Month: October 2009

Blogging will change your life

/ Robert Pease / Leave a comment

Don't believe me?  Then listen to what Tom Peters and Seth Godin have to say about it.  Good friend Max Effgen at 12Sided posted this some time ago and I flagged it to share here.

It is short and captures the essence of why I started blogging and the fulfillment I get from doing it.  It forces you to more fully and thoroughly think through things, truly grasp why you believe the way you do, and structure those thoughts and beliefs for others to consume.  I write as much for myself as I do for others and am thankful to those of you who think my posts are worth reading and keep coming back for more.

Beware the 2%

/ Robert Pease / 1 Comment

In every project or task there are always things that get overlooked, don't go quite right, or are just wrong especially if you are moving fast or entering uncharted territory as often happens in a start up.  I view this as the" 2%."  The key is isolating this 2% down to things that will have the least material impact if they occur or, if they do, can be quickly fixed with limited impact.

Drive for perfection but understand it is elusive.  Understand that things will go wrong but focus on keeping their impact to a minimum.

Earn permission to respond

/ Robert Pease / Leave a comment

This is a great (and short) blog post by Seth Godin on the topic of being accessible and making it easy for people to initially contact you.  Think about the last time you wanted information or were looking to buy something.  Did you want to answer a bunch of questions or provide a lot of information about yourself?

Email contact is like a first date. If you show up with a clipboard and
a questionnaire, it's not going to go well, I'm afraid. The object is
to earn permission to respond.

Keep it simple.  Request an email address or make it easy for people to send you an email with some questions (and be sure to respond quickly!).  This is just the beginning of the discussion not the end.

Can you only handle 150 true social relationships?

/ Robert Pease / Leave a comment

In a day and age of "friending", "being a fan", and even the emergence of LinkedIn LIONS (super networkers or connection collectors – your call), the question of how many true and stable social relationships one can maintain definitely comes up….at least in what I do.

Enter Dunbar's Number and the commonly cited approximation of 150.  These are: 

…relationships in which an individual knows who each person is, and how each person relates to every other person…

I suppose this number varies depending on what you do and what priority you place on maintaining or developing relationships.  I have an open "friending" and connecting policy where I rarely reject a connection…but, again, this is what I do and is consistent with my blogging efforts to connect with as many people as I can even though it is more of a one to many relationship.

What do you think?  If you look through your contacts in MS Outlook, Gmail, or contact management system, your LinkedIn connections, your Facebook friends, or even Twitter followers/following, how many do you have?  How often do you truly connect vs. comment on a post, read a status, or send an email to check in?

It takes effort to build relationships and they are best built when you don't need something.  I always try to ask folks I meet with how I can help them vs. putting myself first. Give it a try.  I promise it will be much more rewarding and appreciated than always wanting something for yourself when you get together with someone. 

Maybe it is possible to have more than 150 true social relationships.  I know I am going to keep trying.