Never Mind the Box; Can You Think Outside of the Spectrum?
Yesterday I was doing a little SMSing with an old friend, one who has a better pulse on me than most. At one point in the conversation I get back "You're an enigma" and aside from being intrigued I'm taken aback that a close friend would think that, but when asked why she thought that her response was "I never know what your brain is going to cook up". She's right.
Personally I feel like I'm an easy read. I'm a husband and father that recently moved to the suburbs, drives an SUV and has a dog. Envious aren't you? Even I'm the first to admit that it's a fairly predictable life.
However, I've always taken a road less traveled approach to everything I do. Let me sum that cliche up for you into something tangible. In a public restroom I'll look for the urinal with the least condensation underneath to assure it's the most infrequently used one. This choice is certainly not pain free and without effort, but it's where I'm most comfortable. Need more? I promised myself when I bought my daughter her first bike I'd get a new one too. This one.
I see dead people.
Lately I've been experiencing so much narrowly focused thinking that I'm curious how people survive or even evaluate success. I've seen some folks not aggressively plotting a new course over plateauing revenue. I've seen entrepreneurs stubbornly content with mimicking 125 other start-ups and thinking their product will be better. I've seen job postings written in a way that eliminates any truly smart person from pursuing the opportunity.
In the past week, I've had a lot of social media stuff thrown at me, primarily seeking feedback or input, and it's solidifying my previous opinion that "social media experts are full of shit" and frighteningly migrating like a communicable disease.
While we're on the subject can I ask all companies to ditch the Social Media Manager/Director title in favor of Engagement Manager/Director? Isn't that more in line with the role? Doesn't it ooze "Hire really intelligent and experienced people" who understand the customer lifecycle?
It's this theme of compartmentalizing a strategy within the confines of the tools that were created to support the compartmentalized term, social media. Being good within the confines of this means that you're good at tying your shoes, but you're not considering what to do with the shoes once tied; walk, run, dance, kickbox, etc.
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