Justin G. Roy

…ok, maybe not all, but certainly something new.  I have heard about drunk-driving and drunk-dialing but an article in the New York Times last week talked about a new software program that helps you from drunk-emailing.

The program is called Mail Googles, and is the newest feature for Gmail (Google Mail).  This program will require users (who enable it) to solve five math problems in 60 seconds or less in order to send an email between 10pm and 4am on weekends.

Click here to read the article.

Congratulations goes out to Liz Strauss from Success-Blog for her 3rd Year Anniversary!  For those of you who have not come across the blog, you should check it out.  Check out the blog here.

Though I have only met Liz once at a networking event (thanks for the tips, Liz!), I follow her blog every week. 

Check out the invitation here.

One of my good friends sent me this quote below; I am not sure how they came across it, but am glad she thought of me.

“The problem in my life and other people’s lives is not the absence of knowing what to do, but the absence of doing it.”
     -Management Consultant, Peter Drucker

I believe she sent this quote, in response to a conversation we had earlier last week.  Was this meant as a motivator?  Probably.  However, I am a firm believer in letting an idea simmer for a while, let yourself go attend to the other pots on the stove.  Certainly never let your hard work get burnt [out] because you fail to pay attention. 

So while I let my new[est] idea simmer, I started to think about how firms in the design and building industry got started.  I know a few, where an architect thought (rightfully so) he could take what was learned at his current firm but do it better; a mechanical engineer was interested in work-life balance so she started her own consulting/design firm.  Both cases I am sure let their idea simmer for a while, and really thought about the potential risks and rewards; but what made them take the leap?

I would love to hear from anybody who has taken the leap and moved forward with a new business, product, networking group, ect.  Though I have a few of my own, I was curious to hear from you.

- Justin G. Roy

As a service-provider (recruiter) to the architecture and engineering industry, I found Seth Godin’s post about marketing and serving your clients, and the “is that it” factor interesting.  Here are some of the questions Godin asks:

Why do Amazon customers, with a choice of every book, delivered overnight, for free, whine about their customer service going downhill?

Why do customers at a truly great 4 star restaurants often feel a little bit of a let down after the last course is served?

Why do Facebook users (a free service that they used to love) complain so vehemently about a change in layout?

Why do the very same Apple lovers who waited in line for days now scoff at incremental (free) improvements in their iPhone?

Click here to view the post.

Chris Brogan wrote a post about what to include in your LinkedIn profile.  His post includes suggestions and tips on:

• Your Summary
• Your Work Experience
• Power Moves: Recommendations
• Enter your blog’s RSS feed
• Add a photo
• write quality recommendations
• Grow your network

Great suggestions Chris!  LinkedIn is a great tool to connect and research profiles on companies!  Working in the architecture and engineering industry, I have found that not many architects or consulting civil engineers utilize LinkedIn as much as IT-related or financial.

Click here to view the full post.

Click here to join my network.

It shouldn’t be new news to anybody; today’s market demands a different approach to networking. In fact, this has been at our heels for quite a few years now.

Is the change driven by a generation of work to live, rather than live to work? Possibly the change is due to people wanting to really connect with others outside the office, becoming a human and not the corporate robot.

How does dress-code affect your strategy? No longer are people seeking out the person with an Armani Suit. Rather, people are choosing to dress business casual; a nice pair of slacks, shirt, possibly tie or sweater.

Here are some tips on how to market and build your business development efforts in response to some of these “new age” approaches.

Find their pain point and solve it. Only if you really can. We live in a give-to-get business world, unless you can give, there will be limited amount of receiving. Connect with professionals who are outside your normal realm of business, other consultants to the industry you serve, or individuals who have similar interests as you. These people either know who your target clients are and can become a cheerleader for your business, or know who you are and will feel comfortable referring your name to their connections.  Think degrees of separation.

Are you handing out more than 15 business cards? If so, stop. How can you have good, solid, connecting, conversations with more than 15 people at one event?

Chances are the attendees are not at the event searching for your service so stop selling and start helping. Try having just 5 good conversations where you talk about each other, learn about the other persons outside work activities and interests and make sure you take note.

Follow up, follow up, and follow up again. Don’t become a telemarketer, but make sure you follow up after an event along with a 30 and 60 day follow up conversation. Offer your connections more than just a coffee conversation during the follow up and ask them how their needs have changed in the past 30 days. You would be amazed at how much people will have new changes and needs. Your connections for a tax accountant may not be needed any more, but you might have the need to know a good catering company.

Would you rather 10 people who drop what they are doing to take your call or 100 people who you need to leave 5 voice messages for? Build emotional equity with everybody you meet by truly caring about their business and connecting them with other like-minded people in your network.

If you are in the consulting architecture or consulting engineering industry, are in a sales or business development role, or just plain need a kick of motivation, watch this YouTube video of Al Pacino Inspirational Speech.

Al Pacino’s Inspirational Speech