Successful Blog

How Do You Exercise the Perspective You Need?

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The theme of SOBCon09 is the ROI of Relationships. To underscore the importance of relationships in business and to have a chance to make and celebrate a few while we’re doing that, I’ve opened up this series by successful and outstanding bloggers like you.

Exercise the Perspective You Need by Karen Sampson

These days it seems like everyone is worried about their money, the economy, or any number of things. What’s wrong is always available for you to focus on and a little perspective may be all you need to stop turning your worries into monsters and start breaking them down into bits you can tackle.

What Perspective Really Means

In order to get real perspective wherever you seek it, the answer is always the same: take a step back. There’s no way to inspect the box you may have found yourself in if you are sitting in a corner inside it. Perspective means looking at your problem in a different way, but it doesn’t take 20 years to have hindsight. It’s funny, but we all need to be reminded of this from time to time. So much focus can lend itself to entrapment, even a few minutes away from whatever is troubling you can shed light on ways to deal with it.

Take a Deep Breath

It sounds cliché’ sure, but researchers have established that your breathing patterns affect your body chemistry. Ever notice how you are breathing when you are worked up about something or something is frustrating you? Chances are you’re breathing shallow ineffective breaths. This not only charges your body with tension but changes your state of mind. Your mind goes on alert and only sees answers in its immediate path. Slow down, take a breath and get away from the problem. While it may not be possible or practical to forget the problem for too long, even a tiny break will help you make the most of future time spent on the project.

Do You Really Need an Excuse to Exercise?

Sometimes perspective can mean talking to other people who have faced the same problem, but in other cases those alternatives simply aren’t available. Take a walk. This simple and relaxing alternative always lets your mind reset itself so that you can come at your problem from a different angle. Do you really need an excuse to exercise? Think of this one as a double duty alternative: you’re increasing your fitness while decreasing your stress load. Both important if problem solving is going to happen on the long term.

Setting Goals and Translating Them

Breaking your problem into a bunch of smaller chunks can be a great way to pick away at it. Is there a portion of your question that you can answer? Then let that tiny tidbit be your guide and break up the rest of what you don’t know. It may be that as a whole the problem seems insurmountable. Think of things in the past that you have already conquered that you felt this way about. Your psychology will play a huge role in how effectively you can deal with any given situation, and if you have a relaxed confident approach you’ll find anything is within your grasp.

The view will be blue as far as your mind’s eye can see.

How do you exercise the perspective you need?

Karen Sampson writes about the online degrees. She welcomes your feedback at Karen.Sampson1120 at gmail.com

Register for SOBCon09 NOW!!

Experience the ROI of Relationships

Have You Tried Negotiating from the Same Side of the Table?

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Colgate Palmolive and Metzer Associates!

Monday, at a meeting at the Chicago Executive Summit, Louise asked how the SOBCon conference this year compared to last. She was surprised to hear that in this economy attendance and sponsorship are both tracking higher. We discussed what might be contributing factors:

  • an even more dynamic, high-value content offer
  • the increased interest in social media
  • the longevity of the conference
  • the return to such a fabulous venue — the city and the Summit facilities
  • and one other … more practice at partnering with sponsors.

Last year as I was putting together the sponsor kit for SOBCon08, I faced a marketer’s problem. How do you communicate the value proposition of a conference with a potential of 150 attendees to potential sponsors who would rather be reaching 150,000?

Knowing Where to Sit at the Table

In trying to find the correct sponsor value proposition, I considered the people who come to the conference. This isn’t a room of 150 “ones” — people who never met each other — but rather one 150 — people who are connected to each other. I thought I had it. I could even explain it.

If one evangelist can move a crowd, imagine what a swarm can do.

I’ve been wrong before. On it’s own the idea of a network of 150, didn’t carry much sway in the minds of sponsors who were looking for more concrete value.

I’d been offering a transaction for sale. I have this. This is why it’s of value. I pass the contract across the table. The magic didn’t happen until I metaphorically moved my chair to the other side of the table. It’s easier to make a deal when I sit beside the person I want to make a deal with.

“What are your goals for the next two quarters?”

“How can we configure a part of the conference to help you there? Would doing this work? Suppose we added an interaction like this one?”

From the same side of the table it’s easy find mutual goals and a path where doing business is natural.

This year, I built the conference with flexibility for sponsors goals inside their role as participants. I’m pleased and grateful that as a result I’m announcing that Colgate Palmolive and Metzger Associates have joined our sponsor team.

and

We love all of our sponsors: Wal-mart, Allstate, IttyBiz, BuzzCorps, Blog Catalog, Proforma, One2One Network, Pathable, and Summit Executive Center. And can’t wait for the chance to work at the same table with them and you!

Have you tried negotiating from the same side of the table?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Buy the ebook.

Register for SOBCon09 NOW!!

See the value of a powerful network!

The Mic Is On: Meet Stacy Brice! Let's Bust Myths about Virtual Assistants

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It’s Like Open Mic Only Different

The Mic Is On

Here’s how it works.

It’s like any rambling conversation. Don’t try to read it all. Jump in whenever you get here. Just go to the end and start talking. EVERYONE is WELCOME.
The rules are simple — be nice.

There are always first timers and new things to talk about. It’s sort of half “Cheers” part “Friends” and part video game. You don’t know how much fun it is until you try it.

Stacy Brice Is Hosting

What Myths Do You Believe about Virtual Assistants?

Delegation. We can’t get work done without help, but no one can do our work as well as we can … right? Actually, maybe we ought to reconsider.

What myths about VAs do you believe?

  • A VA will never do things as well as I do.
  • I can’t afford a VA.
  • I should work with an $8/hour VA oversees–I’ll get more bang for my buck.
  • I don’t think the virtual thing would work–I need to be with someone face-to-face.
  • I should have a bunch of VAs who specialize–no one can do it all for me.

And, whatever else comes up, including THE EVER POPULAR, Basil the code-writing donkey . . . and flamenco dancing (because we always get off topic, anyway.)

Brinng your questions and your relevant links!

–ME “Liz” Strauss

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How Do You Make the Dream Within You Visible?

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Do You Dream a Dream?

We unconsciously believe “What you see is what you get.”

When I started this quest for visible authenticity, I didn’t realize how important it would be. I didn’t know how hard I’d been working to get past what people assumed about me. I thought it was just my shyness from childhood kicking in. Now with minor changes barely in place, I already see a difference in how people are responding.

After our first meeting in November, Kali wrote …

“Liz’s visual presence is perfect for someone, just not Liz Strauss. It sorely misrepresents who she is and the depth of her talent. If the bulk of Liz’s interactions are vocal or written, she may be less aware of the impact of her visual image – but I am certain that it is affecting her life.”

“I am confident that when Liz is in front of people, she is taken less seriously than she should be,”

The same could be said of Susan Boyle the amazing, inspiring woman in this video. She wasn’t taken less seriously than she should be. Even if you’ve seen this video before, watch again. Experience what happens when people realize “what you see isn’t always what you get.”

YouTube keeps disconnecting the embed. You can also view it here.

When we see each other’s dreams, visibly authentically, we are drawn into to them.
Susan made her dream visible. Imagine if everything about her shared her dream — what then?

Do you dream a dream? How do you make the dream within you visible?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Register for SOBCon09 NOW!!

Make your dream visible.

Open Mic 7pm Chgo Time: Stacy Brice Will Be Busting Myths about Virtual Assistants

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Join Us Tonight

JOIN US TONIGHT AT 7PM
With Guest Host Stacy Brice

What Myths Do You Believe about Virtual Assistants?

Delegation. We can’t get work done without help, but no one can do our work as well as we can … right? Actually, maybe we ought to reconsider.

What myths about VAs do you believe?

Join us tonight and bring example links and questions about delegation to add to the discussion.

The rules are simple — be nice.

Do be nice. 🙂

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related article
What is Tuesday Open Comment Night?

Have You Ever Seen a Real-Life Social Business Ecosystem?

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This Social Thing Has Been Around for a While

We act like social networking is a new thing or that social media hasn’t been around since the first cave paintings. Who are we convincing? We learn the rules of relationships before we learn to read. Then we get into business and progressively learn how to undo them.

The part that is new thing was separating the “personal” from the “business.”

If you think about it, it’s … um … inhuman.

How can you give personal service when you leave relationships at the door?

Now we’re talking about social networking and social media marketing. Social business is not a new thing.

What Every Small Town Always Knew About Social Business

Step into any small town — say a town of 2000. Visit the general store and watch the owner go through a day of business. It may strike you that it’s a little like watching a Twitterstream.

  • Connecting conversation: The owner will have a short chat with customers about their families or their businesses.
  • Extending Relationships: Hang around and you’ll probably see the owner head off with a vendor to have lunch at a local diner — a “meetup” to “eat-up.”
  • Social Networking: The store owner will introduce the diner folks to the vendor. And they all know the lawyer and the banker.
  • Reciprocity: The diner owner will probably stop by the store later to pick what she needs for dinner.
  • Co-opetition: The store owner will probably leave huge tip because he knows that business is slow at the diner.
  • Multiplicity of Contexts: The store owner will see the diner owner and the vendor at the ball field when their kids’ teams play each other.
  • Mutual History and Values: Some customers and owners went to the same schools together. A few of them might even remember who wet his pants in first grade and who has a criminal record for staying out past curfew — when they still had one.

In small towns, businesses build a history together that is linked and interconnected. To try to check the social at the door would be ridiculous. Relationships and conversation are the currency that builds the ecosystem. Authenticity, trust, and reputation pile on the transactions that have been made on handshakes and over conversations at weddings.

People invest in each other. The resulting business has the same quality as the relationships.

Have you ever seen a real-life social business ecosystem?
Think we have a chance of building that on the Internet?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Buy the ebook.

Register for SOBCon09 NOW!!

Invest, Learn, Grow!