So...What's Next?!?

Outlining the Next Few Months

So much to juggle, however they are things that keep me motivated.

First the house...the house is a perfect example of "be careful what you ask for." We wanted a house that was pretty much a blank slate that we could work on to make our own. Boy was it...complete with white walls. I hate white walls. That was the first thing we accomplished when we moved in was putting color on the walls. But the carpet does not match. We have picked out the new carpet and bamboo floors. Yesterday my husband ordered a new front door. I have been tearing wallpaper down in my bathroom - I do not understand why people want wallpaper in their house, but...

All of this should be done in the next couple of months. Personally I am excited to get our dining room area set up. We are not going to use it as a dining room, but more of a library. It is attached to the kitchen which we have set up like a coffee shop and the dining room will be like our little Barnes & Noble.

Next my personal goal of getting and staying in shape. I delayed meeting with my trainer, but he has not given up on me. I have my first meeting with him tomorrow night. The goal is to get my endurance up, work on getting my strength back and then I will join their HIT class. I am looking forward to the end result. Start with the end in mind, right....

As far as the Bennigan's sitcom, I figured out how to make it come to life. It is perfect for sketch comedy! My husband and I are fans of Sketchworks here in Atlanta and they have sketch comedy writing classes and acting classes. My husband has agreed to taking the acting classes with me, so stay tuned.

Also related to creative writing - I am working on another performance piece that was inspired by the STIR event. This one is on the sensitive side, but I think is important. When it is complete and ready to be read I will let you know. I have also decided to start attending more spoken word events.

Vacation...boy do I need one, or two. We have planned our beach trip finally. In a couple of weeks I will be spending 4 days at St George Island with friends and family. I also started planning the trip to NYC with my son for his 14th b-day. It is a bit more expensive than I anticipated...but I will keep researching.

Personal finances. I am excited to announce that we are in the best shape we have ever been with our personal finances! wahoo! That includes the business cash flow as well. That is only more motivation to keep building. Believe me, this has been a long learning curve for me.

Associations - I just resigned from my post as programs chair for AECF. I love that group enough to know it is time for me to step down because I could no longer give them what they deserve.

Currently my focus is on the Enterprise 2.0 society. We have a huge event coming up in September where we hope to partner with other associations. We are reserving space for over 200 people at GA Tech. From there we  have a number of initiatives for the first part of next year which are very exciting.

It is also time to start gearing up for SoCon09. Also, if you read this blog regularly you know that I am part of the Social Media Club's Interim Board and we are hoping to re-launch a new chapter here in Atlanta.

That is enough to keep me busy as far as associations go - but expect to see me networking a bit more.

In regards to the business I am focused on enhancing the online training. I also am putting a plan together to "drink my own koolaide" and start marketing the company through more social media channels.

If you have read this far you will get to know that I am also looking at a very exciting strategic alliance. In the next couple of weeks I will be aligning my business with a company that completes my offerings. I will be working from their office space at Studio Plex in Inman Park. We have a video production and podcasting studio, which is cool, but more importantly is the technology for market intelligence gathering and for distribution that has been developed. It's very exciting. I hope to start scheduling meetings to demo their offerings and my services as soon as this week. I am also working on ideas for us to go to market together.

All of this is gearing me up to go national. I am currently working with 3 clients on long term projects and have 2-3 in the pipeline. Now that I have an office space to work from I am looking to bring on a junior account manager - which I have already identified a couple of good candidates.

So yeah - I am busy - but having lots of fun.

I was on TAG Radio

I did not know that it was posted already - here it is

Enterprise 2.0 Round Table

Every other month the TAG Enterprise 2.0 host  round table sessions, with an unconference format.

We had some great session leaders today! and about 45 people participating in the discussions.

Next month we will welcome Indusa for our key note presentation who will discuss new strategies for Enterprise content and knowledge sharing.

Thanks to the following discussion leaders who made today a great success:

Justin Rubner, The Content Factor for leading the discussion on Enterprise 2.0 Wikis, Promotion and Collaboration. As the former technology and energy reporter at Atlanta Business Chronicle, Justin Rubner has been delivering high-impact news, investigative reporting and features to some of the most successful corporate leaders in Georgia.  He has extensive experience covering the issues businesspeople face, whether they're running start-ups or Fortune 500s.  Justin is also one of the leaders behind Techpedia Atlanta: The wiki showcasing Atlanta's technology landscape. 

Dave Coustan, Independent Consultant for leading the discussion on Enterprise 2.0 Blogging –  Dave Coustan is a corporate blogging pioneer who helped make Earthlink a real participant in the consumer dialogue surrounding the company through "Earthling" – Earthlink's official blog.  Dave is active in Atlanta's technology and startup communities and has spoken on product blogging at numerous events including BlogSavannah, BarCamp Atlanta, BlogOrlando and BlogPhiladelphia.

Giff Gfroerer, President North America, i2SMS, LLC for leading the discussion on Enterprise 2.0 The Mobile Opportunity – Apart from his duties running the US division of i2SMS, a global leader in SMS marketing platforms, Giff Gfroerer is a frequent blogger on the University of Oxford Next Generation Mobile Applications Panel, a consultant and author for the ATMIA Mobile Phone Security Committee, and has taught both graduate and undergraduate marketing and business classes at AIU in Atlanta, Georgia. His expertise lies in creating and building business relationships in the exploding mobile and wireless industry. 

Gretchen Miller and Jason Anderson of  Vitrue, Inc. for leading the discussion on Enterprise 2.0 Video and Social Media –  Vitrue builds powerful video and social media solutions to allow corporations to interact and engage with their customers. They have executed successful social media solutions for a wide range of brands — from niche players to large global media enterprises, including Turner Broadcasting, Procter & Gamble and VH1.

What I Have Been Up To

As I had posted on Twitter, my house looks like I am back in college. I have so much going on that I have bought 12 spiral notebooks to track everything.

Notebook 1 -  Is for my personal coaching sessions - which are starting to find a groove. Tonight I listed opportunities for self improvement. The list is still growing. It is both humbling and hopeful. Nothing that I am listing is a surprise and in fact I could offer all kinds of hows and whys I have certain behavior habits. However the hopeful part is that with acknowledgment and willingness to work on improvement - life can only get better.

Notebook 2 - Business Finance - we are not thinking small with this company - never have. But now it is so important that I really wrap my hands around how to make this company financially healthy so that it can grow big and strong.

Notebooks 3 and 4 and 5 are our product offerings - we have listed out 11 unique offerings that can be offered ala carte or as part of a larger scope of work, not including consulting. I have defined each offering and written out the needs analysis and qualification stages for each offering, but now I am working on very specific project management steps for each project as well as roles and responsibilities for the team that would be involved.

Notebook 6 - Future offerings that we have identified

Notebook 7 - Community work such as Enterprise 2.0, AECF, and TAG's social network

Notebook 8 - Overall roles and responsibilities, policies and procedure, and overall guidelines for the company.

Notebook 9 - The 4 P's for Concept Hub and how we can improve in each area.

Notebooks 10 and 11 Notes for self improvement in areas such as sales, communications, and management/leadership.

Notebook 12 -  Family Activities - now that summer is coming up, there is a lot more to keep up with and the kids are so different now that it is hard to keep up with the goals and needs of them both as well as overall family activities.

Besides ALL of that I am working on a number of proposals, and ongoing client projects.

I am also still speaking quite a bit, though I have not been promoting those engagements as much. I recently spoke for the GA Department of HR and the Mac User Group. This week I am speaking for the National Volunteer Health Association as well as leading a discussion at the Enterprise 2.0 workshop. On April 9 I will be in South FL  running a workshop during the day and am the keynote dinner speaker for the Broward County Human Resource Association. I am speaking at Flourishing Forum on April 17, I believe I am slotted to speak at the North Fulton Chamber of Commerce on April 29 and I am teaching a class for the GA Center for Nonprofits on May 14th.

Alright - I am exhausted - going to bed now....but I leave you with a quote - because I know you have been missing them...and look it's a sports quote too!

If you are bored with life, if you don't get up every morning with a burning desire to do things - you don't have enough goals.

Lou Holtz - The only coach in NCAA history to ever lead six different colllege teams to postseason bowl games, and a man who also won a national championship and "coach of the year" honors

Enterprise 2.0 Executive Round Table

Society: Enterprise 2.0

Meeting Title: "Enterprise 2.0 Executive Round Table"

Date: April 2, 2008

Time: 7:30am - 9:30am

Location:  Centergy Building at Tech Square, Hodges Conference Room 75 5th Street, NW 3rd floor, Atlanta, GA 30308

Event Overview:

7:30am - 7:45am - Gather and networking time

7:45am - 7:50am - Introducing Enterprise 2.0 Society

7:50 - 8:35am - Round table discussions

8:35 - 8:40am - Switch tables

8:40 - 9:25am - Round table discussions II

9:25 - 9:30am - Closing remarks

Register Today!

 

Detailed Description:  We had a great first meeting last month introducing our speaker series.  Now Enterprise 2.0, would like to welcome you to the first of our executive round table sessions. This is your opportunity to participate directly in the discussion of the many different facets of Enterprise 2.0.

We will be following the "unconference" format.  Members of the TAG Enterprise 2.0 board will be facilitating tabletop discussions on the following topics:

Enterprise 2.0 Legal Issues - Discussion leader: Paul Arne, Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP.  Each new wave of innovation brings new test for the law. Evolving communication paradigms and social access must still respect copyright and responsibility.  Crowdsourcing, open sourcing, and mashups may require new interpretations of ownership and intellectual property.

Enterprise 2.0 Branding - Discussion leader: David Cohen, Equation Arts, LLC.
Your brand is now in the hands of an empowered community.  Findability is the great equalizer and brings with it a new demand for transparency and alignment of branding with values.

Enterprise 2.0 Reputation Management - Discussion leader: Sherry Heyl, Concept Hub, Inc. (Formerly What a Concept!) People are talking.  And they are doing that talking online for everyone to see.  What are they saying about you and your company?  How are the new tools a boon and a bane to maintaining corporate image?

Enterprise 2.0 Open Source Movement - Discussion leader: Rodney Fernandes, Optaros, Inc.  Community built tools,  creative commons licensing, even commercial open source - the software landscape is evolving.  Those building solutions have more options than ever before.  Can collaboration succeed as a business model?

Enterprise 2.0 Enterprise Solutions - Discussion leader: Bhupinder Chawla, PRIMUS Software Corp. From security to knowledge management there are a new wave of issues and solutions emerging under the header of social computing.  How do you make it work for your business?

Enterprise 2.0 PR and Marketing - Discussion leader: Dan Greenfield, Media Consultant.  The glory days of "yell and sell" are over.  Today companies must seek permission to market and to identify communities of interest.  How do you tell your story when you are just one of many voices in the chorus?

Please come prepared to ask questions and join the discussion.  We will be switching tables halfway through the session so that each attendee can sit in on two topic areas.

Connecting People and Ideas - Using Social Software to Turbo Charge Innovation

Puneet Gupta, CEO of ConnectBeam presenting at the first Enterprise 2.0 Society meeting.

ConnectBeam started before the term Enterprise 2.0 was coined.  The to solve a particular pain within a company which was accessing the vast amounts of information within an Enterprise.

Reasons for using Social Software (Survey by 451 group) - Improve employee communication and collaboration, is the number 1 answer.

Only 44% of business users can find what they want on their corporate Intranet. - Forrester Research

Yet, 87% of people saythey can find what they are looking for on the Internet most of the time. - Pew Internet & American Life Project

As information scales, control and predefined structures do not.

Metadata from users themselves (a.k.a. Folksonomy) is the catalyst which will enable search to become the center of usable information.

Metadata/Folksonomy - you, as human,  can bring information and insights to the computer that no algorithm can.

People are more forgiving of the search results when they are searching for information on the Internet, but when they are searching for information inside the companies that is needed to do a job, they are more critical and want more specific results. A person is very particular about the intent of the search.

Benefits of Social Search;

• Faster response time
• Insights that leads to innovation and increased productivity
• Consolidate duplicate efforts
• More connections to information and people.

Currently, many people are searching for the same information over and over again, but there is no way to connect those people.

Social Search enables users to connect with the most relevant people and top rated content.

The concept of bookmarking is as old as the browser and users know how to search, by adding the social layer people connect with each other while searching for and discovering  information.

Product Demo
Search Results is ranked by human activity to the content such as saving and tagging links. Tags are applied by the end user in regards to the context that the information is related to them.

The application is very similar to del.icio.us but designed for behind the firewall in the enterprise.

Note - Last night at the dinner we were talking about how users without this application was using del.icio.us which is compromising the organization's Intellectual Property.

The search results also connects the users of the information in a Facebook type of application.

A night out with the guys

I am totally bummed.

I just spent a fun-filled evening with 4 incredible men and I have this great picture of all of us together, but I can not find the cord to transfer the photo to the computer!

Tonight, Bhupinder Chawla of Primus Software, Paul Arne of Morris, Manning, and Martin, and I hosted a dinner at BluePointe restaurant for Chuck Pendell VP of Sales and Puneet Gupta CEO of ConnectBeam.

They flew in from CA to be our inaugural speakers for the TAG Enterprise 2.0 Society.

We truly had a blast  and I hope that they are awake and recovered enough for tomorrow's presentation. I hope I am wake and recovered enough for tomorrow's presentation. I do plan to Live Blog it.

So the first bit of information that I found interesting tonight was when Chuck informed me that he has one of my business cards on his desk and does not know where he got it from, how we met. Let me emphasis something...they are based in CA! I have never been to CA and they have not been to ATL recently. Apparently I am getting around...in a good way!

Puneet and I shared "battle stories" about launching a company in a space that even we did not quite understand. He launched ConnectBeam about the same time I launched What a Concept! Their first client was HoneyBeam who looked at what they created and immediately understood the solution they were providing and to what problem. However Puneet and Chuck were still trying to figure it out. Together with their clients they are building an amazing company.

I shared with Puneet that since I had no clue who my market was, I just started calling people alphabetically. Now my client list is very heavy with A list clients :)

I am truly looking forward to their presentation tomorrow. However tonight I will leave you with a quote that I found a year ago when I was working on some case studies for a client regarding how to implement social software for internal communications.

Connectbeam provided  Honeywell's Internal blogging platform. This is the reaction from one of their employees:

"My company is cool. In the last 24 hours we've brought online a pilot project which is one of the very first, if not the first, internal corporate social networking/tagging applications. By internal I mean the service and server are running inside our network domain, yet our employees will be able to tag internal and external content.

Okay why is this cool? Well... the application is inside our firewall and will allow our engineers to perform knowledge discovery, research, and sharing across the miles... even if they don't know each other! GoogleBeam works in tandem with our internal Google search appliance."
source - http://www.socialcomputingmagazine.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=143

Update! I found the cord...here is the picture

The Possibilities of Mass Collaboration

I attended the Georgia Technology Summit today. So far I found a few blogs, some tweets, and Amani Channels video from the session. I am sure there are more to come. I will be saving the reactions here.

The keynote Speaker was Don Tapscott, author of Wikinomics - the 2007 management book of the year.

I was very excited that this group would be introduced to his message, but I am a little concerned that it did not resonate with many.

Just follow some of the tweets;

StephenFleming:                

#gts2008 Seeing a lot of eyes glazed over here. I hope it's soaking in to some people.                  

jhaynie:                

#gts2008 -  *more people need* to read wikinomics in this room                

I actually saw someone dozing off!

Tapscott started with the 2007 Time Magazine person of the year as being “You.”

He discussed the growth of Facebook and MySpace that is happening all over the world and that there is a new blog created every second of everyday…

And then he dropped the "All this news is so 2006."

Today it is about a new way of productions. How we create goods and services and how companies communicate all over the world.

What was so timely about this message was the post on BusinessWeek

Social Media Will Change Your Business
Look past the yakkers, hobbyists, and political mobs. Your customers and rivals are figuring blogs out. Our advice: Catch up…or catch you later

I would like to repeat...I saw people falling asleep this morning!!!

Tapscott also discussed how the new web is accessed throughout various “things” from chips in the door key for his hotel to smart houses.

He talked about how the physical world is becoming smart and interconnected bringing up;

Broadband Mobility

Geo-Spatiality (GPS Tour Guide)  and IntelliOne

He also discussed the idea of True Multimedia – You get to have a movie and be in the movie as well. Think of the next generation of game play with cinema.

I would say it is practically here with machinima.

Tapscott discussed the rise of web services and how the new web is based on XML – computation…..where every time you interact with the computer you are programming the global platform and the need to integrate internal systems to the global platform (AJAX)

He announced that people who keep thinking about the Internet as it used to be are making a big mistake.

Our kids, the ones coming into the workforce, known as the net generation, have no “fear” of technology because it is like air to them.

I hated computers in the 10th grade. Todays 10th graders do not know a world without computers.

How much of an accelerated change is this?...Tapscott showed the growth trend of this generation in regards to the population growth

Generations – Boom, Bust (Gen X) and then the  Echo (net gen) which is louder than the original boom.

For this generation time online is taking away from television. These kids watch less TV and they are multi-taking while interacting with all their digital devices.

62% of the time heavy Internet users bleep out TV ads. That means when they are watching television, they are watching it on their own terms.

Tapscott noted that this is the first time in history when children are the authority on something really important.

Tapscott highlighted the attitudes of the net gen based on  a panel with some kids awhile back.

"Why would I read a newspaper no links and only comes out once a day…"

"News is called an RSS feed and I can start my own newspaper."

"The Daily Show is not funny unless you know the news."

Kids expect to be engaged. As Tapscott pointed out;

Self organization has been around for the ages. Language is a function of self organization. But what used to take place over a millennia or centuries now can happen in a week or even a single day.

Tapscott noted that the average age of people who watch the nightly news is 62!

He also made a good case that the Internet is a platform for collaborations and that companies should not have websites anymore, they should be building communities.

Best question of the day...If you have employees wasting time on social networks…..is that a technology problem?

Sharing is Capitalism at it’s best because it is collaboration for innovation.

My Question – First I noted that there is a generation gap - from my spot in the room I thought I was the only one with a laptop trying to live blog (the wireless was not accessible) as opposed to all the bloggers we have at the SoCon events. But as you see a few others blogged the event -some of the "usual suspects" :)

Then I asked how the participants  of today's summit can find the balance of responding and managing these shifts as well as strategies to embrace and take advantage of these trends. Tapscott nailed the answer - just start contributing.

Overall it was a great event and I got to see a lot of people I know and meet a few new people.

Tonights closing quote;

We could go over the cliff. You would hope not. You would hope that people see what needs to be done. It's not rocket science. It's not difficult. It's not even all that costly. It's actually about the way you think about the world.

Tim Flannery

Introducing Enterprise 2.0

A few months ago I was honored to be elected Chair of the new Enterprise 2.0 TAG Society.

I am working with an incredible board;

Paul H. Arne - Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP
Bhupinder Chawla - PRIMUS Software Corporation
David S. Cohen - Equation Arts, LLC
Rodney Fernandes - Optaros, Inc.
Fritz Hibbler - Soma-Richter
John W. Linss - CoreSpeed
Les Ottolenghi - Digital Commerce

and today we confirmed our first speaker for the March 5th meeting. This is HUGE!!!! I mean this is truly a leader in the Enterprise 2.0 space. Last year when we provided a case study for one of our clients regarding Internal Communications, this person was seen everywhere we did our research....

I am incredibly excited to announce our initial meeting....

Meeting Title: "Connecting People and Ideas: Using Social Software to
Turbo Charge Innovation"

Date:   March 5, 2008

Time: 7:30am – 9:30am

Location (include street address, and floor #):  The Ashford Club,
5565 Glenridge Connector, Suite 100, Atlanta, Georgia 30342

Event Overview (short):
7:30am – 7:45am – Gather and networking time
7:45am – 8am – Introducing Enterprise 2.0 Society
8am – 9am – Keynote: Puneet Gupta
9am – 9:15am – Q & A
9:15 – 9:30am – Closing remarks

Detailed Description:   TAG's newest society, Enterprise 2.0, would
like to welcome you to our first meeting. Kick-starting our calendar
will be a keynote presentation by Puneet Gupta, CEO of Connectbeam.

Social software has already begun to infiltrate the corporate walls,
but is it a distraction or a powerful resource to drive innovation?
Puneet Gupta will discuss the empowering potential of social
bookmarking, tagging, and social networking in an enterprise context.
Come learn the strategies for rapid information dissemination and
expertise discovery that will set smart companies apart while those
that refuse to adapt risk being left behind.

Speaker
Puneet Gupta, CEO, Connectbeam, Inc.

Puneet Gupta is a seasoned technology executive and entrepreneur with
over 15 years of marketing and operations. Prior to Connectbeam, he
was CEO of CourseCafe, an online social collaboration application
company enabling researchers around the world to work together online.

Puneet was Director of Product Marketing at Selectica (NASDAQ: SLTC) -
an enterprise sales and solutions pricing software company, guiding it
into new industry verticals with innovative solutions, joint ventures,
and mergers and acquisitions. He has also held marketing and product
development positions at Peoplesoft, and Oracle Corporation, where he
received the Best Innovative Product of the Year award.

Puneet holds a B.S. in Computer Science and Engineering from Ohio
State University, Management of Technology from UC Berkeley, and an
MBA from Columbia University in New York. He is inventor or
co-inventor on several Patents.

We should be the cool kids!

Is your city social media friendly? Do businesses in your area have a reputation for embracing blogs, podcasts, and social networks?

This is the question that Dan Greenfield asked of several participants of SoCon08.

The overall answer (re: Atlanta)  was no - not really.

The question I had to ask myself today was;  Is that hurting me more than helping me as a social media consultant?

I have not traveled to the west coast...this past weekend I brought the west coast to Atlanta - that should count for something. But this weekend Chris Heuer and Josh Hallett and Dave Coustan pointed out that I need to get out to more conferences...something Timothy Moenk has been telling me for two years.

But today was the clincher. I was presenting to a new company here in Atlanta, my adopted hometown, where I have been evangelizing social media relentlessly for 2 + years - and the person I was presenting to said she had never heard of me. OK - that just sounds egotistical - but stay with me.

This person was also a social media enthusiast. However she had been going to conferences in NY and in CA and not even looking for good opportunities in Atlanta, because, she said, Atlanta had no market.

Because I have stayed in this city, it was almost as though my credibility was in question. Overall we worked it out and had a great meeting - but Atlanta... I am embarrassed!

I am not technical - so I can not go into details of all the activities that Jeff Haynie and Mike Schinkel and many others have been putting together such as start-up weekend or barcamp, but I do know that we have tried a variety of end user social media efforts that I have been involved with such as Atlanta Media Bloggers Group, Social Media Club, Social Media for PR Professionals, CRMA Summit, SoCon07, SoCon08, the new Enterprise 2.0 Society of TAG - plus PRSA events and there have been many other events.

So what is the disconnect?

Well - today I was sent another idea to start another group.

    Social Networking Experience Council

Initially I explained that I just do not have the bandwidth to start another effort. However, then I started thinking more about it. How can I get others to start "experience councils" regarding their industry? Someone who really is in PR (which I am not) should have a Social Networking PR Council. Many Interactive Marketing Agencies are claiming to be involved in social media. They should get together and start trading notes, because the one thing I have noticed is they are all over the place when it comes to how to create a social media site and what being a "consultant" means. We need more round tables and discussions.

But as much as I have tried to get those together, they do not happen in the business communities here like they should. The way they do things on "the West Coast." Everyone who claims to be an expert here seems to  treat social media as their secret sauce. It seems it is only a secret to people in Atlanta. Everyone else knows the doors are "open."

Come on Atlanta peeps - let's stand up and shine and not remain the outcast, introverted, stuff shirt city in the connected world. Let's start being one of the cool kids again!

Every generation needs a new revolution.

- Thomas Jefferson