NezSez

Have you ever:

• Shared a joke with friends?
• At a game, gave a high five to a complete stranger next to you after your team has just made a tough score?
• Chatted with a coworker about a TV show at the water cooler?

What do these three actions have in common?

They satisfy a need to belong.

The Instinct to Belong

I’m sure the development of this need harkens back to the days of the caveman — banding together was the prudent way for early man (and woman) to survive encounters with woolly mammoths, saber-toothed tigers and the like (oh, my!) — those who didn’t, did not survive, and so the instinct was passed on.

Today, however, with those dangers extinct, we find other reasons to bond together. In the end, after food and water, and perhaps shelter, that next need is the need to feel a part of a group, whether it’s a life-partner in the form of a husband or wife, or something beyond a simple pairing.

Benefits of a Group

Indeed, there many benefits to being in a group

• Teamwork - working together can overcome many weaknesses
• Social skills - being successful usually means developing social skills
• Respect for others - the best teams usually have members who respect one another
• Support from others and camaraderie within the group - when one member is down, the others can pick him or her up
• Getting things Done fast - such as in an assembly line
• Brainstorming ideas in a meeting
• Strength in numbers
• Specialists are able to be developed or recruited, since other aspects are handled by others in the group, etc.

In fact, achievements such as building the Golden Gate Bridge or Hoover Dam is only possible through the power of a group. The strongest nations, the strongest corporations, are all groups.

Being in The In Crowd

It’s more than a great Ramsey Lewis composition, the “in” crowd is what makes us feel happy when we belong to one, and certainly makes us feel bad when we don’t — whether it’s a discussion on the latest episode of Heroes, or joining the after-work soccer team, the good feeling we get from being part of something is usually ingrained in all of us from the time we’re born, with things like:

• Being held in mommy’s bosom, where it was always warm and safe
• Cuddling with a parent as a toddler
• Playing in small groups in preschool

And then leading on to:

• School clubs
• Spelling bees
• Kick ball teams
• Birthday parties
• Sleepovers
• Music class
• Little league

Then we hear conversations like:

• “Oh, my kid got into the GIFTED program.”
• “My daughter’s teacher is Ms. Smith — teacher of the year.”
• “My son got into Harvard.”
• “My daughter got a full scholarship.”

These are all everyday conversations we might hear, but they all seem to point to one thing.

A Sense of Competition, and OneUpmanship

In our society, we are taught to (try to) thrive on competition. That push to be better than the other guy or gal is oftentimes a great motivator, and many individuals excel. As a person develops their skills, he or she may find him or herself:

• on a team, or even an “elite” team
• in a fraternity or sorority
• in a club
• joining a political party
• becoming part of the workforce, for a company, or starting his or her own
• at a company, become part of a department
• joining a union, and so on.

The Dangers of a Group

As we can see, society inevitably puts us into a group. And while we’ve seen the benefits of being in a group, there are also many dangers. Those dangers also begin early in our lives.

For instance, in school, we get the “bad apples” who are immediately grouped by being sent to detention. “Loners” may be shunned by the rest of the students for being “strange” or “radical”.

At work, sometimes the employees (”us”) versus customers (”them”) will result in poor customer service — ever get the “that’s not my department” line from an employee? Or a certain department (HR or Accounting or middle management) will eliminate members of the “regular” employees.

However, the true dangers come from exploitation of individuals in the name of the group, simply because the need to belong is so strong:

• Gangs - the need to belong is strong enough to entice some young people to join a gang, where terms like “family”, “brother” or “sister” are often used. Actions are executed in the name of the gang — “initiation” rites, such as robbing someone “outside” the family, turf wars, and worse — done to elicit praise from the leader(s), to get that love that is perhaps missing from their own (broken?) homes or parents that are too “busy” or uncaring, or to have a purpose
• Fanatic groups - think of the extreme right, groups led by zealous fanatics who use their charisma to gather a devoted following, oftentimes pitting them against the rest of society or other groups deemed unworthy, promising deliverance for successful execution of their agendas
• Religion - Religion is supposed to based on teachings of their founders (Christ, Buddha, Mohammed, etc.), and these teachings are taught by those who know “the truth” — the religious leaders — and so they form the group at the top, a group that has great power. But, some of these groups inevitably abuse that power and become corrupted. For all the good that is done, there are also great harm done in the name of religion. Think the Spanish Inquisition, the Crusades, and so-called “Holy” wars
• Politics - the “us versus them” card is often played here as well, resulting in impasses on policies at home, questionable campaign contributions that can sway decisions one way or another. Groups can cause civil unrests and other disturbances. Special interests are groups as well, and have sometimes been linked to conflicts and wars abroad. There are many examples today, but easy historical examples include Hitler and the Nazis, the plight of Native Americans, global Colonialism, Yellow Journalism, etc.

Suppression of Individual Thought and Critical Thinking

It’s easy to see how the group can be exploited by its leaders. Through the use of peer pressure, fear (of being cast out, or even losing his or her life), or simply the promise of love, individual thought and critical thinking can easily be suppressed, forgotten, or simply abandoned.

This can lead to the Lemming effect, where individuals simply go along with the group, not really knowing, or caring, in what direction they’re headed — mob think.

But I think a lot has to the do with the ones who lead the groups. Be it a gang, political, religious, corporate, whatever, leaders of groups have great power. And sometimes decisions are made not in the best interest of the group, but rather in the best interest of the leaders (e.g. to preserve their power and status).

Group is Great But One Still Has to Think

In the end, I think it’s important to be aware of the grouping phenomenon/instinct. Unless one is a total hermit, becoming part of a group is inevitable.

One still should practice critical thinking, especially when the direction we’re headed is not ideal, and voice his or her concerns, or simply leave the group.

One still needs to tell the Emperor he has no clothes.

The Group to Which We All Belong

Ultimately, we should remember that, whether we want to or not, from the moment we are born, we already belong to one group.

The human race.

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Jame’s post on PLR articles yesterday got me thinking. What’s wrong with the PLR articles?

Too Much Run-of-the-Mill Content

PLR articles or Private Label Rights articles, if you don’t already know (I didn’t), are pre-written content that a subscriber can use for his or her own blog. Ideally, the blogger using the article will dress up the content, add his or her own twist to it to avoid having the exact same content as someone else who might have signed up (read: paid) for the same batch of PLR articles.

According to James, though, the proliferation of these cheap, repackaged material that is sold to thousands, if not tens of thousands of bloggers looking for content (with “low” prices, so volume must be high to gain profits) to fill their blogs will overwhelm the internet as we know it, burying us in a flood of recycled content that is old, stale and regurgitated.

The Microstock Business Model

What James is describing sounds similar to what professional photographers are experiencing in recent years as well, specifically with stock photography.

With free photo sites like Flickr (which is great!) and multitudes of “penny” stock — or microstock — image companies, the past work of photographers sitting in the vaults of the giant stock image companies become less valuable. Certain new work undoubtedly is worth less as well due to increased competition. (Wikipedia entry on microstock photography)

Professional photographer John Harrington, in his Photo Business Blog, describes it best: who needs to license a picture of the White House when you can find (a free) one on Flickr that is just as good?

Just as James sees PLR articles as a bad business practice, Harrington also finds the microstock model lacking as well. The once almighty Getty Images bought one of the larger microstock companies, iStockPhoto, and consequently shot themselves in the foot, according to Harrington. Why pay $200 when you can pay $1 for the “same” image? (Getty was recently sold to a private company, so we will see if doing so will mean a shift in focus back to doing what’s beneficial to their content providers — the photographers instead of what shareholders want — the bottom line.)

What’s Wrong with the Microstock Business Model?

I bet in the beginning, the early adopter photographers who put up their images on sites like Shutterstock, which currently pays 25 cents per download, made off pretty well. On this particular stock site, it pays 25 cents to the photographer for each of his/her image that is downloaded, so it states if your image gets downloaded 2000 times, you get $500. Sounds good, right?

Well, it is if you, the image-creator, were on a roster of only several hundred photographers, and you had at least a few dozen top-selling images: $500 x 20 images per month = pretty good money!

However, the site mentions these stats as of today:

• 3,141,584 royalty-free stock photos
• 36,756 new stock photos added this week
• 91,940 photographers

Over 90 thousand photographers. And over 3 million images. Seems like a lot of great choices for the end users: tons of high-quality, royalty-free photos at low, low prices. But how is it for the content creator — the photographer? Of 3 million images, how many are “top-selling”? One must realize that if the supply far, far outweighs demand, the likelihood of anyone having a top-selling images becomes marginally better than winning the lottery.

How many images does the photographer need to have that sell? Would they get enough payment to make a decent living? If not, they’ll have to do something else instead of creative great images, wouldn’t they?

Who actually makes the money here? Hint: the middle-man (remember it’s a numbers game.)

PLR Articles is the Microstock of Professional Writing

I believe Jame’s sentiments about PLR articles is the same as what I’ve described about the microstock business model. The people that truly profit from PLR articlers are the ones selling them — the middle men/women who promise writers hefty pay-out for their well-researched, well-written content. Those content-providing writers who got into the game first are sure to do well, just like those early-entry stock photographers, but as more and more dive in, the result will most likely mirror what’s happened with stock photography — writers would have to write more and more content to generate the same income, most likely resulting in poorer work, and devaluing the overall web experience.

What Will Happen?

While James may be going for the dramatic flare when he says the influx of run-of-the-mill, repeated content will CRASH the internet, I have to think that while the internet will most likely survive, the writing landscape will undoubtedly change.

According to Technorati’s State of the Live Web report (April 2007),

• approximately 120,000 new blogs are create each day, or 1.4 per second
• bloggers write 1.5 million posts per day, or 17 posts per second

Mind-boggling, er…rather, mind-bloggling when you think about it.

What will happen in the end, I think, will be up to us, the bloggers who care about what we want to say, and ultimately who care about our readers.

Already, I see some hints of things to come, but I’ll save that for a future post. Thanks for reading!

photo by Mats Gullikstad

Catherine’s post and a recent one by James reminded me of recent thoughts on customer service.

It’s a Numbers Game

I say that the main reason we experience poor customer service is because it’s a numbers game.

So, what are the numbers and who is this game’s players?

The numbers are those following the dollar sign, namely profits. And the players are the shareholders who own equity in these companies. In an effort to show continued growth, company bean counters are ordered to cut costs, and the resulting emphasis on sales and profits mean that things like customer service often gets de-emphasized.

In a country with over 300 million people, these companies know that any disgruntled customer will be easily replaced by another unsuspecting one. The lure? Low prices. And I mean really low. So low that each item itself must have a very low profit margin. Which means everything must be sold in huge quantities in order for the company to show adequate profits.

An Example: Best Buy

A year or two ago, I bought a DVD box set of a movie trilogy (Back to the Future, if you must know) from my local Best Buy. However, once I got home and put in the first disc, I realized I had mistakenly bought the pan-and-scan version instead of the widescreen version (always preferable, imho).

When I went back to the store to request an exchange, the person at the return counter gave me a bunch of reasons why I can’t return it, e.g. it was already opened, etc. Mind you, I went in to EXCHANGE it for the widescreen version — it wasn’t like I was somehow pirating the video and RETURNING it. Anyway, after a polite conversation with a supervisor, I got my widescreen box. Still, the experience left a sour taste in my mouth.

Now, will I shop at Best Buy again?

Sadly, yes. But, not if I can help it.

As long as I and millions of others have that same attitude, then, I don’t see how a big chain will improve their customer service. There’s just no incentive. Companies like Best Buy, Wal-Mart, and the like know that their low prices will inevitably draw you back (like, $30 for a DVD player?).

The Solution to Bad Customer Service

However, we’re not completely at the mercy of these companies.

• Try a different store branch - sometimes a different branch of a store will have more caring employees (see below for an example)
• Try a different store - instead of Best Buy, try Circuit City, or Fry’s.
• Try a local store - you may have to pay more, but the service can be better (see below)
• Shop online - there are a lot of alternatives online, but stick to the well-known retailers, and check www.resellerratings.com if you have any doubts

You’ll notice the one thing in common to these alternatives: Voice your displeasure by spending your money elsewhere.

The Importance of People

Through it all, the most important thing to remember is that the kind of people running your local whatever-store makes a big difference in the kind of customer service you may experience.

Even a different branch of the same store, for instance.

Union Bank is one institution I deal with on behalf of a non-profit organization for which I volunteer. I’ve had to call their 800 number on several occasions, and the experience is often less than stellar. In the East Bay, they have a physical branch I’ve visited. It has mediocre to poor customer service, depending certain alignments of the celestial bodies.

But the branch in South San Francisco is superb. I attribute this solely to the VP there, Laura, who seems to have the enthusiasm of 10 people. The other employees there are also very helpful, no doubt because Laura had a hand in their hiring, I’m sure.

You Get What You Pay For

This saying is true when it comes to customer service. For those places that sell cheaply priced goods, how much of that profit goes into employee salaries, product exchanges and returns and replacements, employee educational programs, and advancement opportunities and other incentives?

It seems like stores that have slightly higher prices are more apt to have better customer service, and of course, in high-end boutiques or luxury car dealerships, excellent service is de rigeur.

Caring About People, Not Profits

But whether it’s a low-end or high-end business, the key to good customer service is that a business owner needs to care about his or her customers, and also needs to hire people who also care about customer service. The businesses that are successful (in a good, tell-about-them-to-your-friends-kind-of-way) are the ones who care more about acquiring and keeping loyal customers, rather than caring only about short-term profits.

That’s how I want to be treated, and that’s how I treat my clients.

Take care of your customers, and the profits will come.

With weekly fervor over the United States Presidential primaries right now and Election in November, I am reminded of one of my favorite science fiction novels, Ender’s Game.

A Prophetic Subplot?

In Ender’s Game, one of the main subplot involves manipulating Earth’s various governments and societal sentiments through the use of diametrically opposing political commentaries, written by Ender’s older (genius as well) siblings, and distributed via their version of the internet.

The pseudonyms they used were Locke and Demosthenes, and their writings polarized different groups of people, and thrust their online personas into the limelight. (There’s more to the plot, but that’s enough for my purposes here).

Blogs and their Effects

Of course, in real life, we have blogs.

One would think that blogs can truly be used to broadcast a candidate’s message directly to people out in the blogosphere, and perhaps even engage in constructive commentaries among other politicians (I know, wishful thinking).

And perhaps they are. A little.

A Flaw in Today’s Politicians’ Blogs

When I take a look at the blogs of the major candidates — John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama — I notice one thing they all have in common:

None of the candidates write on their own blog (as far as I can tell).

Why is that?

The blogs I’ve seen have posts written ostensibly by campaign managers and other like-minded supporters in their respective camps.

Should Politicians Blog (Subscriptions = Votes)

Could you picture a politician’s blog with 100’s of thousands, or perhaps millions of subscribers, dwarfing the “superblogs” I’ve seen so far? Would it be possible? I’m not sure.

Could you imagine looking at a politician’s feedburner count to see how popular he or she is? Wouldn’t it be kind of like voting?

But, maybe the time isn’t ripe yet.

Perhaps there’s a lack of a critical online mass (e.g. not enough voters are online), or perhaps the recent failures of electronic voting systems make people (and candidates) hesitant about security and authenticity, or perhaps these politicians just don’t have time, being out in the public eye all the time. Whatever.

But as the blogosphere continues to grow, I think blogs will play a more and more important role in shaping societal opinions, public policies and a whole lot of other stuff falling under the realm of governments.

Certainly Local Politicians Should Blog

At the least, on a local level, a mayor or a council member can easily start and maintain a blog to inform and gain feedback from their respective constituents. The numbers would be more manageable, and the communication between politician and people would stay more narrow, focused on local issues at hand.

In any case, I hope to see better, more informative, more constructive ways of using the web to broadcast a candidate’s message, and to engage with people in positive ways.

I realize I’ve only touched the proverbial tip of the iceberg in this matter. It will be interesting to see what happens in the years to come.

What do you think?

Going with the Familiar, the Comfortable

• When we attend a class, we sit in the same seat
• We listen to the same songs on our iPod
• We order the same meal at our favorite restaurant
• We drive the same route to work
• We read the same blogs

Do these traits sound familiar? We ARE creatures of habit.

Physiologically, this makes sense. When we get into a habit, it is because we’ve discovered something safe and comforting, something that will not put us in the classic “fight or flight” mode, which means less stress. Less stress is good, right?

When Good Habits Do Bad

However, getting into a habit can also have detrimental affects. They can get us:

• Stuck in a rut - we do the same thing over and over again
• Blind to new things - we become unaware of changes in the surrounding environment, whether it’s the local physical environment, within or without the industry itself
• Into a sense of Complacency - we have a false sense of security that our way will always be the best way
• Unwilling to accept changes - we become conservative, unwilling to embrace new ideas or to see the writing on the wall
• Afraid to lose our comfort zone - we become fearful that we would lose our current status, and would do anything to ensure our habits remain intact.

These and other ill-effects can come from hanging onto an old habit (assuming it was good to begin with).

Periodic Check-up

So maybe I’ve begun to shout more at my kids, or the video store is unaware of Apple’s entry into movie rentals — whatever our habits may be, it’s a good idea to examine them from time to time with an objective eye, to see whether any change is in order.

It might do wonders.

A few clues as to what I believe is one of our most precious possessions:

• It bonds us with our family and friends.
• It is a conduit to our past.
• It enables our habits.
• People can perform great feats because of it.
• It can also debilitate us, if we let it.
• We laugh because of it.
• We cry because of it.
• We rely on it every day.
• Some people willingly deny it as a way to elude responsibility.
• Some people unwillingly lose it.
• It can become sweeter with age.
• Our other possessions are more precious because of it.
• It is more precious than any amount of money, for money would be useless without it.
• It is more precious than even the One Ring.
• It is what we are, it is who we are.

What is it?

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Our Memories.

One of the plot devices in fiction that engages me the most has always been the “alternate time-line”.

Cause and Effect

The idea of changing causes and seeing the resulting effects is a staple of science fiction.

Films like Back to the Future, The Terminator, TV shows like Quantum Leap and (certain episodes of) Star Trek all have stories that focus on how key events determine a certain future, and if those key events were altered, the future would be altered as well.

And the idea is not limited to science fiction. You may have seen or read Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol, or how about the similarly-inspired holiday “favorite”, It’s a Wonderful Life. In both stories, we get to see alternate time-lines, cleverly suggested as dreams.

There’s a whole list of alternate “history” stories listed in this Wikipedia entry.

What If? is a part of Critical Thinking

These tales all bring to the fore the question of What if? Indeed, the question of “What if?” can be used to generate entire stories. But it is also a way of exercising critical thinking. Only here, it is utilized in fiction, instead of real-life situations.

Baseball

Speaking of real life, the what if? scenario is perfectly illustrated in the American game of baseball. Like setting off a row of dominoes, a key play in baseball can result in a series of events (a player steals a base, causing the pitcher to throw to second, but the shortstop muffs the catch, and the runner from third scores so…) that gets one team closer to victory.

The interesting thing about baseball, unlike other sports, is that there is no time limit. Rather, the game is played until a key event occurs that results in one team having a 1 or more runs scored than the other team after the top of the ninth inning. Otherwise, the game can theoretically play for inning after inning, as long as the game remains tied.

This allows the game to have any number of key events. And in the end, the game announcers usually like to point out the “play of the game”, again, usually one of those key events (a crucial hit or a spectacular defensive play).

(I’m not a true fan of baseball, but I really appreciate that singular aspect of the game — that one play can affect the outcome of the game.)

Real Life Decisions

So because of my understanding, and appreciation of the fact we live in a “linear” existence, I often reflect on decisions that I have just made, or am about to make, and wonder about the resulting time-line that I’m “creating”.

I also like to look back on history, and ponder about key events that set the course of our current time-line.

It really helps to put things in perspective sometimes.

Motivational Books Abound

Visit a bookstore today, and you will find a self-help section filled with books, all claiming to offer ways to help you with your productivity, love life, finances, and everything else under the sun (well, stuff “under” the sun would probably be in the Astronomy section…)

The Motivation Niche Blogs

Go online, and you will find a multitude of websites and blogs who offer information to similar effects, including the excellent Zen Habits, the inspiration for this one.

But Who’s First?

I’ve been wondering who was the first motivational speaker?

“Influencers” on Today

Last century we had Napoleon Hill, Dale Carnegie and others whose books are still popular today (I’m currently working my way through a Napoleon Hill book). This site features an article that suggests that Ralph Waldo Emerson was the first motivational speaker of modern times.

Historic Figures

Of course, I have not read every single historical book out there, but with my somewhat typical college-level education, I would wager that some of the better known historical figures with whom people are familiar were actually the first motivational speakers:

• Shakespeare - perhaps he spoke more through his “players” than himself, but can anyone argue against all the life lessons found in his plays?
• Socrates - going back further, I would have to say many of the principles espoused by today’s great motivational speakers were explored in ancient Greco-Roman times
• Confucious - the Chinese philosopher and scholar to whom we usually attribute the Golden Rule offered principles a hundred years earlier

Of course, there are lots of other notables, including religious and political ones, that we can consider motivational speakers, for they truly did motivate people to do things (good or bad things, that’s up for debate).

We will never find out who was truly the very first motivational speaker (most likely, it was probably a caveperson who wanted his/her clan to move to a new spot where there were unpicked wild berries.)

What Really Matters

In the end, it doesn’t really matter. Today there are tons of motivational speakers, life coaches and other pundits. As long as the principles they put forth are constantly explored, analyzed, questioned and tested, and those that “make the cut” for the critical thinker are practiced in a way to better all of humankind, that’s all that really matters.

One of the best recent books I’ve read that perfectly illustrates critical thinking skills is Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies.

In it, Mr. Diamond espouses on a number of theories that help explain how early human societies throughout the world developed, evolved and eventually wound up with today’s nation-states.

It’s amazing how he is able to illustrate in detail a broad picture of the development of human societies — in many ways, the “story” almost resembles one of those world conquering video-games like Age of Empires, or Civilization and their ilk. For instance, mankind in the beginning had to contend with simply finding (gathering) enough food to eat. But with the introduction of new “technology” like hunting, more food became available to support a larger community beyond a family. Thus, began tribes, villages, and eventually cities, kingdoms, etc. (I wouldn’t be surprised if some of those game creators had read the book for research).

It really is a fascinating look at the reasons why and how various societies developed, who was able to succeed, why others failed, and especially why current national powers exist where they are. Factors such as geography, natural wildlife, plant species, and luck are all examined in detail. And of course, later on in the book, we find out more about the influence of “guns, germs and steel”.

It’s an eye-opening book.