Creativity

creativitythumb

One of the things I resolve to do in 2010 is to devote sub­stan­tial amounts of inten­tional effort towards the devel­op­ment of my cre­ativ­ity. I view cre­ativ­ity as a per­sonal strength, and I think it makes sense to spend con­sid­er­able time enhanc­ing this asset.  Inspired by my friend Artie Isaac, I am going to engage …read more

2009 — The Highlight Reel

2009

2009 was an amaz­ing year for me.  I decided I would end the year with a blog post ver­sion of my high­light reel for the year.   Life has its share of ups and downs, but I feel like I get a lot more good than bad every day.  For that I am grate­ful.  It …read more

odd man out

spade

Look­ing for a fun exer­cise to get your cre­ative juices flow­ing.  Try Edward De Bono’s odd man out exer­cise.  It is sim­ple, fun, and as my friend Artie Isaac would say, it is a great way to “exer­cise your cre­ative pet.” Start by going to a ran­dom word gen­er­a­tor site like this one.  Take the first …read more

Trick or Treat

Trick-or-Treat

With Hal­loween just one day away, Trick or Treat is def­i­nitely on the brain.  So in the spirit of the sea­son ask your­self this ques­tion.  Metaphor­i­cally speak­ing, what are you giv­ing your cus­tomers these days? Tricks or Treats?  If you are offer­ing treats, are they like those old, stale, home-made pop­corn balls or are they …read more

Summing Up SummitUp

summitupsummary

Yes­ter­day I got to cel­e­brate my birth­day by hav­ing my very own social media con­fer­ence — Sum­mitUp.  I highly rec­om­mend this as a way to cel­e­brate your next birth­day.  (actu­ally this was purely coin­ci­dence, but a nice one none the less.)  The day was sim­ply amaz­ing.  To give you an idea of how well things …read more

SummitUp

summitup

For my birth­day this year, I am get­ting some­thing really cool -  a social media con­fer­ence right here in Day­ton.  “Yea, Just what I always wanted, a con­fer­ence!” No, the con­fer­ence was not put on for that rea­son, but it is a nice coin­ci­dence.    The event is called Sum­mitUp, it will take place on Octo­ber …read more

The Physics of Marketing — The Doppler Effect

doppler

Have you ever won­dered why music blar­ing out of an approach­ing car changes in pitch as it passes by you and then moves fur­ther away from you.   This phe­nom­e­non can be described by the Doppler Effect, named for Aus­trian physi­cist Chris­t­ian Doppler.   Who knew Doppler was more than just the ridicu­lous brand name of the …read more

Sharpen The Saw

sharpenthesaw

Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw Sharpen the saw is the last of Covey’s 7 habits.  (There actu­ally is an 8th Habit, but that is another book, and per­haps another post.)  Sharpen the Saw is the habit of per­sonal renewal.  The metaphor of “sharp­en­ing the saw” is sim­ple -  It is coun­ter­pro­duc­tive to spend all of your …read more

Synergize

synergize

Habit 6: Syn­er­gize Syn­ergy is where all of the pre­vi­ous habits come together.  It is the pay­off.  To quote Stephen Covey “Syn­ergy is the high­est activ­ity in all of life.”  “The essence of syn­ergy is to value the dif­fer­ences.”  By doing so, the human gift of cre­ativ­ity can be lev­ered to pro­duce new and excit­ing …read more

Seek First to Understand

habit5

Habit 5: Seek First to Under­stand, Then to be Under­stood Habit 5, Seek First to Under­stand, Then to be Under­stood, is a con­tin­u­a­tion of Habit 4, Think Win/Win.  It is the idea that to truly think win/win, one must start with lis­ten­ing.  Thus the idea that one should seek first to under­stand, then to be …read more