The Post American World

BBC World News has a posted Fareed Zakaria Post American World. First

"the rise of the rest places certain limits on American power"

"The rise of the rest" is actually a pretty darn positive statement. From a study-of-power perspective it is no surprise that the vacuum formed, the monopoly formed by the USA being the sole-super-power, has a post-world that is hopefully more balanced.  Make no mistake, I am incredibly pro-America because, well, I am an American. I can’t tell you how much I love this country.

Yet conversely I don’t like our role as World Police. I don’t recall applying for that job, and the fact we have been forced into it, leads us to an awareness of a lack of gratitude. This leads to email snippets like the one below.

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5 Basic Rules of Negotiation

Reading  Harvard Negotiation Project: 5 Lasting Rules For Negotiating Anything on GigaOm made me send the list of five rules of negotiation to a client. First the rules:

1. Don’t Bargain Over Positions
2. Separate the People From the Problem
3. Focus on Interests
4. Invent Options for Mutual Gain
5. Insist on Using Objective Criteria

One side effect of the recession I have seen is clients getting into complicated situations, even some self destructive, almost as a diversion from the real issues. I don’t have a solution. But I do wish folks would learn a little more about creative negotiation to get us all to a happy place. Just keep paying it forward I tell myself.

Ries: The Law of the Proper Brand Name

On the subject of rules for brand names.

For readers of this blog it comes as no surprise that I am a big fan of Ries and Trout’s book Positioning. And since then a continued fan with The Fall of Advertising and The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding. They articulate thoughts that just make sense; logically, psychologically and sociologically.

Working in the tech sector and also being a fan of Moore’s Crossing the Chasm I view brand names very much as a sociological pattern. The mavens,
even if your biggest fans, must be able to COMMUNICATE that knowledge
to the early majority. It is YOUR job to give them a strong brand name
to communicate!

Recently rereading the 22 Immutable Laws, I found the chapter I was looking for when I wrote this post on brand naming. Here is a summary:

The Law of the Proper Name (pg 148)

1. The name should be short
2. The name should be simple
3. The name should suggest the category (flickr?)
4. The name should be unique
5. The name should be alliterative
6. The name should be speakable
7. The name should be shocking
8. The name should be personalized

So it
hurts me when I see friends use bad brand names. Not my job to prevent
the world from using irrelevant 10 syllable Russian sounding
cryptographs on the basis of "Hey, IBM uses an acronym!", but if you
must, you must. If however you have a choice, I am going to strongly
suggest you follow Ries’ Law of the Proper Name.

We did, which is why I love our brand name for Tendenci which one of our artists at the time, Randy Sarinas, came up with. Now if only we had a better positioning statement for Tendenci, but that is another blog post.

Work Stressors and How to Respond

Stress. Sucks.

Much has been written about stress invoking the limbic brain, which while effective in dealing with saber toothed tigers, isn’t so great at dealing with the complexity of the modern world. Add on top of that the recession, inflation and our mind’s dubious relationship with money and you have a mess. A mess of stress.

So to break this down I did some reading and The Stress Experience at work comes, according to researchers, comes from:

1. a person’s perception of the situation;
2. the person’s past experience;
3. the presence or absence of social support; and
4. individual differences with regard to stress reactions.

(source: Organizational Behavior, Hellriegel, Slocum, Woodman, pg 199)

Attacking these one by one can and will reduce stress. Perception. For example the people a person hangs out with and the content they put into their brain frames their perception of the world. Cliff changed the way I think about the post office. A character? Yes. But a real change in perception based on fiction.

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Renaissance Generation Panel Tomorrow after Patricia Martin

Looking forward to being on the panel with the Houston Arts Alliance tomorrow following Patricia Martin’s presentation on RENGEN; the Renaissance Generation.

So what is the RENGEN and what is this about?

Patricia Martin , the author of RenGen, and a panel of Houston business leaders, new marketers, artists and arts institutions will define the rise of Houston’s renaissance generation – the RenGen – an emerging demographic of enlightened individuals and communities that are dramatically changing the society in wish we work and live.

Registration is here but may be closed soon.

Update: Read Patricia’s recap of the presentation on her blog here.