Playing Mahler: My Response to Boston Terror

ADMAR 2013With chaotic images from Boston still flashing through my mind, I sat with 79 other musicians in the NIH Philharmonia last night to tackle “Titan”–Mahler’s 1st symphony.   The opening movement matched my mood—eerie, somber, haunting. In the violin section, we play a harmonic A for what seems like eons. But soon the lyrical melody kicks in and I’m reminded of the good in this world. And people like Mahler, who, instead of painstakingly assembling bombs to destroy lives, carefully built epic symphonies to last many lifetimes. The fact that Mahler was a Jew whose music was banned by the Nazis, gives me a special sense of triumph as we head into the joyful, Austrian melodies of the second movement. But the third movement forces me to pause and reflect on the lives that were taken, and those that will never be the same, as the somber bass plays “Frere Jacques” in a minor key.  Soon, haunting melodies echo through the winds and strings, me along with them.

Then the triumphant 4th movement is upon us. And I really mean Upon, since the notes bear down at a rapid-fire pace. There is fury and fire and the horrible images return to my mind; then just as suddenly, are swept away by one of the most achingly beautiful melodies in symphonic music.  A yearning towards dawn. There is hope.  Humanity has much to give.

The horns stand up for their triumphant finish. The hall is literally vibrating with sound. So magnificent, it’s actually hard to breathe. The final chords rebound and we all sit frozen, suspended in time.

Guess what, bomb-makers? Our creation is more powerful than your destruction. In the beginning there was The Word, or maybe it was The Note. We the music-makers were here before you. We will outlast you. And what you try to build cannot even fathom what we are already making together. 

If you’re in the DC area and want to hear the NIH Phil play Mahler 1 on Saturday April 27th, details here.

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The Art of Storytelling: Alive and Well in Vegas

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I’m just back from Vegas for NAB—the National Association of Broadcasters Convention. What an awe-inspiring assembly. By the numbers: more than 92,400 attendees, with more than 24,000 from around the world; 1,600 exhibitors in 900,000 net square feet of exhibit space; plus 1,700 press.  The people were broadcast execs, Directors of Photography, audio engineers, producers, directors, and more. Exhibits ranged from DJI Phantom mini-helicopters to suspend Go-Pro cameras to the latest Black Magic pocket camera , plus the latest in Digital Asset Management systems, sound systems, lighting rigs, you name it. Over at Post Production World, where I was teaching, packed classes included Digital Publishing, an all-day Time-Lapse and Panoramic DSLR workshops at Red Rock Canyon and Nelson Nevada Ghost Town.

What does it all mean?

The art of storytelling is alive and well. For a while, we thought the internet killed stories. It certainly made it harder for print newspapers and nightly news shows to compete with a new 24/7 news cycle. But now, the digital revolution has democratized the art of creating content. And NAB is proof that there’s a storyteller’s tool for every price point. And while the conversations were about new gear or bandwidth or asset management or distribution platforms,  at their heart, the discussions were about how to get great stories to audiences who are consuming them at an exponential rate.

Sure, we can sometimes let the newest gadgets distract us from the Real Tools of storytelling:  great ideas, great scripts, great interviews, a dab of decent project management (some of the things I taught) to be sure we’re telling the best stories in the most compelling way.  But the accessibility of low price-point cameras and editing tools had clearly made its mark. I saw a new generation grabbing the reins and putting their content out there (mini shout-out to Kanen Flowers here) with or without the traditional distribution channels that used to comprise the “broadcast” industry.

My only complaint about NAB? No lines at the ladies rooms!  (Seriously—they’re like empty caves at all hours).  As a past president of Women in Film and Video/DC, I’d say that there’s still room for more women at the table, especially in broadcast management and the technical fields. Just sayin’.

So if NAB was evidence of a Renaissance in the Art of the Story–and I think it was–then thank goodness what happened in Vegas won’t stay in Vegas. Adapting what our fondly missed film critic Roger Ebert always said, I’ll see you at (or behind) the movies.

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Musings from #NABShow

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I’ve been giving workshops and hanging out at NAB (National Association of Broadcasters, for those of you who aren’t in this field).  Three questions I think worthy of consideration (and future blog posts by moi):

–Are ubiquitous digital tools causing us to overshoot photos and video (well, yes), thus making workflow overly focused on dealing with quantity as opposed to creative and quality…and what are we going to do about it?

–How are issue advocacy nonprofits leading the way in terms of the convergence of multi-platform media and communitiy-building, and what can the rest of us learn from them?

And a question for those of you here in Vegas: What’s the coolest “new thing” at NAB that will change the way we think and work creatively? Comment below!

(Shameless plug: See the post before this if you want to come to some of my remaining sessions!)

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Why It’s Worth Hiring Professionals for your Web Video

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Can you believe it was just 2005 when YouTube was invented? Since then, millions of companies, nonprofits and government agencies have seen the impact of telling their stories through video.  And with so many tools–from iPhone cameras to Videopad Video Editor–you can do it yourself.  So why bother hiring a professional video production team?  Consider these:

1. Time.  Good story-telling and mastering the technical tools to make it possible can be much more time-intensive than most people realize. Typically I spend a minimum of 100 hours on a 5-6 minute video project, but often more. The work starts with developing the concept and script, but also includes selecting the right people to be part of the story and the best technologies to deliver the content. You’ll have more time to do your real job if you are overseeing others doing this work, but not actually doing all the tasks yourself (like logging footage for editing–a real time suck!). You’ll also be in a better position to make the Decisions That Matter–like What are the key values of your organization (your brand story), Who is the target audience you want to reach, What do you hope to achieve with the video and How will you measure your success?

2. Quality. A professional video production team has decades of experience that can maximize impact for budget. Areas of expertise include: creative direction, writing, storyboarding, camera equipment and lens options, sound recording and equipment selection, interviewing techniques, lighting design, set design, casting, makeup, music licensing, voiceover artist selection and direction, editing (absolutely Huge part of good storytelling!), motion or still graphics design, audio mixing, etc.  Every one of the decisions of the team will impact the final production, so choosing the right team leader (the Director/Producer) and the right person on your team to manage that person (your Communications Director, or a point person on your team who can help funnel decision-making) is a big and important decision for your team to make.

3. Dependability. Hiring a professional team should give you a dependable workflow and schedule for your project, even if it means shooting in your office and working around other people’s schedules. By hiring people who must show up for shoots and edits on a certain timetable, rather than depending on colleagues who have other work to deliver, you can ensure you hit your upload deadline on time.

4. Flexibility. A quality professional team should ask a lot of questions at the outset so they understand what the final deliverable format(s) are optimal. If you want flexibility–to put something up on the web as H.264 video, but also compress it for mobile web and Also be able to use it on a big screen at your next annual meeting–you’ll need the team to know that and “bake it in” to the acquisition specs and workflow for the project.

The big downside to hiring an outside production team is, of course, cost. A professionally produced 5-6 minute video costs $2,500 per finished minute on the low end, and goes up from there depending on number of shoot days/locations, complexity of editing and graphics, professional talent, etc. But often people don’t consider the hidden “opportunity cost” of do-it-yourself work.  Such costs can include: not properly formatting video, so it won’t play on your site or on mobile web; not properly licensing music so that you are at risk of being sued or having your video pulled down; having the production take many more hours to create, because the folks creating it have to learn the craft as they do it; losing sight of the goals of the production, because everyone on your team is too busy to consider the big picture. Not to mention losing sight of your actual job!

The upside to do-it-youself is–well–you get to have the fun of creating a great and compelling story and bringing it to a wider audience.

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Beat the Inc 500 in Social Media Strategy

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The Inc 500–companies with top net sales growth in the last five years–are changing the way they use social media. The Center for Marketing Research at U Mass Dartmouth has come out with a great study to dig at the how and why.  Some interesting trends…

-Facebook use is down

-Linked In use is up, surpassing Facebook use (possible correlation: up-tick in using social to drive down cost of finding new hires)

-More use of Pinterest and FourSquare

-Inc 500’s are blogging more than their counterparts in the Fortune 500

-Almost 2/3 of Inc 500 CEO’s are contributing some kind of content for social platforms

-This almost directly matches the % of CEO’s who believe social platforms have contributed to their company’s growth (does that mean they see the connection because they are contributing content? or does it mean they have big egos and can’t imagine that their content isn’t having an impact? or are they actually measuring their impact?)

-Inc 500’s aren’t increasing social media spending (but they’re not decreasing it either)

But here’s the one stat that really grabbed me: 35% of these companies aren’t monitoring their brand in the social space.  And almost a quarter of them don’t have a social media Plan. Huuuunnh?  It’s truly hard to imagine a company not monitoring the impact of its advertising dollars or its investments in manufacturing tools, so it’s truly astonishing that companies spend time and money on social but don’t try to figure out what conversations are happening there related to their brands.  Is it that they don’t understand how to do it? That they don’t have the resources to do it? Or that they are still evolving a Plan to do it? Or…they’re not sure who should be managing this entire monitoring/planning process?

So if you want to put your company or nonprofit ahead of the fastest growing companies in America, here’s how to do it:

1. Develop a Plan for Using Social Media and

2. Monitor How Your Brand is Doing in Social Spaces.

If you can develop a list of goals as part of accomplishing #1, then you will have something to measure against when you are attempting #2.  To accomplish the first task, you may need your marketing and communications teams to build social media goals and strategies into existing communications plans.  To accomplish the second task, you may want to consider assigning–perhaps on a rotational basis–someone who’s your Chief Listening Officer. That person can begin to monitor conversations and get a sense of where your Plan is working, and where it isn’t.

Using more social platforms can be effective. Imagine how much more effective if you know your goals and your impact.

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Does Your Kid Own Artwork Made in School? Maybe Not.

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If your child brings home artwork you want to reprint on a mug, or a poetry series you may want to publish some day, think again. Your county school system may own the copyright. At least that’s what a new proposal by the Prince George’s County, Maryland Board of Education would do. Approved by a vote of 8 to 1 last month, this rule says that the school board owns work done by the school system’s staff and students–even if it’s done on their own time. The school system says it is only trying to protect its interest in digital apps developed by teachers on school-owned iPads. 

Even so, I find this proposal a major over-reach.

It’s not unusual for universities to have policies of sharing in the intellectual property developed by faculty members, particularly patented inventions, drugs and medical discoveries. To me it seems odd, though, to take this practice into the K-12 educational environment, where teachers don’t get susbstantial income from grants or publications as do their colleagues in higher ed. And if a teacher does develop a great educational app for their class and sells it (and one would expect there would be development and marketing costs associated with that), why shouldn’t they reap the benefits?

It’s even stranger to suggest that work done by students–whether in school or at home–would somehow belong to the school system. Particularly when it is a public education system paid for by those very families!

At the very least, the whole proposal seems antithetical to the mission and values of an educational system–to encourage creative and  Innovative thinking.  Maybe I’m missing something here. What do you think?  Feel free to post comments here and also email your thoughts to the PG County Board of Ed board.comments@pgcps.org  and the Superintendent of schools superintendent@pgcps.org.

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Hiring or Job-Seeking Using Social Web

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Is your company encouraging you to bring in referrals from your social networks? Are you using your social web connections for your next career move? The New York Times  recently ran an interesting story (prompting hundreds of comments) about this practice. It identified companies such as Ernst & Young who have “set ambitious internal goals to increase the proportion of hirings” from their own employees.  Accordingly, employee recommendations at that firm make up 45 percent of new hires (non entry-level ) up from 28 percent two years earlier. Wow. That is a huge jump.

My takeaways from this trend are two-fold:

  1. Employees: Get your social networks in order! If you haven’t already, be sure you are keeping up your connections, updating your resume, and getting “recommendations” on Linked In before you need to job search.  When you do search, remember that you can mine your own networks—much like these companies are doing looking for you. In Linked In, for example, you can use the “search” function to find companies you are interested in applying to. This will generate a list of contacts. Some of these will already be your contacts. Others will be one or two degrees away from you, and so you can ask for a referral from your own contact to reach them. You’ll of course need to do more than shove your resume at your new contact. Generate dialogue inside and outside social web to let them know your skills, ask them questions about the company, etc.
  2. Employers: Re-examine fairness in hiring practices in the new social web context. Today’s social networks can resemble the “good old boys” network of yesteryear. Just as social clubs once excluded the outsiders of the day–including women, Jews, and African-Americans—people’s Facebook and Linked In Networks can also be limited by race and ethnicity, but also educational background, religious affiliation, and other factors.  By asking  employees for referrals from these, are we just moving an old practice onto a new technology platform?

I’d be interested to hear your thoughts.

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Women on the Front Lines Get Closer Look at Glass Ceiling

Let the hand-wringing begin about unit coherence problems if men see women naked and tired (wait, I’m having a flashback to the delivery room). The real impact of the Pentagon’s decision to greenlight women in combat roles is giving female soldiers access to more than 200,000 jobs previously off limits. Along with promotion eligibility that used to be off the table.

This is not new territory. In the corporate world, women were shut out of boardrooms for most of the last century, and even now according to the Committee for Economic Development, women in the ranks of Fortune 500 boards number just 16%.  (That’s the same percentage of women who are uniformed officers, by the way.) This lack of boardroom experience is often cited as the missing criterion for women seeking top corporate posts.  Just like a lack of combat experience  shuts many women out of top military posts. And top pay. 

In the arts world, the story is the same. Few symphony orchestras have ever had a female conductor. With a few historic exceptions (Antonia Brico – Berlin Philharmonic, 1930; Nadia Boulanger – Boston Symphony Orchestra, 1938), Marin Alsop at the Baltimore Symphony is one of the only women conductors leading American orchestras today. And no woman has ever led the “Big Five,” which pay at the top of the scale (New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Cleveland and Chicago). 

I’m hopeful that qualified and determined women can now get access to top-paying careers in the military.   So more can join the ranks of Gen. Ann E. Dunwoody, the first woman promoted to four-star general—waaaaaay back in 2008.

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Improve Fundraising Results in a Social Media World

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If your development director isn’t delivering on fundraising as you’d hoped, you’re not alone. According to a new national study by CompassPoint and the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, many nonprofits are not raising the money they need to succeed. For those on top, one of the key factors was “a culture of philanthropy” by an almost two to one margin.

What does a culture of philanthropy mean? According to the study:

  • People across the organization act as ambassadors and engage in relationship building.
  • Everyone promotes philanthropy and can articulate a case for giving.
  • Fund development is viewed and valued as a mission-aligned program of the organization.
  • Organizational systems are established to support donors.
  • The executive director is committed and personally involved in fundraising.

At the heart of many of these success indicators is storytelling. And in today’s world that means harnessing digital media and social networks. Here are some ways to incorporate those tools in your fund raising work.

  1. Mission ambassadors and relationship building -Make sure board members, alumni, and other key supporters and donors use their social networks to promote your story. That means traditional social networks (i.e. speaking to friends about your organization), but also digital networks. Provide these boosters with regular support—like emailing the right hashtag to use when tweeting about an upcoming event, or sending them links to a new video on your web or Youtube page that showcases your mission in action.
  2. Everyone promotes philanthropy and can articulate a case for giving-Provide “elevator pitch” training volunteers, including board members, but also to staff who are not directly involved in fund raising.  Help these natural supporters explain the case for giving by explaining their own passion for the organization and their connection to your mission.
  3. Fund development is mission-aligned-Be sure budget presentations show your outputs (results) in terms of mission accomplishments, not just programs. Video and photos can be a great way to demonstrate this impact (and keeps people from falling asleep in budget meetings)
  4. Organizational systems support donors.- Cultivation systems and databases are critical. But one of the most overlooked “systems” is creating an internal online-accessible library of images, fund raising scripts, and videos that volunteers can use to make the case for support. Once you’ve create this space, be sure to encourage staff to update it regularly, so that new content is always available for the latest stories about your mission success.
  5. Executive Director commitment to fund raising. – Part of fund raising is not just meeting with prospective donors and making the ask, but raising the profile of the organization and its mission. ED’s can often raise their personal profile and reach a wider community efficiently by taking advantage of social media tools: regular blog writing, microblogging on Twitter, or even photos uploaded from events to Instagram.

There’s no magic potion for development success, but digital tools give us more of a boost than we realize.

Amy DeLouise frequently works with nonprofit boards, leaders, and marketing staff to improve their branding impact–in other words, how they tell their mission story.

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