Vacationing Unplugged

Summer is winding down and the vacations we took fill my mind. If you know me well, you know that I live from vacation to vacation! So now I have a bit of a wait until December. Luckily I’m breaking up that long stretch with an October trip to Chicago and ND for a football game!
 
Vacationing unplugged is a common topic these days as adults try (some more successfully than others) to extract themselves from their work for a week and as parents try to pull their kids’ noses out of electronics to enjoy their precious free time unplugged.
 

Minus the tent and duffel bags on top. And the dirt.

I have a favorite childhood memory of a trip my family took out West when I was eleven. Let me tell you, round trip travel from Cleveland to the Grand Canyon -- 2 parents, 4 girls, a 6-man tent -- is a journey of many miles and memories. And now, as a parent, I have profound admiration for the challenge my parents embraced by taking that trip - bottle of Scotch, and all. I think when we joined forces with my uncle and his family in Boulder, there must have been a definite “there’s no turning back now” moment.
 
My sisters and I laugh about the memory of my dad calling very deliberately from the driver’s seat of our blue Chevy Impala station wagon: “Put down the Nancy Drew books and look at the wheat fields” (periodically substituted with hay bales/river crossing/hawk flying/mountains ahead/etc.). My parallel life finds me directing my boys with, “Put down the iPods and iPad and look at the horses.” Vineyards/valley below/cows grazing/etc. It is hard to find the balance when games and social media have become so engrained in our daily lives. Oh, to have to get a child’s nose out of a book!
 
I am not yet so connected with smart phones (still don’t have one!) and internet that I can’t disconnect. I love disconnecting – except when my email account gets hacked while I’m on vacation and I have to use my son’s iPad and a pizza parlor Wi-Fi to execute some damage control.
 
The constant connectivity is addictive, to the point where our disconnected environment (a.k.a., the world around us) sits at a distance from our physical lives. I have what may be classified as an over-zealous connection with nature and, when given the choice, I choose nature 100% of the time over electronics and social media. But I don’t think that is the way our culture is headed. I’m certainly not sure that is the way my children are headed. The New Yorker Magazine had a humorous cover earlier this summer of a family posing for a picture at a scenic overlook -- each person had a different electronic device in full use for the portrait. We are sometimes so eager to get a picture of what we are doing or seeing posted on Facebook that we miss the moment of awe or pleasure that our surroundings are offering.
 
I will be the first to admit and itemize the benefits of electronics and kids in a car (non-driving kids, that is) (have I mentioned that we drive round trip, Boston-Cleveland, twice a year?)! Or at the end of a long (but wonderful, nature-filled) day at the beach where I just want a beer and a crossword puzzle on the deck, in peace. And I don’t have the answer to finding the balance. But my kids know that when on vacation, there is still allocated “screen-time” and no one should assume that down-time means screen-time. 
 
Growing up, the big nemesis in my house was the television. So we were raised in a complete void of daytime TV and exclusively on the evening news, NOVA, Jeopardy, Little House on the Prairie, Wild Kingdom, The Wonderful World of Disney, The Waltons and The Justice League. Period. Compared to our peers, we were TV-illiterate. But somehow we all managed to learn the lyrics to Green Acres and Gilligan’s Island for the school bus rides. And as I reached babysitting age, I expanded my Friday and Saturday night viewing repertoire substantially. Where there’s a will, there’s a way! As a parent today, the nemesis is the internet, social media and games/apps. I can only control the allocation of time for a few more years. They will do what they want when they are on their own! I just hope that by then I will have instilled within them, amidst all of the techno-clutter, some value in observing and participating in the world around them.
 
My day is easily made when one of my boys in the back of the van says, “Hey Mom, look how many birds are on that wire!” He was looking up! And I didn’t ask him to!

Lessons Learned This Summer

My mixed bag of social media and life lessons:

• Sports: MLB players on the DL take time to tweet from the dugout of the All-Star Game. Has social media surpassed sunflower seeds and tobacco spitting as baseball players' boredom beaters?


• Celebrity: Predictions of new TV lineup successes are tied to the number of Twitter followers of the shows' stars.


• International Social Media Binge: Olympics' Opening Ceremonies tweets clog the social media highway.


• Olympics and Needham, MA: An unknown gymnast with nerves of steel earns gold medals and the love of her town - Way to go Aly Raisman! Puttin' Needham on the map!


• Suburban Life: I love my neighborhood and my friends within it (this is not a new lesson, just a recurring realization that never gets old)! See photo below for details - nice to have our castle guarded while we were out looking for sharks.


• Work: I am the only crazy person I know who starts a new job in mid-August - two years in a row!


• Home Life: Pulling away from the house each summer day, leaving the kids behind, stinks.


• Family: Children are joy. Two teenagers are harder than one.


• Anxiety: Don't worry until they tell you it is time to worry. Otherwise, you've either worried for nothing or wasted time worrying twice as much as necessary.

 

Summer isn't over, but it sort of feels like it is almost gone! Make the most of what is left!

Got Balance?

I had two revelations today as I was reading a piece in the Globe Magazine on the power of moms. From it, I learned that I, not being in possession of a smart phone, am in the 7% minority of moms who have internet access from any location (courtesy of Edison Research). Last week, I could have gone to the local library or borrowed my sister’s laptop and hotspot to check email while on vacation. But I chose to remain off the grid. 
 
My bigger revelation is that working moms need to leverage networking more and better. The mom-based groups highlighted in the article consist of new and relatively new moms who have collaborated via social media to create very powerful, collective voices, weighing in on new mom and toddler issues. I was in that seat not that long ago and I love the efficiency of the parenting listservs, discussion groups, and Facebook Pages that pull interested parties together (none of which I was lucky enough to utilize – dating myself!) 

 
Coming off of a recent experience of helping my employer find a replacement for me as I move on to a new opportunity, I read about these social media parenting groups and realized a need exists for moms in a different chapter of life: Moms working full time or part time, trying our hardest to find the right balance between work and family. 

In my replacement search, I sent emails to about 40 women I know who might be interested in my position or who might pass my message to someone who is interested. Wouldn’t it be great if there was a local discussion group for moms in the workforce or on the verge of entering? It would have been the perfect place for me to share my job posting. It could also be a great resource, as the membership grows, to share joys, frustrations, opportunities, and tricks of the trade. It would be perfect for women who are contemplating returning to the workforce after time off to raise children – a place to get motivated, to feel the momentum of a group of women who are succeeding in roles that seem daunting to anyone peeking through the doors. It would be a great place to go when the balance is tipping precariously to one side and we need the virtual support of women in the same boat to get our determination back on track; or to laugh about the insanity!
 
I had the great fortune to have a role model in my life who raised her family and then returned to the workforce as college tuition loomed. My mom didn’t go back to work as a hobby or just to exercise her brain. She went back for financial reasons, to enable us to attend private colleges. She didn’t want to leave my youngest sisters at home to fend for themselves in high school. But she did it. And what started out of financial necessity grew into a career that earned the organization she steered an honored spot on President George H. W. Bush’s “Thousand Points of Light.” Taking that huge step back into the workforce is at least twice as hard without a good role model to help keep your backbone steady and strong. As I found myself eerily, but not uncommonly, in her shoes, I am grateful to have first-hand knowledge of her successes.
 
Women re-enter the workforce for a variety of reasons, some not always exactly as planned; spouse job loss, relocation, death, divorce, or financial hardship. The happier stories are re-entry because we miss the work or it is simply "time." And there are plenty of those stories, thankfully. All of these scenarios could use a good network to help jump-start the process. I know they are out there, but I'm taking a pro-active approach.

In my own little corner of the world, I’ve set up a LinkedIn Discussion Group called "Got Balance? – Needham, MA." If you are in Needham, on LinkedIn, in or nearly in the workforce, and still raising a family (seems like a lot of criteria, but that is just the tip of the iceberg of our personal definition!), I hope you will consider joining the discussion. If you are outside of Needham, consider starting a local network of your own. If you are male and know a woman who might benefit from this idea, send her this post! I am optimistic that these local discussion groups will grow into useful networking tools for many people for many years.
 
If you are a small business that markets to young mothers, the Globe Magazine article is required reading. If you are a small business that doesn’t market to mothers, you might want to start! In addition to the stunning fact that at least 85% of family spending is controlled by moms, here are some of the statistics from the article:
 
How and How Often Moms Connect (Edison Research):
 

• 93% have internet access from any location,
• 61% have a smartphone,
• Moms spend an average of 2 hours 43 minutes per day on the Internet – that’s up from 53 minutes per day in 2002,
• Moms check their Facebook page an average of 4.7 times per day (compared to 2.1 times per day for dads),
• 46% use social networking websites several times per day,
• 35% have 5 or more devices in their home connected to the Internet,
• 74% have a wi-fi network in their household.

 
Got Balance?

Yahoo's New CEO: Having Her Cake

At first, I thought I would blog about how Marissa Mayer’s move from Google to Yahoo's helm was a refreshing example of how a pregnancy was not viewed as a career-limiting move: How hope remains that young mothers may shake the business perception of distraction or flight risk. Then I read a post by Victoria Barret from Forbes on Quora’s insight into the move which did not mention Marissa’s pregnancy once - Why did Marissa Mayer Go To Yahoo? The Answer From Quora, Silicon Valley's Collective Water Cooler.
 
The post reminded me to view the development not as a gender issue, but to appreciate the magnitude of the move for Marissa as a business person rather than as a female. There is certainly a gender element in her acceptance of the role at Yahoo, as she becomes one of the most visible CEO’s of the decade. But the huge upside to her appointment has everything to do with who she is as an executive, a leader, a visionary, with insight into Yahoo’s weaknesses, and how she will right the ship she recently helped run aground.
 
Quora is Silicon Valley’s “collective water cooler” and as my first introduction to them, I am impressed with the terrific job they did of sidelining biases in their analysis of Marissa’s new role. There is great satisfaction in witnessing her escape from the limitations holding her back at Google. And watching a rising star willfully accept a challenge is exciting for everyone, including the conspiracy theorists!
 
While I still feel pride for women-kind in Marissa’s move, as well as some pity for her that she will most definitely miss out on some new-mom moments (and beyond) as she plans to work through her maternity leave, it is great to read about the potentially great upside she is about to experience and shepherd. I wish her all the best and am relieved to know that someone so capable is at the helm of a Google competitor -- to ensure that someone is keeping Google in check.
 
About three years ago, a former boss replied to my description of my ideal work/family balance with “so you want to have your cake and eat it too?!” There is nothing easy that comes with having your cake and eating it too in the work/family balance. Well, I hope Marissa gets her cake and gets to eat it too! That former boss, now with a new company, called me recently with a job offer I couldn’t refuse. There is nothing wrong with going for your cake and eating it too!

Get to Know Your Audience

One of the most amazing elements of social media tools such Twitter and Facebook is that they serve up free information about our audiences, if we take the time to roll up our sleeves and poke around. So put on your research hat and take a hard look at your followers, those you follow, friends, and the chatter in which they engage. The findings of this valuable research enable us to build the profile of our social customer. With an accurate profile, we can fine-tune our message and the timing of its delivery.
 

Social Media Examiner recently covered the 4 Ways to Discover More About Your Audience With Social Media in its blog. I’m giving it a quick summary. The short post is worth a read for all of its great tips and some of the specialized tools available if you want to take your analysis to the next level.
 
The bios of your followers often describe what is important to them, where their passions lie. While some people don’t take their bios seriously, most take considerable time to come up with the perfect abbreviated description of their social media persona. These bios can reveal useful information which, in turn, can be applied to fine-tuning our marketing messages.
 
Knowing when people are reading our content is a key component to delivering our message in a timely fashion. Check the timing of your followers’ posts. Try to tailor your posting schedule to their activity schedules to avoid your posts getting lost in their news feeds while they are off-line. For example, if you are trying to reach young mothers, they are most likely to be socially active in the early mornings and after 8pm. If social media is a large part of your following’s day, posting during regular business hours will most likely hit them while they are paying attention. Monitor the timing of the chatter for a while to get a sense of the best time(s) to try to engage your audience.
 
Twitter and Facebook give us the opportunity to connect with the top influencers in our respective niche businesses. Take advantage of it by following the gurus in your industry. Learn from their social expertise and mistakes. Engage them and you may find you catch their eye, leading to increases in your own traffic.
 
The social sites our audiences frequent can help us develop our content. Understand our audiences’ interests and we can post content that will draw them to us.
 
Take the time to learn from your audience, whether it is large or still building to a respectable level. There will be surprising discoveries as well as expected trends.  Twitter and Facebook are handing this information to us! We should get as much out of it as we can.

Social Media Fun House

Cedar Point, the great Ohio amusement park, used to have a Fun House that was scary, good fun. Along with the standard Room of Mirrors, black-lit ramps and undulating floors, it had a rubbery floor which made you feel as if you were walking on the stuff they used to fill Stretch Armstrong! There was also the darkened section where some panels were fixed, while others gave way to new paths or nightmare-invoking clown bobble-heads. As a non-risk-taker, the Fun House was one of those places where the fears I wrestled at the entrance were overwhelmed by my sense of adventure and pride, as I held my breath, ducked my head and pushed my way in. It was an attraction that gave me many sensations I really didn’t like, but ones which I couldn’t resist.
 

This memory came to mind this weekend as I assessed my stance on social media, in light of Saturday’s Social Media Day. The commemorative day debuted in 2010 when Mashable introduced it as a way to recognize the digital revolution happening right before our eyes.
 

I have experienced and read of the wonders of social media for small business. These tools level the playing field for the smaller players, enabling us to directly connect with industry experts, capture attention of global vendors, gain notice from target audiences and critics, and reach into buyer homes we never before could access. With social media, spare bedrooms can be transformed into home offices capable of offering products and services with an expertise level on par with the industry experts. Dining room tables can become Command Central for small businesses whose online presence explodes overnight.
 

The Internet and social media tools enable us to know our new customer or boss before she or he steps in the door; qualify leads in an hour when it used to take weeks; become a thought leader as our creative posts gain traction; reach across continents and oceans to find the experts we need to take the next step in our business and/or professional growth.
 

The positively charged power we are given to expand our presence with social media tools comes as a package containing the risks of receiving negative (however warranted), viral feedback, and managing those experiences publicly, with composure and realism. I could use the House of Mirrors as an easy analogy to the social media experience where the potential for distortion and surprise dead-ends is perceived as too risky. It is true that some control is sacrificed by putting ourselves out there for public consumption. But the potential outweighs the risks. And businesses that wait outside the social media “Fun House” because the perceived risk is too high will be left behind.
 

From a personal standpoint, social media brought my far-flung family and friends to my fingertips through Facebook, enabled old school friends and business colleagues to find me on LinkedIn, and gave me a vehicle with which to spread my thoughts and ideas through blogging. As these tools became accessible to me, so did the tools and social games become accessible to my children – the flip-side of the fun being the serious, constant job of policing my children’s access. There are too many choices – some taken intentionally, some taken with a complete lack of understanding. What starts out as fun can turn dark in a flash, private info can spread to an incomprehensibly large audience, bullies are given a vehicle for destruction, and predators are allowed unprecedented access.
 

This personal piece of social media is what most distinctly reminds me of the Cedar Point Fun House – the kids march through with their hearts in their throats and the bravery of an explorer, hit a panel that takes them off in a different direction, and what opens before them is unbridled access to worlds we do not control. Society pulls us in to social media, as wary parents hold off allowing their 'tweens access to Facebook, until they realize that is how the coaches communicate with the players. In we go.
 

Social media has been blamed for making us more disconnected and distancing ourselves. I see this perspective and recommend that we respect it in order to effectively execute a social media strategy in business. But I stand in the camp that sees social media’s great value as a connector – professionally, politically, personally, and culturally. I also strongly believe that no amount of technology will ever take the place of the value gained from live, in-person, face-to-face connecting. 

So don’t pass up the opportunity to foster or cement any relationship with a face-to-face meeting.

An Amazing Graduate

Every graduation season takes me back to my own graduations, when I, consistently, couldn’t wait to get going but was never quite ready to leave. Graduation is always a heady time for anyone on the cusp of enormous change, especially when you are trying to figure out which oar to bring, when you are still not quite sure of the size of the ship.

This year, I received a simple announcement from Laureen, a friend from graduate school, whose daughter, Alexandra graduated from high school on June 2nd. The announcement made me sit right down as if someone had pushed me down - not for any particular mountains Alex climbed to get to where she was, but for the choice she made as her next step in a world which has been so defined by those around her.

When Alex was two, her brother, Garrett, then 4 years old, and her father were in a car accident that left Garrett paralyzed from the chest down. They were running a morning errand in their small New England town when a man coming home from a night shift fell asleep at the wheel and crashed into their car. Over the years, Garrett and Alex and their parents have been unwavering in their focus on a cure for Garrett’s injury. Garrett has found inspiration in others’ similar conditions such as Travis Roy and Christopher Reeve. He, in turn, has been an inspiration to countless others as he has maintained his resilience through multiple surgeries, sought to encourage others with spinal cord injuries and embarked on a fundraising effort of his own design: Garrett and his father, Benton, flew in a single engine plane to the capitals of 48 states, lobbying support for stem cell research, a promising avenue for research into curing spinal cord injury, raising $50,000 on the tour.

Garrett’s story is amazing and he is awe-inspiring in so many ways. His story continues to be filled with hope as he projects a cure for his paralysis as well as the return of his sight which he lost 2 years ago due to complications during a spinal fusion operation.

What I see when I look at the picture of Alex which accompanied her graduation announcement, is the child who accompanied Garrett on so many doctor visits, who missed him and her parents when they had to seek treatment far from home, who helped him be a normal kid in a normal household, who shared his thrills on the Disneyland rides and the frustrations at his limitations. I thought Alex might have lived in Garrett’s shadow. But I was wrong. She has been shoulder to shoulder with Garrett every step of the way. All the while, Alex was tucking the knowledge learned and experiences lived into her budding young mind.

So when I read on her announcement that she will be attending MIT to study Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Biology, I bowed in awe of Alex. Not just because she must be one smart cookie to get acceptance into MIT, but because of her choice of study. I can feel it in the depths of my soul that, as an adult and as a scientist, she will contribute to her brother’s recovery, just as she has contributed to his tenacious will to overcome the obstacles in his path.

Bravo Alexandra! You are an inspiration to me and so many others. You will be unmatched in your understanding, empathy and motivation in your field. A job fantastically well done, in getting where you are. And brain and spinal cord injury patients all over the world just felt their ray of hope brighten.

We should all find inspiration and do something with it to make the world a better place, or to make the world better for one person.