I’ve been speaking professionally for just over 10 years and I’ve learned many things along the way. One lesson though stands at the top, which is no matter how much I think I know, I must always keep learning. Like everyone and everything, I must compete for relevance now and in the future by re-thinking and re-imagining my purpose and the value I hope offer others. So, once a year, I take time to reflect on what’s important and also…
I’m Pivoting Toward Growth
Even Pivots make pivots. Such is true for the Pivot Conference. After 5 wonderful years, Pivot is moving away from a traditional conference format toward one focused on “user generated learning experience.” I’m moving into an advisory role and Matt Godson, Mike Edelhart and the Momentum team will carry the Pivot torch proudly. Now it’s time for me to grow. And I’m excited to announce that I’m partnering with my dear friend Debbie Landa on the 2015 GROW conference. GROW is centered on engagement and…
Pivot: The Total Digital Experience
The Pivot Conference in NYC in October is unique among events in that, each year, it shifts focus to deeply reflect the needs of its community of senior business transformation executives from leading brands and organizations. To make that happen, I serve as Pivot’s Executive Producer along with Pivot CEO, Mike Edelhart. For four years in a row, we’ve put our heads together to develop a story arc that covers the hottest, emergent trends, presented by the industry’s most engaging…
24 Doodles that Visualize This Year’s Pivot Conference Agenda
I’m looking forward to seeing you at next week’s Pivot Conference in New York. We published our formal agenda here. Our friends at doodle.ly though, decided to re-imagine the concept of what an agenda could be by visualizing portions of it as doodles! I hope you love them as much as I do… Click here to see the original gallery. More about our speakers here. I’ve created a story arc around the importance of integrated experiences and digital transformation. We’ve…
Announcing This Year’s Theme and Agenda for the 2013 Pivot Conference: The Total Digital Experience
Companies at the leading edge of change are recognizing that Social isn’t the catalyst for transformation, it is a shift in human behavior that changes everything. Social and its partner in change, mobile, can’t be limited to particular campaigns or even to specific departments. This revolution impacts employees and customers and all parts of the enterprise. There are no boundaries now; everything is integrated. This year at Pivot, we will be exploring topics that reset our perspective of where we…
3 short videos on innovation, surviving conferences and cringe-worthy career moments
Every now and then, I take a step back away from research, writing and the relentless barrage of disruption and innovation to go through my inbox, favorites, bookmarks, etc., to see what’s worth revisiting. To my surprise, I’d forgotten about three fun, short 60-second videos that I shot for LinkedIn on location at SXSW 2013. While short, I was thoughtful in my responses to three important yet diverse questions. As such, I’m hoping that they might either help or entertain…
STUDY: Social Business Strategy – Vision, Purpose and Value drive a new era of digital engagement
In an era when media is largely created and broadcast by the few to the many, social media emerged to facilitate the co-creation of media in addition to creating it. While difficult to trace its origins, the philosophy of social media dates back to the mid-1990s. It wasn’t until the mid 2000s however, that businesses would encounter the idea of a new medium where brand democracy prevailed over brand dictatorship. Suddenly the voice of the customer took on an entirely…
Social media is about social science not technology
In 2007, I wrote an article entitled, “Social Media is About Sociology Not Technology.” It’s a statement that after five years (and counting), I thankfully continue to see shared every day on Twitter. As time passed and experience matured, I amended that statement to now read, “Social media is about social science not technology.” Why did I change such a powerful statement? I believe that it is not only stronger now, it is also truer. See, sociology is just one…
The Pivot Story Arc
During the planning of the upcoming Pivot Conference, I’ve been asked many questions about what it is, what it isn’t, and why the need for another conference. Most importantly, I’ve been asked more often than not, “What is our story?” I think that’s a great question. So, I took a moment to write the story for the Pivot Conference and while I was sharing it with the team, I thought that I would also share it with you here. Why?…
The Pivot Conference: Your Questions Answered, Part 2
As the host and editorial director for this year’s Pivot Conference, I asked early registrants what was on their mind. I received a fair amount of questions and wanted to share the answers with you here in case you’re thinking about similar topics. Here’s part 2 of 3. You can read part 1 here. What 3 things are mandatory when building and sustaining a community? The first thing is to realize that consumers most likely do not want to build…
