Happy New Year: Top Ten List and My New Year's Resolution
Brian's Top Ten Lessons of 2018 & 2019 New Year's Resolution
I have not written often in my personal blog in 2018, as I have been busy, and writing has been more on the professional side for the agency and clients, so the creative spark was not as easy.
Here we are at the end of 2018, and I wanted to share some thoughts, and my New Year's Resolution for 2019.
2018 was a good year for us in Austin. We settled into a new home, have good careers, and are learning to appreciate all that Austin has to offer. There are challenges as well, but as we start the New Year and another birthday has passed, I hope you enjoy my top ten thoughts and resolutions for 2019.
Brian's Top Ten Lessons Learned in 2018:
1) Cats can be sweet and loving: As many of you know, I have not been a cat person. I usually sneeze up a hairball around them, and truthfully am still more of a dog person. With Daisybelle by my side, it has been even more easy to be a dog person and continue to distance myself from cats. You know, sounds familiar doesn't it, I never had a cat. Honestly, I have never spent too much time around them and thought more about the problems associated with cat stewardship; kitty litter and cats crawling over counter tops than what cats can actually be like. So, here I was on a Sunday morning in August, thinking we had nothing to do that morning and what appears by our window but 1.2 lb. fur ball also known as a kitten.
She showed up, and by the end of the first day had made her way inside to our home and hearts. I
was surprised to learn that she could be sweet. She was quite smart, learning quickly how to sneak out of her room. Daisybelle at first didn't know what to make of the intruder. Frank was smart and kept them apart but aware of each other the first few days, but slowly the kitten learned she was a little quicker than Daisybelle who gave up trying to catch her and finally accepting that the varmint was going to be a part of the family.
Fast forward a few months later, Lucky Cat is over 5 lbs and I swear she is learning that sweetness gains more than a little nip from Miss Belle. She is mostly a sweet cat that loves attention, loves her play time and she and Daisybelle are becoming best of friends along the way.
2) Sadly, Ford make a very good car: I started out with Nissans, moved to Buicks and Volvos, but the last few cars I have bought have been Fords. Ford makes a good car. I just bought my fourth, and when I owned Volvos they were owned by Ford, and I can say I have no mechanical or other issues with any of the cars. I say this sadly, because they are not going to make cars anymore and focus on trucks and SUVs.
So, in August I needed a new car, and I was able to take advantage of this shift and got a really good deal on a new white Ford Focus Titanium Model. It has four doors with more bells and whistles than the Volvos I owned in years past. It has leather seats, GPS, heated steering wheel, cameras and sensors, Apple and Android integration, and with the remote start function was quite a bargain. The car has pep and is a good road car as well. So, as GM is going the same path, I bet there will be more bargains to be had on good sedans and I am betting on this Focus lasting a while. 
3) Cup of coffee a day: There was an interesting question on
Facebook the other day. "How many
cups of coffee a day do you drink ? ". I spoke up, at least one! I am
hooked on Austin coffee. On the way to work, is Texas Pecan coffee at Central Market.
The special treat though is Anderson Coffee near the
office. They are the
"sommelier" of coffee. From
importing coffee from around the world (our two favorites are the Costa Rican and Peruvian blends) their coffee is the best and they know coffee. They know which grind for each kind of
filter. They have great treats around
their store and remind me of the true pleasure of if good service from people that
have a true passion for what they do.
4) Diversity Wins: I have written about this professionally. https://delaune.com/automating-your-marketing-efforts-keep-diversity-in-mind-to-exceed-expectations/ Diversity of thought, of life, of culture, of religious beliefs, of gender, of ability coming together is the best possibility we have to heal the ills of society and plan for the future. By bringing people together who don't think alike, and getting to know one another, and come together for a consensus on what are the best approaches in life. To make this easy, we all need to come out of the closet. Share our beliefs and experiences so everyone around us doesn't assume by our silence that we are all alike and agree.
If it is in the boardroom deciding on an acquisition, of a company that may not share the company’s values. Or a a group of people trying to find the next best restaurant to go to dinner, diversity brings together the best discourse to find the best solution. Without diverse opinions and experiences people don't learn about each other, and they certainly are not opening their minds to new ideas and opportunities. When we all look alike, sound alike, and agree on everything then we can also tend to support decisions that are obviously wrong; racism, dangerous politics, and hateful speech.
Look how long the world thought the earth was flat, that the earth was the center of the universe, or that being gay was an illness that needed to be corrected. It truly took gay men and women with the courage to come out of the closet for society to realize gay people are in your family, your neighborhood, and your boardroom. That is how societal shifts happen. This is true across racial, and religious divides as well.
It is easy to silo yourself with others who are like-minded. The result is that your group blames other groups for creating their challenges. If a group has unique challenges such as opioid addiction, gun violence, or higher unemployment, would it not be more productive to engage them in the discussion? You may find out the real causes of their challenges was oppression by the majority, lack of education and opportunity, or even bad legislation that made it easier to get drugs.
5) Social Media tends to limit diverse opinions: Social Media is looking more like your neighborhood where everyone on our street and in our world tend to look and behave like we do. Whether it is all of one race, one political opinion, or just being around people who tend to agree with our opinions and support our life approach. Go look at all your friends and connections on Facebook and see if the diversity matches your physical neighborhood or the world of diversity we live in? This is dangerous, as it makes us more inclined to believe we are right, without proof, as people will agree with you easily. People see a negative post about a group supporting hate speech or bigotry and people tend to believe what is there if it supports the beliefs of their own "neighborhood".
It is making it difficult to have diverse opinions in our digital "hood" as it may in our actual neighborhood and social communities. There was a discussion on NPR, this past week, comparing political parties to social groups where agreeing and staying in the group are more important than the purpose or capabilities of the politicians running for office. The point was that Republicans are more concerned with maintaining membership in the Republican party that challenging Donald Trump for his inabilities and amoral behavior is not an option.
We can sit back in our protected neighborhoods, in person and social media, and use it to validate and
make us comfortable with who we are. Let’s see how many people who don't agree with me I stopped following on Facebook. Or, how many colleagues on LinkedIn I didn't connect with because they didn't match my professional profile. It is similar to what we do in our lives, where we change "neighborhoods" to move up in the world or because there are new people moving in that don't look like us or act like we do.
It is going to take more effort in the digital world, but I am going to challenge myself to pursue more diversity in my inter-personal and social media worlds to not only live better but to open my eyes to appreciate differences and diversity of thought.
6) The News Business is Business: Who has benefited the most from the Donald Trump era? MSNBC. This is a headline from 2014 https://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/as-ratings-plunge-msnbc-faces-shakeup-116207 leading the news channel bandwagon in 2014 Fox News of course. So even though Fox News is still leading guess who is nipping and MSNBC is nipping at their heels. https://www.forbes.com/sites/markjoyella/2018/12/12/fox-news-channel-has-highest-ratings-in-22-years-but-msnbc-is-growing-fast/#111c611d6124 The MSNBC leader of the pack is Rachel Maddow. https://www.mediaite.com/tv/msnbcs-maddow-storms-ahead-of-fox-news-in-ratings-this-week/ Rachell Maddow.
The opposition tends to do well in the news business and so even when the liberal media stands and pounds their chest against Trump, they are making dollars and doing better in the opposition. Rachel Maddow is educated and doing a great job, but her job is made a bit easier with a clear target in the Whitehouse. So, if all you hear is Rachel Maddow you will be depressed and not see any good in the world. Just as if you watch Fox News and Seann Hannity you will see nothing good about immigration or the democratic party.
Diversity of thought, once again, and a variety of news sources helps gain a clear understanding of what is going on and allows us to make thoughtful decisions and opinions of our world around us. It also helps to keep an eye out for good news to keep perspective that even in the most challenging political climate of my lifetime there is more good in the world than the cruelty and insults we see as the primary discourse on TV news and social media discussion of today’s issues.
7) Technology can't solve all the world's problems: I have been in the technology industry, making money from computers and software for over 35 years. I have seen the rise of PCs, Mid-Range servers, Client Server Technology, Internet, ebusiness, ERP, mobile, cloud and now new technologies spurring new acronyms such as AI, IOT and more. I have heard the rise of the internet would reduce human interaction, that computers would replace human care by doctors and nurses, and that with the availability of more information that technology would replace and surpass human intelligence.
This may come into the future, but for here and now technology still can't replace human intelligence, human to human or human to animal interaction, because it can't feel or have instincts to follow a path that appears less than perfect. I don't see computers replacing human thought for a long time. Whether it was a workshop in August for a project at IBM, the conference in Rome, you still can't replace the value of people sitting in a room together and talking and getting to know one another. Conference calls and WebExes are valuable, but it is still easy to hide on a WebEx when you are frustrated or not happy with the direction of a meeting, or even cause negative discourse and attitudes on conference calls that in person people would not be able to get away with in a group setting.
Technology alone cannot replace the effectiveness and efficiency of people meeting in person and the value that it brings to helping people truly get to know each other and improve their relationship and productivity.
8) Marketing needs new respect: Technology and marketing have an odd relationship. For many in the technology industry the path to success has been creating a new product that is better than the rest or creates a new opportunity is the key to success. Whether it was the rise of technology on your desk, or the increasing capabilities of smart phones and those pesky apps that make it harder and harder to disconnect it is the offering that rises to the top and marketing is supporting those creations. I am seeing a shift where clients believe that the technology is already out there to solve their problems, and that they should be able to easily google and find the solution and hopefully will be "open source" and running in the cloud and dare I say close to free. The challenge is how do technology vendors of all sizes gain the attention of their prospects and clients. In a world where the quantity of technology solutions is exploding, how do technology vendors gain the visibility to prove their offerings value and gain opportunity.
The answer is marketing when executed as a profession, that starts out with looking at the opportunities, tying together the right solutions, and determining the right routes to market for success can make or break the success of a technology company.
9) City Chaos is becoming the norm. It seems to me, that larger cities in this country face a growing challenge. The more they grow and that growth is centered around urban centers the more difficult life is becoming. Take Austin, where growth is continuing unabated for a city that apparently didn't want to grow at one point. Here we have what is quickly becoming the tech center of Texas and one of the Tech centers of our country and the growth is exciting but also causing chaos such as traffic congestion and the continuing rise of property values that is pushing the younger population further outside of the city limits increasing traffic congestion. And, since many of these professionals want to live inside a vibrant city life the number of people moving downtown and growing the concentration of people is increasing every day.
These challenges cause our taxes to go up to plan for water, transportation and schools. It causes us
all to have to plan further ahead to go short distances if they are the wrong time of day, and a realization that this growth is going to continue. It is at a point in a little over a year that I don't think we could afford to buy our house today that we purchased a little over a year ago. While New York struggles to update infrastructure to support its growth, smaller urban cities like Austin need to think clearly about what that infrastructure needs to be such as mass transit, clean water, and a way to support affordable housing for all including young professionals looking to move to Austin and those who continue to work and try to prosper in our city. I don't think these challenges are unique to Austin, and I wonder how other smaller cities could benefit from a little forward thought to attract professionals to their city limits.
10) New Year’s Resolution: New Year’s resolution for 2019 is to define a strategy for the second half of my life that gives back to the world and enabling me to focus less on "business" and more on giving back to people and the community we live in.
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