Overwhelmed and overcommitted

September 9th, 2009 | 7:00 am
Posted in Personal Thoughts, life, technology
Comments 10 Comments »

aruba

Overwhelmed and overcommitted: two words that definitely don’t describe how the above image makes you feel. Two words that do describe how technology and instantaneous communication is making our society feel.

Sharing, connecting, collaborating and creating is possible every second of the day. The social web is revolutionizing how we work and live, and how society functions.

Social media has overtaken porn as the #1 activity on the web.

80% of Twitter usage is on mobile devices. People update anytime, anywhere.

There are over 200,000,000 blogs. 54% of bloggers post content or tweet daily. That’s 104,000,000 new pieces of information every day.

If Facebook were a country, it’d be the world’s 4th largest.

More than 1.5 million pieces of content are shared on Facebook every day.

And this is only the beginning…

Our values are changing. Our expectations are growing. Our output is increasing. Our free-time is decreasing. Our people are becoming obese.

The use of drugs like xanax to decrease anxiety and adderall to sustain alertness and focus grows rapidly each year.

We are becoming a society of overwhelmed and overcommitted, caught in a vicious cycle of go, do, more, faster, now… don’t stop pushing, you don’t need sleep, i will be better than you.

But at what expense?

We are becoming a society in which we text while driving, use cell phones at the dinner table, check our inboxes more than a dozen times…in one hour. Some of us have more than twenty online accounts, subscribe to over 200 blogs, and we use text, IM and Facebook as a means to avoid focused and one-to-one communication.

New tools and companies are introduced daily, designed to manage and filter through the noise, and recommend best practices for use.

What does this mean to society? What does this mean to the generations that will follow? Are there ramifications to our overly-connected and instantaneous lives? Can we live better with less?

(image source)

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A day in the life: collaboration is cool

September 4th, 2009 | 1:12 pm
Posted in A Day in the Life
Comments 2 Comments »

Yesterday I stumbled aross an oldie but goodie Seth Godin post about brands as mythology.

Mythological brands make a spiritual connection with the user, delivering something that we can’t find on our own…

Seth’s words left me thinking about the story we tell at Leverage. Do we make a spiritual connection with the user? Personally, I feel an emotional connection with our product because of what it evokes – fresh ideas, clarity, laughter, happiness, getting things done quickly… I use it all day, every day and yes, the connection is very spiritual for me.

This realization left me wondering how everyone else in the company feels. To find out, I came up with a “fun marketing activity” called “Use Your Imagination” and posted it our internal yesterday. I asked everyone to create a story about the Leverage product that starts with “Imagine…”

use-your-imagination

The responses were heartfelt and entertaining, and I think they show how our social networking software satisfies the unique needs of each employee…

Mike (Mr. always responds in t – 1 second) immediately posts:

Imagine if you could spend an extra 30 minutes per day with your kids, instead of in your Inbox?

As I’m thinking to myself, “Aweee, I heart Mike. He’s such a family man,” his next post makes me stop and laugh:

Imagine enjoying a cocktail with your colleagues at happy hour instead of in another boring, inefficient meeting?

Just as I start thinking to myself that I love how you can immediately get Mike as a person (kids and cocktails) just from his two responses, he throws out a third…

Imagine if you could drive more revenue with fewer employees?

Ah yes! Kid + cocktails + make money efficiently = Mike Walsh.

Joe, Audrey and Josh’s turn…

Joe: Imagine if YOU were the person in your company who made it ‘cool.’” If, when people spoke about companies like Apple and Netflix and Pixar, they started adding your company’s name to that list?”

Audrey: Imagine if your employees were as addicted to staying in sync with one another as they are to checking Facebook.

Josh: Imagine not having to imagine what your colleagues are really doing and thinking.

Thoroughly entertained at this point, Tom takes it too a wholeeee new level with his unique approach to the assignment…

Tom’s twisted take on the assignment:
Imagine there’s no email
It’s easy if you try
No inbox to haunt us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today…

Imagine there’s no boundaries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to block successes
100% SaaS too
Imagine all the people
Living life in ease…

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine this solution
I wonder if you can
Check out Leverage Software
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world…

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will live as one

Simply amazing! The reaction internally was rather entertaining too:

tomgenius

To Kate’s point, you may lose your mind every now and again when you have zero communication boundaries but what Kate calls losing mind, I call genius!

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When to do and when to be: productivity vs. relaxation

September 2nd, 2009 | 7:00 am
Posted in life, social web, technology
Comments 3 Comments »

Two videos struck a chord with me today. While vastly different, both evoked strong feelings for me.

On one hand, I greatly appreciate the benefits of technology…

I couldn’t imagine life without my iPhone, MacBook, Facebook and Twitter accounts, my company’s internal business network, etc. These technologies help me stay hyper-connected at all times and I am able to connect with more people and do more faster.

This video, Social Media Revolution, is a moving depiction of our lives today and how the social web is changing the way we do business, communicate and share ideas, and how we live our everyday lives.

On the other hand, I’m a firm believer in enjoying the moment, relaxing and appreciating life moments sans technology.

Most weekends, I drop the excessive texting, inbox checking, Facebook stalking and tweeting. That’s when it’s time for me to step away. It’s easy to get caught up with obsessive responding disorder, becoming a slave to your phone, inbox and the demands and priorities of everyone except you. So as much as I love to “get more done” when I’m in business mode, I love “getting less done” just as much too.

This next video, Moments, is a moving portrayal of what life is all about. True Life at its finest. (Thanks Carlos for sharing.)

Some final thoughts on productivity vs. relaxation:

Technology is a powerful tool.

Life is breathtaking journey to be lived.

Do great work but know when to separate the two… know when to simply live, relax and be.

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On happiness: the most personal, honest post I’ve ever written

September 1st, 2009 | 7:00 am
Posted in Personal Thoughts, happiness, life
Comments 8 Comments »

dad

(Above: My dad (age 23.5) and I (1st birthday) on the left; My dad and great-grandma on the right)

People often ask me how I’m so happy and positive all the time. I do this by actively listening to myself, assessing what I can and cannot control, and then finally, I make choices based on whether or not the decision will create genuine happiness for me.

What is genuine happiness?

While it varies person-to-person, The Art of Happiness perfectly sums up my philosophy:

  1. The purpose of life is happiness.
  2. Happiness is determined more by the state of one’s mind than by one’s external conditions, circumstances, or events—at least once one’s basic survival needs are met.
  3. Happiness can be achieved through the systematic training of our hearts and minds, through reshaping our attitudes and outlook.
  4. The key to happiness is in our own hands.

Naturally, we will all face loss, change, death, difficulty and failure.

What I’ve learned is that how we respond to these experiences is what shapes our life, our happiness, outlook, and ultimately, our future.

When I was young, my father (pictured above) passed away. He was in a serious car accident not long after my 2nd birthday and he never regained full-consciousness. Seven years later he died. Although a very sad experience, I was able to turn these painful feelings into something positive.

At that moment in time, there was nothing I could do to change what had happened. The only thing I could do was to wish him peace, cherish and appreciate the impact he had on my life, and turn my painful feelings into a learning and growing experience that I could eventually share with others (as I am now). What he didn’t want was for me to mourn and be affected by his loss.

My mother (in a hesitant, frustrated yet grateful ”you’re just like your father!!!” tone) describes my dad as ”a free spirit, risk taker and passion-seeker who was uninhibited, fearless and too comfortable with change.” He was on his way to becoming a rock star and what he wanted in life was to inspire, motivate and make people feel. For this, I am thankful.

I often think about how his person and this experience has shaped me to become the woman I am today. 13+ years later, I realize and truly understand how this experience, as well as how my mom and I reacted to it, positively affected my life. For this, I am grateful.

Happiness in our hyper-connected, overstimulated and everchanging world

Consider the following:

How much time do you devote to your relationships? Which relationships are most important to you? Which provide genuine happiness for you? Do you allocate and prioritize your time accordingly?

Spike Jones posted a tweet today that immediately grabbed my attention. He said: “Are you just participating in people’s conversations, or are you participating in their lives? There’s a big difference.”

I totally agree. However, the question is: who are these people and how many people’s lives can we realistically participate in? Participating in people’s lives takes time, energy and effort. Who makes that cut? When does it become too much? How do we cut out what truly doesn’t matter?

Technology makes communication easier and faster. As a result, we make connections and relationships faster, and we take away our time to attend to these relationships.

When does this stop?

When do we spend time understanding and participating in our own lives rather than the lives of others?

Most importantly, when is the focus not on gaining new and getting more; instead, on appreciating what is and cherishing it until it ends?

One day, we and the people we love will die. At any moment, the exciting new project we’re working on, the amazing relationship we feel we’re in, and this great moment in time may end.

Endings are okay. They’re inevitable. Often, we feel they’re not okay when we discover that we didn’t give what we wish we would have or we realize we made choices based on ideals that didn’t create genuine happiness for us. In a world of choices, it’s easy to get caught up in a cycle of pleasing others or not knowing how to please ourselves.

That’s when you need to stop, take a step back and ask yourself: is who and what I’m investing my time on making me happy? How am I actively pursuing and expressing this happiness? Am I letting past irrelevance, future uncertainty or the hyper-connected world we live in get in the way of what makes me truly happy?

If so, it’s okay. Remember: the key to happiness is in your own hands.

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Are you there Amber? It’s me, wine.

August 24th, 2009 | 10:22 pm
Posted in Social
Comments 8 Comments »

A key element (and part of my life) that’s been missing from SocialAmber.com make-me-wineis the social aspect. Well that’s about to change because this girl’s got a social life too!

To start things off, I thought I’d begin with one of my favorite social experiences… drinking wine. To me, wine evokes the perfect one-to-one conversation, it allows people to get to know each other in a more personal manner and it is a very sensual experience overall.

For example, my roommate and I frequently drink wine after a hard day of work, talk life and self-growth, share new music, brainstorm and discuss ideas, and laugh much. It can be the perfect way to end my evenings and an ideal environment for lifting my spirits when I need a little recharge.

With that, four things I’ve learned from our wine weekdays…

  1. Maintain the high maintenance. Recently I drank a 1996 Silver Oak bottle of cab that could have been stored better. While it was still delicious and I enjoyed it thoroughly, the taste was a bit soft. So if you’re thinking about investing in a great bottle of wine, make sure to invest in a temperature controlled wine cooler too.
  2. Down-to-earth is more my style. For the other 95% of the time, often a $5.99 bottle of wine or $13.99 Di Arie is the perfect go-to choice. I’m very impressed with the Barefoot Zinfandel and Di Arie Zinfandel as both are very smooth and balanced, and the price is fine.
  3. In Vino, Veritas. Decrease your inhibitions! Although I have very few inhibitions, wine can help me get the creative ideas flowing. Art, writing, blogging, business ideas, music, compelling conversation and more are often enhanced with a glass (or three) of wine. Most recently, my best friend and I had a successful business idea session while sharing a bottle of wine as it allowed us to relax, enjoy and think freely.
  4. Superb Selection. If you’re looking to purchase some delicious vino, check out K&L for an extensive selection for the modern urban dweller.

So when I’m looking to relax or need to get the creative juices flowing, a glass of wine is just fine. But remember! Too much of a good thing = no bueno. 5:30 am yoga? Check. Still need to make life happen!

ps – thank you Mitch for the recent “Squeeze me, stomp me, make me wine” gift. It’s the perfect addition to my kitchen! :)

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Obsessive responding disorder

August 8th, 2009 | 7:41 pm
Posted in Personal Thoughts
Comments 5 Comments »

cell-phone-etiquette

Two things I’m very passionate about are technology and human behavior — especially the point at which they converge. I find it fascinating to access and understand how technological advancements influence human behavior and shape social norms.

To me, technology is a tool that essentially serves to make life easier and better. For me, technology helps me pursue my passions more ardently and it allows me to express and instantaneously demonstrate these interests every day.

Being a highly curious person, I have a wealth of knowledge at my fingertips. I can quickly connect with whomever I want and I can find whatever I’m looking for 24/7.

But when does this become too much? When are there too many connections to keep up with? Too many requests? When is it right to disconnect and simply experience life and enjoy spending time with people you love?  Isn’t that what life is all about? Taking pleasure in the moment, experiencing your surroundings and spending quality time with those people who you care about? Or, is our culture developing higher and higher expectations for response to the point that it negatively impacts our lives? Is our culture becoming one that feels we need to be a slave to our technoligcal device, or rather, a slave to the request of other people?

As technology continues to advance and improve, are we developing what I like to call “obsessive responding disorder?” Have we become victims to our Crackberry, text messages, BBM, Facebook wall posts, Tweets, DMs, personal email, work email… and the list goes on?

Time and time again, I hear people express frustration because someone is upset that they didn’t respond to them immediately. Perhaps they obsessively use BBM (which I think might be the worst invention for the sanity of busy yet social people) and when they see the “R” show up (meaning someone read their text) and the other person doesn’t respond immediately, they take it personally. Or, you send a text and don’t hear back right away, you might take that personally too. I think people are growing higher and higher standards for response as result of technological advancements and I don’t like it. Just because the time to ping someone has decreased significantly doesn’t meant the time in which they’ll ping you back will be the same.

We all have lives. We have jobs, people in our lives who we love and want to spend time with (without distraction), we have interests we’re pursuing and we have things we feel we need to accomplish. Being a constant slave to our technology because someone requests our attention at a specific moment is terrible, I think. Feeling like we need to respond to every single email or request can be overwhelming and is no way to live. Incoming communication will never die. But we will.

So next time you’re out to dinner, please put the phone away. When you’re engaging in a captivating conversation or spending time with someone you care about, say bye-bye to the cell phone. The other people can wait. Enjoy that experience and take in as much as you can from it. You’ll never experience that moment again.

(image source)

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WTF is Enterprise Social Networking?!

August 5th, 2009 | 4:21 pm
Posted in Social Networking 101
Comments 3 Comments »

When I got a job at Leverage Software, an enterprise social networking software company, my mom’s response was “an enterprise social what?!” (See monkey.)

wtfIt’s definitely entertaining to hear her friends and my family re-explain and try to understand what we in this space do, but more importantly, it’s enlightening. Through these conversations, it becomes more evident how difficult a concept enterprise social networking can be, and through these conversations, I’m able to refine and massage the story.

It’s been nearly six months since I joined Leverage (wow! time flies.) and I think Mom is finally starting to get what exactly we (and I) do. I’m also pretty sure a lot of my friends back in Chicago aren’t entirely sure what we (and I) do either. This post goes out to you!

(To test this theory, I just shot Mom a note asking her to quickly explain what we do at Leverage… more on this at the end.)

I and many others working in this space realize how transformational our technologies are to business. But, do they? While we may all have solid messaging that defines our company and product, this messaging doesn’t always translate into a story — or conversation rather — that’s easy to digest and understand.

My conversations usually go something like this…

Friend of Mom: So Amber, what exactly do you do? Your Mom tried explaining it… it’s sort of like this Facebook, Twitter business thing, right?

Amber: Well… sort of. So basically, we create social networks, for enterprise companies, that help them connect their people, share knowledge, discover new information and do their jobs better.

Friend of Mom: Ohhh ok… (eyes look up as if thinking)

Amber: Does that make sense?

Friend of Mom: (Confused look) Umm, sort of… I get what you’re saying but I don’t get what you’re saying.

Amber: Ok. So think of Facebook…

Friend of Mom: I love Facebook!

Amber: (laughs) Right! So, the functionality and look and feel is similar. Like Facebook, the focus first is on connecting people to people. And then, once you make trusted connections, the focus then becomes connecting people to relevant content.

Friend of Mom: Content?

Amber: Umm.. content, meaning ideas and knowledge… everything you put out into the stream…

Friend of Mom: The stream?!

Amber: The stream… you know, like the Facebook news feed, the stream of “news” related to what your connections are doing and thinking.

Friend of Mom: Ohh, I get it.

Amber: Yeah, so with Facebook, you update your profile to convey what you’re doing and where you’re going. You also use it to connect and stay in touch with friends and family, and sometimes you share photos too. So Facebook becomes this quintessential place to connect with everyone you care about online.

Friend of Mom: Yep! Makes sense.

Amber: So think of how powerful Facebook is in your life. Before Facebook, there was only email, phone and regular mail. You had to look people up in the yellow pages to try to find them. Finding new music, places to travel, recipes and more was also far more difficult. So think of how helpful Facebook has been in helping you to find old high school friends, in allowing you to connect with your cousins who live in London, and even snoop on your kids to see what they’re up to…

Friend of Mom: (laughs)

Amber: Right. So now, think of Facebook but in a business setting. Instead of a focus on social, it’s on getting more done, faster and more easily than before, and perhaps faster and more easily than your competition.

Friend of Mom: Ooh, competitive advantage.

Amber: Exactly! So, you’re an enterprise company and you have office around the world with thousands of smart people. Each of your employees has unique knowledge, experience and resources yet this valuable information isn’t being shared very well.

Friend of Mom: Right…

Amber: For example… sending an email to try and find the right person who can help you do your job better is not immediate and can take a while. Also, with companies cutting staff and resources, there are even less people and resources to help people succeed.

Friend of Mom: Makes a lot of sense.

Amber: So, now thinking of a Facebook-like environment, what we do is connect employees with similar sharing and social networking tools. So rather than sending an email to get feedback quickly, people update their status with a question and this appears in the “company stream” or news feed.

Friend of Mom: Wouldn’t that get overwhelming if thousands of people are updating their status?

Amber: Good question. Our system is built so that you are exposed only to the information and people who are relevant to you. It’s match-making capabilities are kind of like match.com.

Friend of Mom: How do you know about match.com?!

Amber: (laughs) Just trying to help you understanding…

Friend of Mom: (smiles) I know. So what about team-based stuff?

Amber: So, teams and people with similar roles can set up groups and pages to collaborate on projects. There, they share files and ideas, have conversations in a threaded discussion format, set up online chats to brainstorm and more.

Friend of Mom: I get it!

Amber: Yay! So in short, we give employees ongoing, real-time access to a “stream” of company knowledge, resources and people who can help them do their job better. If you need to find someone in New York who’s an expert in say product development, you can do that. You can also find the handful of specific people who share common goals.

Friend of Mom: Neat!

Amber: Yeah… we like to think that we make smart companies even smarter. Or, we help “make everyone as good as your best.”

Friend of Mom: Is that Leverage’s tag line?!

Amber: (Smiling) Yes.

While this conversation isn’t word for word, I’ve had a lot of the “what do you do?” talks and it’s pretty close. From these, what I’ve realized is that as much as we in the social business space can each position ourselves as the “leader,” “the big guy,” “the only” or “best,” these terms mean absolutely nothing. It’s like bad advertising. Instead, having a one-on-one conversation with someone, learning their knowledge of the space and then tailoring your story accordingly is what works. In a space that is so drastically changing nearly every day, it’s hard to keep up, especially for our buyers.

So how did Mom respond to my question, “what do we do at Leverage?” Nearly 30-seconds later, she replied:

I think you develop social networks for companies so that their employees can better communicate with one another for thoughts, help and ideas.

Not bad, not bad at all!

If you liked this, check out Ben Parr’s,  coverage of “What the f**k is social media?” on Mashable.

(image source)

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