Level2wo

Don’t know if this is a good way to start a blog entry, but just noticed that I had 666 tags on this blog to date. If that doesn’t mean anything to you, don’t worry–it means something in terms of how many tags i’ve posted, but yes, I was thinking of that sinister number that you were. Hopefully the blog doesn’t explode.

I was thinking today about the industry I’m in, and while it’s not a shocking revelation, it did occur to me again how young the industry actually is. Many of the professionals in the industry (myself included), were not in this industry a decade ago. And why would they be, when the industry had really just begun–at least as we know it. But it gives light to the fact that it’s the skill sets that matter–not so much the industry, per se. Although yes, it does help if you come from a related industry. Marketing, advertising, programming, project management, copywriting–these are all areas within interactive media that are crucial to what we do–and if you’re in one of those areas in another industry, you’d probably be able to make the leap.

If you are, my suggestion is that you do a little messing around on your spare time. Figure out what you like to do, and practice it. Build a website. Run a PPC campaign. Write some copy on a blog somewhere, and see if you can use a little SEO magic to make it show up on the first page or second page of google. It’s not easy, but it’s not that difficult. In fact, I landed at the third spot on the first page of google a few weeks back for ‘Project Management Steps’ without even trying to. (No, it’s not there any more, but hey, I did it without trying). Good luck.

Without sounding too…something, I can’t stress the importance of teamwork. Not only in the sense of your coworkers helping you achieve the goals you need to achieve and vice versa, but in bringing together ideas and perspectives that, when combined (again, sorry to use this word, which I’m sure you’ve all heard plenty of times just in the past few weeks alone) create synergy. It’s what makes projects succesful, initiatives succesful, and, to go a little further, it’s what makes communities, country, and the world succesful.

But with teamwork comes personalities, egos, opinions, and every other factor you can imagine that has the potential to throw teamwork off track and away from the goals you’ve set for that team to begin with. Though not always the case, gathering groups of people, especially in business, means that you’ll often have to deal with adversity, often have to defer when you think your points may be valid, and, the true test of your understanding of situations and benefitting from teamwork–you’ll have to be able to open your eyes and be receptive to points other than yours, right or wrong.

It’s through that process that the best ideas will emerge–be it for a direct mail piece, a larger marketing strategy, creative, or even what type of venue to have for company outings. Let me stress that again: open your eyes and be receptive to points other than yours. You’re not going to be right all of the time, and I’m not going to be right all of the time. I learn from you, and you learn from me. It’s what makes the wheels turn, and what brings the good ideas to better ideas.

Rarely will you encounter that genius who’s ideas and insight and execution are perfection incarnate; rarely will you have anyone single-handedly, at least in a company of any size, be the end all be all for whatever product or service you’re hawking.

Knowing how to be a teamplayer doesn’t mean giving up your place in the food chain–it means securing it through smart decisions, an open mind, and the realization that we’re all consumers of good ideas and bad, and we’re all producers of them as well. It’s the end result we’re after by participating in a team of any size or structure–so don’t sabotage it, because you’re the beneficiary.

Take a peek at some of these websites–for design, content, and just plain weird experiences. Some of these go through About.com–

Samorost

Subservient Chicken

Stuff on My Cat

SodaPlay

NotPRon

Boxwars

Bore Me

When you’re out there in the middle of techville, managing website builds and SEM campaigns and thinking about Search Engine Optimization, and writing copy (that, obviously, needs to be keyword rich), and you’re thinking about CTRs and PPC and maybe viewing your client’s business from the actual business perspective rather than from your point of view, and you’re google-ing things to help you cram in the minor bits and pieces of technology and the latest trends, you often for get the best resource of all (in my opinion): Books!

Below are a few books I find helpful when managing interactive media projects, some better than others–but I’ll stay hushed on which ones, as you may find some more interesting than others and I don’t want to skew your opinion in any way.

1. Managing Interactive Media: Project Management for Web and Digital Media by Elaine England and Andy Finney
2. Managing Interactive Media Projects by Tim Frick
3. Fundamentals of Technology Project Management by Colleen Garton and Erika McCulloch
4. Lean Project Management: Eight Principles For Success by Lawrence P. Leach
5. The Project Management Memory Jogger: A Pocket Guide for Project Teams (Growth Opportunity Alliance of Lawrence) by Paula Martin and Karen Tate
6. Web Project Management: Delivering Successful Commercial Web Sites by Ashley Friedlein
7. IT Project Management: On Track from Start to Finish, Second Edition (Certification Press) by Joseph Phillips

If you’re an experienced project management professional, or a newbie, the above books are good. I didn’t include the Project Management for Dummies book, but I’ve actually read it and it’s a good resource to keep at home–but don’t bring it to the office if you have a copy or buy one–not that you should be ashamed of it, because it’s a good resource, but you want to look your best, especially in front of clients–and Dummies books aren’t always the best way to project professionalism to the PM craft (or, likely any other professional position).

No, I’m not linking the two to go into any in-depth analysis today, only going to point out a truth you already know but one I thought I’d remind you about one more time: Visibility.

Blogs and social networks are great fun, great tools, and you don’t really have to be a computer geek to get into them and accomplish what your blog and social networking idols accomplish (ok, maybe you are a little geeky like me, because let’s face it, the cool kids…well, no, they probably blog and social network too, so scratch that.

Anyway, we’ve all heard how you’re not supposed to post pictures of certain things such as:

• You upside down drinking from a keg
• You streaking down main street
• You doing anything elicit
• You commiting a crime
• You…yea, you get it, YOU doing anything you’re not supposed to

The same applies to business blogs and social networks geared to business (think LinkedIn, etc). Sites like LinkedIn are used by professionals, and there’s a certain standard that has been created that LinkedIn users expect. It’s why they (and I) use the site, and anyone breaking away from those pretty strict standards gets either politely nudged (at best), or pushed aside in a business-violent manner (at worst). I probably created a term there, but you get the gist of what I’m trying to say.

Same applies in blogs. Business blogs can serve many purposes, but what you want to make sure you don’t do is anything you wouldn’t do at work, or with a client, or in front of anyone who you don’t want to insult (unless, of course, that’s the whole point of the blog, or of the entry). But even so, taking the high road is always a better bet than not. Remember, what you post today will likely still be showing up a decade from now in some form or fashion, and the negatives you throw up now could come back to haunt you.

One of the great things about software is that it opens up a world of ease to those who learn and use it to achieve, more often than not, completion of tasks that would otherwise take a much longer time to complete. That said, sorry if I am not making complete sense–I’ve been reading software manuals all day. Yes, this is where you laugh. Or chuckle. Or, at worse, give a silent nod of acknowledgement.

Actually, it’s not so bad. But it got me thinking. While we do use a variety of software programs to get done the things we need to get done, such as everything Microsoft ever puts out (excel, word, powerpoint, project, access, etc.) (no, I’m not going to mention Vista), we also ocassionally end up using new software that we’ve either never heard of, heard of and had no contact with, or heard of and tried to avoid. It’s times like these that I don’t look to the future to solve but the past. It’s sort of like financial planning–we know we need it but no one ever really teaches us it as we grow up (I know, I can hear you yelling either a) When we were growing up certain software didn’t exist, or b) Many of the software programs extant today ARE being taught to kids in school. Well, good. Good for those kids, I suppose. But in the land of Me, I want more of a quick fix than anything else. Maybe a quick IT doctor visit where I’m injected with the knowledge to not have to read printouts and dictionary-length software manuals that are standard issue in the brains of kids today. But I’m probably asking for too much. Well, at least I can blog about it. That’s something my folks probably think is a space creature from some far away Sci-Fi flic.

It’s been a couple of weeks since the last post. As you know, we’ve moved to Atlanta, Georgia, for a new beginning and new adventures. We’re looking forward to it.

Today is the 4th of July, and I thought it would be appropriate to show some patriotism. We’ll be up and publishing again on Monday. Have a great holiday weekend.

The Big Move

Monday is our big move to Atlanta–and we’re going to be heading cross country for two weeks, hitting what are, in my opinion, the prettiest and more interesting places in America.
We’re going to have a guest blogger on Level2wo.net–founding partner and world-class web and design wiz, E. Themmen. I hope you enjoy his posts.

But from my end–it’s time for the fun stuff–showing off pictures of the places we will go! Below are some pictures from the national parks we’re going to–some of which I worked at during my youth–though, truth be told, I don’t feel it was that long ago.

Enjoy!

Just getting ready to finish packing up the little abode and make the big trek back to the east coast, and in particular the big ATL, or Atlanta, Georgia, as most people know the city as. So for the next couple of weeks, you’ll see some random posts here and there, hopefully with some pictures of my trip (if I can find a computer along the way). I think I’ll look for some funny road signs and different advertisements along the way to share with you.

Today, I just thought I would share some of the companies that are headquartered in Atlanta and in Georgia, as well as some in Seattle, and Washington, to build up your trivia knowledge. Can you guess which ones are located where (without looking it up)?

Hope you’re having a great mid-week Wednesday.

UPS

AT&T

Home Depot

CNN & Turner Broadcasting

Coca-Cola

Aflac

Microsoft

Amazon

Starbucks

iPhone Applications and More…

According to a CNN article, Apple “will charge $99 a year for its new MobileMe service, which sends e-mail, contact and calendar updates to users’ devices.”

Normal. Completely normal, at least that’s what we’ve come to expect–pay lots of money and you’ll get all of these cool services that we can’t live without–I mean, what’s a phone without texting, without email, and without the ability to input important events in my day like going to the mall to shop for my new, ergonomic headphones to listen to the little reminder from my iPhone that it’s time to go get my new ergonomic headphones?

But the phones are dropping in price. The reason? Because they’re being commodotized. Applications are where the money comes from for a lot of the companies in the cell phone business these days–applications like all of the ones mentioned above, but also applications for music downloading (the obvious one), as well as applications for mobile banking (somewhat obvious, but picking up speed here in the U.S., although already prevalent in other countries–I think Spain has a big one going already).

Like Facebook’s barrage of applications, Apple and pretty much any other technology company offering some sort of platform will be looking to make tons of cash through applications–an application being, for those of you who don’t live, breath, and sleep geekdom, being (per Wikipedia): a subclass of computer software that employs the capabilities of a computer directly and thoroughly to a task that the user wishes to perform.

Applications make people lots of money, which is why you tend to get all of those inane and often ridiculous things happening to you on Facebook–someone challenging you to a game of cyberchess or throwing a rubber chicken at you. Fun, I suppose, if you’re 12, but if you’re a grownup and not drunk on one too many martinis or stiff drinks, a wee bit stupid and pointless.

But it’s where technology is today. Social media has exploded, and applications fall nicely into that realm, even when the applications seem more an uber-geeks pet project than anything worth the time it took to create.