A colleague sent me this amazing 13min. TED piece:

( http://www.ted.com/talks/stefon_harris_there_are_no_mistakes_on_the_bandstand... )

, in which Stefon Harris and band play some very beautiful and soothing music, THEN comes the talk on music "creation", "mistakes", "acceptance", "communication", and "finance".

At 11min. 00sec. a really interesting segment begins on micro management and creativity...

Some questions this piece provoked for me:

Does creating music and creating other things relate, and, if so, how ?

Musicians know how to play their instruments ( role ), but what if development team members ( admittedly, or not ) don't know how to play their role ~ can you get anywhere ?

Music, and other forms have a negative space. In music the negative space is the space between the notes, the place where nothing is happening. In visual arts it is the white space. The space that brings your attention more fully to the other things available to see.

So what do you do when team members hang out for long periods of time in this seeming nothingness ?

What do you do when you can see and hear passion when your team mates talk, but there is no real conversion to action ?

Worse, what do you do when the action that does get produced is in complete contrast and seeming opposition to the stated and agreed upon goals ?

And, in closing, where are your effective balance points between; structure and chaos, including and excluding, offering and requesting, pulling and pushing that produce a very high degree of success in a development project ?

Enjoy !...

For those of you that I've been talking to about the subject of this post I found this to be an interesting perspective on the future of web search:

( http://www.fastcompany.com/1754800/conversation-is-the-new-search )

I really like the direction things can take from where this is coming from ~ very interesting possibilities !!...

I've also been exploring energy focus in the domain of financial abundance and wanted to share a few things with you here in the new year.

You are probably familiar with the book / movie "The Secret", which from a brand and marketing perspective has been a phenomenal project and success for it's creators of which I am not one.

This post is actually about some older work that was perhaps foundational. Both books are great, quick reads with an ample amount of value that can be derived from the works IF the reader can get past the specific religious referrences that were used at the time. Enjoy...

The Science of Getting Rich

The Game of Life and How to Play It (Prosperity Classic)

Me: "I've been blogging since 2004"...

You: "Really, where's your stuff ?"

Me: "Out there in the universe"...

You: "Hmmm, what would I Google ?"

Me: "I don't know that that would help"...

I've an acquaintance, that bears no ill will, that claims that with the help of some sophisticated technolgy, that ANY CONVERSATION CAN BE FOUND. There is, of course, a fee.

Now, that is some serious juju. To be able to "locate" ANY, I repeat, any conversation, written, or otherwise.

I haven't posted any fresh content for some time. Why ? No energy...

"Energy" has been my focus for the past six months and I have been doing some amazing work with some very talented practitioners in the area of both; postive energy harvesting and negative energy realization and disbursement.

"The Secret" is a popular topic, AND only the outer skin of the onion as you begin to broaden your horizons and discover the many aspects and lines of thinking on energy. String Theory as one example.

If you look at some of the bigger, and frankly more depressing headlines in the news over the last, say five, years, the Transfer Of Energy, or the Lack Of Energy Transfer is something very interesting to look at.

Start with your own life. Your relationships. Have you been Transfering Energy with others mutually ? Or, are your relationships historically more of a one way street ? Is the energy being expended negative, or positive ? Is the energy being received positive, or negative ? Doing a Likert Scale by individual might be fun, if you want to go all out.

For my life, I've been doing what I love to do, helping others succeed. Somtimes that is extracting people from business relationships they don't want to be in. Sometimes that is restructuring a business to be more profitable. Sometimes that is collecting hard money. Sometimes that is helping people understand other actors in their business play to be more effective with them. Sometimes that is the sheer creation of brainstorming a new business model. Sometimes that is driving a project to the goal line. Sometimes people involved make A LOT Of Money. Sometimes people involved act out their greed, and sometimes they act out of malice. Why name names, you know your own names ? !...

I think what I've done is ALWAYS a success. Why shouldn't I ?...

Not everyone is always happy. Sad. And, that's where energy comes back into the conversation. We make our own energy. Positive, or Negative. And we hitch our energy to the energies of every other living thing in the universe.

An Italian friend once told me that there are two kinds of ways to deal with someone that has been the source of a lot of negative energy in your life: one, whack'em, or two, put their business card in freezer to freeze their luck. Needless to say that I've got a fat envelope in my freezer with many of your business cards in it ~ yes, %!#& you, each and every %!#&ing one of you %!#&s ~ and this New Year I should be adding a few more of your %!#&ers to that fat, %!#&ing envelope ;-) !!!...

But, %!#& that ~ this new year, 2012 is about positive energy, baby, each and every minute of ever waking day. Clean, consistent, powerful ENERGY...

And with that declaration comes another ~ everyone that might be thinking, hmmm, did I give him one of my business cards ~ I'm releasing you all for the new year and forgiving each and every one of you...

Extrapoloation is a killer business strategy. No kidding.

The silly illustration above clearly demonstrates how "off" we can get when we extrapolate, but what happens in an entrepreneur's mind that makes it an acceptable practice to extrapolate any one, or more of the critical business strategies that they are relying on to grow a successful business ?

I’ve had hundreds, if not thousands of entrepreneurs tell me that they are going to execute a go to market strategy “just like _____ ” did. Insert Google, FaceBook, LinkedIn, Groupon or any of a myriad of other success stories we see in the media in the blank.

But guess what, such strategies are bankrupt for most entrepreneurs who fall in love with these notions. Why ?

Because your entrepreneurial endeavor is simply NOT Google, nor is it any of the other highly publicized darlings that have become the strategic gold standard.

But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a nugget you can use here and there. You just need to apply some critical thinking to your situation. The following might get you started:

First, when you look at strategies that have worked in other businesses you have to look past the success to “why” the strategy succeeded.

Demographics, Finance, Technology and Policy are the keys areas where an entrepreneur must make important assessments about how, when and why to apply extrapolated strategies to their unique situation.

Let’s take finance as an example. Most entrepreneurial ventures are under funded, which has a direct relationship on the businesses' ability to effectively go to market. Many of the gold standards pointed to were funded, which makes a BIG difference in the way a business can create large scale market awareness. 

Others forget that low margin models like Walmart have lowered operational costs in strategic ways AND enjoy the benefit of multiple item purchases in a single visit. If you have one offer and think you are going to make a low gross margin offer and make it up in volume you are literally killing your chances of success.

Policy, as another example, can refer to government policy, or it can relate to the business policies that your desired audience has adopted. Either way you have to look at whether, or not the policies are in line with your offer. In other words, do those policies make it easier, or harder to sell your product or service ? If you need policy to change for your offer to be accepted this is never good and generally points to very long sales cycles.

Demographics and Technology must be thought about in similar ways, but I won't go into that today unless I get comments in that direction.

What is strategic alignment within a business ?

@TheEconomist ~ George Jettson and Mr. Spacely are going to be pissed !!!...

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Amazon is reportedly shutting down the Amazon Associates Program, but ( only ) on California participants due to a bill that proposes to tax Californians regardless of where the products involved are shipped from, or shipped to. The company went on to call Governor Jerry Brown's new, proposed bill, which prompted Amazon's announced move, as "unconstitutional and counterproductive".

Duh ! !...

Granted, Amazon's move would come only after the pending bill's passage, but it also strongly signals the company's intention to do what so many have already done ~ vacate doing business in California while searching for more intelligent life forms elsewhere !...

Is this really the most effective and essential thing Sacramento has to offer now ?...

If you too think that the Govenor's plan on this topic is amazingly shortsighted, incredibly small-minded, and caters to big, out of state companies as Amazon also alleges, then ~ please make some noise ~ repost, comment, etc. ~ and check back for updates ? !...

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