rob’s place

I uploaded my presentation from yesterday to SlideShare.net.  This morning I found out the editorial team decided to feature it on the homepage!

An open letter to the King of Great Britain
Posted July 4, 1776 by John Hancock

Dear King,

Our Congress here in the thirteen united States of America are declaring today that we are separating political ties with you. We believe that it’s only fair that we tell you why.

First of all, there are a few rights that we believe are plainly obvious:

1. All men are created equal
2. God has given us rights that can’t be taken away by man: life, liberty, and our pursuit of happiness.

Although God gives these rights, man creates Government to secure these rights. If a Government isn’t protecting these rights then it is the right of the people to make changes to the Government — or make a new one. This new Government should be organized and based on these principles to ensure Safety and Happiness.

Making changes to long established Government isn’t to be taken lightly. We know the risks and that things may get worse for the people. However, when these rights are taken away and abused under a single authority, it is the people’s right and duty to rid themselves of that authority and defend themselves.

We, the Thirteen Colonies, have been patient under your governance, dear King, but it’s time to alter our relationship. You have a history of causing us harm and interfering with our God-given rights. We’ve endured long enough. Your tyranny over us is over.

Dear world, below is a list of facts that you need to understand about this King:

• He has refused to uphold agreements.
• He has forbidden Governors to pass important and timely laws and he utterly neglects his review of the proposed laws.
• He has refused to allow representation for large districts of people — obviously a position an insecure tyrant would take.
• He has called meetings in unusual and uncomfortable places far away from the places we keep the public records in an attempt to tire us out and comply with him.
• He has dissolved some of our Houses of Representation when we oppose his tyranny.
• He has fixed our elections to keep our States in poor official leadership.
• He has made it difficult for Internationals to settle in our states.
• He has not allowed us to enforce our laws without his meddling.
• He has made our judges totally dependent on him for their salary and tenure.
• He has sent his officers here to harass and pillage our people — and created new offices to facilitate it.
• He has kept his armies on patrol in our neighborhoods even during times of peace.
• He has tried to make the military superior to our civil power.
• He has ignored our own laws.
• He has split up armed troops among us.
• He has performed mock murder trials for his people here.
• He has cut off our trade with parts of the world.
• He has imposed taxes on us without our consent.
• He has denied us a fair trial by jury on several occasions.
• He has taken us overseas to be tried for made-up offenses.
• He has helped a neighboring Province grow and strengthen itself to become a threat to our states.
• He has cut our legal foundations out from under us by taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering our fundamental governmental system.
• He has suspended our Legislatures and given his men that power to rule us.
• He has waged war against us.
• He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
• He has (and is) sending foreign mercenary armies to continually barrage our homes.
• He has captured our citizens at sea and forced them to join his army against us.
• He has caused insurrections among our people and has encouraged native savages to attack us.

Throughout this repeated oppression we have humbly requested relief from the king but he has returned our requests with injury. This Tyrant is unworthy to be a ruler of free people.

Our trouble isn’t just with the king but also with our British brothers. They are well aware of the oppression and unfair acts against us. We’ve reminded them of why we came here in the first place. We’ve made appeals to their good conscious to disassociate themselves with the Crown’s tyranny. But because they chose to ignore our warnings, we must treat them as we treat the rest of the world: in war they are enemies, in peace they are friends.

Therefore, we the Representatives of the good people of these united States of America, have come together before God and the world to declare that these Colonies have the right to be free and independent states. We declare ourselves free of the rule of the British crown and all political connection to Great Britain. As free and independent states it is our right to align with whomever we wish, establish commerce, wage war and bring peace.

We rely on God’s protection and we pledge to each other our lives, fortunes, and honor.

Signed from New Hampshire:
~ Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Signed from Massachusetts:
~ John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry

Signed from Rhode Island:
~ Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Signed from Connecticut:
~ Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

Signed from New York:
~ William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

Signed from New Jersey:
~ Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

Signed from Pennsylvania:
~ Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Signed from Delaware:
~ Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Signed from Maryland:
~ Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Signed from Virginia:
~ George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

Signed from North Carolina:
~ William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

Signed from South Carolina:
~ Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton

Signed from Georgia:
~ Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

Are you on LinkedIN? I posted on my business blog how to Start Your Social Media with LinkedIN | Orangejack LLC

Perhaps you’ve heard about Social Media but haven’t signed up to participate on any of the sites yet thinking they are all for kids with too much time on their hands. Well let me share with you one of the more useful websites you can start with for your entry into social media: LinkedIN.

LinkedIN is a professional network. It’s like a networking event you attend but this is all online.

I encourage you to create an account and play around.  Feel free to invite me to be one of your connections by requesting from my LinkedIN profile.

Do you remember that I’ve been saying I have a lot of things going on and more announcements to make? Well today I have a big one that we’re very excited about. Any yes, today is April 1, but this isn’t a joke.

Patricia and I have opened up our own small business called Orangejack LLC. Today is Orangejack LLC’s Grand Opening.

Right now we are focusing our service to Internet Strategy, Internet Consulting, Internet Marketing, and Internet Training.

So stop by the newly redesigned (and continually tweaked) orangejack.com today!

We are open for business.

View Video on Vimeo.

I hate it when people like this are right. A guy named Rob (not me) is also the Business Pundit (so says his blog). ‘Tis a good blog I like to follow.

But I hate it when he’s right about stuff like this post: Why I Gave Up Deserts To Become a Better Entrepreneur:

Plato wrote that “the first and best victory is to conquer the self.” Warren Buffett said something to the effect of “if you have discipline in the small things you will have discipline in the large things.” I’ve read enough about the human brain to know that if certain actions are repeatedly taken, the brain becomes used to them and they become easier. I started to wonder if I could build my overall discipline by practicing more discipline in a small area of my life. I needed something that was difficult, but not in my face every day. I decided to give up deserts. For one year.

I wasn’t cutting out sugar. The definition of a desert was anything sweet that I would eat after lunch or dinner because I was craving it. The goal was to fight the impulse, more than anything else. No ice cream, cakes, cookies, candy, brownies, pies, or anything that would typically be considered a dessert.

But he didn’t necessarily do it for health. He did it for the discipline that would translate into getting things done better.

Eight months have passed, and I’ve had no desserts, and there have really only been 3 or 4 occasions that I seriously struggled and thought I should give up the stupid goal. What are the results? Well, I think the past 8 months have been the single most productive period in my entire life. I still miss deadlines, forget about things, and sometimes get distracted, but not nearly as often as I used to. In other words, I think it is actually working. My ability to buckle down and focus even when I don’t feel like it has increased. In the same way that lifting weights makes a 50 pound box seem lighter the next time you have to carry it, focusing on a somewhat boring task for a few hours seems much easier than it was in the past.

A nice side benefit is that I’ve also felt much better in general. I’ve had more energy, I’ve slept better, and I’ve been sick less than normal. I haven’t seen any negative mental side effects such as decreased creativity, or a diminished capacity to deal with multitasking situations (although I try to avoid these when possible).

When I gave up sugar a couple years ago for health reasons, I, too, lost weight and felt great. I was able to concentrate easier. I wasn’t so easily distracted. Not like I am now.

Oh look! A crazy dog growling at his own leg!

But I have vacation coming up, birthdays, anniversaries, holidays. How will I ever make it?

I guess it’ll be one of those things I’ll perpetually start tomorrow.

My Uncle Blog has a wife, Sally. I remember their wedding so I can speak authoritatively on the accuracy of that claim.

Sally has been playing with mud for years now — and she’s really good at making something out of nothing. My family can attest that her pottery has gone from heavy, utilitarian pottery to now professional-grade art.

Aunt Sally’s local paper in South Carolina decided that they should write about her potting skills also.

She started in pottery by taking piano lessons. 15 years later she was teaching classes of 50 people per semester! You’ll have to read the story to figure that one out!

Her advice is somewhat of a metaphor for success in any field:

The hardest part of teaching is getting students to slow down because they must master the basics first. Hayes said an open imagination is a plus because “anything you can imagine, you can make in clay.”

Mastering pottery is a repetitive process that includes plenty of practice. She said she tells new students they will at least have an ice cream bowl to show for their first semester.

“They laugh and usually call it a doggy bowl, because that’s what it’s usually used for,” she said. “Some people catch on right away, and for others it takes six months before they are really pleased with their work.”

Aunt Sally, one day I want to get over there and photograph your studio. I guess I’ll stick around and hear Uncle Bill preach too if I have to.

photo from scnow.com

I read Seth Godin’s book The Dip over the weekend. The subtitle is “A little book that teaches you when to quit (and when to stick)”. And honestly, that’s the best one sentence summary of this book!

I think my take-away from this book is to take a look at the projects I’m involved with and determine if the payoff at the end is worth it or not. If it is, and times are hard, I’m in a dip and I need to push through. If the end isn’t worth it, quit. But don’t quit a dip because of stress.

It all seems pretty obvious, no? Seth even addresses that:

It’s easy to complain that the advice in this little book is brain-dead obvious. I mean, who doesn’t already know that the secret to success is to be successful, that providing a great product or service is the right thing to do, and that you shouldn’t quit in the face of adversity?

You don’t. That’s the bad news. The good news is that your boss and your competitors don’t know either.

I mean, you know it, but my guess is that you’re not doing anything about it. (pg 22-23)

So what is this “Dip” we’re talking about? Instead of defining it, let me share this example Seth gives that I think can also serve as a decent summary of the book:

Snowboarding is a hip sport. It’s fast, exciting, and reasonably priced; and it makes you look very cool. So why are there so few snowboarders? Because learning the basic skills constitutes a painful Dip. It takes a few days to get the hang of it, and, during those few days, you’ll get pretty banged up. It’s easier to quit than it is to keep going.

The brave thing to do is to tough it out and end up on the other side — getting all the benefits that come from scarcity. The mature thing is not even to bother starting to snowboard because you’re probably not going to make it through the Dip. And the stupid thing to do is to start, give it your best shot, waste a lot of time and money, and quit right in the middle of the Dip.

A few people will choose to do the brave thing and end up the best in the world. Informed people will probably choose to do the mature thing and save their resources for a project they’re truly passionate about. Both are fine choices. It’s the last choice, the common choice, the choice to give it a shot and then quit that you must avoid if you want to succeed. (pg 24)

When he talks about being the best in the world, he’s not necessarily referring to being the gold medalist snowboarder. He means that you can be the best in your world — the world you live in, your niche. He argues that if you can’t be the best, then quit. But the idea of quitting isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

It’s okay to quit, sometimes.

In fact, it’s okay to quit often.

You should quit if you’re on a dead-end path. You should quit if you’re facing a Cliff. You should quit if the project you’re working on has a Dip that isn’t worth the reward at the end. Quitting the projects that don’t go anywhere is essential if you want to stick out the right ones. You don’t have the time or the passion or the resources to be the best in the world at both. (pg 59)

Just as an aside, I noticed he had a few sentences in italics throughout the book. I thought, “he must think these are important statements”. So here they are:

• [Winners] just quit the right stuff at the right time. (pg 3)
• Quit the wrong stuff. (pg 4)
• Stick with the right stuff. (pg 4)
• Have the guts to do one or the other. (pg 4)
• Scarcity makes being at the top worth something. (pg 10)
• The Dip is the reason you’re here. (pg 28)
• Quitting creates scarcity; scarcity creates value. (pg 36)
• The opposite of quitting is an invigorated new strategy designed to break the problem apart. (pg 51)
• If it scares you, it might be a good thing to try. (pg 76)

As I reflect on this book, I realize visualizing the end-value is the piece I often miss. I think this is when I need external help to endure the dip. And that help needs to show up relationally — be it friends, co-workers, professionals, and God.

Via Seth comes Execupundit.com’s Note From Boss To Employees

Last night I met a guy named Nathan. We had several conversations. Three to be exact. We talked about money, how I’m doing, my house, and how much interest we pay on our house.

Not the typical conversation I have with someone over the course of three phone calls.

And I use the word “conversation” loosely.

Have you ever been exchanging words with someone when the other person seems to be the only one talking and barely listening? They usually happen when a telemarketer calls.

Nathan is a telemarketer. But there’s something different about Nathan. He is desperate. He first called me telling me what my interest rate was (he was wrong) then started asking me all sorts of questions I assume are related to that. I finally stopped him to tell him I wasn’t interested.

I got the typical push-back I expected. “But we can save you lots of money”, etc. It’s all about me…and how dumb I am to pay high mortgage rates.

I told him I wasn’t interested many times and was polite. Finally I told him I needed to hang up.

20 minutes later the phone rings and it’s Nathan! I said, “Didn’t you just call me?” He told me that indeed he had but that he called my wife and she said we had a second mortgage and then was disconnected. So he needed to call me back.

“Nathan, either my wife is lying or you are. We don’t have a second mortgage. You, sir, are lying. You didn’t talk to my wife.”

He ignored it and went right back to the questioning. I told him I wasn’t interested and I kept my cool. He got so frustrated. I could hear him sighing and grunting on the other end flabbergasted that I wouldn’t want lower rates!

We parted ways again and I asked him to not call again.

45 minutes later, guess who called?!? “Nathan, I thought I asked you not to call again. I’m not interested.”

This time he was really desperate and frustrated with me. “It’s a free offer! Are you satisfied with higher rates?”

“No thank you, Nathan. I’m not interested. Please don’t call back.”

He gave a pitiful “okay” and hung up before I did.

I was impressed with my ability to stay calm and his ability to finally hear my words and not just his.

Manute Bol, the tallest NBA player of all-time, has one incredible story. Manute is 7 feet, 7 inches tall, 42 years old, but his morals, ethics, and faith make him even taller.

The article talks about how he was recruited to the US to play basketball from his Southern Sudanese village of Dinka, apparently the tallest people in the world. It talks about his financial situation, fame, and struggles of going back to his war-torn homeland of Sudan including his warnings about radical Islam and Sept 11. It talks about his family (his grandfather was 7′10″ and his mom was 6′10″).

I really encourage you to check out this incredible story of Manute Bol.

So says Mr. T!