Heard this today…

5. August 2011 by admin.

The difference between a dream and reality is just doing it.

So simple but it so true. I have always felt action speaking louder than words, louder than aspirations. We must be doers because potential is a wonderful thing but when you fail to realize that potential … you squander a precious resource and it such a waste!

 

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The Wolves inside

5. August 2011 by admin.

An old Cherokee told his grandson, “My son, there’s a battle between two wolves inside us all. One is Evil. It’s anger, jealousy, greed, resentment, inferiority, lies, ego. The other is Good. It’s joy, peace, love, hope, humility, kindness, empathy, truth.” The grandson thought about it and asks his grandfather, “Which wolf wins?” The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

Intro to chapter 10, “Positivity”, by Barbara Fredrickson

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What is Successful Social Media?

29. July 2011 by admin.

Despite the recent buzz about social media, it is not a particularly novel concept in terms of conventional top-down marketing. What is new about social media is the pronounced use of technology and workflow practices, in this context social media is being employed as  a new paradigm; a new way of looking at the relationship and the firm through the lens of new technologies. In today’s market environment, technology, the advent of ubiquitous broadband internet and economic circumstances have presented businesses, governments and individuals with unique opportunities to communicate directly and engage deeply and form profound bonds between individuals, businesses and between companies and customers.  So that these engagements become relationships, which become deeper with time and persist beyond a single one-off transactions.

Technologies and the new landscape

Today’s technologies in mobility, in transaction processing and the ever ubiquitous Internet have can and will change the commercial landscape forever.  Social media platforms like Facebook, Google Plus and Twitter have provided new opportunities for individuals to connect communicate and interact and have changed the game for commerce forever. Engagement and trust is even more necessary than ever in the era of ecommerce and micropayments and the clicks of ecommerce surpasses the bricks of conventional retailing.

The Cultural Imperative

 Given this new commercial environment, responses to inquiries must be rapid and correctly handled; the customer experience must be well received and properly  lead and managed. Brand reputation becomes a treasured if intangible asset.  The injury of brand and reputation can be because a customer will not only stop doing business with you but can and will tell 16 of his closest friends of his experiences. There are plenty of studies and documentation to prove it.

Here where the rubber meets the turf… it ultimately becomes about building loyalty by design.  Businesses must concentrate on forming those deep and enduring relationships with their customers to retain them, to enable those customers to see that they are genuinely valued and want to identify and affiliate with the   brand and ultimately become an advocate for the brand.  There is nothing like “word of mouth” advertising and the correct use of social media can make that happen with little cost to the enterprise.

What is the correct use of social media?

In order to do this correctly, we must understand the common message of what this new paradigm means. Along with the adoption of social media there must be a cultural imperative. The culture must also be proactive and customer centric this can mean nothing short of a change in culture. It requires an elevation of what can be termed “customer experience “and commitment for every executive, technician, every secretary and clerk in business to contribute and reinforce that imperative.

It requires the enterprise to be wildly proactive about solving a problem, selling the products or  develop a solution, It means getting  both peer and customer and vendor to effect a positive outcome; commitment and buy in that must made by everyone from chairman on down to the cleaning staff.

Politics and governments are not immune

It is not limited to the commercial arena, Federal, state and local government must also use social media couple with technology to be responsive to their constituencies. in the 2008 election cycle it was determined that President Obama was elected to his position largely due to his use of social media; particularly the use of social media to solicit contributions and raise brand awareness. There are initiatives within many local governments to report traffic congestion and street maintenance issues. Some localities are using social media to solicit feedback from communities about zoning and building issues. The Military recognized the use of social media to allow soldiers overseas to communicate and engage more deeply with their loved ones. The cost was virtually nothing but a change in policy ( a change in culture) but the benefits in terms of troop morale was incalculable.

The Takeaway

Social media when coupled with the technologies  and ubiquitous internet provides the  means to improve  bottom lines and in turn, provide better and much more personal service, get rapid feedback and can create many market opportunities to create more transaction volume from a loyal and consistent following, With that said, social media must be also accorded with a strong proactive customer experience policy and mindset; perhaps even elevation of the customer experience and relations to a c-level position.  Another suggestion would be to drive the leadership of customer experience as deeply down the hierarchy as possible. This would involve employee training and cultural changes to insure that customer engagement is always positive and problems are remedied as rapidly as possible.

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Sustainable Social Media

26. July 2011 by admin.

lets face it may have been done before.; the debate should be whether it has ever done correctly or in a sustainable manner. Things like social media don’t happen in a vacuum. The very fact we name it this, Social Media represents a need to break with the old ways and barriers and try to attempt something that superficially resembles old media but is different in many ways … access , availability and voice and the conviction that status quo is not adequate for the current economic environment.

We need to change the old ways, to overturn conventional thinking because the consumer is educated and informed and craves for connection and community. We are fumbling now but that’s just like any new thing . it will mature and grow and maybe become something we don’t recognize. The only thing about change is to be flexible and adapt as events and circumstances occur. The losers will those stuck with current conventions and will become as extinct as the fossils under the ground.

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What is CLL Chronic lymphocytic leukemia

27. June 2011 by admin.

Show Notes from #cancerchat (w/ @CinziaRollings )

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a type of blood cancer that begins in the bone marrow. It can progress either slowly or quickly depending on the form it takes. Many people with CLL live good-quality lives for years with medical care.

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) results from an acquired (not present at birth) change (mutation) to the DNA of a single marrow cell that develops into a lymphocyte. In 95 percent of people with CLL, the change occurs in a B lymphocyte. In the other 5 percent of people with CLL, the cell that transforms from normal to leukemic has the features of a T lymphocyte or an NK cell. Thus, any of the three major types of lymphocytes (T cells, B cells or NK cells) can undergo a malignant transformation that causes diseases related to B-cell CLL.

Who is likely to get it

An estimated 85,713 people are living with CLL, and 15,490 people are expected to be diagnosed with CLL in the United States in 2009. Physicians have learned a great deal in the last few decades about CLL. In the last several years, new therapies have been developed, and outcomes for people living with CLL are steadily improving.

When

Causes and Risk Factors. CLL has generally not been associated with any environmental or external factors. However, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences issued a report “Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002,” which concluded that there was “sufficient evidence of an association” between herbicides used in Vietnam and CLL. For more information from the US Department of Veterans Affairs see www1.va.gov/AgentOrange or call (800) 827-1000.

First-degree relatives of patients with CLL are three to four times more likely to develop CLL than people who do not have first-degree relatives with the disease. However, the risk is still small. For example, the 60-year-old sibling or child of someone with CLL would have three to four chances in 10,000 of developing the disease, compared with the one chance in 10,000 for a 60-year-old person without a family history of the disease.

 

Symtoms and signs

CLL symptoms usually develop over time. Early in the course of the disease, CLL often has little effect on a person’s well-being. Some people with CLL do not have any symptoms. The disease may be suspected because of abnormal results from  blood tests that were ordered either as part of an annual physical or a medical examination for an unrelated condition. An elevated white cell (lymphocyte) countis the most common finding that leads a physician to consider a CLL diagnosis.

People with CLL who do have symptoms may tire more easily, and/or may feel short of breath during day-to-day physical activities—as a result of anemia (low red cell count). They may lose weight because of decreased appetite and/or increased use of energy. The lymph nodes and spleen may become enlarged as a result of an accumulation of CLL cells (leukemic lymphocytes). Infections of the skin, lungs, kidneys or other sites may occur as result of low immunoglobulin levels and decreased neutrophil counts.

What are the treatment options

Current therapies do not offer patients a cure for CLL, but there are treatments that help manage the disease. Treatments for CLL include

• Watch and wait

• Single or combination drug therapy

• Blood cell growth factors

• Radiation therapy

• Splenectomy

The removal of the spleen

• Treatment in a clinical trial

- Drug therapy with new drugs or new drug combinations

- High-dose chemotherapy and allogeneic stem cell transplantation.

 

The goals of CLL treatments are to

• Slow the growth of the CLL cells

• Provide long periods of remission (when there are no signs of CLL and/or people feel well enough to go about their day-to-day activities)

• Help people to feel better if they have infections, fatigue or other symptoms

well, processed chemicals fillers additives carcinogenic

 

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Who's your favorite relative and why are they your favorite?

27. May 2011 by admin.

Without embrassing him,I think its probably my younger brother, Mike because I admire what he has done with his life and seen how far he has come. He is the very definition of success in life. He is also a geniunely good man.

Ask me anything

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What I would do first… a missive

11. April 2011 by admin.

From a Facebook question about the solutions solving the energy dilemma

Since you asked, I think I would like more efficient use of the products we use today. let me give you an example, The internal combustion engine has been around for about 130 years now and while it is has improved over the years, in terms of the energy conversion from it toxic and explosive fuel to the kinetic energy of driving a piston is still quite inefficient. the exhausts emissions from a typical automobile are evidence enough. There is plenty of room for improvement if we were to demand it.

Another example is the electrical grid, I would say it is common knowledge that is is old and inefficient and the infrastructure is suffering but the true issue is the appalling loss of inefficiency and effectiveness from the generating plant to transmission stations to the last mile (the home or business) work must be done to not only work to improve the infrastructure but make it an opportunity to improve the systems fundamentally using new technologies to become less costly and allow more efficient transfer of energy from the transmission to the consumption.

The third (and second to last) builders have to build better designed home with efficient heat and cooling system suited to the prevailing climate and environmental conditionals.. I dont think much can be done about older homes although the ability to retrofit solutions are there. environmental controls are not the only considerations. We have the ability to build intelligence into the homes and management of resources( i.e. Lighting, drainage and waste consumption) In my view, this is something that needs to be done.

The last thing I would like to do is (in my perfect world) is remove the necessity of reacting to crisis by taking a very proactive approach to creating solutions to problems. I perceive  that the prevailing wisdom is to “ignore the problem until becomes a crisis” or “if it isn’t broken, dont fix it”. These mentalities are obsolete and mindset are required to change and this is one thing I would change if it were in my power.

While I have many more suggestions but these were the first things that came to mind. Information, education and engineer can and will address these issues but it will be later not sooner, and will be more expensive & more disruptive.

It is always better to be thoughtful than reactive given these prospects.

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What a Boomer Learned at #GenYChat

29. January 2011 by admin.

What a Boomer Learned at #GenYChat.

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Tools ‹ LearnGrow — WordPress

22. January 2011 by admin.

Tools ‹ LearnGrow — WordPress.

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re: Rep Gifford Keith Obermanns rant about Palin and incitement

9. January 2011 by admin.

You might as well remove all the other terms that have cropped up in the professional political culture. Terms like “Campaign”, “opposition research”, “scorched earth” “target opportunity” and reconnaissance are derived from military parlance and vocabulary and both parties use them. I think it is incredibly simplistic of Olbermann to suggest that Palin campaign “targets” were geniune incitements for people to actually target public officials literally is irresponsible and wrong.

I read the liberal the central and even the conservative blog to gain perspective. I consider myself a reasonable person with an average intelligence and I could not reconcile that crosshairs viewpoint with anything but aggressive campaign rhetoric.

To my way of thinking, the Olbermann commentary was an attempt was an attempt to control the direction of rhetorical political speech by cowing opposition (presumably conservatives) into a defensive posture that frees liberals to say whatever and attack whomever they wish without consequence. This comes  from a man who regularly regards and award individuals with the “world’s worse person” designation and regularly those he comments or  questions those he opposes with slights and insults, if not flat out contempt.

In my Opinion, this wasn’t so much about control of the vitriol and the hatred of a political party or ideology and to call this opinion commentary an explanation of the event is charitable at best. It does appear to be enormously opportunistic on Olbermann part to silence political rhetoric and provide an absurd linkage of the tragic event to Sarah Palin, The Tea party candidates and smear them as violent and ill informed buffoons. Anyone painted in these broad strokes have a great justification for anger.

I pray for the rapid recovery of congresswoman Gifford and those otherwise harmed by the event. I morn for those killed.   This is a true tragedy as Gifford is an extraordinary Leader and far less a politician… the type of individuals we need in office to get things done.

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