Mitch Joel's Blog: Six Pixels of Separation, page 217

If You're Really Interested In Podcasting...

One of the highlights of the TED conference this year was...

...Watching Roman Mars record an episode of his audio podcast, 99% Invisible, live in front of an audience. The topic of his TED Talk/podcast recording session was all about the design of flags. I want you to to stop and think about that. With all of the celebrities and amazing stories that are told on the TED stage, one of the most engaging and fascinating presentations was a guy, sitting behind a desk, recording an audio podcast (with a script) about the design of flags. While it does sound dry, it was anything but dry. Roman Mars is a master storyteller. And, the stories he's most interested in are about design. Not the design of objects that have captivated our attention, but the design of things that we see everyday that are - to riff on the name of his podcast - mostly invisible to us. Many brands and marketers are tinkering with podcasting (audio and video) more and more. The growth in podcasting continues to impress. More and more people are discovering this format, and are becoming engrossed by the depth of niche content that is available. Figuring out how to produce something worthwhile (with frequency and consistency) is a challenge. Storytellers like Roman Mars have mastered it.

What you have here.

There is no doubt that the content of this podcast is great, entertaining and informational. As a professional marketer, what makes this TED Talk that much more interesting is in watching how he builds his stories, edits them, pulls it together and turns it into a real show.

Watch this: TED - Roman Mars - Why city flags may be the worst-designed thing you've never noticed. 

Tags:

99 percent invisible

audio podcast

brand

content

content marketing

design

flag

flag design

marketer

podcast

podcast recording

podcasting

roman mars

storyteller

storytelling

ted

ted conference

ted talk

video podcast

 

The Art Of LEGO

"What do you want to do for a living?"

All of us grapple with who we have become. The work that we do defines us. As a parent, this is the question that we most fantasize about. As an adult, this is the question that we often reflect on when work gets tedious or we're simply ready for a change. On a recent flight, I was watching the science fiction movie, Interstellar. There's a part in the movie (don't worry, this is not a spoiler alert) when one of the characters says that once we become parents, our role changes, and all that we are is the memory of our children. All of us grapple with who we have become. The work that we do defines us. We attend events put on by The Art of Productions, because we continually want to do, think and be more in our lives. Over the years, work has become much more than the place that we go to earn living. Work has become the place that we go to, because we're hoping to be contributing to the world... and not wasting our time or clock-watching.

Imagine, if your recently-graduated-from-University child said to you that they wanted to build things with LEGO for a living. 

I can't remember when I first heard of Nathan Sawaya, but I knew his work long before I knew the artist's name. It was a large sculpture. It was all yellow. It was a human torso that was tearing its chest apart, spilling the insides out on to the table that the sculpture was sitting on. It was all made of traditional yellow LEGO bricks. That sculpture stopped me dead in my tracks. It was very evocative... almost disturbing. Still, it was made of LEGO. Those clickable bricks that little kids play with. Those little bricks that get jammed into our feet at two in the morning when we're trying to get a glass of water from the kitchen. Was someone making a joke? Was this serious art? A great piece of art does this. It moves you. Emotionally. Physically. It gets you thinking. After you experience it, you can't stop thinking about it. Delving online to discover who had created this piece - and if there was any more where that one had come from - you discover Nathan Sawaya. Sawaya was a corporate attorney in New York City, until he decided to leave that life to become a full-time artist working with LEGO bricks as his medium.

"It has been over ten years since I left the law firm to become a full-time artist," said Sawaya during a recent conversation from his studio in New York City (he has a second studio in Los Angeles). "LEGO is extremely popular and an important part of culture these days. When I first started doing this, LEGO was not as popular as it is now. Back then, I would get emails from people who were very interested in doing what I do. Now, the idea of becoming a LEGO artist is not that far-fetched. A lot of people are out there, using their bricks and supporting themselves professionally with a business that is LEGO-based in some way. Don't kid yourself, it has taken a while for the art world to really accept the idea of LEGO as an art medium, but now those same skeptical galleries are knocking on my door."

Sawaya had LEGO as a child (like most of us did).

It was something that was always with him. He would tinker with the connecting bricks in an attempt to mold their square shapes into the images that he had in his mind's eye. This child-like sense of wonder and discovery is something that never left him. He would hide bricks under his bed in college. At one point, he wondered if he could do a large scale object out of LEGO. If he could build a pencil out of LEGO, he began to wonder if he could  make one that is eight feet tall. With that, his art began to change towards themes, emotions and, eventually, the human form.

While Sawaya has a relationship with the LEGO company, he is not employed by them.

Like you and I, he purchases all of his bricks. The difference, of course, is that he purchases pieces by the hundreds of thousands, and he stocks his studios with millions of pieces so that his work can get done. All of the pieces in all of his works are regular pieces of LEGO that anyone can buy in any LEGO store. Sawaya is officially recognized by LEGO, and is the only person ever to be certified as a LEGO Master Builder and LEGO Certified Professional (yes, those are both real designations and serious designations that bring with it lots of employment opportunities). Over the years, he has created a lot of highly recognizable pieces including a seven-foot long replica of the Brooklyn Bridge, a life-size t-rex dinosaur, a six-foot-tall Han Solo frozen in carbonite (for the Star Wars nerds) and, most recently, those cute little Oscar awards that were made out of LEGO for the annual event. His exhibition, The Art of the Brick, continues to tour the world and he has published two bestselling books. In short, he takes this toy very seriously.

A great piece of art does this. It moves you. Emotionally. Physically. It gets you thinking.

"When I discovered that creating art out of LEGO bricks was going to be my career, I decided that I wanted to take on sculptures that would really inspire people... and move me in creating them," said Sawaya who is known to think about art elements in his work like spatial perfection and complex concepts. "I have to tip my hat to those folks in Denmark. They have made this product that the world loves. Not just kids. It is very multi-functional. The possibilities are endless. My art studio has over four million bricks in it. It allows me to explore when I have an idea, but I do want to push the envelope and come up with something different. The goal of any artist is to captivate your viewer for as long as you can. You want people to sit and view your piece - or even think about it - for longer than it took you, as the artist, to create it. In my case, this means weeks and months, so I'll see what I can do to make that happen. Even with that pressure, I am so profoundly thankful that this is the work that I get to do."

Now that you know Nathan Sawaya's story, let's ask the question again: what do you want do for a living?

The above posting is an article that I wrote for the magazine, The Art Of.... I cross-post it here with all the links and tags for your reading pleasure, but you can check out the original version online here: The Art of The Brick. If you happen to be in Toronto on Monday, May 25th, make sure to attend The Art of Marketing. I will be there as well.

Also, if you would like to listen to my entire conversation with Nathan Sawaya, it is right here: The Art Of LEGO With Nathan Sawaya - Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast.

Tags:

art

art gallery

art medium

artist

brick artist

brooklyn bridge

culture

denmark

employment

game

han solo

interstellar

lego

lego artist

lego bricks

lego certified professional

lego master builder

lego sculpture

nathan sawyer

oscar awards

puzzle

sculpture

self actualization

spatial perfection

star wars

the art of

the art of marketing

the art of productions

the art of the brick

toy

The CEO Series

How are things going?

It's a question that I get asked a lot these days. Twist Image became a part of the WPP family about a year ago, we changed our creative direction, we rebranded and became a founding member of a new, global marketing agency called, Mirum, and now we're tweaking the work that we do to be more forward-focused and more representative of our clients needs (and where they need to be), when it comes to marketing and technology. It's an evolution. And, with that change comes both opportunities and challenges. Several months back, I was asked to be a part of The CEO Series. It's an in-depth radio show hosted by Karl Moore the distinguished associate professor of Strategy and Organization at McGill University's famed Desautels Faculty of Management. Moore's current area of interest is in postmodern leadership and globalization. He's also a contributor to the Globe and Mail, Forbes and beyond. Our conversation was broadcasted into select radio markets this past week. It was just posted online for anyone who wants to dive a little deeper into the agency business, how to market a business and where brands are headed.  

Here is our conversation: The CEO Series - Mitch Joel - President of Mirum. 

Tags:

brand

business school

ceo series

cjad

desautels faculty of management

forbes

global marketing agency

globalization

globe and mail

jon finkelstein

karl moore

leadership

management school

marketing

marketing agency

mcgill

mcgill university

mirum

mirum agency

postmodern leadership

radio interview

rebranding

strategy and organization

technology

the ceo series

twist image

wpp

Storytelling For Startups

Episode #462 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.

I first met Mark Evans close to fifteen years ago. We were both speaking during a three-day conference dedicated to corporate blogging. Yes, it was a long time ago. Long before social media was a channel. Back then, Mark was the technology reporter for a national newspaper and was open (but still, somewhat, skeptical) about just how far blogging could go. Since then, he's become the founder of a well known event called, mesh, and has become a full-time consultant that helps startups to tell better stories. With that, he most recently published a book called, Storytelling For Startups. But don't worry, if you're not a startup, this is all about story-driven marketing. Enjoy the conversation...

You can grab the latest episode of Six Pixels of Separation here (or feel free to subscribe via iTunes): Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast #462.

Tags:

advertising podcast

audio

blog

blogging

brand

business book

david usher

digital marketing

digital marketing podcast

mark evans

marketing

marketing podcast

mesh

mirum

mirum agency

storytelling for startups

twitter

 business podcast

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #256

Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?

My friends: Alistair Croll (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, Solve For Interesting, the author of Complete Web Monitoring, Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks and Lean Analytics), Hugh McGuire (PressBooks, LibriVox, iambik and co-author of Book: A Futurist's Manifesto) and I decided that every week the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person "must see".

Check out these six links that we're recommending to one another:

The Crazy Connection Between Color And The Existence of Life - Mitch Kirby . "The colors we see were driven by natural selection. Which happened because of the dangers we were looking out for, and the food we sought. Which has to be certain colors to turn sun into sugars. Turns out the colors we see are pretty specific to the way life occurs. But of course, this begs the question -- who's looking?" (Alistair for Hugh).
Beyond Clueless - Art of the Title . "What if all those teen movies happened in one big, hormonal, angsty universe? The long, slow hallway walk is a common trope in high school films. Here's what happens when you put them all together." (Alistair for Mitch).
Tomorrow's Advance Man - The New Yorker . "Another profile of a brilliant techno mind, this time Marc Andreessen, creator of the first graphic web browser (Mosaic, which became Netscape, which morphed into Firefox), and now venture capitalist at Andreessen Horowitz." (Hugh for Alistair).
Why every executive team should have a Devil's Advocate - Financial Post . "Fascinating bit of study about major corporate decision-making. Dan Lovallo Olivier Sibony did an analysis of 1,000 business decisions made over 5 years, and rated the decisions as positive or negative, based on outcomes of revenue, profitability, market share and productivity. They were trying to understand what creates quality decisions. The answer is not analysis, but rather: process. That is, good analysis is a distant second to good process for making good decisions." (Hugh for Mitch).
Report on self-driving car accidents is in violation of good sense - Mashable . "I was lucky enough to have a test drive in one of Google's self-driving cars. It was a wild experience that completely changed my thinking about this technology. In short: the technology can 'see' a whole lot better than humans and it removes things like distractions and emotions. Once the drive was over, I was convinced. This happened several years back. I asked one of the Googlers about accidents, and they told me that the only accidents they knew about were caused by humans either trying to taunt the car or because of human error. Turns out that the technology is a lot safer than most people would have assumed." (Mitch for Alistair).
The Rise of Fast TV: Why Empire Is the Preferred Script Model - Vulture ."Are things getting faster than they used to be? You start feeling like an old man when those kind of thoughts race between your earholes. TV feels a lot faster than it was before. I remember reading somewhere that the scripts for the famed TV drama ER were much longer than most other TV shows of the same length. The writer was trying to push the pace. Well, it turns out that TV shows are, in fact, getting faster. The pace is picking up for all shows... which means much more writing!" (Mitch for Hugh).

Feel free to share these links and add your picks on Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.

Tags:

alistair croll

amazon

andreessen horowitz

art of the title

bit current

bit north

book a futurists manifesto

complete web monitoring

er

financial post

firefox

gigaom

google

hugh mcguire

human 20

iambik

lean analytics

librivox

link bait

link exchange

link sharing

managing bandwidth

marc andreeson

mashable

mitch kirby

mosaic

netscape

press books

self driving car

social media

solve for interesting

the new yorker

vulture

year one labs

You Have To Commit To Marketing

It's easy to say that something isn't working.

We hear it all of the time (or, at least I do). I can be in a boardroom or just off to the side of the stage at an event, and someone will challenge something I said by implying that they tried it, and it didn't work. "Trying it" and "trying to make something work," are two very different actions. Especially when it comes to marketing. I saw one sponsorship marketing program this morning that's not going to be renewed. I was at the airport grabbing breakfast in the lounge, and sat down next to the large flat screen TV to catch the morning news (sidebar: my heart goes out to the people of Nepal... really tough to watch). It was an old TV, but the brand had a clear (and large) plaque next to the TV along with a note about how the experience was also being presented by one of the major television cable carriers. But, here's the thing: that TV was about ten years old and the channels weren't even coming in HD format. In short: it was a terrible experience. It didn't make me think positively about the TV or the cable company. In fact, I found myself muttering something akin to, "this sucks." I wasn't thankful that this company had TVs placed in the lounge, nor was I impressed by the cable company. It was just... bad.   

It's not working anymore... and it's too expensive. 

That's probably what's being said right now in the boardroom. My guess is that the airline has approached these brands to re-up on the lounge experience and some brand leader (who probably inherited this initiative from their predecessor) is shaking their head wondering how they're going to find budget to upgrade all of these TVs, get the cable company back in and execute on what must be a complicated initiative (even from a logistics point of view). It probably seemed like a good idea at the time, but as time passes on it's just left out there. The initiative isn't nurtured or leveraged and then, several years, later it all feels like some kind of liability created by someone else who had ulterior motives.

It's all so sad.

We see this in marketing all of the time. Something that makes perfect sense, but is left to neglect and it becomes a budgetary issue, instead of what it could mean to the consumer. The audience for airport lounges are - without a doubt - a lucrative one. They are individuals with disposable income and probably rank highly on the scale of those always in the market for something like a better television... or a better television experience from their cable company. It's not that complicated. We sit down with a coffee and muffin and think to ourselves, "wow, that's a nice tv!" or, "wow, those shows look great in HD!" In its current state, it's serving no one. It's not a good consumer experience. It's not a good brand experience and, it reflects poorly on the airline that is trying to impress their most loyal customers.

It's not just the lounge.

There are a handful of things that can be done to turn this around. That's not the real issue. Think about your own marketing. Is it tired? Is it tried and done? Now, is it that way because there is nothing really unique about it, or is it that way simply because the marketing and brand team have not committed to the initiative for the long run? I've seen brands fail at Facebook, Pinterest and more not because what they're doing isn't working. It's failing because they're not committed to it. Maybe they've dipped more than their pinky toe into the water, but they have not jumped in and gone for a swim... and then, come back tomorrow for another swim. Saying something didn't work because you tried it, implies that you really planned, committed, iterated, optimized and kept at it. More often than note, this is not the case.

Remember: marketing success has a correlation to the effort and time spent making it work. And, it's a lesson that doesn't just apply to marketing.

Tags:

brand

brand experience

brand leader

brand loyalty

cable company

consumer experience

facebook

marketing

pinterest

sponsorship

sponsorship marketing

television

Are You Living In A (Filter) Bubble?

Every Monday morning at 7:10 am, I am a guest contributor on CHOM 97.7 FM radio broadcasting out of Montreal (home base). It's not a long segment - about 5 to 10 minutes every week - about everything that is happening in the world of technology and digital media. The good folks at CHOM 97.7 FM are posting these segments weekly to SoundCloud, if you're interested in hearing more of me blathering away. I'm really excited about this opportunity, because this is the radio station that I grew up on listening to, and it really is a fun treat to be invited to the Mornings Rock with Terry and Heather B. morning show. The segment is called, CTRL ALT Delete with Mitch Joel.

This week we discussed:

Streaming continues to dominate the media space. And, it looks like Apple is about to announce their streaming audio service (based on some of the technology that they acquired when they bought the Beats brand last year). Not to be outdone, Spotify, could well be jumping the cue and launching a video streaming service to compete with iTunes. So, the question is this: will Apple win the streaming wars because of their brand power (and ability to undercut on price) or will it be Spotify, who already owns a fair share of the streaming audio space? Regardless, streaming is about to become ever-more pervasive. 
Then again, maybe streaming is actually dead on arrival, because it's so hard to make money? Spotify lost $197 million in 2014. Sure they bring in a lot of money ($1.3 billion last year), but it's not turning a profit. In fact, their losses are getting uglier, almost tripling from 2013 when the company lost $68 million. With 60 million users (15 million have upgraded to pay for the service), it's hard to see how Jay Z's Tidal or Apple's new Beats-based service can catch up... and make money. On top of this, artists have be complaining for years that streaming doesn't compensate well at all. The music industry continues to be in a big mess. 
Is the filter bubble alive and well? You probably didn't even know that a filter bubble exists. It does. Basically, we shifted from a world where Yahoo and AOL were our homepage (curated by editors) to a place where Facebook and Twitter are our homepage (a place where we, mostly, see what our family and friends think). That's the filter bubble: seeing content from people you (mostly) agree with. Well, it turns out that Facebook's technology is so strong, that it's more inclined to show you content that you will agree with... thus, actually, making your world view that much smaller.
App of the week: FlightRadar24. 

Listen here...

Tags:

aol

apple

beats

beats by dre

chom 977 fm

chom fm

content

ctrl alt delete

ctrl alt delete with mitch joel

digital media

facebook

filter bubble

flightradar24

guest contributor

heather backman

homepage

itunes

jay z

media

montreal radio

morning show

mornings rock with terry and heather b

music industry

radio segment

radio station

social media

soundcloud

spotify

streaming audio

streaming music service

technology

terry dimonte

tidal

twitter

video streaming

video streaming service

yahoo

Jeremy Gutsche Wants You To Be Better And Faster

Episode #461 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to.

Inspiration is everywhere. And, as they say, the future is here... it's just not evenly distributed. So, where do you go to see the future? There are few that I trust when it comes to individuals who are truly able to point to trends that turn into something meaningful. In fact, there are only two. I do love the work being done at PSFK. I also trust Jeremy Gutsche. Jeremy is the CEO of Trend Hunter, the author of two great books (Exploiting Chaos and the recently published Better And Faster). He's also a pretty amazing speaker and overall nice guy. Jeremy believes that there is a discipline and proven track to finding, discovering and using big ideas. That's what we're going to discuss. Enjoy the conversation...

You can grab the latest episode of Six Pixels of Separation here (or feel free to subscribe via iTunes): Six Pixels of Separation - The Mirum Podcast #461.

Tags:

advertising podcast

audio

better and faster

blog

blogging

brand

business book

business podcast

david usher

digital marketing

exploiting chaos

jeremy gutsche

psfk

trend hunter

 

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #255

Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?

My friends: Alistair Croll (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, Solve For Interesting, the author of Complete Web Monitoring, Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks and Lean Analytics), Hugh McGuire (PressBooks, LibriVox, iambik and co-author of Book: A Futurist's Manifesto) and I decided that every week the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person "must see".

Check out these six links that we're recommending to one another:

The Policy Machine - Slate . "As we automate more of our lives, machines and the algorithms that drive them make more and more decisions. And while this scales well and cuts costs, it's also horribly inhuman. This Slate piece is a sobering look at what it's like to be up against algorithms, and a harbinger of the inequity in welfare, policing, and child services." (Alistair for Hugh).
Story Hackers: How the Hottest Startups in Silicon Valley Are Using Content to Fuel Their Growth - Contently . "Content Marketing is hot. Buzzfeed's taken our love of cats and Listicles and turned it into real traffic. And big brands do it really, really well. Here's a great explainer on how some of today's tech darlings are engaging their audiences." (Alistair for Mitch).
23 Shipping Container Home Owners Speak Out: "What I Wish I'd Known Before Building My Shipping Container Home" - Container Home Plans . "I love shipping container homes, at least, I love the idea of them. A bunch of people who've built them tell you what you should think about before you start your container house project." (Hugh for Alistair).
Peter Thiel on what works at work - The Washington Post . "Maybe the most influential voice from Silicon Valley, Peter Theil, talks about sociopathic bosses, what a useful MBA would look like, the disconnect between Silicon Valley and mainstream America, procrastination, and the bogus 'science of success' (among other things!)." (Hugh for Mitch).
Cancer-stricken mother writes on her present and her family's future - Calgary Herald . "My biggest fear is letting my family down. It's what drives me to work harder (without question). Even when I make a mistake at work, I feel like I am letting them down. I need some work. I know. This weekend is Mother's Day. I don't know anyone who works harder than moms do. Working moms? Even more. Single working moms? I'm bowing down (no idea how they make it work and keep it together). This story brought me to my knees. Get some tissues ready. I can't imagine something scarier than what this individual is facing. It puts a different slant on Mother's Day, the feeling of letting your family down, and is a reminder about what is important in our lives. This person has much more courage than almost anybody else that I know." (Mitch for Alistair).
Solos Under Siege: Country Radio Combats 'Bored' Listeners By Cutting Guitar Parts - Billboard . "This sounds like something out of The Onion. Sadly, it's reality. I have a better idea: let's ask authors to stop writing books and get better at Twitter and Snapchat. Is this article for real? If an artist thinks that their music needs a guitar solo and the audience likes it, what's the problem? Have we just decided to cut them out because we're assuming that listeners are bored? Something is really really wrong right here." (Mitch for Hugh).

Feel free to share these links and add your picks on Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.

Tags:

alistair croll

amazon

billboard

bit current

bit north

book a futurists manifesto

buzzfeed

calgary herald

complete web monitoring

container home plans

contently

gigaom

hugh mcguire

human 20

iambik

lean analytics

librivox

link bait

link exchange

link sharing

managing bandwidth

peter thiel

press books

slate

snapchat

social media

solve for interesting

the onion

the washington post

twitter

year one labs

Maybe You're Not Really An Entrepreneur

Being an entrepreneur is not the same as being self-employed.

How would you define an entrepreneur? I have always broken it down like this: An entrepreneur is someone who has a vision for a specific industry that does not yet exist, and has the ability to bring that business to market successfully. Yes, it leaves plenty of room for interpretation. Yes, it is not all-encompassing. I was once asked to judge an awards program for entrepreneurs. A lot of the businesses were second or third generation owners. I discounted them. I got in trouble for doing so. The argument - on the other side - was that these individuals really took the business to the next level, another level or a whole other space. Fantastic. I agree that these individuals are highly successful and talented, but I also felt like they were entrepreneurial... but not the entrepreneurs. One of the nuances (for me), is that the entrepreneur has the initial idea to start a business, and takes on the risk and leverage involved in taking this idea to market (and growing it). Everything after that is entrepreneurial.

With that, what's the difference between being an entrepreneur and being self-employed? 

We've been waiting for weeks to get something fixed in our home. The trades person took two weeks before returning the initial call. It was a whole production of missed appointments and apologies to get them to do a site visit. We had to follow-up for a quote... and... you know the rest of the story. OK, I made that up, but it's a conversation everyone has had at some point in their life. A friend was telling me a similar story. She paused, and said, "don't they want my business? Don't they want a good referral?" I don't think that they do. It's not just home trades people who have a bad reputation for this sort of thing. We see it in the strangest of places. From lawyers to accountants to designers and beyond. Yes, these individuals own their own businesses, but they are not entrepreneurs. They are self-employed... and they don't make very good employees.

That's the point.

When someone asks me what makes a great entrepreneur, I believe the core attribute that makes these individuals successful, is that they could have no tougher boss than themselves. Nobody has to tell them when they're slacking off or not delivering, because they've spent enough time beating themselves up for it. We live in a world where being an entrepreneur (and failing at it) is so highly glamorized. We see it coming out of Silicon Valley on a daily basis. There are individuals out there (some have written bestselling books and million of followers) who believe that the future of success is all about being an entrepreneur. I don't think that most people are cut out to be an entrepreneur. It's not a slight. It's like saying that most people are not cut out to be an engineer... or a gardener. Entrepreneurs are a rare breed, and it takes a certain kind of individual.

Know thyself.

Giving great service and creating a great experience is something that the best entrepreneurs constantly live, breath and try to reimagine. What saddens me the most is when that potential gets lost. When that person - who owns their own business - thinks they're an entrepreneur, when they're really just a poorly organized self-employed individual. Don't get me wrong, it's not easy to shift from being an employee to an entrepreneur. It's probably a lot harder to admit that you're self-employed, and then shift towards becoming an entrepreneur. Anyone can own a business. Not everyone can make a business unique, successful and resilient.

So, what kind of owner are you? How entrepreneurial are you? 

Tags:

business

customer service

employee

entrepreneur

entrepreneurial

reputation

self employed

strategy

success