Author Archive

I have just finished reading with interest  The Big Decision: Personal or Corporate Brand?

Personally I have always felt my brand was personal.  This allows me to be “me” which I hope helps people get to know who I am, what I like and what I don’t.  I would find it difficult to express myself under “On The Go” branding alone. There is only so much you can write about with regard to “typing”

What is your choice?  Personal or Corporate and why?

I received this as an email today and had to share it and rather than forward to hundreds of people I decided to make it a blog post.

——————————————————

What would you do?…. You make the choice. Don’t look for a punch line, there isn’t one. Read it anyway. My question is: Would you have made the same choice?

At a fundraising dinner for a school that serves children with learning disabilities, the father of one of the students delivered a speech that would never be forgotten by all who attended. After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he offered a question:

‘When not interfered with by outside influences, everything nature does, is done with perfection.

Yet my son, Shay, cannot learn things as other children do. He cannot understand things as other children do.

Where is the natural order of things in my son?’

The audience was stilled by the query.

The father continued. ‘I believe that when a child like Shay, who was mentally and physically disabled, comes into the world, an opportunity to realize true human nature presents itself, and it comes in the way other people treat that child.’

Then he told the following story:

Shay and I had walked past a park where some boys Shay knew were playing baseball. Shay asked, ‘Do you think they’ll let me play?’ I knew that most of the boys would not want someone like Shay on their team, but as a father I also understood that if my son were allowed to play, it would give him a much-needed sense of belonging and some confidence to be accepted by others in spite of his handicaps.

I approached one of the boys on the field and asked (not expecting much) if Shay could play. The boy looked around for guidance and said, ‘We’re losing by six runs and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we’ll try to put him in to bat in the ninth inning.’

Shay struggled over to the team’s bench and, with a broad smile, put on a team shirt. I watched with a small tear in my eye and warmth in my heart. The boys saw my joy at my son being accepted.

In the bottom of the eighth inning, Shay’s team scored a few runs but were still behind by three. In the top of the ninth inning, Shay put on a glove and played in the right field. Even though no hits came his way, he was obviously ecstatic just to be in the game and on the field, grinning from ear to ear as I waved to him from the stands.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shay’s team scored again. Now, with two outs and the bases loaded, the potential winning run was on base and Shay was scheduled to be next at bat. At this juncture, do they let Shay bat and give away their chance to win the game?

Surprisingly, Shay was given the bat. Everyone knew that a hit was all but impossible because Shay didn’t even know how to hold the bat properly, much less connect with the ball.

However, as Shay stepped up to the plate, the pitcher, recognizing that the other team was putting winning aside for this moment in Shay’s life, moved in a few steps to lob the ball in softly so Shay could at least make contact.

The first pitch came and Shay swung clumsily and missed.  The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly towards Shay. As the pitch came in, Shay swung at the ball and hit a slow ground ball right back to the pitcher.

The game would now be over.

The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could have easily thrown the ball to the first baseman. Shay would have been out and that would have been the end of the game. Instead, the pitcher threw the ball right over the first baseman’s head, out of reach of all team mates.  Everyone from the stands and both teams started yelling, ‘Shay, run to first! Run to first!’

Never in his life had Shay ever run that far, but he made it to first base. He scampered down the baseline, wide-eyed and startled.  Everyone yelled, ‘Run to second, run to second!’

Catching his breath, Shay awkwardly ran towards second, gleaming and struggling to make it to the base.  By the time Shay rounded towards second base, the right fielder had the ball. The smallest guy on their team was the one who now had his first chance to be the hero for his team.

He could have thrown the ball to the second-baseman for the tag, but he understood the pitcher’s intentions so he, too, intentionally threw the ball high and far over the third-baseman’s head. Shay ran toward third base deliriously as the runners ahead of him circled the bases toward home.  All were screaming, ‘Shay, Shay, Shay, all the Way Shay’

Shay reached third base because the opposing shortstop ran to help him by turning him in the direction of third base, and shouted, ‘Run to third!’’Shay, run to third!’

As Shay rounded third, the boys from both teams, and the spectators,were on their feet screaming, ‘Shay, run home! Run home!’ Shay ran to home, stepped on the plate, and was cheered as the hero who hit the grand slam and won the game for his team.

‘That day’, said the father softly, with tears now rolling down his face, ‘the boys from both teams helped bring a piece of true love and humanity into this world’.

Shay didn’t make it to another summer. He died that winter, having never forgotten being the hero and making me so happy and coming home and seeing his Mother tearfully embrace her little hero of the day!

AND NOW A LITTLE FOOTNOTE TO THIS STORY.

We all send thousands of jokes through the e-mail without a second thought, but when it comes to sending messages about life choices,people hesitate.  The crude, vulgar, and often obscene pass freely through cyberspace,but public discussion about decency is too often suppressed in our schools and workplaces.

If you’re thinking about forwarding this message, chances are that you’re probably sorting out the people in your address book who aren’t the ‘appropriate’ ones to receive this type of message. Well, the person who sent you this believes that we all can make a difference.

We all have thousands of opportunities every single day to help realize the ‘natural order of things.’ So many seemingly trivial interactions between two people present us with a choice: Do we pass along a little spark of love and humanity or do we pass up those opportunities and leave the world a little bit colder in the process?

A wise man once said every society is judged by how it treats it’s least fortunate amongst them.

You now have two choices:

1. Delete
2. Forward

In this case – please share on your social networks.

May your day, be a Shay Day.

How do you prepare your blogs?  Does a topic just grab you in the morning and you think “I’ll write about that” or do you have pre-defined rules?  Are there specific topics you enthuse about or is a general overview of all and sundry more your style?  An idea came to me today that if I looked back on what I had posted on Social Media last week surely I would find more than one blog amongst the hundreds of posts I put out.  No doubt that’s where the idea of paper.li started.

Georgina Laidlaw posted Easy Content Scheduling for Bloggers which clearly shows  there needs to be a plan.  So working from this I need to be blogging about administration, social media … er – administration, social media.  Hmm… I appear to have a blank spot.  You know what – I’ll use the templates as a guideline and go from there.  I like writing about the odd episode regarding my cat “Butch”- he keeps me entertained and would you really only want to read about administration and social media?  I think not.

Let me know if you have a structured plan for your blogs or whether you just bang them out as and when.

This is the second day that my kitten Butch has brought in a bird. I guess he thinks he is bringing me a present but you know what, I don’t need one! He is cute enough himself without any extras. I did wonder if he was telling me to clean the house in his own subtle way. By bringing in his feathered friends and then removing 90% of its feathers the hoover had to come out which meant that after sucking up the feathers the rest of the carpet got cleaned too. Subtle little minx.

I had thought of sending an email to Whiskas informing them that their kitten food can’t be up to scratch. If it was why would he need to go out hunting? Is it just that he’s a creature of habit and that’s what he does?

This then led me to wonder, am I a creature of habit? What do I do day in day out, not necessarily because it produces the right outcome just purely because that is what I do. Switch on the computer, login to the various social media sites I am linked with, check updates, move to emails, check and prioritise, go through my “To Do” list and get on with the day.

Now I wonder what would happen if I decided to change my routine? Turn everything about and do it in a different order. How long would it take for that to become a routine? Would it throw me off course completely or would I enjoy the change?

Having wondered that I decided to utilise what we take for granted these days and did a search on Google only to find this article

So it seems that change is good for us, it gets us out of a routine and could even spark creative thoughts which in the end will enhance our productivity.

Are you a creature of habit? Do you have a set routine you follow religiously every day? Well, today is Friday, the working week is nearly over, perhaps I will spend my afternoon doing something completely different and muse on how I will begin next week.

P.S.  I hope Butch isn’t thinking of introducing Pigeon into his diet!

How many times do you say – “I haven’t got the time”! “Where do all the hours go”?

Personally I manage time in chunks – I allocate set hours for each client.  For my clients who book a set amount of hours a month I allocate specific days during the week  to carry out their work.  My calendar is a colour coded masterpiece – a set colour for each client.  That’s how it works for me. How do you manage your time?

If you need some guidance on time management there are some excellent tips here in a post by Mark Walsh.

Social media platforms enable us to communicate, advertise, chat and promote ourselves to the world, yes that’s right the world – not just to our neighbours, friends or work colleagues.  These platforms package each and every one of us together as one person, one voice all echoing sentiments on a specific topic of the day adding our own views, thoughts and preferences.  When using a platform such as Tweetdeck or HootSuite you can see clearly who is following what topic of the day, who gets a response from their posts, what their sense of humour is like and which business category they fall into.  Does it make for interesting reading – only if you are interested in that topic.  By making full use of both Tweetdeck and HootSuite I can stream the people I follow – serious – nutty – funny – business – friends etc.  Depending on my mood I can choose which posts I am going to read – the choice is there.  That doesn’t mean I undervalue any of the people I follow it just means I can choose, at a glance if I am going to follow their topic of the day.

Do you have a set pattern every day; spend the same amount of time on social media morning, lunchtime and evening?  Or do you go with the flow and check out as and when?  Do you have a favourite site – Facebook or Twitter?  They both provide the same service the only difference being Facebook allows you to talk longer! Which do you prefer and why?

Nigel Morgan of Morgan PR featured me in his blog this morning having had a conversation with me first thing.  The reason for his call was to discuss MYSMB which has recently come on the market.  I felt it only appropriate to use my blog to respond as well as placing the context of this blog into his comments section.  Before you read on I would like to make it clear that I believe Nigel is extremely adept at what he does not only in the field of Social Media but also as a PR consultant.

————————————————————————————————-

It was good to chat to you this morning Nigel – I didn’t realise I was going to be featured in your blog!  MYSMB appears to have got a few people in a spin judging by the various comments on blogs and social networks.  I will reiterate.  Although I have been involved in social media for over two years (thank you for the compliment – I think she was proficient in the first place!) as with anything to do with technology changes happen at an alarming rate. We are learning all the time, different ways to enhance what we already know, the changes we need to make, what we adapt and what we drop.  The training modules within MYSMB are excellent and I have gleaned information that may well be out there for free as Mike McGrail clearly states, I just hadn’t found it.

I believe this needs to be put in perspective.  MYSMB is a job opportunity that will provide an income for those keen to learn, for others it will enhance a service they already provide (as in my case) and unfortunately for the remainder who don’t realise they have actually got to work at it the opportunity will pass they by.

I don’t believe there are any experts in Social Media, there are people who have become involved originally through fascination, possibly intrigue as to how global it is,  realise they have a talent for it and eventually make it part of their business.  Some people are better at it than others but that doesn’t make them an expert.  Society will decide for themselves who they want to work with and who they want to represent them.  Where Social Media representatives, for another word, will come to the fore is how they produce the ever evasive ROI for their client.  We are a nation clamouring statistics.  Anyhow that is another comment for another blog no doubt.

Just to confirm I did pay for the branding package which will be integrated with my existing site, under development as I type my response.  Each person will choose how they want their site to look and no doubt will update it frequently as we do with our own sites so the few you have earmarked in your blog may well be working on them now.

MYSMB has provided me with the relevant information and support I expected it to.  It will give other people the opportunity to run their own business however large or small they want it to be and who are we to deny anyone that.  Should existing Social Media experts be concerned, well that will depend on how confident they are themselves on the packages and services they provide now.  As someone who provides this service already I wish every new MYSMB person lots of luck with their new venture.  I will be looking to see how they are marketing their business, just as I do with Virtual Assistants, competition is healthy.  Do I feel threatened, no.  It’s a very large world and I firmly believe there is room for everyone.  MYSMB is no different to any other business; it provides a profession and a service to the business community and each and every one of us has the right to choose which provider we use to fulfil that service.

As you rightly point out I am a member of Nigel Botterill’s Entrepreneur Circle and I appreciate his leadership.  As we discussed on the phone we all find someone we “follow”, “admire” and listen to – Nigel happens to be one along with quite a few others whose knowledge in their individual fields I respect highly.

Working as a Virtual Assistant (VA) means my entire business is based on-line, either through email, Skype and the telephone.  The only time I have face to face meetings is when I attend Networking events – which are a must to keep up on social skills and to actually speak out loud. It is very easy to agree with everything you say to yourself.

One of the drawbacks that can arise when working on-line is that I may not always see what the client does.  I can’t tell what they are  feeling.  Until technology takes another step forward how can I tell if they are they having a bad day.  How will I know if they have just lost an important project or that they are running out of time to meet a deadline?  As wonderful as technology is I can’t always tell from an email what frame of mind they are in.

Charles Green – founder and CEO of Trusted Advisor Associates wrote an excellent article on this  A Customer Service Reality Check

It’s not a new theory and I am sure you will recognise some, if not all, of what he has to say. I have often said to friends, clients and even my children when they have received an email or text message that they don’t understand or misinterpret - “they may not have meant it that way”. However, I am grateful for the reminder that you never know what someone is thinking and it pays not to guess.  A little perception is required.  Listen, ask, and then take action.

Can you relate to Charles Green’s article?

We’ve all done it at some point – “my computer doesn’t work”,” I can’t get to grips with the program”,” it doesn’t work for me” and every other excuse we can find to “blame” the tool.

Of course the program works, so does the computer, what doesn’t work is our brain – it goes off on a tangent telling us we should have been able to produce that article in 5 minutes, let’s face it that’s what the program is meant to do – save us time isn’t it?

Well yes – and it does – but first you have to learn how to use it, just like anything else we have done in our lives – step by step, day by day, we get better, more accomplished, more adept at what we are doing but this only comes with practice.

Great article here by Chris Brogan – Hemingway’s Pencil. I can still hear my Father (a solid Lancastrian) who always said in his broad accent “it’s nowt (nothing) to do with the tool, it’s all to do with the bonce (head)”! and so it is.

Take yesterday, the Ryder Cup, what a fantastic conclusion to the event.  Why did the Europeans win?  What did they do differently?  Each player had a golf club, each a master of the game, all worthy of a place on the team.  They took control, they thought their game plan through and they didn’t let their emotions or mind games take over. More importantly they didn’t give up.

How many tools have you started to use and then let go of because they “didn’t work”?

Go back now and try again, give yourself some time, work through the process and one by one the pieces will come together, you will save time, you will produce the outcome you are looking for and then move on to the next “broken tool”.

I came across this video whilst surfing on the net and I became spellbound.  It was slow to load on the original site so I found it on YouTube to share with you so hopefully it will run smoothly.

Storytelling – do you remember being a child and having a story read to you? The comforting voice of your Mum or Dad  creating those wonderful characters? It was so real wasn’t it? Somehow we lose that dramatic vibrancy when we read a book ourselves; it’s our own voice in our head creating, building the scenes and characters.

Has the art of storytelling died?  Has technology taken over to the extent we’ve forgotten what it was like to listen to a story or indeed tell one?  Could it be the speed in which we are able to communicate these days in truncated, abbreviated single sentences, in some way has let this art, and it is an art, die?  You see to tell a story takes time and time is something we all say we just don’t have.

Well, perhaps it’s time to slow down and allow ourselves to be transported. Take some time now (just 8:53 mins) – make a cup of tea or coffee and listen to Jay OCallahan’s wonderful story.  I’m so pleased I came across this – thank you for transporting me away from my computer for just a few minutes.  If you were on Twitter Mr OCallahan you would get my resounding #ff !

Let me know if you have taken some time out – were you transported?