Month: April 2009

art, museum

My Year of Hopefulness – The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Christa Avampato

A short bus ride across town from my apartment, the bus stops just outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art – a place that transports you to a different world once you enter its main hall that is now decorated with large urns full of cherry blossoms. Just beyond that main hall are the Greek and Roman Galleries, refurbished and re-opened almost exactly two years ago. In those halls and throughout the museum the array of art is dizzying. It took me a few moments today just to get my head around the treasures we have the good fortune to wander through.

What I find most amazing about the Met, and art in general, is that someone, an individual, had an image in his or her mind hundreds or thousands of years ago, put brush to canvas, anvil to stone, hand to clay, and shared with us, the world, what he or she was thinking of. These pieces of art are living history. They capture a moment in time for all of us to witness and appreciate.

After touring through the French Bronze exhibit and Rafael to Renoir sketches, I wanted to wander around the gift store and see if I could find some of the prints I’ve been looking for. The Met is so immense that I often just wander around from gallery to gallery, never quite sure where I am. I like to get lost in the art. I asked a docent just outside of the entrance to the Papua New Guinea Gallery how I could get to the gift shop.

“The Main Gift Shop?” he asked.

I nodded, thinking, “is there another one?”

“Walk straight ahead and take a left at the column from the Temple of Artemis.”

It’s not everyday you hear directions like this. I smiled to myself and followed the docent’s instructions, imagining that I was walking through Ancient Greece, appreciating all of the treasures that were my landmarks.

business, entrepreneurship, innovation, marketing, music, new product development, Seth Godin

My Year of Hopefulness – Small Audience

Christa Avampato

Seth Godin wrote a terrific post today relating the contrast between concert opening acts and rock stars to the different grades of marketers. He has some very good advice for all of us: Seek out a small audience who thinks you’re a rock star and then grow that audience. Don’t go out into the market as an opening act and have the market shape your work based upon something else they love (the rock star). You want to stand on your own two feet and have customers who love you and will back you exactly the way you are.

Many companies are so hungry for growth, so hungry for fast, quick wins, that they do whatever they have to do to their products and services to make them appeal to everyone. Of course some other companies focus so closely on one tiny piece of the market that they exclude others who might also benefit from their products with just a few weeks. So what’s a company to do?

A few ideas:
1.) The “Me-conomy” seems endless. The personalization trend can be seen everywhere in the market. Is it possible for a customer to customize some piece or your product or service to make it suit them perfectly? This allows you to serve a number of different groups with just a few minor changes to your product. Think about what adding colors and engraving to the ipod did for that product!

2.) There are a lot of ways to slice and dice a market into segments. Is there a segment that you can serve that’s small enough to provide something special to them while also having a wide enough appeal to enough people to meet your costs and profit goals?

3.) Look for holes in the market. Many companies are set on being fast followers. They don’t want to get out there, innovate, and build something new. Fear holds them back. They’d prefer to watch others, copy, and paste. The saddest part about this kind of ambition is that it never allows you to be the first in the market to fill an unmet need that makes consumers grateful and loyal to your brand. You’re just an opening act in that scenario. You want to be the first association a customer makes with a new product or service. You don’t want people to say, “Oh yeah, there’s that option, too” about your brand. So get out there, talk to people, and find a way to provide a service or product that makes their lives easier.

While it’s fun to play in the market, it’s more fun to build a market and delight customers with a product or service they never even thought was possible. Your following will be filled with early adopters at first so learn from them, get their input, improve your offering, and other people outside of that early adopter segment will catch on. Be a rock star.

business, career, corporation, nonprofit, philanthropy

My Year of Hopefulness – Lend a Hand with What You’ve Got

Christa Avampato

Corporate America is an unpleasant place to be lately. People are scared. They don’t trust anyone. They’re worried about their futures. And it’s understandable.

Today, I began a group pro-bono project for a nonprofit that my company supports on a very large scale through our philanthropy department. I am thrilled that I can combine my business skills and my experience in nonprofit for this project. And I can meet some new people from my company from completely different business units.

What’s most interesting is that the pro-bono project is about helping the national headquarters of the nonprofit more effectively communicate and develop marketing plans with the regional offices. It’s the same issue that every large company struggles with – how do you break through the silos? How do you share best practices? How do you effectively collaborate, learn, and share across geographies and cultures?

While this nonprofit is thrilled to have us work on this project, my co-workers are all grateful for the opportunity to take what we learn on this project and apply it to our own company. Our company needs to up the morale of the staff and provide networking opportunities; the nonprofit needs assistance that they can’t afford to pay consultants for. We’re all lending what we’ve got to help one another. It’s a win all the way around. Can you imagine how many more of these amazing opportunities are out there, just waiting to be discovered, to creatively collaborate in ways that make a difference in the world?

business, Business Week, career, economy, growth

My Year of Hopefulness – The Blessing and Curse of Growth

Christa Avampato

In BusinessWeek this week, there’s a great one page article about The Peter Principle, a book whose basic premise is that the workplace does strange things to people. It was the precursor to The Office, Office Space, and the Dilbert comic strip. We laugh because the material is funny, and it’s funny because it’s all too familiar to all of us.

The main conclusion of The Peter Principle is one of my favorite quotes that I repeat so often as I read the paper these days or hear my friends talk about their latest work travails: In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence. And while it’s a bold statement, it’s also completely logical. We are pushed so hard to claw our way up as high as we can go that we risk toppling over to the other side of the tipping point that represents exactly where we optimally operate.

Here’s a great example: A friend of mine has a boss who is brilliant at my friend’s job, which she used to have. The boss is a fantastic individual contributor, very detail-oriented, strong follow-through, enjoys rolling up her sleeves, and pitching in wherever she’s needed. These are perfect skills and interests if you have my friend’s job. They aren’t good if you’re her boss. Her boss has no interest in developing people, managing others, or taking a step back and distributing work among the team members. She likes implementation and has no interest (or skill) in strategy.

Such a classic case: My friend’s boss was excellent at her job, and because she did so well they promoted her – right into the completely wrong type of role. We see this all the time at so many companies. It’s all about growth – as much of it as we can get as quickly as possible. As a result, a lot of people, good, talented people in just the right place, end up being moved to a position where they have no aptitude or interest. All for the sake of “growth”.

You’d think we’d learn our lesson: companies grew too big, people’s financial ambitions grew too big, we lived beyond our means for so many years, housing prices and demand for real estate sky-rocketed causing bidding wars. In so many aspects our economy grew so big that it was bloated, and as a result, a correcting period has begun that has destroyed all of the growth we’ve experienced the last decade. So what good was the growth at all?

Here’s a little bit of advice that I try to remember every day and it has helped me tremendously in my career: keep you eyes on your strengths, your interests, and your goals. Not your company’s. Not your boss’s, or your friends’, or your family’s. Yours. For example, I enjoy managing large, cross-functional teams that work on complex, multi-faceted problems. I like making things, tangible new products that answer an unmet need, and I’d like to help people live extraordinary lives through the work that I do. Pretty simple to state, hard to keep doing. There are always distractions, always people who want you to stop doing what you’re good at and what you love, and do something you aren’t so great at. Growth in new areas has its benefits, though should not be undertaken at the expense of your aptitudes and happiness. Why rise to a level of incompetence and fail when you can do what you love and are good at and succeed? Growth has its rewards, but it can, and often does, come with a very heft price tag.

business, nonprofit, travel, vacation, volunteer

My Year of Hopefulness – Cross-Cultural Solutions Part 2

Christa Avampato

Tonight I went to an information session for Cross-Cultural Solutions, an organization that organizes volunteer vacations abroad in 12 countries. In 2005, I spent a month in France and volunteered for an organization that rebuilt ancient architecture to help stimulate tourism in small town in Provence. I loved it and have been wanting to go on another volunteer vacation ever since.

While I enjoyed my experience in France, I was disappointed that the organization did not maintain any contact with me after I returned. I have no idea how the work continued after I left and I’ve lost touch with every person I met while I was there. I tend to thrive in situations with a high amount of ambiguity though I do remember feeling disturbed that there was virtually no preparation given to me before I flew to France. I hoped I’d find someone at the airport when I landed, though had no idea what or who to look for. I wasn’t sure how my days would be structured. I essentially went on blind-faith.

Luckily, I had a great experience in France, though it could just have easily been a disaster. Truly, I was just lucky. What I found most impressive about Cross-Cultural Solutions is their sense of organization, friendly demeanor, and care and concern for volunteers. I sent an email through the website several months ago expressing interest and within 48 hours received a comprehensive email and a phone call. The service was top-notch. The friendliness and enthusiasm by the staff and alumni (yes, they have an alumni network!) for the volunteers, the experience, and the people in-country who benefit from the program.

So what could be improved by Cross-Cultural Solutions? A big lesson for all of us: strike while the iron is hot. I was ready to fork over my credit card number after their incredible presentation and there wasn’t a way for me to do that. I went to one of the team members at the end of the presentation and asked if I could sign up right there. I knew the date I wanted to go and the program I wanted. There wasn’t a way for me to put down my deposit. I needed to go home and sign up on-line or call them tomorrow at the office.

They put forward all of this effort to promote themselves and then didn’t close the deal with a willing consumer. Chances are that someone who is so excited about the program at the presentation will take the time to sign-up once they’re home. However, why not have the option to sign people up on the spot? It would be a win for me and for the organization – and isn’t that what Cross-Cultural Solutions is all about?

career, entrepreneurship, women

My Year of Hopefulness – Launching Sideways

Christa Avampato

In New York City, there is a an organization that helps women launch their dream businesses by providing support, advice, and networking at a reasonable cost through after-work classes and networking events. Ladies Who Launch, provides a venue to help women not only dream about building their own careers on their own terms, but also helps them reach that goal. I receive a daily email from Ladies Who Launch that contains an inspirational story or a short piece of advice that keeps me going at the exact moment when I think that I might not be able to make a go of being an entrepreneur. It shows up at precisely the right time, with exactly the message I need in that moment. I’m not sure how they do it, though I am so grateful for their skill!

Today, I received an email about launching sideways – keeping your day job and excelling at it, while also developing your own business on your own time. Victoria Colligan, the founder of Ladies Who Launch, offers some advice on managing this balance and a three-step action plan to put some life back into a side-business that has stalled or to give you inspiration and encouragement if you’re just about to begin the journey:

“One of the lowest risk ways to propel your dream, test your idea, and fund your new venture is to launch on the side of a full time job. Many women have passed through the Incubator Intensive Workshops with full time jobs and full time ideas that they are yearning to start but feel too busy or to guilty to do so. Side launching is a viable and smart way to launch any new business. Follow these tips and give it a try:

1. Be disciplined and consistent about the hours you choose to work on your idea. Is it from 5 to 7am before the kids wake up or in the evenings after you put them to bed? Are you carving out time on the weekends? Be honest and clear with yourself about your time constraints and time commitments; your road to success will be faster.

2. Decide whether and when to tell colleagues or your boss. You may be surprised by their enthusiasm and support.

3. Determine benchmarks for yourself that indicate when you would consider making your side gig a full time adventure. What are your lifestyle demands? What would you be willing to sacrifice for a time if it meant being able to devote more energy to your business? Be realistic but also be willing to go for it!”

death, dying, experience, family, friendship, grateful, gratitude, human factors, loss, sadness

My Year of Hopefulness – Trade-offs

Christa Avampato

Be glad of life because it gives you the chance to love and to work and to play and to look up at the stars. –Henry Van Dyke

A friend of mine recently lost his father and as we talked about loss, we delved into the topic of trade-offs. It’s part of life to enjoy good, happy times for a while. And yet somewhere in the back of our minds, we are conscious of the fact that these moments are fleeting. Part of experiencing life, and love, and a connection to others also requires us to have the ability to let go. It’s an odd and scary thing if we think about it too long, so it usually comes to us as a passing thought, and then we send it away.

I used to have a very hard time dealing with the loss of someone. It seemed so unfair to me to have someone we love taken away. Was it really worth it to feel a connection to people? Did it make sense to spend so much of our very brief time on this planet cultivating relationships with others that eventually fall away, for one reason or another.

Many years ago, a friend of mine was dealing with the loss of his grandfather. Knowing how much he loved his grandfather and how close he was to him, I expressed my extreme sympathy for his loss. And without a tear in his eye or a choked up feeling in his throat, he said, “Please don’t be sorry. I’m not.” I just couldn’t understand. How on Earth could he not be sorry?

“I had this amazing person in my life for so many years. I was so lucky to know that kind of love and closeness to someone for so long. He taught me an amazing amount throughout my whole life that I’m able to pass on to others. He was such a gift and I’m so grateful that I had the opportunity to have him in my life.”

I think about this conversation every time I or someone I care about must deal with losing someone. It’s so hard to imagine letting go, and I find that emphasizing the gift of their presence in our lives for however long we have them eases the sadness. It doesn’t eliminate the sadness and it doesn’t betray the person’s memory. It just helps us keep perspective, and we helps us to begin to understand that it is all worth. The cultivation of relationships is what this life we live is all about. They are the very essence of human experience.

Life

My Year of Hopefulness – Rugby Girl

Christa Avampato

I went out with my friend, Allan, last night. He’s just returned to the States from 6 month assignment in Singapore. While in Singapore, he stopped over in Australia where he picked up a gift for me: a beautiful canvas bag with geometric designs and kangaroos in black, red, and yellow. And a t-shirt that says simply on the front: Rubgy Girl. I laughed out loud at the t-shirt, because it’s true. I’ll be wearing it with pride.

I don’t play the sport of rugby; I live its principles. My friend, Alex, has told me, “Christa, you’re the kind of person who is so nice and generous with such a good heart, but if someone crosses you or someone you love, you have no problem checking that person.” It’s totally true.

I’ve had to learn to be appropriately tough. My tolerance for whining is very low and my admiration of taking action in support of beliefs is high. I learned early on that I had to stand up for myself because I could never 100% count on someone else standing up for me. And I take it on as a personal responsibility to lend a voice to those who cannot or are fearful to stand up for themselves. In my family, if you didn’t speak up with confidence, your concern didn’t get heard. Hard lessons to learn as a child, and ones I am incredibly grateful for as an adult.

business, Business Week, entrepreneurship, hope, Jack Welch

My Year of Hopefulness – Jack and Suzy Welch

Christa Avampato

I never thought I’d say that Jack and Suzy Welch give me hope. Sound business advice. Straight talk about tough issues. A dissenting opinion. Yes, yes, and yes. But hope? Pure, empathic hope? Yep. Believe it.

In their recent BusinessWeek column, Jack and Suzy Welch not only gave me hope, but they made me tear up. They talk about the entrepreneurs all over this country who are about to emerge as the bright shining light to lead us into economic recovery. “Those kids (the ones at colleges inventing businesses right this moment) and their ideas are the future of business, if we just hang on tight…you can be sure, too, that legions of people out there aren’t frightened by the economy. They’re called entrepreneurs. And challenges don’t make them surrender; they make them fierce.”

If ever there was a rallying cry, a mantra to hang on to in this economic mess that seems to get worse by the day, this is it! And if you, as an entrepreneur (or an aspiring entrepreneur), still had any doubt about whether or not entrepreneurs should really consider starting a business in this climate, isn’t a vote of confidence from Jack and Suzy Welch just about the best vote you could find? They don’t say things to be nice or supportive or upbeat. They say them because they believe them whole-heartedly.

I love this article so much that it is currently hanging up by my desk. So when I sit down to do research, to consider where my career might, could, should go, and to write about entrepreneurs, I’m reminded that Mr. and Mrs. Welch are on our side. And with support like that, it seems we’ve run out of excuses to not take our careers in our own hands. In their very simple language, Jack and Suzy Welch have not only given us their support, they’ve put all their cards on the table and told us that the world needs us – we are the people we’ve been waiting for to lead us out of these dark days and into a better world of business. It is not just an opportunity for us, it is a responsibility. The world needs us. Be fierce.

justice, movie, social change

My Year of Hopefulness – American Violet

Christa Avampato

Tonight, I went to the New York screening of American Violet, a movie about an ACLU case in Texas against a District Attorney for racial profiling in drug cases. I was skeptical about the movie. I was worried about it being preachy and over-dramatic, though my friend, Richard, invited me, and I wanted to support him and his organization. And I couldn’t have been more wrong. The movie is stunning.

This movie showcases activism at its best. A young woman takes on the case as the lead plaintiff with the encouragement from the ACLU to stand up for her community, her neighbors, and her family. Wrongfully convicted of selling drugs in a school zone, she endures great pain and difficulty in the name of what’s right. She displays so much courage that had a I not known it was based on a true story, I would have believed it was invented in Hollywood.

A complete surprise, the woman whom the story is based on was there in the audience and spoke after the movie. Her eloquence and grace in the face of such trying circumstances is so inspiring that I left wondering how on Earth I could ever complain about anything in my life. While many people have given their lives to stand up for justice, the main character of American Violet didn’t have a choice. Injustice was her life, and the life of those all around her. If she wanted to live free, truly free, and move forward she had to stand up. She had no choice but to fight.

American Violet is a testament to the power of story-telling and narrative, the ability to connect people across miles and circumstances, despite age, race, culture or gender. Stories, and their telling and retelling, build empathy and strength. Films about social issues have the ability to entertain and inform; they build community. And to solves problems as large as the issues of racism and substance abuse and incarceration, we need community.

As I walked back to my apartment, I was reminded of Anne LaMott‘s book Bird by Bird, my favorite book about writing and story telling. At one point in the book, Anne talks about the writing classes she teaches in the Bay Area. And her one piece of advice to her students that I always think about revolves around courage in writing. If you have the courage to live through a tough situation and free yourself, then have the courage to write it down and share it with others because in telling your story, you just might help set someone else free. I can’t imagine a more beautiful example of that principle than American Violet. Opens in theatres everywhere April 17th.