Know Care Want

You do it; I do it; everyone does it. We have stuff we want or need to do and we find every excuse available not to do it. In my coaching days, after some self-reflection, I came up with three motivating factors that I seem to slip into when faced with this issue and those are; want, know, or care. 

I know salad is better for me than onion rings but I don't always pick salad. I could learn how to change the oil in my car, but I don't want to so I get the oil place to do it. I may know how to clean a bathroom, which I've done a thousand times, but I don't care to do it even though I do.

This TEDTalk is from a bunch of years ago and it rings just as true as when it was first published. Mel Robbins makes a bold proclamation which is absolutely dead on true. 

_________________________________________________________________

Have You Found Your Fans?

Earl "Curly" Lambeau was an employee of the Indian Packing Company and got the idea to start a football team. Curly needed some bucks to get gear so he asked his boss for help.

His employer agreed to give him $500. The only condition was that he incorporated the meat packing company’s name in the team name.


Curly was general manager and head coach for the next thirty years and is a member of the NFL Hall of Fame.

Launched on August 11, 1919, the Green Bay Packers have a record twelve championships and remain the only non-profit community owned American professional sports franchise. For years, NFL rules stated that each team must be owned by one individual. In the case of the Green Bay Packers, the entire city of Green Bay, Wisconsin owns the team.

When the Packers are playing at Lambeau Field, the city of Green Bay is a ghost town. Residents are either at the game or watching it. The franchise is as much a part of the community as any person or major company.

Line Up and Wait.

If you want tickets to a game, line up, for a very long time. If you want season tickets, you have about a forty year wait and you have to prove you are a permanent resident of Green Bay, Wisconsin.

The Green Bay Packers are celebrating their 91st anniversary. The team has not won the championship in 79 seasons since 1919.

Content Context Community.

Fans happily wear a wedge of cheese on their heads - a tradition that began when fans in rival Illinois attempted to insult Wisconsinites. Instead of turning the name calling in to something ugly, they embraced it and the sight of cheeseheads at Lambeau is as common as beer.

Buzz phrases such as “brand evangelist” come to mind but in this case, Curly Lambeau simply wanted to start a football team and asked his boss for some cash to pay for some gear. And nine decades later, Packers’ fans will virtually defend the green and gold with their lives.

What can you learn from the Packers to apply to your business?
Have you found your fans or still looking to sell a few tickets?

@knealemann
strategy. marketing. social media.

photo credit: goinglikesixty | wikipedia

Vancouver 2010 | Make Us Proud

The Games Are On

Last night’s opening ceremonies of the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games were not perfect but still did Canadian’s proud. The Twitterstream was buzzing with second by second accounts and opinions of every detail.

Ghost in the Machine

There were some technical glitches and you’d think that a team that worked on a production for years would be flawless, but that’s what you get when you have hundreds working on a project where mechanical malfunctions happen. Nothing is perfect – not even hydraulic torch extensions.


Tragic Event

The Vancouver Games are clouded by the tragic loss of Georgian Luger Nodar Kumaritashvili who was killed instantly going 90mph in an unprotected sled on ice. Tragedy has happened before at the Olympics but surprisingly not as often as you would think considering the often dangerous situations in which these world class athletes perform.

Paying Tribute

Billions watched the opening ceremonies last night and when paying tribute to Kumaritashvili it was as if billions of people in hundreds of countries around the world were silent giving respect to a young life cut short.

Head Held High

As a Canadian, I was proud to see numerous accomplished Canadians included in the event last night. The Canadian Olympic Team – from a country of only 33 million has 206 athletes at these Games. Our American friends have 215 athletes from a country of ten times the population.

Remember

Let's dedicate the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Winter Games to a 21 year old man from Borjomi, Georgia who did what selected few get to do – become an Olympian.

Controversy, tragedy, discussion over sponsorships and doping are all realities of this storied event.

Have your opinions, I’ll have mine but for the next couple of weeks I choose to be proud of my country as it hosts its third Olympics in thirty-four years.

@knealemann

photo credit: nlptechnologies

How Much Pareto Is In Your Life?

The Principle of Victor

Sometimes phrases or theories seem to have a life of their own, as if they were always around. Before Vilfredo Federico Damaso Pareto was born people didn't think of a lopsided world. Pareto was an economist and industrialist who lived from 1848-1923.

He was the father of microeconomics and the author of the law of the vital few and the principle of factor sparsity or the 80/20 rule.

The Rich Get Richer

The most commonly used example is that 20% of the population has 80% of the money.

The Pareto Principle explained that the second 20% most richest had about 12% of the money and numbers declined sharply after that.

80/20 Is Everywhere

But this can be applied to virtually everything in our lives. If you are in sales, 20% of your clients can represent 80% of your billing. You may spend up to 80% of your free time with 20% of your friends. If you are on a sports team, you know that approximately 20% of the players account for 80% of the team's production.

Tweet That

In the case of social media, 80% of the followers are found on 20% of the profiles. We spend 80% of our time on tasks and 20% of our time on the important stuff. And unconfirmed data state that approximately 80% of the planet has seen about 20% of Kevin Bacon’s films.

Are you part of the 80 or the 20?

@knealemann
Let’s create experiences, not campaigns.

image credit: newschool.edu

The Right Brain Economy

I was listening to my local sports radio station yesterday and the announcer was talking about a multi-million dollar a year salaried athlete being fiscally responsible by parking his private jet during these tough times. I shed a tear.

The report was followed by a string of commercials from companies all claiming to have the way out of the crunch through the purchase of their products.


An Experiment

Do you think it’s possible – just for 24 hours – to turn the other way every time you hear a reference to the world economy? I am not suggesting head-in-sand tactics, just an experiment. The la-la-la-I-can’t-hear-you approach is not a sustainable long-term plan but just for one day. How much is all this chatter and noise helping?

What Do We Have To Lose?

We are driving each other to the collective straight jacket. Just one day of good news, ideas and sharing successes. Social network with a friend over a beer and focus on solutions. Pity party can call in sick.

Right Brains Rejoice

The shift is coming. Creative minds, ideas and experiences will be a significant part of the new worldwide economy. These will become equally as important as commodities and consumerism.

What’s Next?

If you’re looking for ways to build for the future, look to small businesses and small business owners collaborating and networking their services. The offerings will be vast while creativity and experience-based industries will flourish.

It's time for us to shift our focus from whether the glass is half full or empty and get on with designing a new glass.

@knealemann
knealemann at gmail dot com

Helping you better utilize all media.
How to make it, use it and profit from it.

photo credit: modernurbanliving.com

Clock Management

Minutes To Go - Time Out.

It’s amazing what can happen in the last minute of a sporting event. This is when the coaches on either side of a basketball game seem to call endless time-outs. It’s when we expect heroics during the last ditch effort from the quarterback.


One team pulls their goalie for an extra attacker and often it works to tie the game and send it in to overtime.

You are reviewing your presentation in the hotel room before hitting the showers. The same presentation you have been working on for days, if not weeks. And you just want to have one more look at it.

Why do we do that? Why do we wait?

Why don’t we manage the clock better when we have hours, days, weeks, even months to prepare? Why does the coach not call a time-out and get his team pumped for a 90-second touchdown drive in the third quarter?

Why doesn’t a coach pull the goalie in the second period to see if it can boost her team? Why don’t we trust our abilities in the presentation and have a calm breakfast before heading to the client’s office?

Because we are human.

Think back to school and how many times you crammed for exams or did the project on the Sunday night before the deadline. We do it to ourselves and cause additional unneeded stress. Or is it the juice we need to get the job done right?

Can Convenience Help?

I can remember when I first started banking online. A bill would come in the mail and I would immediately pay it. In the “olden days”, I would have to find a stamp and write a check to the company. Inevitably, I would be writing it a day or two before the deadline hoping the mail service had a monumental day and got it to the payee in record time.

So if we know that most of us operate like this, how do we increase our chances as business partners and colleagues? What can we do to help each other manage the clock better?

@knealemann

Are You 'Trying' To Steal Third?

When stealing third, lead off in the same way you would when not stealing. Once the pitcher sets, it's 'one thousand' and you're off. That half second gives you a couple of steps toward third and a great chance of making it. qcbaseball.com

Sports has always been an excellent backdrop for business analogies but in the case of this baseball example, are you hovering at second base wondering if the pitcher will make a mistake so you can steal third?

Are you staring at an opportunity or decision and waiting for that perfect moment – that sweet spot – to pounce? Does that moment ever really arrive? Do we often wait for the invitation forgoing the opportunities?

Sit On The Lead

Last night the Vancouver Canucks tried to nurse a third period 1-0 lead. The Chicago Blackhawks chipped away, scored late and won it in overtime. The Canucks, for the second time in the series, were victims of their own defensive plan.

Quick Decisions

I had lunch recently with a colleague and we were discussing how successful people often make swift decisions, find the deficiencies, make changes and re-launch in the time it takes most of us to deliberate in the first place. How often have you gone against your gut and been wrong?

Go Big Or Go Home

If the base runner hesitates for even a nanosecond, it’s over. If the Canucks had kept on the attack, they may have ran the score up a few more goals to avoid the late minute heroics of their opponent.

How many decisions are you hesitating on?

@knealemann

photo credit: mlive.com