Blog Day sharing

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BlogDay posting instructions:

1. Find 5 new Blogs that you find interesting
2. Notify the 5 bloggers that you are recommending them as part of BlogDay 2008
3. Write a short description of the Blogs and place a link to the recommended Blogs
4. Post the BlogDay Post (on August 31st) and
5. Add the BlogDay tag using this link:
http://technorati.com/tag/BlogDay2008 and a link to the BlogDay web site at http://www.blogday.org

Blog 1: 6footsix
This gem of a blog is by Colleen Smith, a beach volley player in CA. Her height is as exceptional as her being. In her blog, she asks how she can use her visibility to bring awareness to green issues. She is especially interested in engaging with kids in fun, playful, and powerful ways that motivate change.

Blog 2: BubbleGeneration
Wild card insightful man says things both brilliant and a bit disturbing. Never expect him to say what everyone else says. He marks his own territory effectively, directly, and swiftly. I sense that he is deeply moved to push our world to a better more thrivable space. He also blogs through Harvard Biz blogs.

Blog 3: MoveSmart
The organization putting up this blog is working toward better technology for residential integration. Justin, the founder, has a deep understanding of the issues at hand, a great grasp of the possibilities of technology, and a profound commitment to a better world. I love conversing with him, and I love reading what he is thinking about.

Blog 4: Unimaginable Inscape
A poetic sensibility + lit crit “reading” ability + history studies ability to contextualize = an ability to convey a compelling, situated story. Which Jo directs to landscape where she reads the world through the accidental “art” around us all. Sublime.

Blog 5: Do Good Well
Of course I love a person who has an asset mapping background and talks about doing good and philanthropy and Africa. He taglines it: best practices and beyond for citizen-led global social change. Indeed.

There are dozens more I enjoy, but these strike me as the ones that have yet to make the blogroll–but really deserve to be there. Will update. Thanks for the inspiration, information, and insights!

14 – 7 – 5 Adventure Part 1

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I set out with the intention of seeing 14 people in 7 days and 5 cities. Unfortunately, I drove.

The adventure began when the service engine light came on just as I was heading out of Chicago. A quick look at the owner’s manual reassured me that it might not be a critical failure, so I drove on. Wanting all the good luck the universe might offer, I paid for the family behind me at the first toll booth I came to. Minutes later, an old client called to ask me to do some work. That was great to hear, but I worried my good karma wasn’t going to help the car now. Silly me for not being specific about my needs.

The drive to DC is not short. A good 11 hours spent talking on the phone, singing along to my favorite female divas, and trying to keep up with the usual internet flow. The route is nearly all toll roads. Incredibly expensive. But maybe it should be for all the carbon emissions. When I discovered that my fuel cap was not on appropriately, I assumed that was the reason for the light going off (according to the manual, that was a reasonable cause). Toll roads are not very pleasant ways of seeing the country. You can’t get off the road for fun distractions.

I am a lifelong cross-country driver (please forgive the carbon emissions). I used to stop only when the car needed refueling. Bathroom break, refuel me, and jump back in for the next stretch (which could be 6 hours). This trip I tried to stop every half tank. I have played math games about traveling ever since I was a kid. So I burn up mental energy calculating time and distance to major cities and final destinations–and breaks. Though this exercise, I have figured out lots of things about reading interstates.

For example: How do they number exits? By mile markers. Exit # – current mile marker = distance to go.
A few states do not do this–and on some roads on the east coast, they will indicate the old number. One system –I think it was the New Jersey Turnpike, numbers theirs consecutively. It can be rather frustrating to find out that exit 10 is NOT 10 miles up the road nor at mile 10, but instead is 10 toll road exits further. Vastly different when calculating distance and time!

I am a terribly impatient person. Horribly. And my mother seems to have broken me of most external indications of this. I have to keep my brain busy. So calculations amuse me. Soaking in what nature I can get across vistas of concrete also keeps me at peace. The light penetrating the forest and reflecting in dancing waves off the outermost leaves. Hawks circling. The vast range of domiciles one can view from concrete interstates. The rains which come slower of faster when in a car depending on which direction you are going in a storm. So much external information to soak up while moving.

I am a compulsive reader. In the shower, I read the shampoo bottle. At breakfast, I read the cereal box. I am not sure any of this registers in my head consciously. Surely little of it sticks. But in my usual compulsive reading way, I felt compelled to read a sign at a rest stop in Pennsylvania explaining wind power and the wind farms in view from that location. MMmm, good, very good. I thought to take a picture. But like photographing redwoods, windmills just don’t really show scale in a landscape very well. You have to stand next to one. Wind-farms are like giant flower gardens.

Hours later, stomach grumbling, I got lost 3 times on my way into Washington DC. Thankfully my patient host guided me in. The final minutes were marked by my name being called as I approached an intersection. Really?

PART 2, where I actually get to PEOPLE I saw, coming soon….

Rebuild

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Absolutely brilliant article by my new Chicago pal, Jo. Not only does she write in a way that explains why things are the way they are, but she does it in an elegant and engaging fashion.

“The nation’s skeleton is as fragile as the candy-cane bones sucked down to threads on Cinco de Mayo.”

Gorgeous! Scary. Informative.

creating conversations: receiving with grace

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Conversations….mmmm, I love having them. But the art of conversation is not celebrated enough in our culture. And it is becoming ever more critical online as we struggle with tools that don’t communicate facial expressions or even intonation. So what can we do to bring forth conversation and nurture it?

Of course there are some simple obvious answers: ask questions and express gratitude. Come from a state of curiosity.

But how about receiving with grace? We have valued being independent or autonomous so highly that many of us have lost touch with the ability to receive with grace. Allow other people to feel good about their contribution. Don’t quickly close the social reciprocity contract–you know that sense that you have to return the favor? Don’t take it to be a sign that you are a slacker or a mooch! What a negative framing that is…although it does point to people who are not being gracious about receiving (or our jealousy of those that do receive with ease).

Keep in mind that people don’t see the world for what it is, they see it for what they are. Most people think about themselves, especially in our competitive culture. If you allow people to see themselves positively, they will see you positively.

I had a lovely friend who spoke about those in his social network in the most flattering terms. He said how brilliant and creative they were. And it made me feel like I must be pretty brilliant or creative to be included in his world, since that was clearly what he filtered for. And I had the sense that when he talked about me to others, he was saying amazing things about me (ones I might not even be able to believe about myself). Oh, was he ever attractive to spend time with!

What can you celebrate in others? Especially when they have given you something. Instead of returning the favor, do them a different sort of favor by saying very specifically what you see them having done for you (or for others), how that works for your needs and values, and how thankful you are for it. This is NOT a display of your weakness, in fact it shows your confidence and strength.

Allow it to create a flow in conversation toward common connection–shared celebration of shared values, other instances of gratitude or other things to be grateful for. Be patient in listening and clearly ask for more. I mean clearly as in “can you tell me more about that?” Or “What I hear you saying is ‘insert summary or key points‘ and I would love to know more about how you came to that/where you want to do with that.”

Receive with grace and enjoy your conversations flourishing–online and off.

Inspired Philanthropy

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Today, we release the website for the forthcoming 3rd edition of Inspired Philanthropy. Phil blogged it.

I have been honored to participate in the development of this edition. Also, Tracy has asked that I refer to myself as co-founder of Inspired Legacies, because of my involvement in some of the development, creation, and projects of Inspired Legacies since August of 2005. I am deeply honored by and grateful for this designation!

Now through November 6th, a Donor Diva Challenge, allows anyone who buys Inspired Philanthropy, to designate a free copy to a nonprofit of their choice! Buy the book and give the book to a nonprofit. Give the gift of transformational giving.

And check out the website, not just because I worked so hard on it either! There are loads of resources–exercises and worksheets, the whole appendix! Pdfs, uploaded and available free for you to use!

Also, note, National Philanthropy Day is November 15th!

Honored by Razoo

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A friend pointed me to “A Little Thanks Is In Order to Razoos Top 25 Members“.

I am honored to be celebrated with such change agents and collaborators.

I also must acknowledge that this comes as a result of the connections formed and work done at Omidyar.net community, which transferred over to Razoo, allowing me to connect with many people and immediately jump in to many groups and causes. It was a reputation transfer of sorts. It was certainly not because I have been super active on Razoo. I have been focused full-blast for the last month with a brilliant and valuable project which I will announce tomorrow. (hint, hint)

Green Dinners

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Recently an amazing network weaver friend, Steve “Habib” Rose, passed away unexpectedly. I have been thinking about this idea for many months, as it relates to his efforts around neighborhoods connecting. And I decided I best get started! Please feel free, if you knew Habib, to host a Green Dinner in his name. Suggested topics for conversation might be peace and neighborhood networking.

Now is the time. Connect to those you care about and take action on what matters to you.

Green Dinners allow people in our local community to come together, not only to enjoy each others company, but also to bring up relevant issues occurring in our neighborhood that we’d like to change. It’s a great opportunity to meet people, strengthen friendships, eat nourishing food, and to get in touch with your community.

Green Dinners first initiated with Beyond Today.

I think this is a brilliant idea. After attending a gathering in Houston of local spiritual folks to talk about spirituality facilitated by the book and cards of Amazing Faith of Texas, I thought, why are we not doing this for green issues?

What you need to host a green dinner:

* Space to host dinners
* list of neighbors or community members to invite
* invitation (may or may not request food be shared and be local, fair-trade, organic)
* open attitude

Connect face-to-face around the issues you care about and discuss them over a shared meal, potluck style.

Please host or attend a Green Dinner in your community. Invite your friends over to discuss green issues, whatever that means to you.

For now, please use the http://www.wiserearth.org/group/GreenDinners/ to share and discuss. I encourage you to post photos and highlights of conversations. By naming these events and conversations, I hope you will help me spread the word about the importance of a Greener World. The more we talk about it, name it, expand it, the more it spirals out into the world, inspiring and evolving this great work of ours.

Opportunities to help Green Dinners: help write a standard invitation, help create simple guide to facilitation of conversation, sponsor dinners and share online about them. Get other people involved.

Network Weaver, Habib, passes on

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I am very sad about the surprising news that Steve “Habib” Rose has passed away. He was an inspiration to me and a delightful friend. We still had projects in the air, and I feel hesitant to do the work without Habib. I first met him in Seattle at an event for Wiser Earth where Paul Hawken spoke about Wiser Earth and Blessed Unrest.

In honor of a fabulous network weaver, please contact someone you know (best if it is a weak tie) just to do it, just to connect and see what happens.

A memorial celebration of the life of Steve Habib Rose will be held on Sunday, October 7th from 4 to 5:30 pm at University Friends Meeting, 4001 9th Avenue NE, Seattle, WA, to be followed by social networking time.

Habib dedicated his life and his work to building connections among us. He moved us, both individually and collectively, to work joyfully for a deeper community. His vision, humility, generosity, justice seeking,
loving-kindness, network weaving and his phenomenal hugs inspired the many communities he graced with his presence.

Habib, may your presence live on. May we all learn from your spirit.

Donations to the Duwamish Nation are gratefully accepted in lieu of flowers.

Please also contibuting your reflections on Habib to an on-line memorial that can be found at http://wiserearth.org/group/habibsgarden

More on Community Managers…

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Over at fast wonder again…trying to find the time to read and respond to Dawn’s points about community managers.

Today, I added:

Great list! Synthesizer comes to mind. The ability to take an existing conversation, and restate it so people feel heard and new conversationalists can easily grasp content seems very useful. Of course this might be context dependent. 🙂 Taking this a step further, from summarizing to encouraging forward movement of the conversation and related actions seems important to me too.

Which responds….to…well, here it is, but check it out on her space too!

What skills do I think it takes to manage a community?

* Patience. The community manager should not be the one responding to all of the questions. She needs to hold back and let others within the community participate. This is especially true when someone in the community is being particularly difficult. It can be easy to fire off an angry response that might be regretted later, but waiting until the emotions cool a bit can make the response more thoughtful and constructive. This includes patience with newbie community members. She may have heard the question a million times from other newbies, but this is probably the first time this particular person has asked the question. Taking a little time to welcome new community members while pointing them to a list of helpful resources (nicely) can go a long way toward helping to grow your community.
* Networking. The best community managers are the ones who seem to know everyone and have a large group of colleagues who can help in various ways. These people do not typically acquire large networks by accident; they have good networking skills and are constantly meeting new people and growing their network.
* Communication. Community managers should be great communicators. In some communities where the interactions are primarily online, good writing skills are essential. Public speaking skills can also be required for those community managers who also spend time organizing community events, evangelizing, and speaking at conferences on topics related to the community.
* Facilitation. I spend a fair amount of time making sure that the right people are involved and engaged in the community. No one person can (or should) respond to every question or comment, so the community manager is frequently in the position of facilitating the discussions.
* Technical Skills. Having at least a basic understanding of the technologies used in your community are important. This varies widely depending on the community. In my case, the ability to administer the Clearspace installation, maintaining and writing web pages, bug tracking software, svn, etc. have been really helpful. I find that my background as a sys admin has been really helpful in this job. Not all community managers need to be highly technical. It certainly helps to be able to do some things yourself, but in my case, I do what I can and rely on our hosting provider, our web developer, and other developers at Jive to help with the tricky stuff.
* Marketing. For those of us managing developer communities, marketing may seem like a dirty word, but yes, marketing skills are a requirement. The community manager needs to be able to promote community activities, solicit new members, and in general get the word out about the community.
* Self Motivation. In most cases, no one will be looking over the community manager’s shoulder telling him what to do. He needs to be self motivated to do whatever it takes to keep the community active and healthy without much direction from others.
* Workaholic Tendencies. I do not mean that the community manager must work all the time; however, most communities do not exist in the 9-5 work hour schedule. People from all time zones participate at all hours of the day. Community managers probably want to at least check in on the community outside of business hours and respond to any hot topics or heated debates. This ties into the self motivation skills described above.
* Organization. Community managers should also be organized. Keeping track of loose ends, making sure that questions are answered, being able to organize events, etc. all require good organizational skills and attention to detail. This is probably the toughest one for me. Although I tend to be highly organized, I tend not to be particularly attentive to details. I’m working on it 🙂

I have no doubt that there are more skills required for community managers, but I think this is a pretty good start. This list may also be a bit skewed toward those who manage developer communities or open source communities, since these are the types of communities that I have managed. I would be very interested to hear perspectives from other community managers here in the comments. What skills do you think are most important for community managers?

Motivating Participation

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Recently I was asked how to increase attendance at a gathering. I came up with a few simple questions to consider. Look at three perspectives.

1. The participants–who are they? There may be several audiences, and for each one, figure out what they want to get or are getting from the gathering.

2. Your perspective–why are you inviting them? What do you want to get from their attendance and participation? List separately for each audience group.

3. Observer perspective–what will the outcome of the gathering be? What will the world be able to see, touch, taste, smell, or feel because of the participation?

Now, what do you do with that? Use #1 to develop your strategy of attraction of participants. Use #2 to identify the proportional blend you want to have of different audience groups. Do you need idea generators? Processors to move ideas along? Finishers to put ideas into action? And #3 is useful for attracting funding and sponsorship.

Incentives, and this is just a starter list, might be:
# association (other people to connect with–especially face to face if they know each other virtually)
# reputation (most active in the field or other recognition of effort is honored)
# growth (learn something)
# inspiration (this is usually why a well-regarded speaker works)
# challenge (opportunity to collaborate on something vital)
# recognition (building their own visibility–like getting acknowledged for doing a cool video etc)
# play (to laugh and be creative)
# delight (good food, good sensate experience)
# narrative (fits into their story of who they are and why they do what they do)
# contribution (opportunity to give to the group)
# influence (able to change others or environment)
# stuff (things people can take with them and help develop branding and identity)

I strongly encourage visual mapping to show the relationships between people and between motivations/incentives and people.

Once you are clear about who to invite and why (for them, for you, and for others), then develop your message to each audience considering the benefit they receive for attending and participating. Then, also, consider what that benefit gets for them. Does it save them time or money? Does it develop their reputation or acknowledge them? Consider Maslow’s hierarchy. What core need is met?

There is much more depth to this than I can address in a single blog post, but this gets us off to a good start. What would you add to the incentives? Are there other valuable perspectives to consider? Is there a good way to create a matrix for organizing the information? What visual techniques would reveal the most useful information?