The Case for Personal Executive Blogs
Is Warren Buffett Sitting Next to You?Why have a personal executive blog? Because in today’s Internet savvy world, how you communicate and interact with people, determines your effectiveness as a business leader. It’s that simple. Let’s take a look at three hypothetical examples. Imagine you’re sitting at a table in your favorite coffee shop. Two senior gentlemen take the table next to you and begin a lively conversation about promising companies. You quickly tune them out and continue reading the WSJ. A friend sitting at a far table, texts your cell phone with the information that you are sitting next to Warren Buffett and Alan Greenspan. I’ll bet that while your eyes remain on the WSJ your ears and mind are glued to the conversation at the next table. The point, knowing the social markers of the people you interact with has direct relationship on the value, trust, and importance you place on the information received. Now imagine you’re the CEO of a major enterprise software company. Imparting the collective DNA of your management team on new and existing: customers, employees, vendors, and business partners is an important part of your job. It’s also very time consuming. How do you control the public view of your management style while influencing those around you to incorporate your thoughts into their daily business life? You can’t possibly meet with everyone, every day, in a one-on-one setting to explain or demonstrate the values you and your company adhere to. The point, thought leadership is a highly effective business method only if you can consistently communicate efficiently. And lastly, let’s imagine you receive a voicemail from a business exec you don’t know. She wants to schedule a call to discuss a business opportunity which sounds mildly interesting. You email her with a few times that are good for you and then she does the same. About four weeks later (after numerous cancels and reschedules) you finally have the conversation. The amount of time invested in scheduling the call in addition to listening to her establishing her and her company’s credibility far exceeds the time needed to explain the deal. The point, you need a better way to allow people you do know and people you don’t know, to schedule one-on-one time. So why use a “working” executive blog as your public face? Because blogs provide efficient mechanisms and tools to address the communications and time challenges faced by executives in the internet age. |
Top Five Reasons to Use a "Working" Blog1. Establishing credentials or social markers- Knowing (or gently being reminded of) an executive’s prior positions, education, and accomplishments helps assess the value of any information exchanged. 2. Extending one’s reach- Through the use of RSS feeds and other internet mechanisms posting your thoughts enable you to instantly reach your “community” of interested parties. 3. Letting the universe find you- Blogs are indexed by all the major search engines. Post an article related to your company, and you have just increased the probability of having new customers call you. 4. Efficiently using time- Working blogs offer a number of interactive features to minimize wasted time. By incorporating features such as Intelligent call scheduling, secure file exchange, instant NDAs, quick notes, a blog becomes the focal point for managing one’s business day. 5. Creating thought leadership- A working blog enables you to drive discussions of interest to you and helps establish your expertise on a particular topic. |
