Over the past month I have been fortunate to attend a number of events that reminded me that there is no lack of ideas. What seems to be missing, however, is an execution mindset. I am not suggesting that people are lazy but rather that they either do not realize or have forgotten how easy it is to turn an idea into something tangible. We too frequently allow gaps to form between our ideas and our ability to execute them.

Last month I attended the Business Innovation Factory’s Collaborative Innovation Summit (BIF-6). Over the course of two and a half days I heard a number of inspiring stories and three were especially noteworthy because they were not complex ideas and their impact was based on simply changing behaviour and attitudes.

The first storyteller was Cassandra Lin who received a standing ovation after she described her Project T.G.I.F. (Turn Grease Into Fuel). She heard about families having difficulty heating their homes and started a program to collect and refine grease from restaurants into usable fuel to heat homes. Cassandra is in the 7th grade and showed a room filled with experienced adults what is possible when you set your mind to it. Her program also included a educational game show component used to raise awareness with schoolchildren. She didn’t face huge obstacles. Grease was abundant and refining partners existed. She simply put the two together and championed the idea. We can learn a great deal from her. You can hear her story here.

The second storyteller was Dean Esserman, the Chief of Police for Providence. He is the son of a doctor who was tasked with improving policing in his city. He reflected on the past when his father would make house calls and developed strong ties with his patients and, more broadly, his community because of it. Inspired by that, Esserman gave his police officers Blackberries and business cards. He then asked them to get out of their police cruisers and get into the community to get to know the citizens and become known by them. Nothing fancy beyond community outreach and that is something we have been hearing a great deal about in the online world but it is great to see it happening in the offline world.

The third storyteller was Gerard van Grinsven, President and CEO of the Henry Ford West Bloomfield Hospital. Formerly an executive with Ritz-Carlton, he has applied his expertise in hospitality to healthcare. By bringing quality food, amenities and education to healthcare, he has created a facility that people actually want to visit, even when they are not sick but wish to participate in one of the many wellness or educational programs being offered. How many other healthcare organizations will adopt this kind of thinking and behaviour? You can hear his story here.

Fresh off my visit to BIF-6, I tagged along to Startup Weekend Toronto. I supported team Tadwana with a Social TV idea. Although we did not win the competition, I still got a tremendous amount of inspiration from being a part of it. The weekend showed me that, with a small team of bright, energetic people, you can take an idea from concept through to tangible business idea in about 48 hours. A mockup in powerpoint or a working prototype online or using a simulator are enough to convey what you are trying to accomplish and how. It was also further proof that a prototype, even a poorly constructed one, is still better than an exhaustively constructed business plan without a prototype to give the idea credibility.

The following stats are also noteworthy from that weekend:

157 participants, 52 observers, 38 ideas pitched, 13 teams formed, 14 sponsors, 8 speakers, 4 panellists, 5 mentors, 5 winning teams and over 900 bottles of water consumed.

If there was enough stamina, how many new companies could be formed by running startup weekends on a regular basis? How many problems could be attacked and resolved by running hack weekends on a regular basis? I am not suggesting that this is the only approach to idea generation or problem solving but it certainly gets people focused and energized around ideas which is the whole point.

Lastly, I was involved in an innovation workshop to help some companies identify the different mindsets that exist within in their organizations when it comes to innovation and how to put together the best teams to tackle the problems that require innovative solutions. The emphasis was not on how creative people are but on how they are creative.

Several of the activities illustrated how adults have unlearned things. We can give too much thought to things because we have accumulated knowledge and experience which drives a particular perspective. We fall into the trap of thinking of how things should be rather than how they could be. This is why children can often focus on the outcome and work backward to develop the most appropriate path rather than getting bogged down with over-engineering the process to achieve the outcome.

We were doing a number of activities used for workshops in corporate settings that had originated in the Destination Imagination Program for Children. For example, teams were tasked with constructing a tower as tall as possible with the materials provided and launch a feather from the top of the tower. The height of the tower plus the distance travelled by the feather would be added together to determine the winning team. No matter how successful a team might have been, none came close to achieving the success of teams comprised of children. All the adult teams focused too much on tower construction rather than the overall objective. If you had a tower two inches tall but you used a paper airplane constructed from the materials to send your feather greater than ten feet then you would have easily beaten a team who built a tower three feet tall but could only blow their feather a little over two feet because they missed the point of the exercise - outcome trumps process.

If we chose to take a more holistic perspective with emphasis on the outcome or objective as well as the parameters we must play within then I wonder how many more times we would find solutions rather than getting distracted by development of the process.

When I reflect on these different events and the stories I heard, the ideas I saw developed in a weekend, and the examples where adults need to unlearn some things in order to be more innovative, I can not help but think that we are spending too much time thinking and too little time doing.

If we remind ourselves to draw inspiration from broad sources, strive to prove a concept through prototyping rather than written explanation, and learn to unlearn for the purposes of innovation then we will have better chance of closing the idea-execution gap. Good luck to us all!

I have always admired other entrepreneurs with innovative business ideas. I especially admire the ones with business ideas that are beautiful in their simplicity.

If you ask Jason Sadler what he does, he proudly says, “I wear t-shirts for a living.” Huh? Yes, you read that correctly. He wears t-shirts for a living.

Jason is the founder of iwearyourshirt.com. Begun January 1, 2009, the idea was to sell t-shirt-based promotion by-the-day to companies wanting to advertise their product or service. Things started slowly, but momentum began to build and 2009 was sold out eight months into the year. Continuing to build, 2010 sold out early too.

But building and maintaining the momentum has not been easy — it has been a serious investment of time and effort. Jason works 12-16 hours per day, seven days a week. At last count, he had worked 612 days straight without a day off. This dispels the myth he often faces from potential clients and audiences: he was not an overnight success. Social media is not easy, nor is it cheap in terms of true costs. It took Jason 18 months to accumulate his following and it must be maintained daily. In his own words, “It is a marathon, not a sprint.”

Profitability in the first year of operation, selling out each year early, to-die-for press coverage, and an army of loyal followers and clients are just a few of the results of his efforts. Not bad for someone who has never advertised, has no media kit, and doesn’t use salesforce.com to track leads. He has actively used social media tools, media coverage, and public speaking to promote iwearyourshirt.com — and the result has been clients seeking him out, not the other way around.

What do clients get in exchange for buying the day, sponsoring the month, or becoming a proud partner? If you buy a day, you get Jason and his team wearing your firm’s t-shirt, blog posts, a Ustream.tv show covering your firm, and mentions on Facebook and Twitter to and by the iwearyourshirt.com army.

Their YouTube channel has had 1.4 million views, and they get approximately 1000 viewers for the daily Ustream show, broadcast from wherever an internet connection can be made. Jason has approximately 24,000 followers on Twitter and nearly 5000 friends on Facebook. These channels all get leveraged for the sake of the day’s client, and people show up every day to find out who that client is. Not bad at all.

If you look at the “How it works” section of Jason’s site, you can see that buying a day is relatively cheap in comparison to other options. And you can’t quantify the passion behind doing something fun for a living and engaging people on a daily basis.

Jason does not guarantee a specific ROI but he does guarantee content and engagement. That content lives online forever, and Jason and team can advise on what to do next. Based on iwearyourshirt.com's success, some clients have been afraid of the potential increase in business and how to handle it. That’s a great problem to have.

Brands like Nissan, Pizza Hut, Jockey, and Lucky Brand Jeans have all jumped on board. Competitors have tried to copy Jason’s approach, but he is authentic and his passion is contagious. Clients have remained loyal, for the most part, and Jason reciprocates by only promoting things he believes in.

Wearing a t-shirt for a living is not a complicated business model. However, it was not a back-of-the-napkin idea nor was it exhaustively planned out. Jason adheres to a “focus more and do less” mindset. He mapped out the idea, looking ahead a few years but not allowing planning to stand in the way of execution. In social media especially, things move too quickly to waste time deliberating.

With two years of growth and success under his belt, the future still remains uncertain. New members are being added to the team. Relationships with clients are growing and deepening. Word of mouth continues to grow and, despite the relentless activity, Jason still feels, “It’s much more fun to say I wear t-shirts for a living.”

Over the past 18 months there's been a revolution in template driven integrated blogs, websites, and online communities. This year I've decided its time for a change despite having had a phenomenal 18 month run with this blog. I've learned that TypePad is the least friendly and advanced site for site Content Management Systems; they are up to 18 months behind providing functionality that WordPress, SquareSpace, and Ning offer in my view. I have a list of needs for our new integrated website, blog, and community and would like your opinion on why gets it right. 

Your Opinion - Who's Going To Get It Right?

What template and site platforms do you think can deliver on most of the above? Over the next 3 years businesses need to merge their website, social content and their own communities together to create what I call "assets". This convergence is critical for monetizing social media and creating a pipeline flow that enables community members to build a relationship with a brand based on value of their content, and the brand to naturally make its services available to its target market.

Share Your Thoughts And Experience Below

Please leave your thoughts in the comments section below. Outright sales solicitations will be deleted, helpful industry insight from practicing experts is appreciated. Thank you for your input!

In filmmaking there is a term known as “shooting ratio” that refers to the ratio between the amount of footage shot and the amount of footage contained in the final cut. What drives this ratio are the number of shots planned for each scene for maximum coverage and the number of takes allocated per shot.

As a former filmmaker turned strategy consultant, I have been thinking about the value that could be derived from taking a similar approach to strategy development and execution, in terms of an organization’s innovation efforts.

On a shot-by-shot basis, a filmmaker will decide how many takes (a.k.a. attempts or permitted failures) that will be required or anticipated. This is planned ahead so it can be incorporated into the budget. With every additional take, another option becomes available. Many factors can influence the outcome of a film; having options helps to increase the likelihood of a better end-product.

This approach can be applied beyond filmmaking; it does not necessarily have to be restricted to a process where the outcome is a tangible product or thing. It can also apply to service innovation where the outcome is a new experience.

If you ask an Oscar-nominated or winning actor which “take” (1, 2 or 12) it was that ended up being the clip that led to their being considered, you will receive different answers. Some hit the mark within the first one or two takes. Others work their way up incrementally, building to the point where they hit the mark, and, finally, others use each take to try something entirely different in the hopes that at least one will be usable.

This idea is very similar to current trends like rapid prototyping and agile programming with technology, and innovation development where incremental improvements are made through constant iterations and refinements. “Let’s do it again, only different, better, slower, faster.” Teams sprint between milestones rather than run a marathon only to end up at the finish line with an unwanted outcome. By pursuing short-term objectives through “sprints” and reflecting on those achievements once they’ve been reached, organizations can revise their approach and move forward on a new trajectory with a different and likely more highly anticipated outcome.

To some, these activities seem inefficient, bordering on wasteful; but if the outcome met or exceeded expectations, was it still the wrong approach? Designing and budgeting failure into the process is not an innovation indulgence — it’s a hedge or mitigation against failure or a less desirable outcome.

Malcolm Gladwell talks about the concept of 10,000 hours being the amount of time required for someone to develop and hone a skill before becoming an expert. Those 10,000 hours were filled with numerous attempts and failures but, in the end, expertise was the result.

Ultimately, I am suggesting that people, and organizations in a broader sense, be given the opportunity to try a variety of different things and honour their failures in the process, because that is where the greatest learning and potential for successful innovation comes from. However, I am not suggesting that people be allowed to make an unlimited number of attempts either.

I am just asking you to imagine that if Take 6 was the right or best one but you or your organization weren’t allowed to make six attempts at anything, then what a missed opportunity that would be.

There's a substantial amount of buzz going on over Facebook's decisions to further commercialize the value of it's technology and assets (user information). While the decisions Facebook is making may come as a shock to users it awakens the business questions in social media that have not been getting addressed - how does a social network monetize it's model beyond advertising income?

While users may feel that they are being hard done by Facebook keep in mind that over the past six years now up to 500 million users have had a free ride without being asked to give back to the Facebook community financially in any form. There is almost no other business scenario any shareholder would approve to run for free for hundreds of millions of users on their nickel without a cost to the community or users.

There is a great confusion perpetrated from purest and social media evangelist I call the "flower child mentality". We've listened to self proclaimed social media guru's tell us peace and love are free and social networks should be too. This is dead wrong. We learned during the dot come era that eyeballs, page views and wild stock valuations weren't the fuel to keep only web based businesses alive. Social networks and websites need paying customers and solid revenue models. Only websites and businesses that can deliver an ROI to their shareholders deserve to continue thriving despite know matter how novel the concept that can be achieved with technology.

Facebook deserves to monetize through any possibly channel it can. It does not have to consult users. It does have an obligation to protect data, however, so does every other site. BUT any users in this age of searchable electronic trails on anyone and anything is naive to think that they have a right to have a free ride from a social network and not be held ransom to its policies and changes.

I was on record a year ago that in the next three years (now 2 years) social networks are headed for a cataclysmic shake-up. Just like the dot.com era that saw free use business models go the way of the dinosaur, so will similarly modeled social networks that do not put in aggressive monetization programs to pay back their stakeholders. Facebook is the start of more changes to come in social media, hold on to your hats. Reality is catching-up to free use social networks and what being online really means to a world that shrinks by the nano-second where ultimately, I do hate to say, money makes the world go around even in cyberspace.
  
  

I am currently working on a strategic planning project and I am incorporating the Balanced Scorecard developed by Robert Kaplan and David Norton. It got me thinking about how one might apply the Scorecard to social media strategies. I know that I am not the first to consider such an approach but I still thought it worthwhile to give you my take on it.

• People (a.k.a. Learning) - Develop Workforce

• Internal - Enhance Operational Efficiencies

• Customers - Grow Market Share Or Share of Wallet

• Financial - Improve Profitability

When an organization is considering its social media strategy, a Balanced Scorecard might look like this:

• People - Develop the social media capability of the workforce

• Internal - Embed social media within operations where possible and appropriate

• Customers - Layer social media onto existing marketing activities

• Financial - Lower cost marketing and customer engagement

From wikis for collaboration and information sharing to CEO’s who tweet, social media can and should become part of an organization’s operational DNA. Granted it may not be possible and/or appropriate in every case but companies are changing how they create and share information as part of their collaborative efforts. In some ways, social media can be credited for making the walls between business units or silos and management layers more porous and less of an obstacle standing in the way of solving problems and making progress.

The timeless adage "don't fix it if it isn't broken" is the opposite of what thought leaders aim to do. Seth Godin, an illustrious thought leader, recently stated, "want to know why so many companies can't keep up with Apple? It's because they compromise, have meetings, work to fit in, and fear the critics...". As a thought leader is he right?

In 2009 we saw a horrific number of U.S. businesses being broken as bankruptcies rose 38% according to Reuters. Bloomberg reports 8 million jobs were lost due to the recession over the same period. Without a doubt a complex set of factors had its insidious hand in the restructuring of corporations and American lives. But how much of this demise was caused by the malaise of satisfied accomplishments that accompanied years of success and seemingly endless prosperity?

Thought leaders have a duty to assist in the continued destruction of our prior templates for how businesses run. It was a tragedy that the grim reaper of recession tapped market forces on the shoulder and gave a wake-up call, but it was due to happen.

Sally Hogshead, has become a thought leader as an after affect of getting marketing results, winning a variety of industry awards and becoming a best selling author. In her latest blog she started with, "I believe you do not have to be an asshole, or work for one, in order to do great work". Great thought leaders call out the elephant in the room and remind us of the obvious so we come back down to earth and move on to better things.

Who Is Helping You Destroy Status Quo?
As you look forward into 2010 ask yourself what criteria you are using for finding a thought leader that helps you destroy your old ways of compromising. If you're reading books and blogs and attending corporate events that reinforce what you know, you're not in the presence of a thought leader. Whether you are a business owner, an executive or someone making their way through the shuffle of life we owe it to the grim reaper of 2009 to not settle back into status quo.

Mitch Joel, President of Twist Image, reminds us how to filter a noisy world of advice and determine who is the right thought leader for us, "If you're following someone and they're really not adding any value to your life (your growth, development and education), drop them." Think of all the books, blogs and articles you've read during your lifetime. How many people have really helped you destroy your old way of thinking and move onto something better? How much was just noise? Have you been inspired lately to 'destroy your business' based on better advice?

An Opportunity To Participate In Destruction
Share your story below about how you assisted the 'destruction' of a business with your leadership or tell about how a thought leader (in a book, event, coaching, etc.) helped you destroy your old thinking and move into innovation. 2 free tickets (worth $399 each) will go to the person who has the best comment below for The Art Of Marketing held in Toronto on Tuesday March 2nd. Note: tickets are not transferable to cash, collection at the event is required.

Reproduced from MarketingVOX - Because it is meant to look fun, putting together a social media campaign - or integrating one into a larger online initiative - can be surprisingly difficult. There are many challenges to capturing and engaging user interests online - starting with finding the right person to lead that effort, says Andrew Ballenthin, president of Sol Solutions.

That point was driven home last December when Ballenthin put together Blog-Off II a 12-day, seven-judge contest to test participants' qualitative and quantitative effectiveness in social media marketing fundamentals.

From that marathon he concluded the following about what to look for when hiring a social media expert, which he shared with MarketingVOX in an exclusive interview.

According to Ballenthin, the person you should be looking for will have:

1. A significant business and communications background - preferably a minimum of 3 to 5 years in marketing, journalism or media. "This forms a foundation for understanding effective communication strategies and implementation."

2. A history of success in their communications background. "You wouldn’t let a mechanic work from a text book or just on their own car before they safety your car." Look for someone who has proven repeatedly he or she can deliver expectations for program results that have real business value.

3. A series of measureable accomplishments in social media that can be independently validated. "Having ten thousand followers on Twitter means you learned once how to create this achievement but an expert is someone who has achieve above average accomplishments several times."

4. A true understanding of your customer’s relationship with social media before proposing a program. Your customers may not want anything to do with Twitter of Facebook or never have used LinkedIn MarketingVOX, Ballenthin says. "An expert should build a vibrant profile of your customer’s online behavior and model a program that’s good for them versus the latest gadget and trendy sites to go with."

5. Straight answers when you ask about measuring social media campaigns. 'Social media is too new to be effectively measured' is a common and erroneous claim, he says. "In marketing we understanding that we need a baseline on what we want to change in a business before implementing a new program. If you want to improve retention, cross selling, nurture marketing, prospect acquisition, brand loyalty and use social media marketing to try to achieve that, run the program and measure if there was a difference in these areas or not.

6. A focus on getting a return on investment. "This is where mainstream marketing backgrounds are important. An expert should be interested in validating a financial improvement not just giving you cost."

7. Clear methodologies. Social media is not new anymore. There’ve been hundreds of articles and cases studies on what does and does not work and effective processes. An expert should have a clear set of methodologies they work with to get consistently replicable results otherwise you may have a one hit wonder, if that.

8. An emphasis on an integrated marketing. Social media success rarely happens on its own. "Great social media campaigns require databases, emailing, advertising, publicity, industry influencers and more. It’s exceptional that social media marketing can just happen because it’s a good idea in the right place, other media needs to support effective results."