My New Phone

I've been in the market for a new phone since the day I purchased my 8125. What a brick. I've had to have the device replaced by AT&T twice.

So I regularly make trips to the AT&T store looking at what's new. Given our requirements here at the church and what I've learned about my own preferences here where my specs:

• Win Mo 5 or 6
  
• Must have "real" buttons for dialing
  
• Must be small and somewhat attractive
  
• Must be a phone first and a PDA second
  
• Must be a good PDA
  
• Must have at least pretty good battery life (i.e. shouldn't need a charge mid-day)
  

Things I realized I didn't care about:

• WiFi
• Touchscreen
  
• Cameras (although nice they usually aren't any good anyway, no matter what the megapixel count is)
  

I found it the other day in the Pantech Duo. 

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CNET reviews

Pantech Duo Website

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The phone is as small as my wife's Samsung Sync flip phone, has both a qwerty keyboard and a real phone keypad (due sliders) and if you didn't know it you would think it was only a phone. It runs Win Mo 6 smartphone edition. 

The exterior is pretty good looking. As a bonus it also has 3G wireless. It doesn't have WiFi but see above on that one.

I could forgive quite a few since on it's appearance alone but here are a few quirks after having used it for a week:

• Sometimes freezes up. Hey it's still a MS product.
  
• Keyboard is a little hard to type on.
  
• Couple of personlizing things I would like. Most seem to be an issue with the fact that I'm using smartphone instead of pocket pc.
  
• Vibrate isn't super strong, but it is quiet. 
  

My Christmas Prayer

Humbled. That's what you were. You chose to take a form so beneath you it's incomprehensible. Comparing it to me becoming something like a maggot doesn't even begin the comparison of what you did for me.

Perfection. What heaven is and what you are. You introduction was without notice to most of the world. You met earth and immediately were covered with it. Disease, dirt, and depravity were you cherubim. They surrounded you but could not overcome you.

Dirty. What we were. Instead though you decided to get your hands dirty. Pierced actually. So that we could be clean again. We were trash. Because of you we are treasured.

Overwhelmed. That's me. To think that you would do all of this so that I would be clean. That you would leave, humble yourself from perfection to become dirty so that I could be treasured...overwhelming.

Thankful. Is what I can never be. I can't start to be thankful for the sacrifice you made. I can try. I'll never understand. I can't comprehend the contrast. I can't.

Rest. Is what you tell me to do. In your lap. In your arms. In your grace. So I will. Until the day that I can be risen up with you, to see your perfection. I'll realize my own dirt that you humbled yourselves to save me from so that I can be humble enough to finally thank you the way you deserve.

Speechless. What I am until that day.

Ministry is like a used-car

A friend of mine, Tony Dye, recently purchased about a 15 year old Acura Integra. As he took me for a spin and told me about the car he told me more about the person that had owned it than he did about the car.

He described how meticulous the person was in caring for the car, how in order the records were, how carefully the car had been driven. All of these details told me how good the car was by how good the person was to the car. It wasn't a matter of love, we all love our cars, even when we hate them. It was a matter of care and the realization of that love into affection.

So, question: How many people would want to inherit your ministry after you? How are your records (could anyone pick it up if you suddenly moved to Hawaii)? How many people could successfully adopt your ministry?

A sinking dinghy

I've been reminded recently of the dangers of not focussing on internal communications.

When an organization with a lot of things to be positively proud of stops communicating them to those on the inside terrible things happen.

People need a sense of pride in what they're doing, accomplishing. When organizational pride is removed or not fed people will go looking for that satisfaction. They will attempt to find it in individual or departmental sources, or any way they can.

Instead of pushing the whole ship forward they jump ship, grab a dinghy and start paddling.

Which do you think can go further though, a huge ship or one guy in a dinghy?

How do we convince people that the ship/process isn't a hindrance?

Things I don't want to do (maybe there's 10)

<DRAFT> Sort of- I guess a public draft.

10 Things I hate doing/feeling:

1. I don't want to say no.
2. I don't want to be perceived as a road block.
3. I don't want to have to justify good practices.
4. I don't want to have to charge people, even if it was their mistake.
5. I don't want to lose my calling.
6. I don't want people to not like me.
7. I don't want to care so much.
8. I don't want to care so little.
9. I don't want to sacrifice relationship for process.
10. I don't want to have mistrust for those around me.

10 Things I wish I had more of:

1. I do want to help people everyday.
2. I want to make people's day.
3. I want to advance ministry.
4. I want to love on people personally and professionally.
5. I want to be affirmed in my calling.
6. I want to care more.
7. I want to care less.
8. I want to surround myself with fun, Christ centric people.
9. I want support from above and below.
10. I want Christ to be honored in my every action.
    

It's cold

It's a cold day here in Atlanta. That is there are a few patches of ice on the ground and I needed to wear a coat this morning.

As I was driving in I had the thought from my childhood. My dad once told me air conditioners don't make the air cold, that take the heat out of the air. Sort of made sense. So I had this thought, cold is the absence of heat, sort of like black is the absence of color. The edges of the universe are cold, because there is no sun to heat them. The default if you will is cold.

Similar in people, our default is sin and negativity. Negativity can be seen as the absence of positivity or some counter active force. You have to have something counter active to the negativity to create a positive environment. You will always be going against the default.

This has another implication as well: The amount of positivity can only be equal to the ratio of the positive force to the environment. Since the environment is inherently negative you have to have a significant ratio of positivity to create an overall positive environment.

The problem we're all left with is how can we create enough positive force to counter act our negative tendencies?

Flip Video- First Review

From one of our global outreach teams: 

Thanks to Communications for the use of the “just over $100 Flip video camera” in Sao Paulo, Brazil & Buenos Aires, Argentina November 27- December 5, 2007.  Brian & I filmed 60 minutes, dumped the files on a laptop, and then took another half hour or so of footage.  Here’s my review:

I found it to be very user-friendly, considering I’d never used a video camera before. All I had to do was turn it on and push record!  Timid GO Journey team members will definitely appreciate that, as well as its small size (fit in my purse so I had it with me every minute of the trip), the ease of getting it through airport security, and its use of simple AA batteries.  Not having to charge it came in handy in countries where you need an adapter to use electrical outlets.  The Flip camera didn’t run out of juice until 7 days into the trip.

From what I can tell viewing our clips on a computer, the quality is good, but I am eager to verify this by seeing a clip incorporated into a video and played on the big screens.

For GO Journey teams, I’ll need a quick instruction sheet for:

1. How to use the Flip video software to dump the files (and that saving them in a new folder each time will mean no duplicate names)

2. How to use Real Time to view them on the computer

3. How to post clips to a blog

Crystal Steadham

Global Outreach Mobilization

Perimeter Church, Duluth, GA

Flip Video

After many ministry requests to borrow a camera, about two months ago I purchased a cute little device called a Flip Video recorder to see if it could meet our needs. 

We purchased them to be a small, fast, and inexpensive device that used an international power standard that would allow people to vlog from anywhere in the world pending an internet connection.

I was so impessed when I unpacked the box. First of all it was small and inexpensive. Given that the request came mostly from our Global Outreach ministry that was a big deal. We have cameras, but the thought of losing a high-def Panny over the side of a ship (don't ask) just didn't seem like good stewardship. 

I intentionally didn't read the directions. I'm a pretty tech savvy guy but wanted to see how easily I could use it. Took me about 30 seconds to figure out how to install the battery, turn it on and shoot the video.

Getting the videos off was equally as easy. The device has it's own USB the "flips" out so that you can attach it to your computer. The software contains all the needed drivers and doesn't actually "install" but instead runs off the device. Tony Dye did a great first user experience post on his blog, tonydye.net.

We just sent this little device oversees with one of GO teams, which was it's original intent.So far our global ministry has asked us to purchase somewhere between four and six of the devices. 

Overcommitted

I was in downtown Decatur today, waiting for a friend, when I saw this truck. At first I didn't even notice, just looked like a moving truck. Then, since I had time I started reading it. I laughed out loud when I read the first line of the ad.

Truth is though I feel that way all the time. Overcommitted & undertrained. In over my head.

How many of you feel that way? How many of you have to feel that way? What do you specialize in? What could you let go of? What are you willing to let go of?

Website- A brief survey #1

I can't tell you how many times I've sat down to write this post but been called away by the urgent. I had a choice I could write about what I'm doing or be doing it. For me it was way more cool to be doing it.

A quick history on the Perimeter website (since I was in middle school when some of this was happening pardon any parts that aren't perfectly precise):

10 years ago we launched a single page billboard website to give people basic information on Perimeter.

During the next five years that grew to the point we needed a CMS and to decentralize maintenance of the site. We decentralized the site so that each ministry could update their own pages. At that time we had still only a few pages (less than 100).

Today Perimeter has grown to around 250 ministries with about 1,500 pages on our site. We have 33 subwebs (read different subdomains) and a myriad of looks as we've sought to keep the web up to date.

3 months ago we wiped the slate clean and brought in an awesome design/hosting group called eye-speak. This team is amazing. Randy and I sat down and archicted the site for them and they went away for about two months and did that programming stuff that I have become uncomfortably comfortable with.

Two weeks ago we went beta with the site. We sent out the link to the staff and encouraged the spread it around. We wanted as much feedback as we could get. After all, we couldn't think of everything.

Now next week we go full live. DNS servers will be changed, redirects will happen and most likey pandmonium will occur.

Tony Dye, the IT guy has encouarged me over and over to be documenting the process on this and I haven't, see my first statement again.

Next I'll post on what our process has been and then ultimately what we came up with.

Worship Well?

Is worship intended for the worshipper or the worshipee?

How often have you heard someone say, "that style of worship just doesn't appeal to me," or, "I prefer a more _____ stye of worhsip."

Worship isn't for *us*, it's for Him, the One, the Creator. It's like going to a birthday party and being upset that the cake isn't our favorite flavor.

I wonder if I could fully grasp that how my worship would change.

Art

You start to fell almost paralyzed by this idea of how grand something hs to be to be legitatmate art.
Shepard Fairy, Juxtapoz Magazine, Nov. 2007

The takeaway

It's been almost a month since MinistryCom. I left with so much stuff in my head I wanted to blog it but couldn't. So I've been digesting over the last month and this is the takeaways I'm left with.

1. You don't have it so bad. There are many ministries at other places that are less resourced, less appreciated, more overworked. No matter who you are there is someone who has it worse. Which leads to:

2. You are not alone. It was amazing how many people I heard with the same struggles as me. It taught me that I need to be better, the situation is the reality. I need to adjust my expectation.

3. A brand is a lasting experience not stuff. A brand is not your logo, collateral, or web site. It's how you make people feel. A lasting impression has a lot more impact than a brochure.

4. Web 2.0 is way more than I ever though. Matter of fact it is everything. Web 2.0 is how people interact with you. Our constituents don't want data hand fed to them (well actually they do). They also want to interact with that data, make it theirs and manipulate it.

And a few more but that's all that fell out right now. More to follow.

Is it true?

I've heard Kem Myers speak about. I've read her blog but until just now I never knew exactly what she meant when she said, "everyone doesn't hate you, it just feel like it." Maybe I "knew" what she meant but really thought it was hyperbole.

It's not.

If you work in communications, especially church communications, for more than six months you're going to understand what she means.

I got vendors that won't call me back, a wife that falls asleep alone most nights (ps I'm typing this at 11:35 p.m.) and ministries that I'm sure hate me. Hate's a strong word. Yep, accurate.

The funny thing is I love them. I am desperately passionate about getting their message out, well. Maybe that's the problem. Everyone knows the old triangle, good, cheap and fast, now pick two. To be honest I'm not sure where the breakdown is.

Do they expect too much or are just difficult? Am I slow and incompetent? Is the reality of the situation unfortunate? Who knows.

Well hopefully I will. I am desperate to find out how I can serve these guys. I want to create a team atmosphere where we're all on the same team working together towards the common goal. Nothing illustrated how obviously not true that is as a meeting I had today.

A ministry partner made mention of bringing a volunteer with a particular skill with THEM into a meeting with US so that he could be sure he understood us. WOW! I didn't think we were that bad. I thought that was what I did, protect them from the over-the-head vendors out there. Gut check!

So I like lists. Here's my steps to getting back to that team spirit:
1. Find out what they think about me. I hate surveys but they have their place. I'm going to try to get some candid feedback from a web survey on how we can best serve them and what roadblocks they feel like they face. I'm also going to keep making my daily walks around. I want to be around the ministries and hear them.
2. I'm going to start trying to heal hurts as I find them. Sometimes its not hard to find the hurts and sometimes they're more difficult. I'm going to make a point to start rebuilding relationship first. Which leads to my next two more subpoints (trying to get to five points, its magic there.)
3. Rebuild relationship. I am going to continue to actively work to build relationship. I'm going to bring them breakfast on a day they have a major ministry event. Show up with extra things they need. Staff an event. Volunteer with them. Pray with and for them. One other thing: My wife serves during our first service and I've taken a semester off from serving. Which means I've got about an hour and a half to do whatever. Going to my office is BAD. So I've started going to each ministry, one a week, and just sitting with them. Doing whatever they need. I WANT to know them.
4. Exceed expectations. This is always a goal but really want to step it up. I want to always be thinking one bigger, smarter and better than they are. That's why they "want" me around.
5. Try not to say no. I thought I'd love the day when I was a decision maker. Yes, no. Horse hockeys. It sucks. I hate saying no. I want to say yes. Honestly, it's easier. But now I want to say yes in all the right ways.

If there's one thing I wish my ministries knew it's that I love them. Work and product aside, I love them. I love what they do. I love what I do, and I love serving them. That and $4 will get me a venti, non-fat, no whip mocha at 140 degrees at Starbucks.

A non-law abiding citizen

I'm normally a pretty law abiding type of guy. Sure I get the occasional speeding ticket for 30 over the speed limit but I'm haven't say committed any federal crimes lately.

Today I saw a device that makes me want to take that risk. We've all been there knee deep in a heated meeting. Debating the finer points of acronyms that I don't even understand. When suddenly the meeting leader gets a phone call that derails the whole thing.

Maybe you're in church and the pastor is bringing it down. Closing the service. God's really moving. Then that familiar Cingular (now AT&T) ring tone.

Being severely ADD this really kills me. I saw a new device on engadet.com today that blocks most GSM signal for a mere $166. Seems like a small price to pay for the chance to break major laws and stop meeting disruptions right?

The non-post

Hey guys, I feel like I should write a whole post on not posting on your blog. Let's consider the past month or so a ministry sponsored experiment on what happens when you don't post.

That said I haven't stopped thinking. I've got quite a few things I hope to get up in the next day or so. One is basically the whole thrust of what I'm thinking from a philosophical strategic communications direction. Hey I'm thinking book deal here.

So check back soon for more rocking good and sometimes plain fun thoughts on communication.

(Tony does this even count?)

Fusion- Week 1

I work in a very microsoft dominant environment. Being one of a few Mac guys in a PC habitat can present some challenges.

I've overcome most of those through the use of a couple of Automator scripts to help mount network drives. Recently though everyone went to office 2007.

So I needed a solution for playing elegantly in their world. After all the remainder of the organization are my clients. I have to interface with them in the way they expect it.

After reading several reviews and seeing a great comparison chart in MacWorld (May 2007) it looks like VMWare's Fusion is the way to go.

We installed it last week and I've been trying to make the change over. Here are my notes as of week one:

• It is amazing to be able to have a full version of windows alongside my native Mac apps.
• It is giving me a lot of functionality that I had lost being siloed on a Mac
• The program runs quickly and I haven't had a single crash yet (even though it's running windows) PS-- I went to send an email while typing this... It crashed.
• I love that it can see all my peripherals including all my drives and anything plugged into a USB outlet.
• Unity mode adds a cool element that allows me to use Expose to view ALL windows open, instead of looking at a window within a window.
• Drag and drop has worked pretty well. Dragging an attachment from an email to the desktop is a little buggy.
• One negative- It is chugging my system down. I typically have the entire Adobe CS3, Entourage, Stickies, Itunes, Ichat and FireFox open at all times. My system (2.33 core duo with 3G of RAM) usually handles that effortlessly. Since installing fusion it's been a challenge when working with large files.
• One other thing making the switch challenging is email. It doesn't look first at my contact list so I can't just start typing and it picks up the name. Sure that can be changed in some option menu.

Overall I like it. It's working pretty well and it allows me to function the way I need to, without an additional computer. I'll keep you updated on whether or not I can make the switch. I'm still keeping entourage close by and reaching for it often.

_sl

My take

Viral marketing is the most powerful. If you can't get your own people to proselytize their friends towards your product back away from the marketing. You should start to investigate your product instead of your communications.

Reactions?

God thinks he's funny

In case you didn't know it's blistering down here. It's been around the one hundred mark for some time. Today it's 95.

So, it made sense when I came back in from lunch knowing that I would have to leave again quickly that I left my windows down.

When I turned my car back I was greeted by the sound of static. My FM transmitter was gone. They took the ipod too.

First thing when I sat down at my desk this popped up. God's funny. In all things praise him. Whoever took it needs an ipod more than me.

First Impressions

I saw this as I was driving the other day. This was a small church near my home.

Question is what should a church marquee say? What should it communicate?

I'd love to get feedback then I'll put up a post on a couple of my thoughts.

What do you think?

A couple of months ago on Friday at 3:00 p.m. I got a request for a design, for that weekend.
The event was an evening of worship with the them of a disturbance. That as Christians we would be a disturbance to the status quo around us. The impetus for positive change.

I laid out the card quickly and showed it to a few people. One designer that I respect a lot responded with, "that's really disturbing, in a good way."

So what do you think?

What I learned from Giants and Spiders.

How much do you have to do today? How full is your calendar? How many tasks are there in your inbox? Okay, now the tough one, how many emails will you have to ignore today because there isn't enough time?

If you know me at all lately you know that the answers to some of those questions for me would be unbelievable. Write down all the things you've done over the last five years. All the brainstorming sessions, tasks, errands, and projects. Now do those over the next three months. That's pretty much been me.

I told my supervisor, Randy, the other day that some days it feels like all of these plates are spinning and you have to select which one you're going to let fall. Some days you just know you're going to need some new plates. But in my field that isn't an option. A plate is a relationship and those can't be bought.

This is the stress level I've been living with lately. It's manifested itself in my relationships and in my body. My wife is amazing. She is so supportive but some days she just looks at me and doesn't know what to do.

All this climaxed this weekend. Through a set of circumstances that I was unable to control (not that I couldn't but just wasn't able to) I was left heartbroken, or at least just broken. I wrote my resignation (I'm not turning it in, it was just a creative exercise to get some stuff out).

The next night my family watched the movie Facing the Giants. I've heard from many people that they felt the turning point of the movie was a scene were the coach encouraged a player to finally give his 100% towards the team effort. To not give up. The player achieved more than he thought he could.

That may well have been the climax but certainly not the turning point. The turning point was the night before. The coach completely in despair, did the only thing he knew. He turned to God. In what was an amazing scene his wife wakes up and sees and empty pillow beside her. She looks up to see her husband in his study reading. She turns, gets on her knees and prays.

Oh to have that faith that the first place I turn was to God not to my own understanding. Proverbs 3: 5-6 says, "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight."

Tonight my wife and I were watching Charlotte's Web. Have you figured out I love movies (maybe I should write why one day)? Thirty minutes or so into the movie Wilber finds out his fate. He isn't a pig, he's pork. He's crushed. He cries out "I want to live."

Charlotte drops down and tries to console him. This leads her to a promise to save him. When he asks how she doesn't know but reconfirms her promise. Wilber accepts that and walks away.

Oh to have that kind of faith. His very life is on the line but he trusts his existence to a spider he can barely see. But we have a Big God. Our God is eternal, immutable, self-sufficient, wise and just. How much more should I lean on Him.

As I was talking this through with Sarah we started naming off the times God has been faithful. We've seen many miracles just in the short time since we've been married. God has protected us and our family.

Why then when faced with times of trouble am I not on my knees? Why do I think Outlook and I can tackle anything?

If we ever understand the grandeur of God we couldn't be paid to get off our faces.

Go back and look at the answers you had to the first questions I asked. Confess how many times you think you could solve the problem. Reflect on how much you prayed about each.

I heard it attributed to Ben Franklin (although I've also heard rumor he was an atheist) that he once said, "I often find myself so busy that I don't have time not to pray."

Psalm 9 says:
9 The LORD is a refuge for the oppressed,
a stronghold in times of trouble.

10 Those who know your name will trust in you,
for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.

_SL

Three steps (and growing) to reboot your creativity

Let's face it, for all of us the well runs dry from time to time. No matter what your field nobody wants to continue looking at things the same way. New ideas drive the world. Original ideas change it.

We all want to challenge ourselves not to walk through life like a child at Disney World, simply accepting the facades. I've written down some ideas that help me to stay unique even when I'm creatively constipated.

I've generalized them so that they could work in most vocations:

1. Go back to your roots.
Nature played a heavy part in who we are but there was also a time when we were at our creative peak. I was a jazz musician, professionally for a very short time, I loved to write and photograph almost anything. For me these caused me to look at things in a unique way, each or their own reason.
Go back to the time you felt most creative. Think about things you enjoyed do them again. If your a programmer go back and write a simple and fun game you've done 100 times. Go back and find that first love. There's a reason you are doing what you are. Try to find that reason.

2. Go old school.
I'm not the "good ole days" type of guy. I'm too young for that. But we have allowed our minds to get lazy, especially in the way we entertain our minds. Listening to someone read a story on the radio takes me creativity than watching TV. Reading a book takes more still. Stop letting the world feed you. Create your own thoughts.
There's a reason the stereotypically smart people listen to classical music. It's complex, the chords change, there is dissonance. Listen to music made in the 1950's or earlier. After that period music began to follow established, simple rhythms and structures.
Take well composed photos, write, talk, sing, pick up an instrument. Your mind is a muscle. If you want that power there when you need it you have to train for it. Mentally if you want to be a power lifter you have to mentally train like one.

3. Get simple.
Go back to the basic concept that are fundamental to your field. For me its just got basic composition and layout. Too often we look at something so much that we begin to accept compromise on the basics. Go back and remember the things you did that landed you the job or the first time you did something that made a friend say, "You should be a..."

4. Pray.
You want to be creative? God is the creator. He invented creation. He is the root of all creativity. Realizing that you have never had an original idea is the beginning to finding your unique voice.

If you've got something that works for you that can be generalized to any field drop me a comment. I'll update the post with more.

Bottom line is find your own unique voice. Don't walk through life accepting the structures put there by people less intelligent than you. Question everything. Create something.

The calm after the vent

So if you read last week you know I was kind of going through an internal crisis about how do I/we unify 242 screaming voices into a coherent choir.

Thanks to everyone who left feedback.

Question though- Should I try to make those messages the same? If so, to what extent.

Trust me I know this flies in the face of all traditional marketing and communications thinking but I'm mentally going down a path here.

Also don't go to the other extreme, absolutely I think that an organization as a whole should have one key message (or maybe a couple) to its audience.

What if all of the message are trying to achieve the same goal but with different messages. Is that noise?

I played football and ran track in high school. I remember running, focusing hard on the goal and all around me people were yelling. Sometimes I could focus in on one person saying GO! GO! GO! but not most of the time.

Most of the time I heard yelling. But immediately I know if they were yelling for me or against me.

Think of it, 1,000 voices yelling different messages all with the same goal. It worked. I knew if I had messed up or succeeded by the tone.

Is that how corporate messaging should be? Different voices yelling at the same time different messages pushing on to the same goal.

As I've mentioned we are in the middle of a rebrand. I was surprised to find out during the focus groups that people get us. Is that because we are doing it right despite my thoughts otherwise? Everyone cheering, everyone saying press on to the goal.

ingenious?

Sounds errogant huh? I like the definition I found on google the best.

• imaginative: marked by independence and creativity in thought or action
  
• adroit: skillful (or showing skill) in adapting means to ends
• clever: showing inventiveness and skill

What I covet the most

My boss, Randy Renbarger, is truly one of the greatest communicators I know. This is a guy who has a broad perspective on almost every topic, patience with our clients, and a servant heart that just can't be muted. Yesterday he and I were talking about a discussion he was having with other communications professionals in the church world. All of them are giants in their own right, and I look up to them.

During the conversation, as I understand it, the topic of communications noise was brought up. Too many messages, too little space and difficulty unifying that message. This is the core of branding, and it seems everyone is struggling with it. At our church we have about 250 ministries, all competing for "air play."

The complication is there just isn't that much space available. So obviously you start trying to unify messages so that you can speak once but include 10 groups. But, does that do any good? Aren't you still watering down their message and yours.

Another obvious answer is reduce the number of messages that you have, i.e. the number of ministries. Wow, is that tough. How do you tell a ministry seeking to reach out to battered wives that there just isn't enough interest, or a divorce support group that there isn't any more space. Out of all of the professionals on Randy's conference call only one said they could reduce the number of ministries.

So I'm back to my question how can I support and communicate the message of all of those groups. I truly don't have an answer on this. I'm looking. If you have a map let me know.

The Big Vent

I've been banging my head against a wall for months now, literally. I mean I have a headache and my stress hacky sack is starting to leak all over my desk. I can't get this frustration out about how some churches seem to communicate so clearly and flawlessly (and in a fun, cool way) and I feel like we are at an impasse of uncoolness.

On the surface I would identify it as better design or more money but that's not it. They have something that seems like a constantly moving target- a unified message. Somehow these guys have figured out how to reduce the clutter and increase the impact.

I mean this is the most obvious communication principle in existence, concentrate the message to increase the impact. It's just like a water hose, turn the nozzle to jet and a single, concentrated stream of water comes and moves stuff, it has impact. Turn it to mist and millions of tiny droplets come out that have no impact on anything and barely get your feet wet.

I don't covet my neighbors car, house, wife, donkey, anything like that, I covet his unified message.

I'm sitting here swooning over the idea of designing for a concentrated brand message. It would be so easy. I would know exactly what it was about, who it was for, oh it would be so swell.

There's more to come on this topic. I want to explore it and I beg for input. It's a given that my organization isn't going to start doing fewer things so I want to discover how to continually unify those things into a cohesive message that makes sense.

P.S.- As I've mentioned in my other posts we are in the middle of a brand audit with Aspire!One. Our hope is the product of that audit will illuminate how to do some of this. Despite my feelings of no unified messaging during their focus groups they discovered that people actually know exactly who we are and can identify with all of our key messages. Maybe our frustration is just the byproduct of the filtering we do everyday.

I quit... the WORLD

In the past few weeks I've been threatened by my neighbor, flicked off and been given a dirty look. My wife being in the car for all of the incidents confirmed I wasn't the offender.

Stuff like that makes me want to give up, on humanity. I want to quit the world. We have to remember the impact that something so flippant has on the receiver.

I would like to encourage everyone to remember we are all pretty close neighbors on this planet.

If you are a Christian you are commanded in multiple places to love your brother. In the last few days I've been reading through Hebrews and found it twice. Hebrews 12 specifically says,"Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord."

Just a reminder- Be nice.

Quality v. Value

I started reading a book yesterday by Leslie Cabarga called the Logo, Font and Lettering Bible. Not sure about the term bible but it's a great book so far, mainly focusing on the holistic creation of logos.

In the first chapter the author quickly jumps on soap box about the art of hand lettering. She makes a statement (my paraphrase) that today the contribution that many designers bring to the table amounts to nothing more than font selection.

I thought about that a while. On the surface it appeared to be a royal smack down to me. However, I went on to read that custom fonts for new logos often go for around $20,000. Boy, am I in the wrong field.

As I thought I began to consider should I be creating custom fonts and lettering for my clients. Am I cheating them by not? But most of my clients couldn't afford a fraction of that for a complete identity package, and in some cases my work is pro bono.

Does the use of existing fonts cheat my clients out of a truly unique mark or am I providing them value that they couldn't otherwise afford.

At first glance it seems to be a question of quality or value.

I would love to get some input from anyone passing through, designer or not. Actually, even better if not a designer. That gives the designers that read a client's perspective.

~sl

Make Clients Want What You Give

"A good thing about being an in-house designer is that once I built up a reputation, upper management began to trust my judgement. But there are still times when communication breaks down. I find that if I visually show them what they want and they can see that it doesn't work, then they tend to rely on and trust my opinion more. Unfortunately, that means more 'wasted' work on my end up front, but payoff later."
--Kimberly Conger

My new favorite thing...

Anyone who is around me at all has heard me raving about this site but for those that haven't heard yet, I love Lynda.com.

Lynda is a training site. It offers a huge library of training videos on almost any piece of software imaginable. Each video based training is about 3-10 minutes long allowing me to take a quick class during moments of downtime. Memberships are only $25 a month and include unlimited classes.

I can't tell you how this has empowered me. For instance I'm extremely comfortable in Photoshop but not Illustrator. I can get around but I wouldn't say proficient. I find myself running back to Photoshop well before I need to. So now I get to take the time to learn more and have a resource feeding it to me. How great!

Illustrator down, next Flash.

Wisdom From the Stars

A quote on my Starbucks cup:
It's relationships, not programs, that change children. A great program simply creates the environment for healthy relationships to form between adults and children. Young people thrive when adults care about them on a one-to-one level, and when they also have a sense of belonging to a caring community.

~Bill Milliken
Founder and vice chairman o Communities in Schools, author of Tough Love and The Last Dropout.

It is possible that applies to more than children.

I love woot!

For those of you who have never wooted before what a joy. They even have fun 404(ish) errors. Went to check out today's product and got the enclosed image.

Imagine you were creative. What would you do?

Let's face it I'm not creative. Yes, I am employed as a designer, sort of. Yes, I do make things that people later see in print. But I'm not creative.

I think my designs stink. I think other people think my designs stink. I wonder if it hurts my printer to actually produce my designs.

Flashback to the other day at the HOW conference in Atlanta (I want to post on that but I'm not sure what is worth writing). I was sitting in a session with Sharon Werner, the brains behind brands like Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day and 10 Cane Rum. She was speaking on packaging and how to give packaging personality. She said that at her agency they personify a project, to the level of defining what kind of shoes it would wear. Then everything they do gets tested and compared to that persona.

I started thinking about that. I've always personified everything. I used to personify the letters of the alphabet. I always felt sorry for U because it seemed so isolated from the other vowels. OK, maybe I'm telling a little too much about myself.

Never the less I started thinking about personifying things. During one of the breaks I needed to work on a logo for a client that had a tight turnaround. As I was working I asked myself this question: Imaging you were creative, what would you do?

It seemed simple yet profound. If I were a creative person would I add a flourish here, would I let this go to print, would I take this client? All of a sudden I began to give character to my creative self. I manifest a whole new personality (any psychiatrists reading this can contact me via email). This was my creative persona.

I've now gone so far as to use an inflatable Jerry French as the visual representation of this character.

I was surprised in one other the HOW sessions when the speaker asked how man of you are really good designers and a majority of the room raised their hands. This is not for them. They know/think they are good. But many people I know question the validity of their creative ability.

Many times I've considered giving up design, it's too frustrating. I can't though. I'm an addict. I love it. This idea of portraying the creative part of me as something outward has had an amazing impact on my work thus far. I don't feel the pressure or the rejection like I may have in the past. It's not me, I'm just doing what Jerry said.

I may not be creative but Jerry is.

Four ways to train people to ignore you. (borrowed)

I was reading a post on CZ Marketing's website that I thought was interesting.

For the complete text follow the link.

Top Four ways to train people to ignore you.

1. Send out something for the sake of it. (press release anyone?)

2. Everything is urgent.

3. Not understanding how to properly utilize your website for you constituents.

4. Expect branding to generate sales.

Who can define branding? (the same way twice)

The concept of branding may be one of the most talked about, misunderstood, and debated topic in the world of communications. To some it means creative collateral, advertising, logos or slogans.

I've been looking around for resources that describe what branding is really about. Even as of a year ago I thought branding was a good logo that was used correctly. I found an article (which I can't seem to find on a webpage anywhere and is copyrighted so I won't reproduce it) where Roland Jacobs is being interviewed by CZ Marketing. Roland is the managing director of Aprire!One, a branding agency specializing in church branding.

In the article Roland breaks down branding to a key message that directly reflects your mission. The brand is in the message and every touch point you have is part of that message.

So it isn't the creative although that supports it. It's about taking a clear look at the mission of your organization and determining how to convey that message to your audience. You can immediately recognize when a company is doing that poorly, their message seems frayed. If you can't quickly identify what you at least think they are about then there's a problem with the message.

Volvo seems to be a great example of good branding. What are they about? Safety right? I went to the Volvo cars USA site and the first text I saw was "The luxury car that treats life like the greatest luxury of all." They have clearly defined who they are and everything they do supports that.

Creative is a huge part of what a brand is. A great design can inspire feelings and emotions that can't be conveyed through a text tagline. Supporting your message with graphics is important. What if Volvo told me they were about safety but had a cheap pixelated website. I'm going to think they make cheap cars and they've lost my consumer faith.

To see some of the article I've been reading check out the links to CZ and Aspire!One.

How to organize a creative?

The task list for a creative is a little different than most. We're often called into brainstorming meetings where ideas fly around and it comes down to us to create steps that make the idea happen. Even our daily list of to-do's can change drastically based on deadlines or vendors.

I'm sure you have your own method. Just today I was sitting in a meeting with another guy I seriously respect for his ability as a designer, Britt Collins. I've got my pad and I'm jotting ideas and drawing lines to connect similar points, doodling along the way. Britt across the table from me brought only three neatly folded papers to the table. He laid them out and jotted with extreme precision each idea on one of the three sheets.

All this to say I've been looking at websites that help creative people stay organized. I'll post them here. If you have your own ideas or places please post them here too.

Lastly I came up with my own idea based on the method I've been using since I started working. My printer was kind enough to discount me a few pads. Feel free to rip this idea off if it helps.

behance.com is a site dedicated to making ideas happen. They interview giants in the industry and see how they were able to make it happen. They have an outfitters section with some pads that I really like. They also have an "unscientific" method on how to use them. Thanks to Drew Kimball, who creates some of the best designs I've seen, for the link.

knockknock.biz is a site that I just like. Some of their office pads really interest me and just being on their site gives me ideas. Don't know how much I'll ever use. Thanks to Jason Walch, a guy that just oozes creativity from every large pore on his body, for turning me onto them.

And last- here's what's working for me.




_sl

Our private little sandbox

This week I’m departing from the series on concepts of design for a moment of personal investigation on a topic.

Just the other day my boss came into my office and plopped a magazine down on my desk. “You’ve got to read this,” he said. This is a guy I highly respect and who is a leader in his area so I listen carefully when he gives something such a glowing remark.

Before leaving I threw it into my bag for a read over the weekend. As I was browsing through the articles I came across one written by a guy with some lengthy credentials. The title caught my eye as something I thought I could relate to. So I dove in.

Whatever my expectations were I realized by around the second column that they weren’t going to be met. Don’t get me wrong, the content was great. The author was quoting sources, using proper illustrations, and using a logical story progression.

Technically it should have been a perfect article. The problem was it didn’t say anything to me. It was talking a lot, and quite eloquently, but I didn’t get it.

I thought about this pretty carefully. As I said I was interested in the topic, I was in a proper setting to hear what it had to say, in my normal chair at a quiet time on a Sunday evening. It just didn’t register.

As I went back and read over it a second and then a third time I started to see problems in the writing. First and mainly, the writer was writing for himself. The article was more of a journal entry that had been adapted for publication. Much like a book adapted for screen, it just usually doesn’t live up.

The writer was playing in his own sandbox, making his sandcastle. It was a perfect castle to him and most importantly it made sense. The problem came when someone else wanted to play in his sandbox.

When I came in I didn’t understand the rules or the circumstances of the sandbox. Therefore it made little sense to me.

Looking over it I realized crucial points were left out of the illustrations, gaps were left between supporting resources and his own points, leaving the reading to wonder about their connection.

There is a parallel here with design. Often designers play in their own sandbox. We create complex symbolism and iconography that often is lost before that masses.

However, I don’t believe that the burden of understanding lies on the public in this case. As designers it is our creative task to develop symbolism with significance. If all we ever do is play in our own sandbox then how are we to expect others to understand our meaning when they don’t know our circumstance.I love symbolism. I often spend time looking up color meanings, animal icons and type histories. I want everything to be authentic and meaningful. But when you look at one of my designs will your first instinct be to crack open your laptop and google the colors I used. I would imagine not.

As designers it is our calling to create images with universal application and understanding. We must create design with both meaning and comprehension for everyone. How, is the much more challenging and eternal question.

Avoiding the fatalistic other extreme is equally as difficult. We mustn’t determine that since not everyone will understand that we will only create those things which have no significance.

Erring on one side or the other allows the birthing of design which is not worth the time the public will spend viewing it. We absolutely must strike a balance. Failure to find that higher middle ground only leads to the degradation of the art itself.

The perfect little black dress?

Last week I said that you can classify almost all popular design today into four categories: timeless, retro, grunge, bleeding edge or high tech. Bu what do those style mean and what message do they convey to your clients?

Today I want to look at the first and most classic style of all, timeless design, and what it really means and how it fits into the supermarket of design before us.

Before I do that let’s take a look at something familiar to all of us. Ladies, all of you probably own something you call the perfect black dress, for the guys imagine the perfect white oxford shirt. It’s a mythical thing really but it’s your best friend. It’s something that you feel awesome in. It goes with almost any occasion. It can be counted on.

Now I’m going to borrow from the guys example for a moment. Guys, you all have that shirt in your closet, crisply pressed and hanging ready. Do you even have the perfect tie that always goes with it. It’s a classic right, timeless?

Go check out your dad’s closet. If he still has it, pull out his 20 year old perfect white oxford. Would you were it to the next office party? But it’s timeless right?

Timeless doesn’t mean that it never needs to be updated. Cuts change, collars grow or shrink, buttons are replaced. It’s happened to us all, we’ve reached for the thing that we thought was timeless and realized that it’s gone out of style, not the little black dress or the white oxford but at least the one we have.

Design is similar to this. There is a style that will not fade but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to be updated.

One company that I think does a great job of this is Coca-Cola. That font based logo with the long tail has been there for 20 years. Sure they tried something different but just like new Coke it went away in favor of Coke Classic. They have a timeless logo, but they’ve changed the dressing and the elements around it to keep it cutting edge.

What does that say to us? It says,”We’re consistent and we aren’t changing, always Coca-Cola, but we’re also young, fresh and still cool.”

Now think of another company, Wells Fargo. Wells Fargo is a result of a merger between California-based Wells Fargo & Co. and Minneapolis-based Norwest Corporation in 1998. The new company chose to keep the name Wells Fargo, to capitalize on the 150-year history of the nationally-recognized Wells Fargo name and its trademark stagecoach.

They are banking on the credibility that 150 years of financial service gives them. People every day allow them to carry millions of dollars of their money.

Their logo and trademark, however outdated modern design may claim it to be, conveys that message. To them being outdated is an asset, it means, “We’ve been here, and we’ll be here.”

So are there any characteristics of a timeless design? I think there may be a few. First, they are almost always text based in simple fonts, many times a serif font. This allows background, graphical ornaments and icons to move around them without altering them. They are also usually done in primary colors. Pastels, bold colors, muted colors seem to come and go. Primary colors seem to never be the most popular but they always exist. Lastly, they seem to only consist of very basic shapes if any, i.e. circle, square, etc..

At the end of this series we’ll talk about each of the styles and who they apply to and how they might be able to strengthen your overall design package.

Is your design timeless?

You can mostly classify all popular design today into four categories: timeless, retro, grunge, bleeding edge or high tech. Pretty much anything you see is going to, in some way, fall into one of these categories. Some really masterful design is able to incorporate pieces of each into a single design making an artistic melange of creativity and style.

The thing is, each of these styles means something, it conveys a given message to your audience. For established companies a great concern may be the shelf-life of the design they have.

I have some close friends who would essentially say that the freshness of their companies design doesn’t really have an effect on their perceived ability as a company. They may even take it further to say that their design simply doesn’t matter, that as a company they have to have a design because they need to get information out and that it is expected, but that that design doesn’t necessarily matter.

This just isn’t the case. Let me compare this to something that we are all consumers of, the music industry. There are a lot of songs from decades ago that we still listen to. We all know Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl- in April 2005 the White House officially announced it was on regular rotation on W’s ipod. But it was released in 1967. How many songs from 1967 can you name?

The simple fact is some of them went out of style and some never made it and even others popped in and went out before we really noticed (Milli Vanilli?). What we are talking about here is style. Some of these artists were able to create styles that were cutting edge for their day but didn’t last, some created styles that weren’t even noticed for years, and some created styles that have been recurring hits for 40 years.

You might say, “Well that was their main job but style isn’t my main focus.” Not true, their main focus was to make music, they could have done it a la Mozart or James Brown, it was how they did it that we remember. Artists such as Aerosmith and U2 have been able to prove that they could produce music in many different styles, from ballads to head-banging metal music. Again this just proves they could have presented their message in many different ways, the way they chose made them icons.

In the coming weeks I’m going to talk about the different styles and how I think they impact companies and the marketplace in which they exist. There are pros and cons to each but ultimately it’s about a fit. The design has to fit you and your company. Hang around and see if you think your design is off the rack or custom tailored to your needs.