As a result of what I would consider a “the jury’s still out” feeling, I decided to sit down and try to create something in the iBooks Author Software.  I sit on both the technology and professional development committees for our school district, so I figured putting together a book with iBooks Author served several purposes.  I would learn the tool by playing around with it, and I could make a book that could explain things like digital citizenship to teachers and parents.  The goal is to also have others help write the book as well, if they have time, and to customize it for our school district, making it a pretty decent “project-based learning” exercise for everyone involved.

It’s early on in the project, but I’ve found that iBooks author is pretty easy to use.  It works very much like the Pages application on the Mac, so getting started is pretty easy.  It took a little bit of fiddling and using the help feature to make sure I put hyperlinks in properly, and I could not find the footnoting feature, but I assume I’ll figure that out today.

It’s incredibly easy to add keynote presentations and videos into iBooks.  I had a one-step conversion process to take a YouTube Video and convert it so I could embed it in the text, and a Powerpoint presentation from the Pew Internet and American Life Foundation was easily converted into Keynote and included as a “figure” in a chapter. (They have their data available for use as open source with credit, so inclusion is not a copyright violation.)

My initial thoughts are that this could be a great tool for teachers and even people who regularly teach adult classes or trainings to put together interactive texts, aggregating resources and more.  For example, for folks in social media that are trying to teach folks how to use WordPress, it would be simple to put together a few slide shows, short how-to videos, and the like, and hook them together with text to create a much more useful and instructive guide.

The biggest problem I see with iBooks is making sure that IP rights are respected.  If you look in the back of any textbook, there are tons of footnotes, references and the like, because textbooks are, by their very nature, a conglomeration of expert advice from all over.  With iBooks Author, it’s very simple to cut and paste from all over the web to create a really terrific interactive book, yet determining whether anyone selling an iBooks Author text through the iBooks Store is “profiting” from work they did not actually create is going to be tricky.

The tools provided to create really terrific looking EPUB books are simple to use.  The application to sell your books in the iBooks store or distribute them for free is also pretty straightforward.  The aggregation of information and preserving intellectual property rights for a book format that relies on aggregation of information may be tricky.  But certainly for most teachers and educators who may be considering creating their own textbook or compendium of information they use for their lessons every year, this will be a terrific tool.

The only additional wrinkle is that so far, the epub multimedia format of the books produced will only be available for viewing on ipads.  I get that- adding video and slide presentations in an interactive format won’t work so wel on a Kindle or e-ink readers, especially when hot links to websites and secondary resources will require web access.  I’m not sure why the books should not be viewable in a reader on a Mac or PC, but I suppose if there’s enough demand, those problems will be solved as well.

iBooks and iBooks Author tools are an interesting business play for Apple, and provides a great way to let anyone, even children, create multimedia books and projects that are truly impressive.  We’ll have to wait and see how many people adopt it, but so far, it’s been a much more interesting way to put together a book than just using Microsoft Word.

I go to Educon every year because it’s always inspiring.  You hear what’s happening in other school districts, and realize both how much more you could be doing and how far along you are, as well as how common and universal certain problems seem to be. Resources, even in well off school districts or private schools, seems to be an issue, even the ones issuing kids laptops and ipads simultaneously.  People are nervous about making a decision and spending money that might look wrong headed three years from now, but also know in their hearts that if you wait for the perfect answer, or the most convincing data, the road to the future will be even more steep and unwieldy than it seems now.

Regardless of the uncertainty of it all, the people at Educon are optimists.  They’re optimists because they are betting on the kids they see every day,  betting on the kids’ creativity and promise, despite the obstacles that often leave them drained at the end of the day.  These are educators who realize that technology is a tool to open up the world to kids in ways we could only dream about a few years ago, while realizing that the most important thing that happens in a classroom doesn’t involve electricity at all.  The most important thing about school is community.

Inherent in the purpose of school is bringing a group of people together every day in the classroom to learn with and from each other.  It’s about creating small families that may meet for all or part of the day, and that learn, over time, to leverage their strengths and weaknesses so all boats rise.  It’s about seeing kids as individuals, not just within your classroom, but as whole people with worries and even troubles that can effect everyone.  It’s about trying to teach and model resilience- how you get through challenges and come out the other side better for it.  The best teachers are wizards at turning a group of kids into a learning community- one that has its own ups and downs, but centers around mutual respect and common goals.

This is something you can’t buy from any business or publisher.  It’s not for sale, but it’s probably the largest predictor of whether the education in your schools is working or not.  It’s the common thread that the folks at Educon share, and talk about with passion and feeling.  It’s what moves them and keeps them in teaching every day.  It’s the chance to care and effect kids and help them learn as much about life as about the subject matter at hand.  It’s mentoring and nurturing and caring, and from that core, all other decisions are fairly clear.

One principal shared a story of having one of those dreaded moments of imposing clear line discipline with a student that violated the fundamental rules and trusts.  As he returned to his office, he saw a group of students there waiting for him.  He expected they would be mad, need to talk, or otherwise have an “us vs. them” conversation, but instead, one of the students asked him “Are you all right?  What can we do for you?”  They knew imposing this penalty was a hard for the principal as if he was doing this for one of his own children, and it still brings tears to my eyes as it did to almost everyone in the room.  It demonstrated that when you show real caring and empathy for the folks you deal with, you are in turn, understood and treated the same way.  this is the way discipline and learning should happen everywhere.

Instead, I worry that in too many schools, the caring is slowly being beaten out of everyone, students and teachers alike.

We all know and say this- but the best things in life are free.  They don’t come out of a box and they are unscripted.  But they do require an awful lot of time invested into community, common purpose and mission, and caring about everyone as people first, and people that are imperfect, changing, developing, and doing their best every day.  If we can start to humanize our schools, to lead with empathy, caring and understanding, we’ll have truly transformed schools without spending a dime.  But it will take the biggest commitment of all- one that begins and ends in our hearts.

Compass Points

*Quick note- I accidentally published this piece before it was edited- a quirk from using the iPad to compose in the WordPress app and save in draft format, which I messed up. Sorry for any inconvenience.

Sometimes, we know we’re going to encounter a problem that needs to be solved. But when we choose to take on that task may be more open to discussion.

For example, if you know your car is beginning to hit that age where repair costs start to outweigh the value of the vehicle, you have at least two choices. The first involves starting to shop for cars and deciding to find a replacement before it dies on some back road in the middle of the night. The second is to wait for it to die completely, and then make a more urgent and forced decision on alternative transportation. There’s clearly middle ground between these two choices, but procrastination tends to box you in on choices and timing, where doing some advanced planning may give you a wider range of alternatives and cause less stress. (This, of course, leaves you with less dramatic stories to tell as well, so that is something to consider, I guess.)

Many people get stuck in the research loop. They start planning, but they are always looking for that one better option, the one elusive piece of data that will make the choice easy.  I know I get stuck there, sometimes, thinking I’ll find just that one thing that will be the tipping point on a decision.  often times, data can just be more data.

There’s actually a whole psychological syndrome about this called the Hamlet Complex or Hamlet Syndrome, where people get stuck in the “to be or not to be” loop, paralyzed by making a choice, and fear of making the wrong one.  It’s caused by over-thinking decisions and as a result, becoming paralyzed from just making a choice and getting on with it already.

For these folks (and I think we can all go there sometimes), something that forces their hand, like a crisis, makes them feel better, because they can hardly be blamed, the rationalization goes, if they had to make a quick decision without a lot of information- it was an emergency! It wasn’t my fault! We paid too much, but we had no choice! The truth of the matter is that there were plenty of opportunities to do some advanced planning, or make a faster decision, and perhaps a better decision, but they just couldn’t find the trigger they wanted to pull.

I feel this sense of frustration often with some committee work I’m involved in. There’s general agreement of where we want to go. There’s general agreement of what the right thing to do is. But issues like time, money, logistics, etc. all seem to get in the way and give people an excuse against making a decision.

For example, let’s look at Apple’s new textbook initiative. We all have known since the Kindle came out that digital textbooks were coming.  Many of my kid’s classes have “at home” textbooks on cd, online portals to supplement the text, etc. because the current textbook purchase cycle is TEN years.    Is there anyone who REALLY thinks in the digital age, that text books purchased today are going to last TEN years in almost any subject? Do we really think kids won’t be reading digital textbooks within that time frame? Because if we know that’s going to be the case, why don’t we start the transition and planning for that process now?

There are lots of really good reasons why (or why not). Not every text is ready for digital right now. Committing to every child having a laptop or tablet scares the crap out of teachers, administrators and parents, who are themselves just getting used to these things. It will be expensive. It will require teaching teachers and students about digital citizenship and some of them will make mistakes.  Some of the mistakes will be more serious and have more consequences than merely doodling the margin of a school text or losing a book and having to pay for it at the end of the year.  Many teachers may not be comfortable adopting their lessons to an online world, or giving up top down control in the classroom. But I ask again, if we know that it’s coming, why aren’t we planning for that today?

It turns out if youset a firm goal and deadline you have to work towards, everyone can then start to make firm plans to meet those parameters. As long as a goal stays in the “some day”, or “wouldn’t it be nice if” range, it is as good as water through a sieve. It means very little without verbs in sentences and things to do behind the mission statements and platitudes.  Without nailing down what you want to do and when, it merely becomes another dream, ephemeral and unlikely to become reality.

So I ask you, as I ask everyone- what are you saying “Sure, but not now” to in your life? What excuses are holding you back? What are you afraid of? And what would happen if you just said- ” OK, so if not now, when?”   When will I finally commit to accomplishing this goal I know I need to accomplish?

If it isn’t tied to a date, or specific goal or course of action, you simply aren’t serious about committing to the goal, so take it off the table and forget about it. It’s worthless to you. It’s up there with my hopes I’ll finally get that extra two hours in a 24 hour day to accomplish so much more. Since Hermoine Granger isn’t showing up with a time turner, I have to deal with reality that there are only 24 and not 26 hours in a day, and make sure all those lists of some day tasks are put into a timeframe to be accomplished.

What will you move off your some day list, where your dreams are waiting for the stars and planets to align, and move it onto the front burner, where you have to work to make it happen?

It takes guts and commitment to go for your dreams.  It takes courage and conviction to face difficult decisions and take painful action now to make tomorrow better.  It’s not easy to pick a direction and go for it, especially when it’s a time of flux and change.  But I know waiting until the “right” moment means there will never be a perfect right moment and we’ll never achieve anything by waiting on the sidelines, hoping rather than doing.

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

I’ve combined the handouts for weeks Two and Three into one PDF, you can download by clicking here: Branding Your Business Week Two and Three.

I combined the handouts because much of the material concentrates on making sure your website is working for you. Your online presence is a “threshold experience” like walking into a store for the first time. The design, navigation, information and calls to action are all extremely important when it comes to taking people directed there by any social media site or offline interaction and converting them into customers.

So long before we add “social media sauce” to your marketing mix to help increase traffic to your business and website, we really need to make sure that website allows people to do business with you as simply as possible. We suggest a couple of simple tests to look at your website with a new eye, and check for things that might cause problems for your customers, and we have a few tasks to make sure your business is easier to find through search.

We then suggest you make sure you have a good analytics package on your site, so you can begin to look at what affect your social media efforts may have in increasing your business traffic, and let you know what you may want to adjust over time, if things aren’t getting the attention you want them to have.

We’ll then talk a little bit about Google’s Zero Moment of Truth, (you can download their great e-book on their website, or by clicking this link) and how you need to start thinking about how to reach your customers during their research process, and help make sure you are one of the options they consider when looking for a product of service in your industry.

I’ve also included a few great blog posts covering topics ranging from “Link Bait” to The Best Small and Medium Business Metrics to “How Much Time Should I Spend on Social media?” from a variety of great websites around the web (all credited and linked to the source).

Please let us know if these handouts are helpful, and I look forward to seeing you in class!

Business Feedback Loops

Before the internet, we had to wait a lot longer between taking an action and seeing a result.  You launch a product, and in the next quarter, half year, or longer, you might finally have enough data to begin to see whether the product was a success or not.  If you get mediocre results,  you might start to consider tweeking the product, but the time between “trial”and “error” or getting an improvement out to the existing customers has been so long, it hardly seemed to matter much.

Now with the internet, you can begin to get almost instantaneous feedback from customers, and go to work almost immediately on your next iteration, if needed.  This can be a blessing and a curse, of course.  You may save money by not having to commit to thousands of units if your item has problems and you find out early, but the pros and cons of your 1st bite at the apple will also haunt you by the spread of reviews, comments, blogs and the rest around the internet.  This would be why limited beta testing and early focus groups are even more valuable to help you sort out details long before official launch.

Keep in mind, early reaction can be misleading.  Think about all those tech folks who said “Who cares about the iPad?  It’s just a big iPod touch- who needs one of those?” Those tech insiders and geeks had to eat their words when they figured out they weren’t the only audience for the thing.  Making choices and reacting too early to the early adopter crowd might lead you to making a big mistake- so it’s important to know which audiences you are speaking to and how important and relevant their feedback is to your overall vision and business.

Implementing Helpful Feedback Loops

The key is to set up feedback loops where you can gauge reaction or impact and adjust course, when necessary, with relative speed rather than waiting years to adjust.

Government, as we all know, is awful in terms of feedback loops.  Once a law or regulation is finally in place, after commentary, reconsideration, input of special interest groups and the like, the final version often has very different effect than what was intended.  Then along comes our old friend, The Doctrine of Unintended Consequences, where real world consequences of decisions and laws turn out to be different than what was initially anticipated or expected.

For example, the Americans with Disabilities Act has a couple of positive and negative unintended consequences.  With the increase in the number of ramps available for wheelchair access to buildings, parents with strollers, delivery men and others have easier access than ever before as well.  The negative consequences come from some folks using the law as a way to do “drive-by” lawsuits for businesses without adequate disabled parking, even for businesses they have never even attempted to visit.

Yet every law, negotiated and put into place to try to solve real world problems will sit, with its good and bad effects.  It will take forever to change it, with yet more compromises, to make sure it works better than it did at the outset. Because of the delay between enactment and action, the legal process moves at a pace that is frustrating and ridiculous at almost all levels, and this lack of responsiveness is part of the underlying frustration we all have with government at all levels.  The feedback loops, from election cycles to implementation of actual laws is so long, it can seem to render the modification moot.

But government is gradually getting with the program.  The State of Delaware has been using Twitter to help keep people informed of road closures and emergencies They also listen to social channels, so they know where there might be an emergency, a snow removal problem, or other issue the State and its employees can address, rather than waiting to hear through more formal channels.  It makes the State gradually more responsive to citizens, especially where it counts- on day to day issues that effect everyone.

Education Feedback Loops

When I was in school, our teacher figured out what we knew by testing us at the end of a unit or chapter.  we might have had a quiz or paper in between.  These data points are pretty far apart, and don’t help a teacher or student assess what they understand or don’t understand when something can be done about it- closer to the point of first learning.  Educators are using simple things like a “thumbs up/thumbs down” to do a quick check on who is following along and who is lost.  They may use “clickers” to take polls and informal assessments even several times during a class period, checking on what kids are getting and what they need more help with along the way.

These immediate feedback loops help keep kids on track, and avoids losing too many kids along the way.  They help a teacher figure out how to adjust her teaching speed to her students, and keep her from “over-teaching” concepts the kids already know.  The shortened feedback loops help make a teacher and a classroom of students more in sync, making sure each does their jobs better over time. Errors and issues can be spotted and corrected quickly, giving everyone a better shot at mastering the material and doing well.

Tweek Your Feedback Loops

The key in business and education is to keep feedback loops coming, and know when you need to adjust your course of action, and when to hold steady.  If you don’t think your marketing is working, ask your customers what they think of it, sooner than later.  How often would they like to hear from you?  What sort of information would be most helpful?  Do they want sales information, education information, or what would they like to see most?  The more you can gear your materials to your clients needs, the more likely you are to get the response you need.  But like any good feedback loop- you have to remember to ask for the feedback and then act on it appropriately.

feedback loops are the key to getting more out of your current actions- tyr playing with them, and see how they work for your business.

In No Particular Order:

Fiction

Jen Lancaster.  Jen Lancaster has been a favorite of mine since my friend, beth harte, introduced me to her books a few years ago.  While Jen’s previous books were more life adventure sort of books, If You Were Here is her first fiction novel. Her writing is funny, touching and it has a sense of authenticity to it- It feels like she’s telling these stories to friends over drinks.  Meeting her at a reading in Center City Philadelphia this Spring felt like meeting Bruce Springsteen- it was a big deal for me, especially since I was finishing my own book at the time.  Her previous book- My Fair Lazy, inspired me to take my first trip to Chicago and go to Moto, a molecular gastronomy restaurant that makes you rethink what food can be.  It currently holds my personal record for having spent the most on a meal ever,  and having the most amazing time doing so I could imagine.

The Help- Kathryn Stockett  Yes, I read it, and enjoyed it- and the book is much more in depth than the movie.  I think the only thing missing from this story is the current irony where most of the people in the 50′s and 60′s who were prejudiced and unkind to The Help are now older people, depending on the very people they were abusive to, to take care of them in their old age.  Karma can be a b*tch.

Non-Fiction

The Myth of the Garage- by Chip and Dan Heath.  This book is a collection of great short pieces by the brothers responsible for Made to Stick and Switch- two other books I constantly recommend.  I find myself taking notes about things I want to remember or points to use in my work when trying to explain complex things to people who are a bit scared of all this new online stuff.  Even better, it’s free as an e-book on Kindle, Nook and iBooks.

Dan Ariely Dan’s work helps explain why we all do things that logically don’t make sense and how we can get in our own way.    I love this sort of cultural anthropology, and I’m a huge fan.

What School Leaders Need to Know About Digital Technologies and Social Media- Chris Lehmann & Scott McLeod.  For teachers in the group, Chris Lehmann, the principal of Philadelphia’s Science Leadership Academy, is one of the most thoughtful, kind and amazing people I know.  His book helps you figure out the way forward, as technology becomes more a part of the student’s lives, even if you aren’t 100% comfortable with it yourself.  Time is short, and you need to get with the program as quickly as possible.

Waiter Rant: Thanks for the Tip–Confessions of a Cynical Waiter (P.S.) “>Waiter’s Rant by Steve Dublinica, you’ll end up being a lot more patient and understanding with all the sales clerks you meet.  From a business owner’s point of view, you’ll realize how important your front line personnel are to your overall success or failure.

No Bullshit Social Media: The All-Business, No-Hype Guide to Social Media Marketing “>No Bulls**t Social Media- Jason Falls & Erik Deckers.  While I should disclose up front that I consider Jason a friend and someone who I respect highly – and he’s a blast to share a meal with – His book is definitely worth your time, even for those who consider themselves social media savvy.   This is the no-gloss book to recommend to people who are still trying to figure out what this social media thing is about, and why it doesn’t seem to be “working” the same way traditional marketing works.  It contains the conversations all of us in this general social media marketing arena have with each other- it’s about time everyone else knew it, too.  Basic business good sense does not go out the door just because you have a website.

Chuck Klosterman IV- A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas- this is a fun romp from one of the kings of “literary non-fiction”.  Chuck has a bunch of interesting interviews and some of his famous riffs that always make me laugh and walk away totally amazed.

All of Seth Godin’s Domino Project books, including:

Poke The Box- Seth Godin

Do The Work-Steven Pressfield

We are All Weird- Seth Godin

Anything You Want- Derek Sivers

Pick Four (Zig Ziglar workbooks)

Read This Before Our Next meeting- Al Pittamipalli

Zarrella’s Hierarchy of Contagiousness: The Science, Design, and Engineering of Contagious Ideas- Dan Zarella

End Malaria- Collection of work including amazing people like Mitch Joel, Sir Ken Robinson, Pam Slim, Steven Johnson, and Jeff Jarvis, to name only a few.

Each and every book on this list is worth your time, your attention, your money, and worth sharing with friends.  I’m also excited to say that another friend will be launching a book in this series shortly, and I can’t wait to tell you more about that one- it will change your life.

That’s probably more than the classic top ten, but it should give you a good idea where I’ve spent my time and attention this year, and where I think yours can be well spent as well.

And I have to add this last one:

For any teachers, educators, speakers, parents or other folks interested in education, please check out Chris Brogan, did a video review of the book recently, and it sums up what Jenifer and I were trying to achieve- giving teachers, parents and anyone interested in education a roadmap to how to reach everyone in your audience/classroom, and how to teach with your students in mind.  For me, the best reviews I could get for the work we put into the book is this sort of response- that it made people think, consider, and try something new to better reach their audience.  That’s all an author can ask for in the end.

While Ms. Sullivan did nothing disruptive while in the Governor’s presence other than send this tweet, she is being accused of being disrespectful in a rather ad hoc ergo propter hoc  way.  (after this, therefore because of this).   Ms. Sullivan is currently choosing not to apologize, and I strongly support her free speech rights, especially since she is at the age when she can begin to vote and take place in public discourse as an adult.

The really interesting question this whole incident is the free speech versus regulated speech argument, hitting at the heart of an  age-old debate about whether free speech rights apply in the school house or at school-related functions.  While the Supreme Court has stated many times that students do not shed their constitutional rights at the schoolhouse door,  the school does have leeway to balance free speech with educational objectives.  This means, for example, that schools can reasonably restrict kids from wearing clothing with provocative language that may be disruptive to learning.  The most recent school speech case,  Morse v. Frederick may apply here.  In that case, Students had displayed a sign saying “Bong hits 4 Jesus” in front of their school when the Olympic Torch Relay was passing by.  The sign was confiscated by the principal and the student responsible for it was suspended.  The case wound up in the Supreme Court, where, in a 5 to 4 decision, the action of the principal was upheld as a reasonable enforcement of the school’s policy not to encourage illegal drug use, and that these policies also included students who were on field trips or other approved social events.

While Ms. Sullivan was clearly on a school sponsored event, her speech was not disruptive at the time, and did not inherently violate school policy other than using her cell phone during school hours.  But it is the content of her message, not the method by which it was communicated, that is being punished, making it much more likely that Ms. Sullivan will prevail if this matter ever goes to Court.

What I think is most important about this, however, is the need we all have to begin to teach kids at every age (and adults as well) what it means to be a good digital citizen.  We are doing virtually nothing (in the aggregate) to teach our kids about how to use new communication channels appropriately, and that digital communication like tweets can have a bigger impact on their lives than they realize.  For Ms. Sullivan, who is likely applying to colleges, will this event become something that makes her a more attractive candidate or less?  Will her handling of this issue lead to applause or a reputation of being a troublemaker?  the jury is out, but one thing is for sure- one snarky tweet may change this young girl’s life whether she’s ready for it or not. The lack of guidance provided in the vast majority of school districts to students on digital citizenship issues at any level of schooling will likely lead to more of these issues coming to the fore rather than less.

If we learn anything from Ms. Sullivan’s incident with her school and Gov. Brownback, I hope it’s that we can no longer afford to turn a blind eye to the power of social media and the effect it has on people.  We need to begin to prepare our kids to live in a world we ourselves are still adjusting to- where your fifteen minutes of fame or infamy may come at any time, for almost any reason.

The classes are structured so that each class can stand alone, but the series creates an overall picture to help you better understand the opportunities available through social channels and how to leverage them for your own business.  The classes are being offerred in three locations and will cover the same material.  In addition, each week we’ll have handouts to go along with the class with resources, online tools to help you and your business, and a list of steps you can take to help implement what we’ve talked about that week.  Our goal is to make sure each week you have something to think about and actionable steps to help make this “social media thing” more manageable and useful to you.

Below you’ll find an outline of the course as planned, and I’d love any suggestions from you about things we may not have added to the list that you’d like to see included.  We’ll also leave a little time at the end of class so you can help get your own questions answered, making sure the class fits your needs as closely as possible.

Course Outline:

Session 1 Branding Online with Social Media
-Why Social Media Matters
-Identifying Your brand and Message
-Overview of the Social Platforms including mobile
-Communicating your brand through your profile

Session 2  Your Customers and Your Community: The Two Way Conversation
-Who do you want to connect to online and why? Inbound and Outbound marketing in a nutshell
-Engaging Your Audience- How to create content they will care about and how to make your messages more memorable
-Setting up listening posts

Session 3 – The Google Tools session: How do customers look for me, and how can I help them find me?
-Google’s Zero Moment of Truth and Customer Feedback Loops- When are customers making decisions and why after the sale is also more important than ever before.
-Basic SEO- understanding tagging, keywords, and trying to fish where the fish are
-Using Google Tools to help time content and check on your competition

Session 4 Managing Social Media and Defining Your Goals
-Integrating Your channels- to cross post or not- making the most of your content.
-Managing Social Media- tools to help make your brand and messaging more consistent
-Defining Success: How do I know if this is working? What am I looking for as far as results?
-Final To Do’s
-Q & A

Locations and Sign-up Links

Flickerwood Wine Cellars- the great wine shop in Kennett Square- 4 consecutive Mondays starting November 28th

http://brandingflickerwood.eventbrite.com/

Lily Sushi- the great new sushi restaurant in Kennett Square- Four consecutive Thursdays starting December 1st

http://brandinglilys.eventbrite.com/

Film Brothers in Wilmington, DE- four consecutive Wednesdays starting December 7th

http://brandingfilmbros.eventbrite.com/

We hope you’ll join us for these sessions.  The price is $80 for the 4 weeks, which comes to $20 per class!  Even if you need to miss a week, I know you’ll find it more than worth it and the handouts will be available to help cover what we covered in class.

I look forward to seeing you there!

This is true for me as well.  I have my own consulting business, helping local businesses learn and use digital and social media, and I have my book to promote.  I sit on committees for our school district, teach Podcasting once as week at the Middle School, and moderate a group on Edutopia on personalized learning.  I help organize Podcamps.  I wear lots of hats, with a focus on digital and social media, and education. I do hope some of these volunteer positions will generate clients, but my first focus is making a difference in my community.  I can do this, because my spouse has the “full time gig” which means my income is our “extras” money, going towards long term goals and acting as gap-filler in our personal household economy.

The problem with having multiple gigs, paid or unpaid, is giving each one the attention it deserves, where focus on one or two core things would be better.  While my big picture focus is clear, the day to day “What needs my attention now” can get a bit cloudy, and it takes a lot of effort to remain focused on articulated goals.  I think this is a problem for almost everyone participating in the Gig Economy- how much of your attention and passion are you using for each of these part-time things?  Is any one “good enough” to become a full time, single focus venture?  Do you want one focus? What happens if any one of these gigs dries up, or requires additional focus- how does your juggling act change?

It seems promising- Should I leave a job for the Gig Economy?

I often hear friends talk about the glamorous world of public speaking.  How can they make money by sharing what they know with others?  One woman was thinking about leaving a successful law practice, because she had a speaking gig that paid her a few thousand dollars.  She started to think that if she could do a couple of these a month, she’s have it made, and be able to spend more time at home with her kids as well.

Potential Hiccups in a Great Goal

The potential problem with this idea is the following:

In order to make this business plan work, she would have to make sure (Minimum) she booked paying speaking gigs equal to the money she needed for her family every month.  Who is going to pay her that much, month in and month out?

-While she may be well-known locally, how many times could she give the same speech or even a new one, to these same folks, for the same money every month? Or every year?

- This would mean expanding her market to reach folks she didn’t know as well, and who didin’t know her.  This means spending time networking and connecting to others, to build her reputation.  It also means setting up a business entity, website and more, which are going to require an initial investment of capital.

-She wasn’t a famed law professor, or have any other “product” like books, or coaching, or other “stuff” to push to help generate additional income and up-sell people attending her presentations.  This means she was currently limited to whatever each organization was willing to pay her, and many organizations also have tight budgets.  This makes setting up a stream of guaranteed income producing gigs, month in and month out for the foreseeable future might not be as easy as this first gig made it seem.

-If she had to expand her reach, she would need to travel out of the area.  Paying or receiving compensation for the travel might lower the speaking fee she received as well.

-Additional travel and preparation for these gigs might actually take time away from her family, not give her more time.

-She would have to generate additional income to pay for things like health insurance, professional license fees and other things currently covered by her employer.

This doesn’t mean becoming a public speaker is impossible, or ill-advised.  It just comes with its ups and downs as much as any other business.  Starting out, the speaking can generate a nice side bonus-income, but until gigs get so numerous and/or lucrative that they start either effecting the main job or generate enough income every month to justify making that choice, the speaking business is really more of a nice bonus side business, not a full-time venture, no matter how terrific it seemed at first.

The Side Gig Economy

There are plenty of folks with side gigs- and there always have been.  This includes everything from selling Avon, Mary Kay, Tupperware or any other “representative” and Sell to Your Friends in Your Spare Time kind of things.  I know many teachers, parents, and other folks who sell this stuff on the side, to generate side income. Many of these programs sell things you and your friends might like, but you can only tap that resource every so often before you become a social pariah.  I have sought some of them out when I want something from Pampered Chef, for example, but I will NEVER go to another Partylight candle party, no matter how much I love you- and the number of these candles at the local Good Will would seem to indicate I am not alone in this feeling.

This sort of side gig is meant to be a side gig and uses the leverage of your social relationships the same way the social web does, in order to spur purchases.  But think what you would have to do and the number of strangers you would need to meet and sell to in order to generate a full time income from this.  These organizations are fairly benign multi-level marketing programs, where a few people at the top get very rich, but most people make at best a modest income.

Multilevel marketing plans are all about generating income for folks further up the scale, and trying to get you to develop more people downstream from you, to help you move up the ranks.  It is a game where you have to pressure people to join as representatives, and each person is then told their success or failure is determined not by the product itself, but how hard you are willing to work to pressure more people to join and sell this way.  It works well for a few folks, but often produces no more than side-gig money and an excuse to get friends together for everyone else.

Multilevel marketing is now entering the digital space with a vengeance, and I’ll be writing more about that shortly.

What do you think about the new gig economy?  What are its benefits and burdens?  s this the way all jobs are going- where everyone is a hired gun and a consultant?  What are the overall social benefits and burdens of this?  Let’s talk about this more.