Broadcasting Hypocrisy

Posted on March 8, 2010 by Scott Gould

I think Seth Godin is reading my blog. Yesterday he wrote on ‘Losing Andrew Carnegie‘ and talked about investing in people over parts. Anyone who has been reading here a while knows I’ve been talking about this a lot since October, and gaining new levels of growth by getting free what I call ‘Factory thinking‘. The idea is that parts in a factory will break, but if you lead people, they can develop and grow.

Of course I know Seth isn’t reading my blog, nor is the idea mine to begin with – we’re just standing on the soliders of giants who’ve been discussing this since the beginning of time.

However it is an opportunity to discuss something that’s really on my mind right now and will require me to be painfully honest.

Are We Really Focussing On People In Social Media, Really?

So confession time. Claiming that Seth Godin is reading my blog is attention seeking. My blog is getting less comments and retweets and I find myself at times wondering what the point is. I’ve been doing things like writing blog titles like this, trying to promote my own stuff as if it’s someone else’s. All the dirty tricks.

But then I catch myself: this is factory thinking. It’s treating my blog is a machine that has outputs – rather than a place to serve and lead people.

What really shook me up was spending a bit of time with Chris Brogan at Like Minds. I don’t want to play the name game, but I was profoundly impacted by the time I spent with Chris. I’m pretty good with people and good with names – but Chris was on a whole other level.

I saw him meet people in the morning, meet a tonne of people during the day, and then call that person by name in the evening. Every person he spoke to I watched him converse with genuine interest, and never flip open his phone or excuse himself like I know I so often do.

When I asked Chris what his secret was, he gave me the simplest, yet most painful answer: “I just have an insane passion for humans”

Are We Broadcasting Social Media?

I wonder how many of us are broadcasting the message of discussion? The whole idea of Social Media is that it is two, three, four way communication, yet I know my behaviour of late has been one of broadcast.

What hypocrisy!

One of my friends is Robin Dickinson. He and I talked a few months ago about a comment-driven blog, a place where the blogger was actually a facilitator – and rather than forcing his readers to read his content, he instead used the blog as a place to draw comments to form the content.

Well Robin went away and did it. What he has going on right now at RADSmarts is something I’ve never seen before – a community that is commenting on each others comments based on a short, 50 word blog ‘question’ with a picture.

I’ve got no point to round this up on, and to be honest I’ve lost the expectation of getting an discussion going below. But that doesn’t matter. This isn’t a machine that I’m churning – it’s a place to lead people. And if what I’ve seen last week with Like Minds is anything to go by, leading people will build far bigger things than managing machines ever will.

My thought now is, how much of what I thought was ‘discussion’ and ‘social’ was just broadcast?

100 Blog Posts On, My Number One Lesson

Posted on January 15, 2010 by Scott Gould

My number one lesson: That it’s better to have connection than community if you want to achieve greatness. Continue reading →

If You Fail To Prepare, You Prepare To Fail

Posted on November 24, 2009 by Scott Gould

Since getting back from our time away over August, I haven’t stopped. I wrote a blog post about being relaxed, refreshed and re-envisioned when I got back from the holiday, but boy does it seem like a distant memory! The good thing is that I delivered on what I said I’d would.

I have, however, learnt a valuable lesson over the last 3 months (I seriously can’t believe how quickly the time has gone) – a lesson not learned through success, but through burnout: if you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail. Continue reading →

Life Never Closes Its Doors

Posted on August 4, 2009 by Scott Gould

I loved reading Leonard Speiser’s words on TechCrunch on Sunday: “Business hours are dead. 24/7 is the new 9 to 5.” As an often too-connected individual, I must say I am glad that I’ve embraced this principle and moved my agency from time constraints to a non-geographically bound entity with international clients.

Whilst I’m only beginning to grasp what this global village is all about, most of us know that life, unlike business, never closes its doors. Putting your feet up at the end of day might mean your colleagues aren’t watching you, but your partner and/or kids certainly are. And whoever it is that you are in a position of influence with – children, friends, colleagues – the fact is that they always have their eyes on you.

George Ambler put it this way: Leaders live in a fish bowl. There’s always the human, or the cat, looking in to see what you’ll do next. Life doesn’t close is doors.

Now I think we need down time. And for sure, we’ll let people down because no-one’s perfect. But that doesn’t make me shun or despise the fact that people are watching me. To be given influence in that way is a privilege, and I’m of the opinion that if someone wants to watch me, then I want to make it worth their while. For me? No. For them. Because if they’ve granted me the honour of their attention, then I want to give them the honour of mine.

Leading 24/7 is hard. But if I have something to give, then I want to give it. If I can add value, then I want to add it. Like Roosevelt said:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena…

So, whether people are watching you to see how you succeed, or are watching in the hope that you’ll fail, decide that you’ll give them a good show. Or, should I say ‘a great experience‘?

Switching Off

Posted on August 3, 2009 by Scott Gould

I’m currently reading The 4 Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris, and amidst the mixed reviews I’ve received, I’ve been enjoying it and found this gem while I was skim-reading last Saturday:

An abundance of information has created a poverty of attention

Now being a marketeer I love ideas that spread, so a saying that rhymes like this is right up my street. But I also find it overwhelmingly true. In my rant last month on the commoditisation of content, I made the ascertion that we are drowning in content. Tim says it far more beautifully, and reveals the consequence of our high level of media consumption: attention poverty.

So let me get down and get real. I wake up at 6am every morning and, as you know, pray and read my bible. But recently at 6am, I wake up and I’m thinking ‘blog’. I actually have a rule for no work between the hours of 11pm and 7am which I call the ‘eleven-to-seven’ rule – but last month I have all too often worked during those hours. When I’ve picked up a book to read, or fancied going for a calming walk, I’ve ended up flipping open the laptop and going through my to-do list.

In short, I’ve found that I’ve been unable to switch off. And it’s because I have so much information during the day, my mind is buzzing when I want to rest.

The whole point of me blogging is to sharpen my thoughts by using them to help others, and I know that you learn just as much (if not more) from the scars as you do from the successes. In exchange for my vulnerability, and the jabs and pokes I’ll get for my honesty, I’m asking a favor from all of you who read this – whether by RSS, as a note on Facebook, by email, or if you’ve stumbled here by mistake…. I want you to leave a comment and share with me how you switch off.

So if you’re not on my actual website, then click here, and let’s talk about this!