ROMANTICIZING THE WEBMASTER: "This Is Your Time!"
Who would have thought that the tapping on laptop keyboards and scribbling algorithms on a windowpane (not since John Nash in A Beautiful Mind) could possibly be as exciting as a James Bond or Jason Bourne spy flick? Welcome to “GeekWorld”! There’s an almost romantic aura to punching those keys at lightning speed to code a Website. The movie glorifies computer genius. Webmasters and IT professionals, listen up: “This may be your time.” It certainly is in TSN.
SIGNIFICANCE OF TSN TO THE NET GENERATION
As Sean “Napster-founder” Parker says to Zuckerberg in the film, “This is our time.” He may well have been addressing the entire Facebooking-Twittering community of Net Geners.
The goal was not to make money off the site, at least, not early on, because it will lose “all cool and credibility.” However, Zuckerberg’s genius combined with his social insecurities to create a computer chip on his shoulder the size of Quasimodo’s hump played out in his relationships throughout the film.
This film is the 1st detailed screen portrait of the Net Geners by mostly Net Gen actors. It conveyed their views on money, personal and professional relationships, careers, and responsibility to society. The movie also revealed their character, integrity, business ethics, and values, although loyalty, betrayal, and jealousy were the primary driving forces.
HOW DOES TSN DEPICT NET GENER CHARACTERISTICS?
You bet! All of my research and writing on the Net Generation over the past 2 years hit me in the gizzard as I was watching TSN. Aaron Sorkin’s screenplay and David Fincher’s direction represented the confluence of so many Net Gener learner and social characteristics: tech savvy, creation of Internet content, operating at twitch speed, learning by inductive discovery, teamwork and collaboration, pressure to succeed, need for instant gratification, embodiment of change and activity, confident and assertive, trial and error problem solving, and craving social interaction—face-to-face and, especially, virtual connectivity.
TSN is like mouse candy to a Net Gener baby. What does Facebook represent in the transition to Web 2.0 technology? What message does it send teachers? Stick around for the final blog, coming to a PC/Mac near you.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
We now resume Weedland after all of your 4th of July celebrations. Put your beer, som'mores, and sparklers away. Hunker down. It's time for the weed of evil relationships. It's one of the toughest weeds to kill.
3. RELATIONSHIPS: Disassociate yourself from the cynics, pessimists, and complainers who will just drag you into their mire of weeds. If you keep company with weeds, you can begin to adopt weed-like characteristics yourself.
Instead, hang with colleagues who will feed and water your efforts regularly. If you can’t identify these people in your department, search for these colleagues outside your institution—at conferences, other universities, airports, places of worship, shopping malls, the grocery store, playgrounds, caves, or forests. You need to surround yourself with people who are supportive to keep you focused and motivated.
Pick profs or others who will build you up, not tear you down; who are ENCOURAGERS, not discouragers. The encouragers can provide constructive feedback, but hopefully it will be delivered with tender loving care and compassion.
You should also do the same with colleagues and students. Encourage and spur them on toward achieving their goals. Get out of yourself and help others. Isolation is deadly and can stunt your growth.
Also, find one or more MENTORS for your teaching and research who can show you the ropes and guide you through the professional rocky terrain with your gas-guzzling SUV. Again, they may be in your institution or anywhere in the world. Their old-sage advice can be invaluable along your academic journey. They can help your young-sage self grapple with the challenges you will encounter.
The next blog will suggest strategies for the final two categories of weeds, in case you haven’t accumulated enough weeds from the preceding blogs. I’m here to help! Don’t thank me yet. We’re almost done. Then you can shower me with weed poison or smack me with your baseball bat.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
Weed-wise, here are 2 more categories to consider:
2. WEEDS IN YOUR HEART: Have you isolated yourself and become hardened and cold in your relationships as a means to survival? A hardened heart will be manifested in your daily attitudes, words, and actions. It can distance you from important people and activities in your life.
Has your professional growth in teaching and research come to a standstill or regressed? Have you become rigid and resistant to interactions with colleagues and students? Are you toting around negative relationship baggage or harboring grudges, resentment, anger, or jealousy?
Remember, the objects of your harboring are happy and free; while your harboring may be making you miserable. STOP harboring! Let go of your harbor. Have you said to yourself: “I’ll succeed by myself by the hook or the crook? I don’t need anyone; I can do this by myself.”
3. WEEDS IN YOUR RELATIONSHIPS: Who are your professional friends and heroes? Are the colleagues with whom you hang “discouragers”? Are they the negative haunting voices of cynicism and pessimism? Their voices can be like chains around your neck or shackles around your legs that can drag you down? They can squelch your spirit to succeed and suck the life out of the efforts you have made. They are poison to your professional progress.
How is your weed list coming? Didn’t make it, huh? Trying to remember them? Well there’s more on the way with the last two categories.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
WAS THE SPEECH EFFECTIVE?
The test of whether your new speech had any impact will be the contacts you receive after the conference, such as e-mails, invitations to join colleagues on LinkedIn, invitations to collaborate, invitations to present workshops or consult, and invitations to parties and elevator rides. Sometimes these invitations may occur months later. Usually there’s a flurry of activity immediately after you get back to your institution. Then it just trickles for 20 years. You never know what relationship seeds you planted with your spiel and cards. Your ROI (Return On Investment) in relationships will usually exceed your effort expended in those one-minute bites.
BOTTOM LINE
I suspect some you may find the elevator speech blogs a total waste. If you don’t want to go to the trouble of preparing a speech, as described in the preceding 27 blogs, and you prefer to continue to just “wing it,” at least, at minimum, give some thought to what you’re going to say and how you’re going to say it. You just might be able to help a colleague at another institution and, maybe, you’ll benefit from that contribution or collaboration.
Building professional contacts at every opportunity can have lots of advantages. I see relationships as the most important experiences in my career journey. Eventually, you might even want to consult, speak, or collaborate. The elevator speech is just one way to initiate that process. Happy spieling!
Let me know your thoughts and reactions to any of these suggestions.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
EXAMPLE RECAP
To recap, here are the 2 examples from the previous blogs, plus a bonus:
EXAMPLE 1: Professor of TV Production
“Hi, I’m Clarissa, but you can call me Rissa. I think inside the box, because I teach TV production. I also work with IT staff on campuses to help them connect with their faculty on media techniques in the classroom. I’ll be doing a session here tomorrow on that topic at 1:30. Here’s my card. May I have your card? I’ll contact you about joining my network on LinkedIn so we can stay in touch. I hope to see you at my session tomorrow.” (84 words)
EXAMPLE 2: Researcher on Cheating
“Hi, I’m Bucko. I do research on cheating. I present a dozen techniques for faculty to use to detect and eliminate cheating in their classrooms. I’m doing a workshop on a few of them on Thurs. at 10AM. Here’s my card. Do you have a card? Let me know if I can help your faculty. Here’s an invitation to my university’s reception tonight. See you there.” (66 words)
BONUS EXAMPLE 3: Professor of Film and Media
“Hi, I’m Jim from Pandora University. I create Oscar-winning movies, just not this year. I’m working on the sequel to my 2009 release. It’s called Avatar 2. I’m casting for parts now, especially blue people. No, not smurfs. Would you be interested in auditioning? Here’s my card with audition information. I hope to see you there." (56)
Any questions? Is this helping at all? Each example provides buckets of critical information in only 56–84 words. Notice the shift in emphasis from the traditional intro of “what I do” to “what I can do for you with follow-up.”
WHAT ABOUT DELIVERY?
How do you say it? With style and pizzazz! Whatever you say in your version of the above spiels, say it with passion and enthusiasm. Convey energy, excitement, and professionalism about what you do. If you’re not excited about what you do, why should anyone else be? Are you forgettable or unforgettable with a positive image?
The final blog in this long, overdrawn, bloated series will suggest how you can determine whether your spiel was effective. There will also be some bottom-line advice. See you tomorrow.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
Here’s the final ingredient in your recipe for an effective elevator spiel:
3. FOLLOW-UP (How can you follow-up and maintain contact?): Most first-time encounters are superficial how-do-you-do events with no follow-up. You probably will see them again only in your dreams. Here we’re trying to build relationships. You need to go one step further to continue the initial contact. Make an effort to follow-up. At the end, don’t forget to
a. ask for a business card, e-mail address, or info on the session he or she is presenting so you can attend,
b. give an invitation to join your LinkedIn professional network, your session at the conference, a reception your institution is sponsoring, or to collaborate on something, and/or
c. schedule a follow-up meeting at the conference, preferably over a beverage or food.
Example 1: “I’ll be doing a session here tomorrow on that topic at 1:30. Here’s my card. May I have your card? I’ll contact you about joining my network on LinkedIn so we can stay in touch. I hope to see you at my session tomorrow.” (Note follow-ups with session invite, card, LinkedIn, and session reminder.)
Example 2: “I’m doing a workshop on a few of them on Thurs. at 10AM. Here’s my card. Do you have a card? Let me know if I can help your faculty. Here’s an invitation to my university’s reception tonight. See you there.” (Note card and invites to session, to help, and to reception.)
What do you think? Are the examples and focus of the spiel any different than what you’re already doing? Let me know your thoughts.
The next blog in this series will tie these examples together and address the delivery of the speech. There will also be a bonus example suggested. See you Mon. It’s time for a snack.
Have a blast this weekend! Also, don’t forget to set your watches and clocks to daylight savings time, if that applies; otherwise, you’ll be an hour late to my blog. Buhbye!
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
Ivory tower-wise, what is an elevator speech? Let’s first examine its purposes in higher education and then its salient characteristics.
ACADEMIC PURPOSES
In higher education, professors are not selling a product. Instead, they are promoting, to some degree, themselves as teachers, researchers, or clinicians, their scholarship, and their institutions. They’re selling their professionalism.
As an academician, the primary purposes of the elevator speech are to build professional relationships in:
1. your teaching strategies or discipline
2. your research area
3. your clinical specialty
4. anything I forgot
Got it? Certainly, those of you who are in recruit mode may use that opportunity to entice faculty, administrators, or students to your institutional lair.
WHAT IS AN ELEVATOR SPEECH?
So what is this speech all about compared to what you’re already doing?
DEFINITION: It is a concise, carefully-crafted, and well-rehearsed description about “Who you are” and “What you can do for the contact” that your mother would understand, delivered in the time it would take to ride up or down to your hotel floor in an elevator. (Note: If your room is on a low level floor, you’ll have to talk really fast.)
It shifts the emphasis away from you and your credentials, which are already visible on your nametag, to what you can do for the person to whom you’re talking. Rather than promoting you and describing what you do, it’s about spinning what you do for the benefit of that person. And, certainly, who is in a better position to write and deliver that speech than you? Well, maybe your mommy.
CHARACTERISTICS: It’s just a short, mini-spiel, sound-bite of 30–60 seconds to succinctly and memorably introduce you to people or livestock you don’t know. Granted, for professors to speak less than a minute can be an excruciatingly painful, restrictive, and nearly impossible task, especially when they’re talking about their fave subject. It’s like a 100-word abstract (5–8 sentences) of YOU to spotlight your uniqueness and how you can help the contact. Is there any characteristic worth mentioning that distinguishes you from the rest of the pack?
What is the role of the elevator as well other modes of transportation? What constitutes an appropriate elevator speech? What are the key ingredients that will make a lasting first impression and showcase you as a professional? Stay tuned.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
