs are featured on http://collaboration.alltop.com/

Posted via email from Kare Anderson on Coummunicating to Connect