Transparency Camp – Good and good for you

I’ve just arrived home from an abbreviated day at Transparency Camp 09.

1. Sunlight and iStrategy Labs did a phenomenal job of organizing.

2. Caliber of attendees was surprisingly high

3. Number of people i recognized also surprisingly high. – about 500 attendees in all, I think.

4. Based on a quick conversation after the kickoff – i put up a topic on the board that I\’d run: \”What can transparency accomplish?\”

5. 5 min before the start there were 2 pple there and one left. One min after the start time, all 20 chairs were filled, and pple hanging on periphery

6. I asked the question: saying its about anti-corruption is aiming too low. So what is it about.

7. Quality and diversity of answers stunned (to be published soon, awaiting photos of whiteboard.) From enrichment to participation to trust to everything – prob 30 or 40 diff elements.

Here are the raw photos of the Whiteboard from our session, courtesy of Ellen Scully-Russ. Processed version coming soon.

8. Follow up question – so do we have to tune what we do to focus on one or more of these potential outcomes?

9. Session tomorrow scheduled to follow up to answer this.

10. Had to leave to relieve hubby so he can go to work. 😦

10. Thank you so much for sharing – can\’t wait to see you again.

SlideShare: decks on a higher plane

I’ve become a slideshare addict.

More accessible and interactive than TED and with a much higher signal to noise ration than twitter, it is my latest go to place for ideas and information.

I mean look at these things – they are gorgeous. And it used to be that the only way you could share this type of info is if you were a guest speaker or in a conference room. No more – now your best ideas can be shared in a vivid way more broadly. More dynamic than text, less complex to deal with than video, power point is my native toungue. I take notes and offer notes in ppt. Sick, I know, but I’ve always done it. It handles, text, tables, pics and links more easily than anything else I’ve used.

I’ve been so inspired by some of these, I’ve actually emailed their authors – and the authors have been kind enough to respond.

So – check them out. TED and SlideShare have raised the bar. Our crappy, wordy slides with lame clip art will simply not do anymore.

I loved this one especially, on a subject near to my heart. Let me know your favorite. Please!

can work styles change?

I  have a colleague who believes that we should complete the job, then share.

I believe that when you’re trying to get something done, you should get the input of all the stakeholders first.

Colleague believes that asking shows incompetence and laziness

I believe asking shows respect and is efficient.

I believe my role is to gather information, analyze it, and present solutions that represent my experience and insight, while accounting for all the issues.

Colleague believes that all this talk is a waste of time.

Can I win him over?

No more “info@”

My personal prescription for a reasonably low risk and painless step into “social marketing”

Change your “feedback” or “info” or “sales” email addresses – put people’s names on there. Too much volume? Nice problem to have. Then put “KenOrSherry@company.com.

After all, almost every relationship begins with the exchange of names. And nobody believes that anyone will return the message they send to “info”.

Government Collaboration

Last week i had the good fortune to be a speaker at the Potomac Forum’s workshop on Social Media in Government.  (My slides are at the bottom of the post.) The workshop was an interesting mix  of speakers and an audience of people who have spent their careers in service to our country in one form or another.

A few takeaways:

1. A lot of people in the government are excited about moving forward with Obama’s agenda of a transparent, collaborative government.

2. Existing policies around procurement and communication relevant to this area are a mix of things that seem very sound once you get to know them, and some that need updating.

4. There are some very innovative people in government who are pulling people together to get things done, and I look forward to contributing what I can.

5. You can see the speaker’s slides at the ClickforHelpSite: Jefferey Levy, Dan Philpot, Dan Mintz, Ken Fisher and Alex Koudrey’s contributions ranged from the abstract concept of social media to specific ways to plan blogs and specific policies for managing content and comments.

6. GovLoop.com has 5,000 interested government and gov-wannabes signed up to keep each other informed and work through some of the hairy issues.

7. If you are considering using social media in government, you should read this.

8. The Potomac Forum and my friend Ken Fisher(click for help) both work very hard to make certain the workshop is useful for people.

Here are my slides from the event. My angle is that social media can do a lot to make an organization more effective on the inside – not just in its relationship with its audience.