Thursday, September 29, 2011

Business Meeting Time


Well, I’ve been posting to my blog for 9 months now, and I think it’s time to take this blog to the next level. I’ve been out of pocket for a while, and one of the outcomes of this was a realization; the need to come to a meeting of the minds of my readers. So, let’s have a roundtable, so we can brainstorm on ways to either level the playing field and/or come up with a real win-win situation.

I want us to think outside the box, color outside the lines, and form some synergies with you. You all are my change agents. I don’t have the bandwidth to do this on my own. You all bring a lot of value to the table. At the end of the day, I’m looking to get more than just the low hanging the fruit. I gotta raise the bar on what I’m posting; improve the user-experience. Who is going to step up to the plate? Grab the bull by the horns? Feel free to leave a comment or you can ping me and we can touch base and take this off-line. Or we can schedule some face time. But I don’t want to have to take anyone out behind the woodshed. Will you be in the trenches with me?

From a high-level, specifically the 8,000 foot view, I like where I’ve been. But this is a chance move up the value chain and offer something game-changing. I’ve been flying under the radar and it’s time to be front and center.  Time to bring my “A” game. I’ve done some back of the envelope calculations and I’ve realized that I need to push the envelope.  Go off-road.

Net-net, my goal is to create a fully-integrated, precision-engineered, streamlined reading experience. I want this to be a ground breaking, state-of-the-art collection of cutting-edge posts and I develop this blog to be more robust and customer-focused. The name of the game is to create not just the industry standard, but the industry leader. The benchmark of blogs. This needs to be a world-class collection of thoughts and the bottom line is that I want this blog to offer everything from soup to nuts. I need to expand from my core competency.  It’s not really a paradigm shift, but more building on my best practices in combination with analyzing some lessons learned. My goal is to architect each post to differentiate myself from the rest and hit the sweet spot every time. My posts should sometimes include all the bells and whistles, but at other times I’m Ok living under the 80/20 rule. But I don’t want to be all things to all people.   

Excuse me, I have to take a bio-break.

….
OK, let’s reset.   


So, let’s hit the ground running! Ready, fire, aim. Let’s take a deeper dive, drill down, and get granular…what can be done to right-size this blog? I need to peel back the onion and wrap our heads around this.  Tear down the silos and get back to basics, the block and tackle, the bricks and mortar.  But I don’t want to re-invent the wheel.  I’m looking forward to a seamless integration without one-offs or work-arounds. This is what has come out of the think tank so far:

The Journey, The Travels, The Road Trip:  The Next Generation?
The Journey, The Travels, The Road Trip:  2.0

This is where I put a stake in the ground and draw a line in the sand.  This is where the rubber meets the road and we start to gain tractio.  My talk track, vision, and mission statement might be as simply stated as: 

The Journey, The Travels, The Road Trip: For all your cliché-weaving needs.

 
Stick a fork in this, it’s done.
_____


PS – here are the phrases I couldn’t work in but are too brutal to omit (feel free to comment with some of your own favorites!):

  • Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic
  • Chief Cook and Bottle Washer
  • Stick to your knitting
  • Drinking the Kool-Aid
  • Hope is not a strategy
  • It's a bird nest on the ground
  • Skate to where the puck is going
  • Drinking from a fire hose
  • The genie is out of the bottle
  • Polishing a Turd
  • The scenery only changes for the lead dog
  • Run it up the flagpole and see who salutes
  • Boots on the ground and feet on the street.
  • Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater
  • Let's remember the rule of 212 degrees
  • Hey, we're not here to boil the ocean.
  • Putting lipstick on a pig (or perfuming the pig)
  • Getting all my Ducks in a row
  • Monday morning quarterback
  • Noise in the System
  • Eat our own dog food
  • Take one for the team
  • (He's gone) off the reservation
  • Screw the pooch
  • Pound the table
  • Spray and pray
  • Has legs and can go really far...
  • The Elephant in the room (or the corner)
  • 800 pound gorilla
  • Being thrown under the bus
  • Apples to apples
  • It’s part of our secret sauce

2 comments:

  1. Show me the money, just don't ever let them see you sweat. There is no I in team and there's no crying in baseball... especially since the earth was not created in a day. Just be sure to knock their socks off so your blog will have a domino effect. After all, we're all in this together... Oh wait... It's not you, it's me.

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  2. Don't tell me.........
    He knows, she knows, everybody knows...

    ReplyDelete