Month: February 2009

Seeking a proactive professional to proactively proactivize

Dave

Originally published on Conversations & Connections, my SAS social media blog

My SAS colleague Margo Stutesman forwarded me a blog post from Sasha Dichter, director of business development at Acumen Fund. “I’m assuming she sent it because she likes the way he quantifies what he’s looking for in a social media marketer, as opposed to trying to get me to move on.” I’ve spent a lot of time either writing or reading job descriptions and help wanted ads. Writing a good one is not easy. I like the way Sasha lays out what he’s looking for:

I’m looking for a great marketer — a storyteller, a tribe-builder, someone who knows how to connect with people in a real and genuine way and help them to be part of something big…and who at the same time is ready to roll up their sleeves with data and numbers and analytics and web 2.0 tools.

Great stuff, and it immediately gives you a sense of what the job will be like and what it would be like to work with Sasha.

Social media gives us so many opportunities to rewrite the rules of corporate communications – not the fundamentals, but the stodgy old stuff that isn’t working anymore, like some of the language we use. I’ve read dozens, possibly hundreds, of job descriptions that told me the company was looking for a proactive, customer-focused self-starter, but not what the person would actually, you know, do. “My favorite line in a job description was obviously a placeholder that never got edited before publication: "Works closely with Harriett."”

Knowing you’re being stodgy isn’t always enough. I’m working on our Social Media Guidelines & Recommendations to give to SAS employees who want to know how “and indeed if” they can participate in social media. “The short answer is yes, with more to come.” I’m a pretty informal person and often find myself struggling to maintain a professional demeanor in meetings when what I really want to do is sneak jokes into the minutes to see if anyone reads them. Even so, it’s hard to break the habit. I just looked at a sentence I wrote in the draft guidelines for podcasting:

Our intention as we develop podcasting practices at SAS is to identify podcast-worthy topics that support overall SAS messaging and create a unified podcasting strategy that supports multiple marketing efforts and maximizes the content and production resources.

Not the most inspiring of manifestos. But it’s so easy to slip back into stuffy mode. That’s one reason I appreciate Intel’s social media guidelines, and why they’ve gotten a lot of attention. They sound like they were written by real people, for real people. “And in my own defense, the sentence I picked out above is one of my stuffiest.”

The larger, more important message of all this is one I hope our bloggers at SAS will continue to recognize and feel comfortable with: not every post has to be a white paper. That email you just dashed off to ten colleagues about an important development in your field could be a blog post with a few minor tweaks, and maybe just a spell check.

Social media may be encouraging some to become too personal and informal “I’m still a fan of good grammar and spelling”, but if it convinces the corporate world it’s okay to talk like people instead of committees, that will be a wondrous thing.

First word! Probably!

Dave

Like so many things about parenting, we’re not really sure of the protocol for deciding on a child’s first word. Is it the first time he says something recognizable regardless of context, or the first time he clearly identifies something by using the correct word for that thing? When does it happen? If we declare it too early will we get knowing, accomodating, but not-quite-accepting nods from fellow parents?
The Boy has often said “mama” and “dada” and “hey” and a few other things that seem to be actual words, often at times when it could reasonably be said that was what he meant to say. And for a month or two he’s been making vague noises when he sees one of the cats “or should I say Hastings, because Siegfried and Roy still run from him like he’s a tiny veterinarian”. Sometimes it sounds like, “Hey, kitty.” Sometimes it sounds like, “Ehhh, keeeahhhhahh.”
But this morning in response to Mommy’s question, “Do you see the kitty?”, Conrad responded, very clearly and without ambiguity, “Kitty!” All the sounds were there, including the oft-overlooked T sound.
So, we’re calling it. On February 16, 2009 at 8:42 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, at the age of one year, five days, one hour and 42 minutes, Conrad said his first word, and it was “kitty.”
UPDATE: We just got back from his one-year checkup with his not-easily-impressed pediatrician who said that this, in fact, does not count since Jean said “kitty” first. So his official first word is yet to pass his lips.
She also asked us a lot of questions seemingly designed to deflate the proud parent, like, “How does he show you what he wants?” and “When you roll a ball does he roll it back to you, and does he put any English on it?” and “Has he written anything I might have read?”
Dave

We wanted to celebrate Conrad’s birthday with his daycare class, but somehow cupcakes didn’t seem right for a roomful of babies. Instead we made bibs for all of them celebrating Conrad’s demonstrative affection.

It has been reported to me that our dear son loooooves his classmates so much that he is often found making the rounds with kisses and hugs to them all. Hence, the caption under the photo:


And here they all are wearing their bibs:

Please note that Conrad not only looks bummed that he doesn’t have a bib, but also has removed his shoes and socks.

One!

Dave

It’s been quite a year. Just like everyone says, it seems to go by very quickly but at the same time it’s as though he’s always been here. We tried to make his birthday as much fun as possible, considering that he doesn’t know what a birthday is and the things he enjoys most are pressing buttons, pointing at things, eating and knocking stuff over. We took him to breakfast at Elmo’s, which he really loves because there’s a lot to look at, including ceiling fans. The rest of the day was pretty much like any other day, although I did bring him back to the office from baby school and let my co-workers bask in his one-year old glory.
As for the evening, it’s hard to do anything special for a baby who is telling you in no uncertain terms, “There is nothing you can do that will make me happier than giving me a bottle and putting me to bed.”
He is such a happy baby and so much fun to be around. We are very, very lucky. I never understood babies before. They frightened me, frankly, because I didn’t know what to do or how to connect with them. With Conrad, with a few minor exceptions that usually occured late at night and involved stuff coming out of him that was supposed to stay in him, it’s been easy. That’s probably because he’s a part of me.