Over-50

Launched This Time Last Year, Bob Dilenschneider's "Decisions" Is at 1,138,306 on Amazon - Anatomy of a Failure

This is an object lesson to all those who don't audit their promotional tactics. 

Ever since public relations player Bob Dilenschneider put out there a book on power in the early 1990s, he has been using publishing print books as his MO for marketing his firm The Dilenschneider Group. That first book had done well.

On December 31st, 2019, he was at it again. Out came "Decisions." It never caught on. Today, one year later, it ranks below the one million mark on Amazon - 1,138,306.

Meanwhile, Dilenschneider had a growing number of options to enhance his branding, boost influence, prevent client churn and develop new business. Among his advisors is his long-term assistant Joan Avagliano. 

For example, podcasting was catching fire. He has a good speaking voice, is skilled at interviewing and has a network of contacts to interview. That audio medium would have been perfect for him. This week I published on Odwyerpr.com an article "Podcasting in 2021."

Instead of moving the needle on his business objectives, Dilenschneider plunked himself in the Amazon corridor of shame. That's where authors wind up whose books don't sell. 

What this clinging to old success formulas might remind us of is Ben Horowitz's seminal leadership essay "The Peacetime Vs. Wartime CEO."

In it, Horowitz depicts the peacetime CEO as settled-in, no longer hypervigilant about threats as well as opportunities for victory. Of course, that CEO could be a sitting duck for attack. He or she isn't sleeping with a gun, one eye half-open.

On the other hand, the wartime CEO is downright paranoid about the possibility of attack. That's exactly how the leader should be in an uncertain economy with lots of upstart competition. They are always assuming the enemy is trying to outfox them. They expect both stealth and big-bang competitive action. And, no, they won't fight this war as they fought the last one.

The Horowitz message is, however, nothing new. Rattling around since the beginning of civilization has been the old adage: Nothing fails like success.

It's during success that all promotional tactics should be audited for current results and the odds of future ones. "Decisions" does not seem to be the product of such an audit.

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

No, You Can't Ignore Podcasting for Your Digital Marketing/Personal Branding

As predicted in the Pivot podcast by Karen Swisher and Scott Galloway, Amazon has become a player in the growing podcast space.

Initially Amazon entered the category through podcasts on its Amazon Music.

Now, BusinessInsider reports that that Amazon announced it is acquiring podcast startup Wondery which is associated with the popular Dr. Death and The Shrink Next Door. The price has not been disclosed. But Wondery had been asking in the ballpark of $300 million to $400 million.

Apple Podcasts currently dominates podcasting. With its resources, Amazon could take on Apple. 

Here is my article on podcasting in 2021, published on Odwyerpr.com. All marketers and professionals focused on their personal branding should consider podcasting for their digital tactics. 

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

Howard J. Rubeinstein, Power Player and Public Relations Builder, Dies at Age 88

He was on the networks of New York's political establishment. His clients ranged from Rupert Murdoch to Donald Trump. And all that emerged from a public relations firm he started in his New York City mother's kitchen in 1954.

That had been Howard J. Rubenstein.  The Wall Street Journal reports that he died at age 88. The cause of death has not been disclosed.

Meanwhile his brandname firm Rubenstein Public Relations firm continues to thrive. Its special expertise includes comprehensive media relations and brand-building. 

Place your paid sponsored content on this blog. Here are 6 tips for search engine optimization (SEO) in 2021. Contact janegenova374@gmail.com.

Brutal Lesson from 2020: Lockdown Accelerated Work Addiction

Face it. For many professionals, stuck at home during COVID-19 lockdowns, there wasn't much to do, at least not that was meaningful to them.

The exception was work.

And that became the platform for learning a brutal lesson: More and more work doesn't necessarily achieve any of usual objectives. Those range from increased productivity to creating fresh value. 

Instead, the likely outcome had been burnout. London journalist Ellen Hunt recounts her own encounter with crashing in The Guardian. That included, after one too many self-imposed crazy deadlines, her fingers freezing on the laptop keyboard. She could not function. 

What she learned from that has been the ethos of self-caring. Given the tenets of capitalism, it is unlikely that those commissioning the work will pitch in and prevent the burnout. The burden is on the professionals to figure out how to establish what Hunt describes as a "soothing system of self-compassion." Yes, to overcome out own addiction to work - which turns on us - we have to experiment with what allows us to take proper care of the human parts of ourselves.

From my coaching, I have found that begins with the admission to yourself that you are a human being, not a machine. You have human limitations. Those could go by the name of "human needs." 

From the get-go, right in high school, as we prepare for the college of our choice, the capitalistic message comes through: To even survive, we must scramble to the top of the heap. To stay there we have to make work the priority. It's binary: Success or fall off the end of the world. Most don't even attempt to just get by. Life becomes a sustained struggle to get ahead and hold onto that while simultaneously pushing forward to the better-paying, more prestigious work situation.

To stop that is up to each professional. The decision is individual and personal. No employer or institution will come forward with a path to saving the self from burnout - or worse. 

A New Year's resolution might be to take a life's audit. Find out if you like what you find. Then, if you are dismayed at the pickle you got yourself into, have the insight and courage to begin to push back on the inner capitalistic demons driving you.

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

 

Retirement/Semiretirement Planning - Need to Update Your Information Before Relocation

Florida is no longer all that "cheap" for retirement/semiretirement. As USA Today reports, the cost of living there is now 0.6% higher than average. 

Where will your money last the longest? Well, in Mississippi, the cost of living is 14% less than average. In Alabama, it's 13.6% below average. 

That's based on new research. And that's investigating you have to do before uprooting your lives.

For those of you 65 years old, there are probably 19.4 more years of life on planet earth. That's good news in one sense. But it can be scary if your financial resources are wobbly. 

No matter where you relocate, you may still have to continue to bring in additional income from working. Here, a free read, is my book on getting, holding and moving on to better work, no matter what your age Download Outwitting ageism.

And, if you have already retired, you could be among the one-third who do bounce back into the workforce. That's documented by the Federal Reserve and called "Reverse Retirement." 

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

Will You Need a Podcast in 2021?

The elephant in the room for all digital communications is this: Must I be in that space? After all, time is finite. With podcasting surging in popularity, now you are wondering if that's a must-do for your personal branding and marketing in 2021. 

In this article, published today in O'Dwyerpr.com, I answer that and other questions about podcasting. It also contains 8 best practices for boosting the odds of success. 

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

Hillary Baldwin - Make-Believe Isn't Just for Children

It's out there.

Long passing as "Hilaria," Alec Baldwin's wife has now have to settle in with the real identity of Hillary. Over is the identity of an immigrant from Spain, who showcased cute bits of a Spanish accent. The facts are that she is an American with a version of a privileged background. For instance, she attended a prestigious high school in the Boston Metro metro area. Her mother is a college professor.

Media outlets such as Daily Mail have made this a story with legs. It's interesting to observe the hot-headed Alec became agitated again.

However, what is being ignored is the fun of make-believe. Hillary created a fantasy sandbox to play in, with the toys she custom-made. Not only children do that. 

Life, even in the celebrity circles of a Baldwin lifestyle, can be humdrum. Why not float into make-believe? As Henry David Thoreau observed: Most live lives of quiet desperation. 

The rub, though, is that in this digital era, exposure is almost certain. Also, there could be violations of the law. The fun stops.

That's probably why the majority don't set up their own identity sandboxes and enjoy life their way. 

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

There Were So Many of Us - But, We Did Connect the Dots on How to Get, Hold and Move on to Better Work

"How you begin your working life tends to shape your professional and financial prospects for decades to come." - Amanda Mull, The Atlantic, October 2020 Issue. 

The transition from years of formal education to the workplace usually is a wrenching rite of passage. That is primarily because getting, holding and moving on to better work require new skills which have to be learned. That happens through employer onboarding procedures, mentoring from generous colleagues and, sadly, making mistakes that can serious consequences.

Remote work decreases the depth of that learning curve. 

For example, lacking are the vibes in the workplace which clue youth in that such and such a behavior is verboten or a quite welcome by management. 

It's not possible to just peek in the mentor's door and ask an urgent question before a meeting. 

On a bad day, there aren't any co-workers to round up and gain both wisdom and support. The young person is unable to set about course correction and self-healing. 

Also missing are the opportunities to build a network. Seasoned professionals already had that in-place before the pandemic. We can retain the sense of connection through LinkedIn, Facebook, phone, texting and the occasional email. 

Youth is left out in isolation. Yet, as the old adage goes, it's through people that doors open in a career. Even outstanding performance usually won't trigger reward unless some human beings or a group of human beings broadcast that accomplishment to the right people.

So, what can youth do? Likely it will be up to them to figure out how to fill those gaps. We Baby Boomers also had plenty of figuring out to do. Yes, the economy was booming. Yes, there were many good jobs. But there was also a glut of us. 

What some of us came up with was, unlike our parents, changing jobs often. The added experience and laundry list of accomplishments made us more marketable. 

Then, when Corporate America game-changers such as GE's Jack Welch began eliminating middle management, we had to figure out our Nexts in careers. Fortunately, outplacement was up to the task. The presenters in our outplacement briefings told us about the resources for entrepreneurship. Yes, it was possible to reimagine our careers from corporate middle manager to business owner. 

Then arrived aging and the bias, even for the self-employed like myself. Again, the burden was on us to circumvent that discrimination and keep earning income from work. We are succeeding. Part of my solution had been to relocate my two boutiques to locations where there was less age bias and the cost of business was significantly lower.

Young professionals currently face different type of challenges. The first step is this: They have to get it that there is no institutional help handing over to them customized solutions. Essentially, the burden is on them to create the resources they need for long-term professional and financial success. That could be as basic as forming a mutually supportive group of young professionals in X or Y location. Organizing that, in itself, is a route to acquiring new skills. 

What I predict is that there will be ah-ha moments or flashes of clarity which come to them when they are sitting on their couches with their laptops. All they have to be is open to accepting how the world of the now really operates. Then they can accommodate themselves to spot the opportunities and exploit them. 

With them, as with us Baby Boomers, all that formal education probably didn't provide preparation for those hard tasks of figuring out. 

The needed mindset likely is the Zen one: Clear thinking, don't know. 

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

Why Those Layoffs/Forced Retirements Throw You for a Loop (and you aren't enjoying laid-back holiday season)

It's well-known: In the legal profession there is more mental illness than the national average.

Research studies such as by the American Bar Association document the extent of depression, anxiety and substance abuse. It is higher than the national average.

I call the condition "The Unquiet Mind," borrowing the term from Johns Hopkins University professor Kay Jamison. Among her publications is the memoir of her own struggle with mental illness. Yes, the title is "An Unquiet Mind"

Of course, myriad organizations, including law firms themselves, have launched initiatives to quiet those minds. However, that focus might be too limited. The problem might be how the notion of work has changed since primitive times and how primitive cultures go our their lives in modern times.

In the current edition of The Atlantic, Derek Thompson publishes a major feature on that evolution.

Essentially, the concept of work has gone from a necessity for survival to the platform for - to use sociologist Emile Durkheim's term - "malady of infinite aspirations." Given the latter, leisure is almost a curse. The state of well-being consists of being very busy, focused on future gains such as more money, more recognition and promotions. There is no confidence in the present to provide what is needed for today and for tomorrow. Instead, angst about the future drives the pursuit of always-on-duty. Being too-busy remains a status symbol. 

Thompson leverages extensive research from James Suzman's book "Work: A Deep History, From the Stone Age to the Age of Robots." No, we just don't have the Protestant Ethic to blame for the prevailing preoccupation with the innate value of work. A recent Pew poll found that the majority of those interviewed identified enjoying one's work and career as the major component of happiness. That takes precedence over relationship type values such as love of family.

The rub, of course, comes when what is invested in work doesn't pan out or work is taken away, as with a firing, layoff or retirement.

The classic situation is that that the first setback in the educational/career paths of the ambitious triggers a kind of emotional unraveling. It's not positioned and packaged as a modern rite of passage. If it were, then it could become the unique learning experience, almost a gift distributed very early in life. 

It could be counterproductive for productivity for law firms to encourage their employees to reduce their obsessive focus on work per se. Therefore, reform in that manner might not come. 

However, other types of work settings might encourage their employees and contract staff to loosen up the tension about external forms of success. In itself that could unleash fresh creativity. Too many are simply wound too tightly to look up and discern the big picture. The big picture could be full of abundance, for now. And all human beings really have is the now.

Reflection: Probably too many workers and contract staff experienced the leisure time of the holiday season as uncomfortable. They would rather be working.

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)

 

Nonono, You Don't Want to Explain How It Used to Be Done

"People in many countries are longing for the good old days. When asked if life in their country is better or worse today than 50 years ago, 31% of Britons, 41% of Americans and 46% of the French say it’s worse." - Johan Norberg, The Wall Street Journal, December 26, 2020.

The current wave of nostalgia will sell a lot of memorabilia from the supposed good old days. Already, the music of the 1960s has become popular again. Some forecast a return to the ethos of the Roaring '20s.

But, when it comes to your search for jobs and gig assignments, your performance at work itself and your preparation for a promotion or better-paying, higher-status employment, nostalgia can derail you. 

For example, you casually, with a smile, refer to how speechwriters used to compose the first draft on yellow legal paper. Immediately, that can send the message to those hiring that part of you is stuck in the past. That's not where you should be. Not with all the problems to solve in the present.

The same applies to the quality inspector who alludes to how it used to be done. Not only is that irrelevant. It can shake the confidence of those in charge that you are in the right century.

Results are what matter. The search teams and management/C-Suite need workers who can generate outcomes better, faster and less expensive than others competing to do the task. That counts more than a deep well of experience. Actually, a lot of experience can knock you out of the box since you could be perceived as "too expensive." 

So, keep all communications in all mediums - cover letters, resumes, interviews, conference calls, in-person meetings - in the now. If the powers that be ask you explicitly how it used to be done, be brief and totally factual. Don't showcase an affinity for the past. 

The Future is already underway. Ghostwriting/Marketing Communications and coaching on those issues. Sliding scale fees. Complimentary consultation (janegenova374@gmail.com)