Jun 4, 2008 | blog
Wow, what a wild ride the last few months have been. I’ve been planning to refine the direction of my blog and revamp the appearance for some time and it’s finally completed!
Well, it’s almost completed – I’ve got a replacement for the About page almost ready to publish, and I’ve got one last page that I’ll add a little later. Seems I just can’t get it to come out quite right in the past week while working on other things – so I’ll get to that real soon.
Direction
The great part is that I’m refining my direction. Since I’ve come out of corporate, with a strong background in information technology, I’m going to focus on helping those organizations with social media. I’ve changed the description of the blog to "social web & the enterprise". I believe that to better describe the direction that I’m going.
Friends
First, I really respect a number of bloggers for their work & influence on me. So, instead of the old blogroll, or a list of links, I created a new Friends page. This page is people I have come to know, respect, learn from, work with, and I wanted to do more than just link to them. You’ll find a description of each blog and a thumbnail of their landing page.
Resume
Also page that can now be found in the top navigation area is the Resume page. I’ve had a variant of this Social Media Resume up for about 9 months, but never advertised it on the blog. I’ve revamped a number of pieces of the page as it used to be a completely custom HTML page forced into a WordPress theme template. Now it fully fits the theme, with a special resume.php template that allows different sidebars and such. Much better. I’ve pulled the video that I had on it, but will replace it with another one to fit the direction of the blog shortly.
Advertisement
You’ll also notice that all advertising save two things have been removed from the blog. While I make enough to pay for hosting, I believe that the ads detracted from what I’m here to accomplish, so they’re gone. The two items I mentioned that remain are badges for Personal Branding Magazine, and for Avatar Consultants. Their of personal interest to me, I’m involved in writing for one, and the other is my consulting firm.
Nowhere But Up
So if the picture in this post didn’t give a hint, my motto as I revise my direction and enter a new phase, is that there is nowhere to go but up. Join me as we bring the benefits of the social web to organizations of all sizes. Come along and help individuals realize the power and strength of their brand. Let’s make each day the best it can be!
I want to give a special thank you to Mykl Roventine for patience, ideas, and a great design – I wouldn’t have gotten this completed without his work. Thank you.
Got feedback? I bet! Don’t hesitate to leave your thoughts in a comment below.
Photo credit: Leo Reynolds
May 12, 2008 | blog
This past Saturday (May 10th) I had a chance to facilitate an unconference session with Peter Fleck (@pfhyper on Twitter) at MinneBar on the University of Minnesota campus. While Peter and I hadn’t planned it out long in advance, and we had technical difficulties at the beginning, namely to overhead equipment, it went pretty well.
The part I really enjoyed was the interaction. Peter and I both wanted to start a group discussion, and that’s exactly what happened. There were a lot of great questions from both experienced and new Twitter users, and many people shared their perspectives and ideas on using Twitter. It reinforced the idea that Twitter is just at it’s earliest stages of uptake.
What I really want to do from Saturday is to thank everyone that stopped by and joined the conversation. It was great to meet so many people here in the Minneapolis Web2 scene, and I look forward to talking more with you on Twitter and elsewhere. Don’t hesitate to let me know if you have questions or ideas to talk about – you can find me on Twitter as @RickMahn.
Also, since I didn’t grab the names off the board in the room, I’d like to invite anyone who was there to share their Twitter name. Just leave them in the comments and others from the session can find them and connect with you. Any other questions or interest in social web tools that you’d be interested in talking about? It might be worth putting something together if enough people are interested.
May 8, 2008 | blog
We live in age when anything is possible, at the touch of a button, or simply for the asking. The modern world is filled with tools and technologies that allow us to do amazing things. From communicating around the world in the blink of an eye, to reporting breaking news by the average person, to creating the perfect latte at home, our world makes things so easy.
It’s Easy
So if things are so easy, why are people not taking advantage of the tools and techniques available for networking themselves and building a better brand? Is the concept of reaching out to connect with like-minded or similarly skilled people that foreign to the average worker? Or is it the tools? Granted social networking and personal branding are not needed by everyone. Some people will, of course, simply shun the idea of publishing anything about themselves on the Internet, and they are welcome to that opinion.
However, if you’re at the foot of that corporate ladder looking up and wondering if it’s even worth it, you need to be thinking of how to position yourself properly. There are dozens if not hundreds of books on the topic that you can buy and use to build your brand. There is also a genuinely easy way to get started building the brand that is you. Be smart.
Beware the slip-up
With all the ways to interact and share your life online, sometimes it’s too easy to slip up. Whether you like using the pre-packaged social networks or you’re more of a DIY person and build your own. You need to make sure you are thinking about what people outside your social circle will see when they view your online presence. You’ve heard the stories of college beer parties being posted, or inside jokes traded with online buddies. These are some of the things that can be found months or years later.
So don’t let your reputation, your brand, be so easily tarnished by easy mistakes. Also, think about the tools you use to network. We are lucky to have so many tools at hand to build that brand and network. Choose the one(s) that best match your goals, message and style. Whatever you do, don’t hesitate to get started. Perversely, that is usually the most difficult step in the process.
Photo credit: spackletoe
Apr 27, 2008 | blog
It’s something that I’ve been thinking about recently. For how much all these nifty tools have helped us become more productive, I think there is a percentage of creativity or inspiration that we give up. All productivity tools are things that can do harm to our work habits as much as they simplify a task.
Maybe it’s that most of these tools are single-task automation or simplification utilities and from that perspective are inefficient solutions. Take a close look at all your “social media†or “Web 2.0†tools and services – I bet most really only solve one real task with a few frivolous extras sprinkled on top.
I’m not sure what to do about this, but I look at my productivity today and compare it to a year ago. Back then I was chewing through thousands more feeds, had more ideas and, it seems, more time to write posts for my blog.
Today, I have client software installed that automatically checks my Twitter and FriendFeed accounts for updates. It notifies me with a pleasant tone that triggers me to quickly switch windows and check out the latest possible news like a rabbit hitting the feeder bar for a food pellet.
How is this productive? How is this helping me? I have Twhirl updating the main Twitter feed every 2 minutes – how many times am I interrupted in an hour? Right. 30! Think about that. Now add FriendFeed into the mix on its own (similar) updates schedule. How many times can you be interrupted in a day without losing focus?
Now I don’t mean to beat up on Twitter and FriendFeed – heck, I can come up with dozens of reasons why they help more than hinder my daily life. Email used to be the same. I used to use Microsoft Outlook. If the computer was on, so was Outlook – and what was that nice feature introduced in Outlook 2003? Pop-up notification… great. So that is where that bad habit was developed for me. Since changing to web-based email about three months ago, I find myself checking email much less often. I’m no less effective or timely in my communication either.
So it’s really how we use the tools – their convenience allows us to lean on them for help. Sometimes a little too much. As we’re creatures of habit it’s up to us to develop, groom, and manage those habits. If we start developing bad habits, it’s ourselves that needs to correct them.
So that’s what I personally need to do. Simply change how I use Twitter and FriendFeed. There are others, but those are the two that I really need to manage my time with the most.
How about you? What are your tricks & tips in managing these productivity tools?
Photo credit: Kate Tomlinson
Apr 20, 2008 | blog
As is usually the case, the way we use tools changes over time. I’m wondering if how I use Twitter is going to change because of some of the issues that have been discussed this weekend. Probably not, I’d been starting to change how I use Twitter about a week or two ago.
While Twitter has had some problems in the past and certainly is having another round of troubles, I too have problems that need fixing. I’ve found that the way I’ve used the service in the past does not scale well, and clients such as Twhirl have added to the problem.
It’s TOO EASY to keep flipping over to my Twhirl window whenever it “pings’ at me, scrolling through up to 20 messages to see what’s going on. Like some mad Pavlovian subject, I have to see what’s been updated. Now that FriendFeed is also in my Twhirl stream, it’s gotten much, much worse.
So I’m changing how I use Twitter. I’m shutting off the notifications for the bulk of the Twitter and FriendFeed updates. I’ll keep notifications on for Replies and Direct Messages. I’ll check in when I have a few minutes and review what’s in the last page or two on the website, but that’s the extent of it.
Twitter has become extremely important as a social and communications tool, but it’s also become too big of a time sink to keep on top of during the day. I know several people who shut it off during the main part of the workday – something I’ve put off as much as possible – and tune back in after work hours.
I still encourage everyone to contact me through Twitter first and foremost. A DM in Twitter will get directly to me (they are all forwarded to my phone) and I respond to every Reply, so don’t think I’m not monitoring it if you don’t see me Twittering a lot.
My Twitter Profile: http://twitter.com/rickmahn
My FriendFeed Profile: http://friendfeed.com/rickmahn
I’m curious what techniques you may be using to manage your Twitter stream? What can you share with our Twitter friends to help ease the volume of information that speeds past?
