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As a follow up to my last blog post on be good at what you do and be visible,
…and back up your visibility with consistent performance! Remember, performance trumps all. Expert first – speaker second!
I attended an incredibly sad funeral this morning – of a vibrant life cut way too short. As I arrived early and watched what seemed to be a very diverse group of attendees – young, old, senior executives to personal friends, I couldn’t help but to wonder about the vast array of lives this person had touched. Throughout the moving service, I wondered less about what this person accomplished and much more about how others described him – the rich, loving life he lived. I found myself pondering what seems to be a cliché, yet worth asking:
If this were my funeral, who would show up and what would they say?
I’m convinced more than ever that few will care about the size of my house or bank account; they will be there because of the portfolio of real relationships I invested in – personally and professionally. You see the person who passed away, wasn’t a whole lot older than I am – another reminder that you can’t take any given day for granted!
Who would you most like to see at your funeral and what would you want them to say? What will you do to make 2010 count? What are you doing to invest in those relationships today? That’s something LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter can’t do for you!
I read with particular interest the following excerpt:
About 15 percent of teens ages 12-17 say they’ve received sexually suggestive photos or videos of someone they know, according to a study by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project. Four percent admit they’ve sent photos of themselves to others.
Amanda Lenhart, senior research specialist and author of the report, said “sexting,” as it’s called, has become a form of “relationship currency.”
“These images are shared as a part of or instead of sexual activity,” she said, “or as a way of starting or maintaining a relationship with a significant other.”
Here is where the respected Pew Research and Ms. Lenhart are dead wrong! “Relationship Currency” – as a registered trademarked by our firm, is defined as a win-win investment in a valuable and prioritized relationship, one that has an immediate and quantifiable impact to enhance both party’s condition. Ms. Lenhart’s comment is a gross misuse of the term, particularly given the troubling topic of teen sexting. We believe Relationship Currency Deposits to be of great value in our society, highly instrumental to one’s personal and professional success in 2010 and beyond heightened by the current environment of low trust. It is unfortunate that Ms. Lenhart has decided to use an otherwise positive and wholesome phrase, instrumental to the success of many hard-working professionals, and unjustly associate it with inappropriate and juvenile acts.
Another reminder that even the most astute of analysts can get careless and lazy with their word choice!
What does “relationship currency” mean to you?
As a mentor of mine often says, “If you’re not tooting your own horn there is no music!” Those whose livelihoods depend on externally focused relationships such as business development professionals, all understand the power of reference selling. In any economy there is an enormous level of comfort in a buyer’s journey when they get unsolicited recommendations from other satisfied buyers – it’s simply called “credibility by association.”
When you’re a candidate for a promotion that ends up going to a peer, are you left wondering “why them and not me?” Why were they promoted to manage or lead a broader realm of responsibilities, but not me? Why when I am the one who is more consistently and more recently invited to spend time with the boss, are they the one receiving the promotion?
The prevalence of LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and a host of other social networking tools has certainly raised awareness for personal relationship development and social networking best practices. When the use of the same social interaction functionality is brought into an organization to manage client or customer interactions and partner or supplier engagement in order to enable and manage collaboration within your organization, the mindset becomes one of Enterprise 2.0.
