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Questions to Get Closer to You Question 26

August 26, 2010 by Liz

Get Closer to You

This is a series of questions, I don’t know how many. They are the ones I ask when I help folks get closer to their personal identity.

What sort of thinkers and advisors are the best to test your decisions?

I’ll answer first to get things started.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Check out the Work with Liz!! page in the sidebar.

Buy my eBook and your best voice in the conversation!

Related< Branding: 5 Ways to Help You Find Out Who You Are

Questions to Get Closer to You: Question 25
Questions to Get Closer to You: Question 24
Questions to Get Closer to You: Question 23Branding: 5 Ways to Help You Find Out Who You Are

Questions to Get Closer to Your Brand: Question 1
You’ll find the entire series of Questions to Get Closer to you on the Successful Series page.

Filed Under: Business Life, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, business advice, LinkedIn, questions

Looking for Some Feedback

November 11, 2008 by SOBCon Authors

SOBCon08I am looking forward to this year’s conference – it’s going to be bigger and better than ever! In fact, Liz and Terry are putting together a program for the Friday of SOBCon weekend (1-3 May, 2009!).

We have been brainstorming some ideas and now we need your help too. I originally sent out this survey as an e-mail, and received a bunch of good responses. But for those that may not have received it, here it is again:

If you could be in charge of putting together a program for an extra half-day of the conference, what would you like to include? How about having a series of short, intensive, highly practical “How to” sessions on Friday? What kind of format would you prefer for this program, say from noon until 5:00:

  • 3 tracks of 45-minute sessions, featuring content for new bloggers and for experienced bloggers
  • 2 tracks of 30-minute sessions, again with content for new and experienced bloggers

Next, within that format, what sorts of things are you dying to learn? Do you need help with things like:

  • How to strengthen the connection between your business and your blog
  • How to make it easy to comment and discuss posts
  • How to design your website or blog for sales conversion – not just copywriting but the architecture, Ad placement, Affiliate sales, etc.

Please feel free to name your own course category, the one or two things that you would really, really like to take home from this year’s conference and put to use immediately.

Many of the responses that I have already received included comments to the effect that the group/brainstorming sessions were the best part, putting what the presenter just said into practical terms. What do you think?

Finally, if you had a chance to sponsor one of these sessions, and have a spot to promote your blog/business, would you do it?

What do you think that would be worth to you?

What would you want people to know about you and how would you like to get that message across?

Leave a comment, let us know what you think.

Filed Under: Attendees Tagged With: bc, questions, survey

Reviewing the Internets in Our Heads

April 17, 2008 by Liz

Thinking about What We Think

Personal Identity logo

As I sat down at my computer, I looked over at a teacher’s guide for a writing program that I worked on a few years ago. It was open on my desk to page with of teaching tips. One section was called Using Internet Resources. In the introductory paragraph it said,

Explain to students that the Internet does not undergo the same kind of scrutiny and review process that books and professional publications do. Voyages in English, Grade 6, p. 147

That sentence got me thinking about how we think. The information highways of our brains process ideas, thoughts, and concepts at incredible speed. Those messages transmit efficiently, but our “scrutiny and review process” has only our own context and experience to determine whether the information is flawed or faulty, incomplete, biased, or inaccurate.

As a source, we can be woefully limited, inexperienced, or out of date.

How do I know what I think I know?
Am I doing this out of habit or is it what the situation requires?
How did I form my opinion about that person?
What makes me think that I’ll never be good at doing that?
Am I sure that what I know from the past is still true?

How do you review the information on the Internet in your head?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Stuck? Work with Liz!!
SOBCon08 is May 2,3,4 in Chicago. Register now!

Filed Under: Business Life, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, personal-identity, questions

What is He Talking About? Chris Cree on Questions

April 12, 2007 by Chris Cree

“What if this were not a hypothetical question?”

I love to ask questions.

When I was a tyke I like to drove my folks bug-nuts with the “Why, Mommy? Why, Daddy? Why? Why? Why?” questions that never much seemed to end.

One Way to CC It logo

Even now as I approach my fourth decade I still tend to get conversations rolling by asking questions that I may or may not think I’ve got an answer for. I’m not in the teaching profession but I love seeing the light bulb go off when someone I’m talking with “gets it.”

I have a Brazilian friend who said there is a Portuguese phrase for that light bulb moment. It escapes me right now but I remember the English translation: “nickel down”. He told me it came from the old vending machines they used to have South of the Equator. You didn’t get whatever you were trying to buy from the machine until the nickel dropped down.

My mom’s a high school biology teacher still, so maybe I come by it genetically. I don’t know.

Thinking Excercise

One big reason questions are so wonderful is that they force us to think. And thinking can keep us young.

Not only that, but thinking through questions and problems and scenarios can help prepare us for times of crisis.

I remember we were living in Florida when hurricane Floyd was forming up in the Atlantic. Because I was in marine operations in the shipping business I keep close tabs on the storm systems out there. Looking at the satellite photos of that storm I called Gorgeous and told her to start packing up. Because if the storm didn’t change tracks we were going to be heading out.

And that was 5 days before the storm hit the coast. Got a framed picture of Floyd taken three days after that phone call hanging on my office wall right now.

Hurricane Floyd 14 September 1999Fortunately for us packing up and heading out was fairly simple and straight forward. Why? Because we’d asked ourselves a question prior to that day.

What would we do if “the Big One” was headed our way?

For us, living right near the Florida coast surrounded by tidal marsh (our subdivision at the time was called “Marsh Lakes” 🙄 ) the question was not hypothetical. The danger was real. In 18 years of living in the Southeast I’ve run from about a half a dozen storms. I’ve also ridden out a couple doozies onboard ships. I’ve seen their destructive power up close and personal.

Therefore we treated the question much more seriously than a hypothetical exercise. We actually invested the effort it took to come up with a workable plan. And because of the way we treated the question, facing the reality was not nearly as big a deal when the time came as it was for many other folks.

How You Respond Makes a Difference

How do you respond when you see a question?

Many people just gloss over it with a little, “Hmmph.” And then they go about their business.

Other folks don’t even notice that a question was asked.

If you fall into one of those categories you may very well one day end up like a friend of ours. She grew up in that coastal Florida town, lived there all her life, and never even thought about “the Big One.”

When it eventually came she was in a tight spot. She was seriously stressed out to say the least.

Fortunately we were on top of our game well enough that while I sorted out the ships I had to get out of the way of the storm at work Gorgeous went over and adapted our plan to their situation. It worked out that our friend got some help from us to get her and her infant baby out of harms way. And her cat. And her dog. And her Vietnamese pot-bellied pig.

We brought the whole zoo (plus our own cat) along with us to higher ground.

The Choice is Yours

So the next time someone asks you a challenging or difficult question you have a choice.

You can blow it off and hope you never face that situation in reality. Or, if you do, that a good friend will come a long and bail you out if you ever get in that jam.

Or you can think about it as if it really wasn’t a hypothetical question and work out how you’d respond for real. Then if you ever find yourself in that situation you will be way ahead of the game. And folks will appreciate how well you respond when things around you start falling apart. Trust me.

But that’s just the Way I C it.

–Chris Cree, SuccessCREEations.

Filed Under: Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, Chris-Cree, One Way to CC It, questions

Writing– The 2 PowerQuestions

May 17, 2006 by Liz

The Second Question

Power Writing Series Logo

When I start with that blank page, whether I think about it or I stare into space, two questions are waiting in white letters on the white space. I have to make myself see them and answer them before I will ever be able to write. The questions are basic and always the same.

What will your topic be?

and

What do you want to say about it?

If I can answer those two questions, the piece pretty much writes itself.

It really is as simple as that.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
How To Beat Writer’s Block
Questions about Burnout and Writer’s Block
Why Dave Barry and Liz Don’t Get Writer’s Block
The Power Writing Series on the SUCCESSFUL SERIES PAGE

Filed Under: Strategy/Analysis, Successful Blog, Writing Tagged With: bc, power_writing, questions, transitions, writer's_block, writing_series

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