Life Lesson

The number of options you present matters.

The number can determine the reaction or response you get from the room.

When you present three options, the decision maker will work to take the good out of each and combine them. This method works when the decision maker is also a content creator (your colleague, perhaps). If it were a client or your boss, three options isn’t the way to go. Two is.

When you present two options, the decision maker has a benchmark of quality to base one off of. The mentality of choosing one over another is gratifying – the decision maker feels in control.

When you present one option, it’s the decision maker’s instinct to figure out what’s wrong with it. Presenting one option is asking for feedback (and often not the good kind).

I was explained it this way: If you’re a book cover designer and you go into a room and show one book cover design, the room is going to hack at it. They’re going to search for what they don’t like. If you go in with two book cover designs, the room is going to rank them and subsequently look for what they like more in one over the other.

Consider this the next time you present ideas.

 

Stay Positive & Maybe Present Two

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Certain people require different things to feel good about themselves.

Some need praise from their bosses to feel good. Others need to know all the information about an industry or project before they can feel good about the work they’ll do. Then, of course, there are some wackadoos like me who need to fail a few times to feel good about themselves (because it means they took a leap).

While recognizing what others desire (perhaps through personality tests and spending time with them) is valuable, what’s more important is what you need to feel good about yourself and the work you do.

What has the most influence over your self-worth?

If it’s praise from your peers, let them know how motivating their pat on your back is. If it’s more information, carve an hour each morning to share your learnings/expertise on a subject with others. If it’s experience, do one thing a day that scares you.

You decide each moment whether you’ll stand still and let self-satisfaction slip away or if you’ll build on your self-worth.

 

Stay Positive & It Feels Good To Feel Good

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is a reminder to leap.

And tomorrow, we’ll be on our own to remind ourselves and each other.

 

Stay Positive & Together

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Care is an emotion that’s tough to fake.

It’s a feeling that is easily detected.

Care is a mentality that’s stronger than fear.

It’s a sensory experience that requires no history.

One doesn’t need to be size 11, age range 25-34, make an income of $50,000 a year and have a dog for you to care about them. When you strip your marketing down, there’s either nothing or someone who cares.

You are your most powerful marketing tool.

 

Stay Positive & Care… And You’ll Win

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It doesn’t take much for us to be proud of ourselves (today).

More often than not, at the end of the day, if we put out a few fires, we feel proud of ourselves.

If we react to the urgent and get back to equilibrium, we feel proud of ourselves.

If we give a little to someone else or sit and listen to a friend, we feel proud of ourselves.

10 months from now, we won’t remember these moments of urgency, of firefighting, of caring for a hot second.

A smart question worth asking is what can I do now that I’ll look back on in 10 months and feel proud I did it.

 

Stay Positive & That’s The Line Between Making And Making A Difference

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At every PR event, seminar, breakfast I go to, I inevitably hear complaints about the C-suite of the business not caring about measuring qualitative variables. Some clients still don’t believe in PR. Some clients don’t care about impact or target – all they care about is sales. The list of trials and tribulations (complaints) goes on.

These attitudes by a business’s decision-makers don’t bother me, or, more importantly, their attitudes toward my profession doesn’t make me dislike my profession.

Here’s the truth: Those in the PR industry will always be ahead of those in the C-suite, of those in the R&D department, of those private investors to a business when it comes to our industry.

As soon as the entire business gets on board with what we’ve been telling them for the last five years, we’ll have discovered something else, we’ll want to test something else, we’ll have shifted our beliefs to something better and the cycle restarts.

We can complain…or we can keep pushing marketing until are worth is obvious. This isn’t to say informing and inspiring businesses to support PR and social media will ever get easier. I’ve already made it plain that it won’t. It will, however, make it more rewarding.

If you’re being put off by clients’ and businesses’ slow move to embrace PR and social media, the marketing industry may not be for you.

When you can wake up each day and know you’ll be dancing up a hill (sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s nowhere near easy) and you’re fine with that, then you’ve found your industry.

 

Stay Positive & You’re Called A Professional For A Reason – You’re Supposed To Know More

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It takes vigor to get up each day and bring ideas to the edge.

Time and time again there will be those who play devil’s advocate, who give you a reason to quit, and, sometimes life throws such a curveball at you that no one would think any less of you if you put down your weapons.

In those moments where you decide to give up or overcome, you either win or lose.

What’s unique is that either way, it’s impermanent.

A few years ago I wrote about being one bite away from being on track with your diet plan. You don’t fail the entire plan when you deviate from it because you’re only one right bite away from being back on track. Your failure is impermanent.

Success, determination and resilience is impermanent too.

I fancy momentum, but there’s no hill in life that some rocks or people won’t find themselves running up to stop what’s rolling down. Success isn’t sustainable in all areas at all times.

Whichever end of the spectrum you find yourself waking up on today, know that it’s not permanent – it may just change how you tackle the day from here.

This impermanence is a gift if you’ll accept it as one.

 

Stay Positive & Humble & Hustle

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