By Lauren Mayer, on Tue Jan 22, 2013 at 5:00 PM ET
In case you’ve been under a rock for the past week, dethroned cyclist Lance Armstrong ‘told all’ to the queen of the confessional, Oprah Winfrey. And most people reacted much like Claude Rains’ character in Casablanca upon learning about gambling at Rick’s – “we’re shocked, simply shocked” – or something to that effect. The highly promoted, well-publicized interview covered many subjects, but I was surprised that Oprah stayed away from the good stuff, or at least what seems most interesting for a hopeless romantic like me who knows nothing about competitive cycling (but is addicted to Downton Abbey and Jane Austen): his love life! Armstrong has certainly been a cad to his teammates, trainers, sponsors, and anyone else he’s sued or insulted (and I love his defense of all the horrid things he said about his teammate’s wife, claiming as long as he didn’t say she was ‘fat’, all the other names he called her were okay). But he’s been spectacularly awful to his romantic partners, dumping his first wife for a glamorous rockstar, whom he then very publicly dumped because she wanted kids, ironically next taking up with a child star (okay, Ashley Olsen was an adult by that point but she still looks like a teenage waif), and then adding insult to injury by having two kids with the newest girlfriend.
I’m hoping the resilient and talented Ms. Crow will pull a Taylor Swift and write some devastating new song about Armstrong’s betrayal of her, but in the meantime, I’ve taken a stab at it myself.
By John Y. Brown III, on Tue Jan 22, 2013 at 4:00 PM ET
Watching Silver Linings Playbook.
Albert Camus once wrote that fiction is a lie through which we tell the truth.
This movie is a story that tenderly and impeccably reveals the truth about life and the world we live in. All of us.
It’s supposed to be a brilliantly authentic and deadpan depiction of the world within the world of those laboring under the weight of mental illness. But it’s really not.
Silver Linings Playbook seems to me to be something more real and less mysterious. About finding extraordinary moments amid the utterly banality of life made possible by those who find ways to cope most graciously with a world insanely obsessed with the delusion of sanity.
By John Y. Brown III, on Tue Jan 22, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET
Sometimes what seems to be a confident answer turns into a cause for worry.
Last week I was asked by a client, “Is there any way in the world –anything that could possibly happen—that means this deal won’t go through?
I flippantly joked, “Yes. If the Mayans were off three weeks in their prediction of the end of the world.”
We both laughed.
But since then I keep worrying, “What “IF” the Mayans really were off three weeks?! And the world does end. And this deal doesn’t go through. I am totally sc***d. I will have lost my credibility with this firm and probably not get renewed for this year.
Gosh, I sure hope the Mayans didn’t have a tendency to be off 3 weeks in their predictions.
I mean, the Mayan culture seems like the kind of culture that if they were going to get something wrong, they would at least get it wrong on the right date. They seemed to be sticklers like that.
By Nancy Slotnick, on Tue Jan 22, 2013 at 8:30 AM ET
I never would have thought, when I was single, that those 4 words could sound so sexy. “We’ve got an hour.” With a raised eyebrow it becomes a full-fledged turn-on. At least I have the hour. Usually.
As I prepare to fully enter the world of new media when my iPhone 5 arrives next week, I find myself sad to retire my Crackberry. Those little keys on the keypad are so easy and so soothing. I can get so much done. Or nothing at all. When both my husband and my son started complaining that I was so addicted to my Blackberry that I didn’t notice them, I knew I had a problem. I had just thought I was a Blackberry Girl.
So I started realizing that how I spend my time might have some impact on whether I am reaching my goals. I know I’m always busy. Emails, texts, constant communication. But maybe I’m just running a treadmill?
Ironically, they had a marathon of Ground Hog Day on TBS or something last week. (Yes, they played it over and over. Lol.) Like a sucker, I watched even though I have seen it many times before. (I watched in between emails, anyway.) I didn’t see the end but I asked my friend who is a huge Bill Murray fan: “What finally got him to the next day?” It was when he started focusing on the people in his life in a helpful and vulnerable way. He wasn’t concerned about what he was getting from them. But he still was going after what he wanted. (i.e. Andie MacDowell.)
I want to recommend to you, if you are single, to be Bill Murray. Try to be Bill Murray in the last go ‘round of Ground Hog Day, not Bill Murray in Caddyshack. (The pond is not so good for you.) Bill Murray in Lost in Translation is not bad either.
What this means— There’s a guy who was in the papers this week because he has spent $65,000 on Matchmakers and has not gotten a mate. I have not worked with him but supposedly I might be approached next. (at least that’s what the Yahoo reporter said when she quoted me)
Here’s what I would tell him: I run a matchmaking company, Matchmaker Cafe, but I don’t consider myself a matchmaker because finding love cannot be outsourced. It cannot be figured out on paper nor by an algorithm. You have to meet. Emailing and texting is only useful to the extent that you use that technology to set up a date. At Matchmaker Café we facilitate dates because you are busy and you may need a concierge. We don’t promise to find the person for you. You have to collaborate with us, to have some skin in the game. We know that you don’t need endless email noise and phone tag. You don’t need to spend thousands of dollars on matchmakers and your iPhone (or Blackberry!) is not going to help you that much. You need to have a date. And you need to show up for it. It’s as simple as that. But over and over. Until it works, like Bill Murray.
Read the rest of… Nancy Slotnick: We’ve Got an Hour
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Jan 21, 2013 at 3:00 PM ET
Happy Martin Luther King Day
A man who taught us about the importance of fighting for — in a humble, appropriate and civilly disobedient manner– the God-given freedoms bestowed on each of us.
Even if others who claim they are the actual bestowers of these freedoms, in fact, are usurping them.
“Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty, I am free at last” has become the universal rallying cry for all who have ever found freedom from bondage, political or personal.
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Jan 21, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET
I’m easy, cheap, and proud of it.
On Facebook anyway.
Is that a bad thing?
I just found out about “deactivated” accounts of people who are Facebook friends and that you should probably delete or “unfriend” them since they are no longer active on Facebook.
That made sense until I got my real lesson from the process. Some of the “friends” I discovered with deactivated accounts included names like:
Jon Doe
A Fish Sandwich
Carissa Carmos Wayfm Shinefm (totally made up name)
John Doe (with an ‘h’)
And more…
It’s not my fault that my friendship with a fish sandwich or an imaginary person didn’t work out. At least I tried. If they were having fun at my expense, heck, well….it’s their loss.
And besides, I can comfort myself by knowing I was probably the best friend that fish sandwich had in its entire imaginary life. At least the longest. We were apparently friends for several years.
By Erica and Matt Chua, on Mon Jan 21, 2013 at 9:15 AM ET
Where was your country 3200 years ago? Were loin-clothed warriors chasing wild game with spears? Were people living nomadically or in cities? If they lived in cities, did their world extend beyond the city walls? Odds are you, like I, don’t know much about what happened at our home 3200 years ago. Egypt though is different, not only is their history known, but the temples, tools and writings still exist. There is nowhere that has as much history, as old as Egypt, making the entire country a true World Wonder.
Were your ancestors being subjugated by the powerful Egyptians as these “Asians” and “Africans” are depicted at the Abu Simbel Temple?
Egypt’s major sights are spread conveniently along the Nile as the Ancient Egyptian society was for thousands of years. Where to start though? How about the bottom end of the Empire, visiting sights as the Nile flows to the North? Not only does this make for easy trip planning, but also makes the trip easier to enjoy, beginning in tranquil Aswan, working your way towards the chaos of the 21-million person capital, Cairo.
Abu Simbel’s massive statues have stood along the Nile for over 3200 years to demonstrate Egyptian supremacy. They stand to warn welcome you to the Pharaoh’s territory…
What will you see by starting in Aswan? You’ll start walking like an Egyptian in one of the country’s best sights, the Abu Simbel Temples.
Read the rest of… Matt & Erica Chua: Walk Like an Egyptian — Starting Point
Learn by doing. Constantly test new ideas. Learn, share and repeat. The world is ever changing — stay ahead of the curve. Embrace the art of discovery.
We need to try more stuff. Innovation is never about silver bullets. It’s about experimentation and doing whatever it takes, even if it means trying 1,000 things, to deliver value. Business model innovation requires a lot more experimentation than we are comfortable with today. Tweaking existing business models won’t work. Technology as a sustaining innovation may improve the efficiency of current business models but will not result in the transformation that we all want and need. We need to learn how to leverage technology for disruptive innovation and to experiment with new business models.
Geoffrey Canada, the inspiring founder of the Harlem Children’s Zone in NYC, reminds us of the importance of constant experimentation. Everyone wants to know the one thing that makes a program like Harlem Children’s Zone successful. What is the silver bullet that will allow the program to be replicated with ease across the country? We are always looking for an easy answer. There is no silver bullet and it is not easy to transform any business model or social system. According to Canada, at Harlem Children’s Zone it is doing 1,000 things with passion to help those children succeed. It is about focusing on the customer, in this case, the children within 100 city blocks in Harlem and doing what ever it takes to help them secure a bright future. There is no one thing.
Business model innovation is all about experimentation. It is about combining and recombining capabilities from across silos until something clicks and value is delivered in a new way. It is never just one thing. It starts with a big idea that gets the juices flowing and attracts others with similar passion to the new approach. The big idea has to be translated from the white board on to a real world test bed to demonstrate that the idea is feasible. Starting small and demonstrating progress is key to building credibility and expanding a network of interested stakeholders. An ongoing portfolio of small-scale experiments to fail fast on those without merit and to prioritize those with the potential to scale is critical.
We also must get far more comfortable with hacking capabilities. Capabilities are the amino acids of innovation. They are the building blocks that enable value delivery. Innovation is a better way to deliver value and is often the result of repurposing existing capabilities. Locking capabilities into rigid organization structures and proprietary closed systems gets in the way of unleashing new sources of value and solving many of the important challenges of our time. Innovation is about hacking capabilities. Business model innovation happens when we enable random capability collisions resulting in new and unexpected ways to deliver value.
A good example of the power and potential of hacking capabilities is Microsoft’s (MSFT) Kinect. Microsoft introduced Kinect in November 2010 as a product extension to its Xbox franchise. Kinect adds a very cool capability for Xbox game players by getting rid of the hand held game controller and turning players into their own controllers. Microsoft and cool haven’t been used in the same sentence for a long time. Kinect is cool.
Read the rest of… Saul Kaplan: Experiment All the Time
But since then I keep worrying, “What “IF” the Mayans really were off three weeks?! And the world does end. And this deal doesn’t go through. I am totally sc***d. I will have lost my credibility with this firm and probably not get renewed for this year.
I want to recommend to you, if you are single, to be Bill Murray. Try to be Bill Murray in the last go ‘round of Ground Hog Day, not Bill Murray in Caddyshack. (The pond is not so good for you.) Bill Murray in Lost in Translation is not bad either.
Business model innovation is all about experimentation. It is about combining and recombining capabilities from across silos until something clicks and value is delivered in a new way. It is never just one thing. It starts with a big idea that gets the juices flowing and attracts others with similar passion to the new approach. The big idea has to be translated from the white board on to a real world test bed to demonstrate that the idea is feasible. Starting small and demonstrating progress is key to building credibility and expanding a network of interested stakeholders. An ongoing portfolio of small-scale experiments to fail fast on those without merit and to prioritize those with the potential to scale is critical.
