Hey everyone, here we go. . . . . .
IN OUR WORLD
MERRY CHRISTMAS & HAPPY HOLIDAYS to all of you and yours!
I am closing an incredibly successful 2009 and I want to make SURE you all know how grateful I am in finding a place of value for my ideas.
I am having a very non-traditional Christmas for a guy who thrives on the tradition the season brings. Colin (my youngest) is celebrating Christmas in Spain with friends, Laura is in Southern California with her mom and my family as health reasons prevented them from coming to Dallas. I’m hanging at the Dallas home celebrating Christmas with my oldest, Dylan and his girlfriend Amanda. First Christmas in 32 years where we are all kind of separated. I know we are all where we are supposed to be in the Grace found in our lives.
I have a lot of neat stuff in this blog so I hope you have a little time to check out the links!
HEY, YOU CAN FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER –CREATIVEVENTURE
AND ON FACEBOOK – STEPHEN HARVILL!
THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW
This is my version of scatter shooting a bunch of stuff I found interesting:
- The 2010 TED line up is posted and it once again shows the incredible journey offered by this dynamic and ever changing event. I hope you all take advantage of their postings:
- Blackberry Blackouts – Man, the crackberry folks must all have been ready to check into rehab as the Blackberry crew had two huge outages in one week. Hey, the phone still worked. You remember the phone right? You dial a series of digits and talk to another person. Try it; you might remember how you liked it. You probably guessed it, right? I’m an iPhone guy.
- Fits and Starts – The economy is, by many measuring sticks, starting its recover. The big question is; “a recovery to what?” Certainly the new economy will only have small resemblances to the old economy. The income index ticked up the fastest rate in the last 6 months, but the .04% will not get champagne corks to pop. It’s better than a stick in the economic eye.
- Got That 2010 Plan? – Let me help you simplify your 2010 planning. Despite a business environment that shifts more than the San Andreas Fault, the core of what you do will always be the best filter for your planning ideas:
-
- Don’t Loose Track of What You Do: It’s a great planning exercise to keep defining what you do and make sure EVERYONE knows.
- What Value Do You Bring: Take some time and run your 2010 plans through the old VALUE screen. Do your plans provide definable value to your team, your customers and your shareholders?
- I’m Not The Same: If you think you can do everything like you have done in the past you will be disappointed. At the same time run those 2010 plans through the differentiation screen. Do our plans create a sense of separation and differentiation in a commoditized world?
-
ENTERTAINMENT
MOVIES: Invictus: Clint Eastwood is one of the best film makers in history. I will see whatever he does.
NetFlix Fans: 500 Days of Summer: A very clever romantic comedy that tugs at your heart and makes you laugh.
TV: Look for some holiday marathons that will break up the family tension of everyone jammed in a small space! A&E will have Criminal Minds going. Discovery has Mythbusters running. SyFy has Stargate. If you lack cable or satellite coverage – get it for Christmas!
BOOKS: Return To The Little Kingdom – By Mortiz. Great book about how Apple changed the world.
MUSIC: So much to share. I have been learning this song for the past week. This is the VERY best version of hundreds that have recorded this wonderful painful love song. Here is Hallelujah.
WEB SITES: I am always amazed at the people who don’t’ use Pandora to listen to music on their computer while they work. This is a site that allows you to make your own radio station with your favorite performers.
SOUTH OF NORMAL
OK, here are the three so South of Normal ways of thinking that I run into I felt I had to post them:
- Social Media Is Not For Us: Huh, What? That is 100 % true if you don’t see the connection to a new and expanding world. Social media strategy is a MUST and though it appears to be a glob of hard to understand pieces, you don’t have to be an expert to start. GET GOING and get in the water.
- New Ideas Don’t Need Management: I wish I could tell you how many organizations are brilliant at seeing the need for a new way to do things while at the same time have no desire to hold anyone accountable for doing these ideas. They are worried about pushing the system too hard. Ideas will never show value without constant attention. If you believe in it enough to launch it, believe in it enough to manage it. It takes focused ENEGY.
- A Meeting Is A Meeting: NOPE! A meeting has three parts; the pre-meeting which enables a meeting to be successful, the meeting itself, stop making them boring and mindless, the post-meeting, what do you do to reconnect to the MEANING of the meeting. Design and manage meetings to create impact or don’t have them!
Drop me a note with your comments at steve@creativeventures.com
Thanks for stopping by and until next time, Adios and Aloha.
Leave a Reply