Game Change
by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin

Published in 2010, Game Change recounts the stories of the 2008 Presidential election with a behind-the-scenes perspective unlike anything I’ve seen elsewhere. The book reads like a novel (think Joe Klein’s Primary Colors or even a John Grisham work) and is simply fascinating to take in.  Chapter after chapter paint a nuanced picture of what Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton, John McCain and other candidates were experiencing from the time they decided to run until the election itself – it’s a narrative that the media simply couldn’t have assembled along the way.  Knowing of the extensive research and interviewing that the authors did to assemble it together made it all the more impressive.

Though largely retrospective in nature, much of it remains relevant today as we try to understand how John Edwards` campaign could have made it as far as it did (and how surprisingly successful they were at denying to themselves the truth about his character and actions along the way), just how unprepared Sarah Palin was or is to be in any kind of position of national leadership, and how hard politicians have to work to overcome or work around the personal turmoil that being a candidate can bring.

I admit that as a current candidate for local office, some of this reading was personal escapism – no matter what challenges I might face in my campaign, at least I don’t have to fly, drive and walk back and forth across the country for months and years.  But I think the book would be a page-turner for anyone who enjoys following national politics, or wants a more complete understanding of what goes into running for President.

Rework
by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson

Rework is a series of short and easily digestible chapters with common sense advice on how to succeed in business.  That particular topic – business advice – has surely been beaten to death by other publications over the years, so I was a little wary of Yet Another Business Book when a friend gave me a copy to check out.

It turned out to be the best single collection of business advice I’ve ever read.

It’s important to say again that it’s pretty common sense stuff, but that comes with the corollary observation that the traditional mainstream answers to the question of “how business should be done” are generally NOT helpful or good common sense, and that makes this book a bit of a revolutionary writing.

With advice like “don’t have meetings just to have meetings” and “get a good night’s sleep” and “fire the workaholics” and “don’t label everything ASAP – of course everyone wants things done as soon as they can be done,” it’s hard to resist the urge to smack one’s forehead over and over again while reading, if one has ever worked in a traditional corporate culture.  But make no mistake – this is not a cheesy, impractical and oversimplified “chicken soup for the business soul.”  Authors Fried and Hansson write from experiences of success and failure that are real and complex and always evolving.  They’ve been there and done that, and they have lots of good stories from others who have done the same.  Their approach is one that acknowledges the realities of business while balancing the humanity and emotional layers of what it means for a group of people to collaborate on something together – a rarity in business books, I think.

If I can think of any resource that, were it available 15 years ago when I was working with my business partner and then first employees to start our own business, and during all the management decisions I’ve made since, would have saved me lots of time, hand-wringing and self-doubt, Rework is it.  For that reason alone, I think anyone starting or running a small business today should read this book, especially those that traffic in information or technology (some pieces of the book don’t translate so well to more traditional brick and mortar business models).  There’s no substitute for direct experience and I don’t regret my own, but this book will be a head start and/or affirming encouragement to those who want to run a business well.

Confessions of a Public Speaker
by Scott Berkun

I’m fascinated by the art and science of interpersonal communication, and as I continue to develop my own profile and technique as a public speaker, I’m enjoying reading the advice of others who have been doing it for a while.

Scott Berkun’s book is much more than a how-to book, though.  It’s part telling of a personal journey – Berkun took a leap of faith to become a full time writer and speaker, and you can tell he’s still riding a wave of amazement that it’s working – part lesson in cultural anthropology and biology (asking questions like “why do we get butterflies in our stomach before a public talk?” and “what audience dynamics in a room lead to the most enjoyable sessions?”), and yes, part advice about the mechanics and logistics of giving a public talk.

Perhaps it’s just that my own sense of humor seems to match up to with Berkun’s really well, or maybe it was the no-frills, common sense approach to a topic that’s either over-analyzed or hyped up and mystified by other writers, but I found Confessions to be very enjoyable and refreshing.

It also made me realize, unfortunately, just how many ineffective presentations and public talks I see on a regular basis,  even by those who are held up as great public speakers. It isn’t always that the speakers themselves are executing their talks poorly (but sometimes it is), it’s often that some of the many other factors Berkun identifies as critical in successful public speaking haven’t been given any regard.  The size, layout, and decor of the room.  The time the speaker has given them self to practice and get setup.  The way that Q&A sessions are conducted.  The way feedback is obtained and used.  These are things I’ve thought about before (and even blogged about), but I’ve never seen such a useful distillation of the issues at stake.  In each case, Berkun makes a simple, straightforward argument for why these things matter, and offers his experience in how to do them well.

I highly recommend Confessions of a Public Speaker to anyone interested in public speaking and effective communications in group settings.

1. Capitalism vs. The Environment: A small business perspective on doing well AND doing good. This coming Thursday September 24th at 4 PM at Indiana University East in Whitewater Hall Room 132 the Community Room, free and open to the public, no registration required.  I’ll be talking about our experiences at Summersault as we’ve tried to do the “right thing” when it comes to the environment and nurturing sustainable lifestyles, and examine whether it’s even possible to pursue a for-profit technology venture and not be in a harmful relationship with the land and life around us.
2. Get Techie, Get Social! A workshop to help non-technical people learn more about technical topics, especially social media like Facebook and Twitter.  Monday September 28th from 9:30 AM to 11:30 AM at Morrisson-Reeves Library, free and open to the public, no registration required.  If you’re at all intimidated by some of those “newfangled Internet trends” or the Internet in general, I hope you’ll bring your questions and frustrations so we can work them out together.  There’s a PDF flyer for the event.
3. TCP/IP topics in Introduction to Computers and Computing.  I’ll be speaking at this IU East class on Monday October 12th about things like DNS/Bind, network topologies and routing, e-mail technologies, and web technologies.  This particular class isn’t open to the public, but if you have folks interested in discussing these topics in technical detail, let me know and I’d love to speak with your group.
4. Communicating Through Technology. Friday October 23rd at 9 AM at a conference for women hosted by the Wayne County Foundation.  I’ll be speaking along with co-worker Jane Holman about social media and general technology topics.  You can view the conference brochure in PDF, and registration is required.

I hope you can join me for one of these events!

The dynamic duo have teamed up to do it again for Blog Indiana 2009, which starts later this week.  It looks to be an expanded and amplified version of the inaugural event – the conference will span three days with multiple tracks – blogging and social media, higher education, non-profit, etc. – and it sounds like there will be a lot more people there too (with great representation from Richmond).  Summersault has returned as an event sponsor, and I’m also presenting again, this time with a session on “Using Social Media for Real-World Community Improvement” and as a panelist in a session about “technology.”

I’ve apparently also been nominated for the award of “Best Hoosier Blogger” in the “2009 Blindy Awards,” and while I’m not saying that I will give you significant amounts of cash just because you click on this link and vote for me, I’m not saying I won’t do that either.

I’m looking forward to gathering with fellow bloggers and fans of technology, and sharing about how these tools can help us make life a little better for everyone.  I hope to see some of you there!

Around the same time I noted a historical reference to a 1959 headline in the Earlhamite, “Southern religious leader visits Earlham.”  It was about a then only mildly well known Martin Luther King, Jr. visiting the College and speaking at the Meetinghouse there.  Being a religious leader from the South surely had different connotations then than it does now, but I was still struck by the headline’s focus on the origin and destination of the speaker, less on his message or credentials.

Ever since, I’ve been thinking about the role that travel plays in establishing credibility and expertise for someone when they come to speak or teach on a given topic.

Based at least on my observations, it seems that we’re generally willing to assign some extra credibility to someone when they’ve come over a distance to be present, and we tend to defer to them at least a little bit more because of it.

At first, this seemed a little strange to me.  In a highly connected world where almost anyone has some kind of access to the knowledge and expertise of people around the globe, let alone the artistic and cultural insights of the same, you wouldn’t think we’d still be so enlivened by encountering someone from afar.  “Why bother flying someone in when we can just watch their powerpoint slides online and listen to their podcast?”

But I think there’s still some innate human curiosity about those who are not from our own communities, who might represent a peek into a world we do not know.  Even in a largely culturally homogenized world, we still wonder what we might learn from encountering someone from another town, another country, another way of life.  “What will they be wearing?  How will they speak and present their information?  What experiences have they had access to that I never will?  How are my fellow humans getting along in other parts of the world?”   These are questions we might be able to answer academically through Wikipedia, but there’s no substitute for a face-to-face encounter that provides the experience of something a little new, a little different.

The actual act of traveling has some significance too.  I’ve noted that when I’m asked to speak to groups or organizations outside of Richmond, there’s much more of a sense of adventure and exhileration for me and for the group I’m speaking to.  We talk about the details of the travel experience in a way that we wouldn’t if I was coming from across town.  “Chris is here all the way from Richmond, and he drove or flew X hours, and let’s just soak that in for a few seconds.”  Maybe we just want to honor the effort and time that’s been exerted to get there, or maybe it’s again a desire to hear about an experience we don’t all have every day.  I can’t quantify it, but I sense a deeper sense of engagement and benefit of the doubt in those situations than I get from an audience who already knows me, or knows that I came from just a little further down their own street.

Of course, we have to be careful about assigning too much inherent value to someone’s words or thoughts just because they are not from around here.  (Certainly from one perspective, it might be worth being additionally skeptical of their insights if they’re not connected to the values and culture established in our own land.)  I cringe sometimes when I hear of local groups paying significant amounts of money to bring in an expert speaker on a given topic, where part of the primary appeal is that they are from another place with different perspectives, not that they will actually provide $10,000 worth of value in their visit.

Generally, though, I think it’s a good thing that we still find some exhileration in encountering “the other, unlike us” and that we look to those experiences for insight and perspective on our own lives.  In some ways, having traveled or been on other kinds of journeys does give us a wisdom and expertise that we can’t obtain otherwise, and it’s a great part of the human tradition to share in that with each other.

A few thoughts on how it went, and what’s next:

This was a very unifying, clarifying event for me.  It knitted together elements from all facets of the “save the world” efforts I’ve put my time and energy into thinking about and acting on over the last ten years.  From organizing national conferences around Daniel Quinn’s books, to attending regional conferences about Peak Oil and community-based solutions, to helping with other statewide efforts to promote sustainability efforts, and then to more locally focused efforts such as local food issues and the 100-Mile Radius Potlucks, to lending my skills to local entities like the Cope Environmental Center, trying to make my own life more sustainable, to identifying and confronting the very personal fears around sustainable living – the notion of facilitating a community transition to lower energy usage (and all of the amazing social, cultural, educational, political, and personal opportunities that come with it) serves as a nice umbrella for all of these.  Better yet, it’s presented in terms of possibilities and better living, true homeland security, and returning to community values of days past – these are ideas that transcend political boundaries or ideological conflicts…they’re just about doing what’s needed to survive.

The purpose of the event was to equip each of us with the tools and support to initiate transition efforts in our own communities. It was successful in that – from getting more up-to-date information about the data points of Peak Oil, to a cornucopia of documents, slides, and links, to some hands-on practicing of training/conference facilitation tools, it was a broad coverage of community organizing skills.  There were also plenty of useful stories of success and failure from other participants doing all sorts of interesting things (Chicago, West Virginia, Pittsburgh, etc.) and the added bonus of deep wisdom from fellow-participant Peter Bane, who publishes Permaculture Activist magazine.

For me, I was certainly there with an eye on how I could help Richmond, especially as this community seems to flounder about in asking “what can we do in the face of economic collapse and other global crisis?”  See exhibit A, today’s editorial in the Palladium-Item (“Region needs targeted, local development strategies“), which tries to tell us what we need, but offers no practical advice on how to do it or why it would help, at least not beyond the same old same old: tax abatement incentive packages.  As I’ve said before, without a driving vision that informs the hunt for more jobs, we’re just treading water.  And as I told the EDC when they invited me to speak to their board, we’re overlooking and underestimating the importance of “going local” – building a self-reliant community instead of looking for more imported resources (jobs or otherwise).

I think I’m more ready now to be a part of spreading that message a little more effectively.  This training helped me see an approach and find a tool-set that makes some practical next steps clear, and provided the clarity, inspiration and motivation to make it real for me again.

If you’re in the Richmond area and are interested in talking more about how this city can transition to a more self-reliant, resilient way of life, I hope you’ll make contact with me if you haven’t already.  And if you’re elsewhere and want to learn more about the Transition movement, there are trainings happening all the time, or you can bring one to your own community.

His comments were interesting and insightful, but not necessarily ground-breaking, and when asked to comment beyond what I took to be his prepared remarks, he had some trouble even being insightful. But, I did really appreciate his perspectives on how deferential and petty many members of the media have become, and his advice to politicians and interested citizens to go against the grain more and shake things up a bit.

Though, when I asked my question of him, he wasn’t so into the shaking things up bit:

Chris: “You mentioned the lack of policy distinctions between the two major party candidates. How well or how poorly do you think you and your colleagues are covering the efforts of third party candidates, and what impact do you think that has on voters?”

Scott: “I’m glad you asked because we’re actually interviewing over the next few weeks – we’re going to be interviewing five of the independent presidential candidates. And forgive me but I’m drawing a blank on all of their names [crowd laughter], but I guarantee you I will know their names by the time I actually have to interview them. But, umm, obviously Ralph Nader and Bob Barr, but, um, it’s also the Constitution Party….I forget. Sorry. Um, we’ll be interviewing all of them, but I don’t think that’s going to be done by a lot of the other members of the news media.

There’s a finite hole. And I recognize that this has sort of a self-fulfilling effect. Um, I’m going to make up a number, but if you have an independent, a non-major party candidate for president, unless they do get some exposure, they’re likely to remain professionally non-major. And from the standpoint of news organizations, they’re saying to themselves ‘well, why are we spending twelve minutes interviewing this man or woman,’ – uh, Cynthia McKinney is another person we’re interviewing – ‘about whether or not they’re going to become president?’ – Because I guarantee you, they’re not! – ‘So, why are we taking airtime that we should be using to explore the positions about the other candidates that are much more pertinent to the campaign or, for that matter, the financial crisis, the war in Afghanistan?’

It’s a finite news hole, and those decisions are not easily made. When you have a third party candidate with the resources that someone like Ross Perot has, then you get a lot of coverage because they’re perceived to be a threat. Of course, when he didn’t get that many votes, he complained about the same thing, and he might have even been right.

But in our own small way, we’re trying to do that. Because, as I said in our editorial meeting, the non-major – and I’m sorry for that cumbersome construction – the people running for President not as Republicans or Democrats are nothing if not people who are serious about their ideas. And I think the American public deserve whatever chance our show has to give them that chance to put their ideas before our slice of the country. So, I’m glad to do that. But I guarantee you we will be criticized by people who consider it to be a misuse of our time.”

Well, okay, if you say so. In any case, it was good to see Mr. Simon in person and get a sense of him, I’m sure it will only enhance my experience of hearing him on the radio.

Last night I went to a talk in Indianapolis by Dave Isay, founder of the StoryCorps project. If you listen to NPR at all you’ve probably heard the audio segments they produce: interviews of everyday people, usually by someone they know, about their life experiences. The stories generally speak to some universal human truth, and as Mr. Isay said several times, tend to be much more authentic than the stories we’re told by television, movies, and other parts of our culture.

The talk was interesting, but not quite what I had expected – he played several segments that were featured in a book he was selling, and while they were powerful and really engaging, they probably weren’t the best use of time. I’d come to hear the context and technical details and “behind the scenes” stories of these stories, and so while Mr. Isay did provide some of that, it wasn’t in the proportions I’d anticipated.

It was an especially timely talk since Girls, Inc. here in Richmond was just awarded a major grant from the Wayne County Foundation to do some StoryCorps production about our community – more on that soon.

All in all, it was great to see these two significant players in the world of national public radio take the stage and talk about what they do and what matters to them. As someone who does my own work with audio production and who follows media issues closely, it was a real treat.

• Rising Above the Noise: Online Strategies & Tools for Success: we’ll take on blogging, RSS, micro-blogging, social networking, widgets, photo sharing, and more, and talk about how these tools can help businesses and other organizations get their message out there further. See also the article in today’s Pal-Item. Thursday September 25th 8-9 AM at the Uptown Innovation Center in Richmond. Free, contact Main Street to register.
• The Internet as a Political Tool: this is a repeat of the presentation I did in May, but now with more flavor! I’ll talk about how the Internet is changing the world of politics, and what it means for local citizens (especially right before the November election). It’s a part of the Technology Series at Morrisson-Reeves Library (see the PDF brochure) that is bringing together local experts to talk about various technology issues. Thursday, October 9th 6:30-8 PM in the Bard Room at MRL in Richmond. Free, contact MRL for details or just show up.
• General Talk about the Technologies of the Internet: I’ll be speaking to a group of freelance artists, web developers and consultants in Cincinnati about how to best use the technologies of the Internet to serve their clients. Friday, October 24th. If you’re in the Cincinnati area and are interested in joining the group, contact Katie McGuire.

If you’re interested in having me speak to your business or organization, learn more about how to get in touch to make a request.

I always make a mental note to write down some suggestions for improving this situation, and now that the academic year is ramping up again with plenty of lectures and convocations on the schedule, I thought I’d hold forth. So, here are my 5 tips for how to get the most out of Q & A time at public lectures:

1. Think about the wording of your question in advance – I know this may seem obvious, but many students seem to wait until the microphone is in hand and the whole room is staring at them to compose their thoughts. You’ll save everyone some time if you have a rough version of your question rehearsed in your brain, and you get extra points if you write it out on paper too.
2. Make your question clear and concise – related to the first point, the more circuitous route you take to ask your question, the less chance you have of getting a substantial response. If you need more than two sentences, you’re probably going on too long. Oh, and make sure you actually have a question – stating a bunch of ideas and just waiting for a reaction by your guest is not helpful.
3. Q&A time is not a venue for sharing your own views at length – I can’t count how many lectures I’ve been to where the question-asker takes five minutes to talk about what they think about some topic that may or may not be related to the event itself. Okay, you might have something interesting and insightful to say, but if you can’t sum it up in a sentence and do so as a clearly relevant introduction to your question, then you’re probably losing the attention (and perhaps respect) of the audience. The person at the podium is there for a reason, you’ll get your turn later.
4. Be gracious – again perhaps obvious, but I continue to be jarred by the abrasive and even vitriolic tone of some of the questions I hear asked. No matter how much you disagree with the speaker, no matter how awful you think they are, you will gain very little by insulting, interrupting or embarrassing them. (And for crying out loud, don’t throw food at them – it’s been done, and it has no positive utility.) I believe you can show respect while challenging the speaker, and if you do it well, the challenge may just be met with a worthwhile reflection or response.
5. Don’t follow up unless asked or necessary – a follow-up question is still a second question, and depending on the event format, you may be taking away someone else’s opportunity to ask their question by getting yours in. If the speaker prompts you (“did that answer your question?”) or if the speaker clearly evaded your question, a follow-up can be appropriate, but you should still be open to the possibility that moving on to someone else will yield the best results for everyone involved.

Of course, you’re welcome to take issue with the above. What other tips or advice do you have for folks attending public lectures and hoping to participate in the Question & Answer section?

I really appreciated that it was a “grassroots” conference, organized by Noah Coffey and Shawn Plew of Indianapolis, and not a big corporate conference organized by people trying to sell us stuff. Sure, there were corporate sponsors (Summersault was one of them), and there were some grumblings about session leaders spending too much time promoting their own products/services. But on the whole, this was a group of people who are passionate about new media and wanted to get together to see what else was out there, talk about some of the issues that come up, and just get to know each other better. Oh, and we also totally geeked out on Twitter.

I presented a session on Blogging Basics right at the start of the conference, and from what I can tell it was useful to the folks who were there – I think a few of them were starting blogs at the conference with some of my tips, which is great. As much as it was a technical talk, it was also a look at the culture and context of blogging in the Internet overall, and I really enjoyed spending some time looking at that.

I was also on a panel with Laurin Manning, Ruth Holladay, Joshua Gillespie, Steve Dalton, and Thomas Cook about how blogging and social media affects politics and the current election cycle. Things went okay, but we didn’t really have enough time to dive into some of the more interesting issues, and it was more of an orderly rotation of monologues than a panel discussion. That said, I hope it started some other conversations, and at least now I can say I was on a political panel with the Director of Political Operations for a presidential campaign.

I’m going to blog more about this later, but there’s something really great about remembering that, contrary to a lot of the messages out there about what it means to be successful on the Internet, you don’t have to be a Silicon Valley star or national figure to feel like you’re making a difference in the online world, and to some degree then, in the offline one. Travis touched on this nicely with his post about placeblogging – noting that it’s the textures of our everyday lives that end up being most relevant and interesting, not how many times we’re thrust into the spotlight in a sea of people who otherwise don’t connect very well to our own experiences. I feel more grounded in my “place” in the world of blogging and new media for having experienced those discussions with people who were not only in touch with the technologies, but who are also connected to this geographical place in some way.

This was amplified given that I was joined at the event by Richmond bloggers Anna Lisa Gross and John Dalton, and finally got to meet Doug Masson from Lafayette, whose blog I already follow regularly.

What’s next? Well, I hear that preparations for a 2009 Blog Indiana event are already underway. Locally, I’m hoping to be a part of producing a “New Media Summit” for Richmond and Wayne County, where we can explore some of these topics and do some of this education at an even more local level – stay tuned for more information on that soon, and let me know if you want to help make it happen.

Roundups and reflections from other bloggers:

• Blog Indiana 2008 Wrap-Up
• BlogIndiana conference: All good things must come to an end
• Blog Indiana Conference
• Technology-Enabled Attention Help
• BlogIndiana
• Blog Indiana Conference Notes and Presentation
• Noah’s Photos
• helloleticia’s Photos
• Photrade Gallery of Photos

Other related links:

• Blog Indiana 2008 Wiki
• Blogroll of conference participants
• Indianapolis Star article: IUPUI event helps bloggers find audience
• My delicious links tagged with “blogindiana”

And don’t forget that the Richmond blogger community is alive and well – if you have a blog missing from my list, please let me know.

The cool part is that the conference is only $49 for both days, and even cooler, I’ve got a 15% discount for you if you use this link to register. If you’re interested in blogging and social media at any level, I hope you can make it.