Coaching, reloaded - Coaching question of the day #399. - A very specific and empowering rule of thumb

We are exposed to every possible kind of content and advertising on a daily basis, wherever we are, whatever we do, whether we like it or not.
Sometimes, it can make us feel hopeless, overwhelmed, and at the mercy of whoever is the loudest person in the room at a given time.

Luckily enough, it doesn't have to be this way and we don't have to succumb to any kind of communication entropy either.
We can always say NO, we can always disconnect, we can always unsubscribe.

[The answer can be related to content types,

frequency of communication, overall tone...]

If you have your rule of thumb for unsubscribing already, that's incredibly helpful (and healthy) and it can be fun to give it some further thought, in order to better understand what your red flags are.

Coaching, reloaded - Coaching question of the day #38. - Your memories

If we are what we think and what we think shapes the way we feel, act and behave, it's clear that what we think about, what we remember, and how we tell our story is extremely important.

[We are what we remember 

and how we remember it]

Coaching question of the day: 

"One year from now, how do you want to remember your present thoughts, actions, and feelings?"

Tags: Coaching question, Self-coaching, Self-awareness, Mindset, Personal storytelling, Perception

What to read next:

The dark forest one should be aware of, or the only way to become an adult that's really worth it

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Where to start, if you are new

Coaching, reloaded - Coaching question of the day #26. - A new name

"Need new name Extra", this is how the now notorious Corona beer logo looks like when redesigned by Slovenia-based creative director Jure Tovrljan, willing to offer "just an idea of how logos should look like in these difficult times." 

Under normal circumstances, needing a new name is quite rare and a sort of "ultimate resolution", the kind of option to go for when everything else failed or would not work anyway.  We don't know yet if the Corona label will need a completely different name, after the devastating pandemic outbreak the world has been experiencing lately because of the coronavirus.

[Go ahead, play along...

What could be a good new name?]

Still, we could play with the idea and think about possible scenarios where changing names would be the chance of a new beginning, the step to take for a big change, the way to go for leveling up.

Coaching question of the day: 

"If you would change your name, which kind of name would you go for, and why?" 

Tags: Coaching question, Self-coaching, Self-awareness, Branding, Corona beer, Names

What to read next:

80 unusual and yet fascinating Italian first names for women

Visiting the blog for the first time? Aloha!

Where to start, if you are new

Coaching, reloaded - Coaching question of the day #25. - Different aspects of yourself

"LockedIn", this is how the famous LinkedIn logo looks like, when redesigned by Slovenia-based creative director Jure Tovrljan, decided to offer "just an idea of how logos should look like in these difficult times." 

[LockedIn? LinkedIn?

Where lies the focus?]

Jokes and impressive design skills aside, this could become a compelling invitation for thinking about our identity, who we are, what makes each of us really "us", what makes each of us unique and yet recognizable. What can stay the same, what can be changed, what can make us more flexible and resilient, and so on.

Coaching question of the day: 

"Which aspect of yourself are you willing to play with today?"

Tags: Coaching question, Self-coaching, Self-awareness, Self-knowledge, Branding, LinkedIn

What to read next:

Do you want me to accept your LinkedIn invitation? Pay attention to these five things

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Where to start, if you are new

Do you want me to accept your LinkedIn invitation? Pay attention to these five things

Don't put all your eggs in one basket, they say.
Most of the time, they are right. (It happens a lot that they are right, just deal with it)

Still, when it is about networking and having an account on websites for professionals, I like to keep things simple and to embrace a minimalist approach.
This means that besides the Google+ account related to this blog, you can find me on LinkedIn, and on LinkedIn only. When people send me invitations for other networks, I pass, even if I feel flattered. Time is limited, and I prefer to focus on one network, where I have a strong and well-tailored profile.

Thanks to my profile and professional experience, I receive new invitations on a regular basis.
Some people follow a strict policy and they accept only invitations from people they know well in real life. I consider it a good option to also accept invitations from people that I don't know yet, if their profile is relevant to me. That said, I am always amazed at how sloppy and amateurish LinkedIn profiles and above all invitations can get.

[You don't have to look like a modern dandy, 

in order to make a great impression on LinkedIn,

but displaying a drunken selfie or some weird cat pic

would just not help. Just saying.

Image credit: ISO Republic]

Do you want me (= and probably other people as well) to accept your LinkedIn invitation? Then you should probably pay a little bit more attention to the following five things:

35 basic and yet pesky technical & business-related acronyms that everyone but you seems to know already

Good communication is all about communication in a transparent, clear and consistent way.

Speaking the same language (or being open to finding a common language for the interaction, if different languages are available) is just as important.

Acronyms and abbreviations are more than ever part of the professional life of all of us and are, per se, a perfect example of a shared language, where everyone refers to the same, while using them, as a convention.

Below you can find 35 among the most used and yet sometimes tricky business-related acronyms:

API - Application Program Interface

ATS - Applicant Tracking System

B2B - Business to Business

B2C - Business to Consumer

B2G - Business to Government

[Let's be honest for a minute...

We all have been there, at some point.

Some of us just keep staying there, 

but that's another story]

CMS - Content Management System

CPA - Cost per Action

CPC - Cost per Click

CPL - Cost per Lead

CPU - Cost per Unit

The first five minutes of trust are golden, and spoiling them is a terrible idea

What's one of the most precious assets, in life?

Gold, petroleum, diamonds, mutual funds, platinum, design clothes, Bitcoin? 

Nope.

After water, food, sleep, shelter, and oxygen, what else? Love? Sex, maybe? Freedom? Happiness? Growth? 

Sure.

But what about trust?

Without trust, there are no love, freedom, happiness, and growth. Not in the long run, at least.

[Trust is among the most important gifts someone can give you...

Almost as cool as this OOAK handmade lavender draft 

I got from a friend yesterday.

Thank you, Cansu!]

How long are you going to keep someone's trust, if they decide to let you in, in their life?

Are you going to be on time?

Are you going to be prepared?

Are you going to be respectful?

Above all, are you going to make them feel like they did the right choice, while trusting you?

Which superpowers do you have? Twenty questions that will help you the next time you will talk about yourself in public

If tomorrow you should stand up and find yourself in the middle of a room, filled with twenty people looking at you and waiting for you to talk about your superpowers as a human being, what would you say?

Is it easy for you to introduce yourself or you too, like most people, are somehow afraid of talking in public or not sure about what you should talk about in the first place?

[Like every other human being,

you are a special mix of everything that makes you...

you. How are you going to convey your superpowers?]

Here you have 20 questions that can help you to break the ice and to find your own superpowers, if you are still looking for them:

You & your unique experience

What did you love to do when you were young?

What are the five most valuable things you have learned, over time?

Your passions

What passions do you have? 

What does excite you? 

Paying compliments? Accepting compliments? It's not that easy, apparently... #1. The badass shy guy

"NERD? I prefer the term Intellectual Badass!"

I can't miss this one.

"I beg your pardon, can I take a pic of your t-shirt?"

Long, awkward silence follows. 

"What for?" (the young man that crossed my path on the street is now looking at me, very skeptical and mistrustful)

"Because it's super cool!" (and of course for the blog, for all of you, folks...)

He smiles like I would have said, he would be the most handsome man in the world. Literally, his smile is shining and all that jazz. And then...

[Here you have it, anyway. And even in purple...

But it is not the same feeling as taking a pic on the street...

Image credit: Spreadshirt Media]

He says no.

The kind of questions that can leave you speechless, make you smile and force you to grow

"Who do you feel would benefit least from your work?"

The question that coach Travis L. Wilson has kindly thrown at me, as we are talking about which kind of change I want to make, as an intercultural consultant on her way for getting certified as a coach and willing to work as a coach for diversity management, leaves me puzzled and a little bit speechless. Speechless, moi!?

Being speechless never occurred to me, if we keep out the first 18 months of me learning German after moving to Berlin without speaking (back then!) a single word of German and a (back then!) incredibly broken English that soon became an even worse Denglisch. 

But this would be another story, even if one with a linguistic double happy ending, and I digress. ;)

[Speechless, moi!? No way!

I do speak up if I need to. No problem there.

One of my personal issues is...

having often closed eyes in pictures. 

Pics: Me, November 2017 

at Berlin's street art museum

Urban Nation © Radoslaw Kosiada]

And suddenly, I smile, because I realize that I am in the right place and that giving myself Seth Godin's The Marketing Seminar as a Christmas present - even if I don't celebrate Christmas at all and I was just looking for a good excuse for enrolling in the workshop - has been a very good decision.

"Would you rather fight one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses?", or the one about 16 (yes, 16!) cool t-shirt slogans that can make people smile or think about life

Most of us like to think that very deep thoughts and life-changing ideas have to be long, complex and difficult to get. Otherwise, everyone would get them, right?

Well, sometimes.
And sometimes, it is really so simple.

A story is the expression of how and why life changes. 
A story begins with balance, then something throws life out of balance, then a story goes on to describe how balance is restored.  

Robert McKee

Sometimes, something tiny can make all the difference: a sentence or a question may be enough for creating a new mental landscape, for showing a new perspective to someone willing to get it and able to see it, for playing with a challenging and yet refreshing suggestion.
In other words, for providing someone with a very valuable piece of information or a moment of pure and precious serendipity.

Oddball brainteasers have been a big hype in the recruiting style of big internet companies for a while, and then they started to fade out. My favorite one?

"Would you rather fight one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses?"

Whole Foods Market meat cutter job candidate (Lexington-Fayette, KY)

The question sounds crazy, I know. (even more because now you are visualizing 100 duck-sized horses, and if you tell me that you don't, I won't believe you anyway).

And yet, how you will reply and react to it tells a lot about you.

Five reasons why you should have a business card, or where's the difference between Mark Zuckerberg and Rumplestiltskin

He looks at me and he smiles, with dashing white teeth and big blue eyes, and then he says casually: "Business card? I don't need one any longer".

Well, darling.
For sure you have dashing white teeth and big blue eyes, but still.
Sure, one can find you on LinkedIn and even add you on the spot, while using the very useful LinkedIn app available for Android and for iOS.
If they are not on LinkedIn, they can still google you, I get it.

[A very fancy purple business card 

with golden lettering and deluxe texture.

You don't have to go that big. Still, go get one, pal]

But.
Of course, there is a but.
Actually, there are at least five of them, if you ask me.
And it may surprise you, but it is also a matter of intercultural sensitivity.

The questions every (good) consultant should ask her clients, Feat. Berlin's coolest product management Meetup group & Albert Einstein

Do you know the difference between "Narrow A.I." and "General A.I." already?

And why it could be important to distinguish between puppy dogs and muffins?

And what's the biggest problem for A.I. and M.L. gurus willing to pitch their products to possible clients?

[Here you have a thorny A.I. image recognition problem.

Are they puppy dogs or muffins?

None of the above, ladies and gentlemen...

They are puppy dogs cupcakes!]

If you are a product manager or a project manager and you are living in Berlin or visiting one of the most interesting European capitals of the start-up scene, there is one great Meetup group you should definitely check out.

Why decluttering one's life, one day at the time, could be the most important thing you will ever do - Part 2. Minimalist living - How this shapes my life every day (#1.-4.)

Coco Chanel, featured in 1999 in TIME magazine's "Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century", is still one of the most well known and most quoted fashion designers to have ever lived, and doesn't need any kind of introduction.

Madame was all about quality over quantity, and she was used to saying: "Once you've dressed, and before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take at least one thing off". She knew that, way more often than we'd like to think, less is more.

["Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance",

or said in another way: quality over quantity matters]

Just like the timeless style created by the woman that invented the little black dress and chose the future Chanel No.5 among different perfume samples presented to her, minimalist living is not a fortuitous occurrence.

Embracing a minimalist living means being bold enough to take the path less traveled and smart enough to make the right decisions and to adjust your trajectory on the way, every time that you need to.

Why decluttering one's life, one day at the time, could be the most important thing you will ever do - Part 2. Minimalist living

What are the five items you would bring with you on a deserted island?

What would you buy at any cost, while living on a budget, and why?

What are the possessions that energize you and make your life better, and what are the ones that suck energy and life out of you?

(And here we are again, with Marie Kondo's suggestion about verifying if a specific item sparks joy or not)

[Minimalist living comes in many shapes, forms, and flavors -

Just like in this amazing unicorn multi-layered cake.

What's yours?]

For some of you, these can look like mundane or rhetorical questions, and yet they are not, at least if one is truly interested in minimalist living. They are, in a nutshell, what minimalist living is all about:

Just yet another epic DHL delivery fail, or the three pivotal elements while building (and keeping) trust in a relationship - Part I

Shopping for products online can be exciting, funny, time-consuming, smart, interesting, frugal, money-draining, surprising, safe, addictive, disappointing. 

And even if what you purchased is exactly how you were expecting it to be and you are not experiencing one of the more and more common online shopping epic fails that go viral these days, after purchasing something online you probably feel a little bit nervous until that very special moment where, after such a long waiting and so much patience, you are going to hold the package in your hands, at last.

[Not a long time ago, happiness was...

being in love with someone that loves you back.

Now happiness is way more mail-related]

The right advice for your friends, or about the magic of earning trust and the risk of losing it

Attention is difficult to earn and when it's gone, it's gone.
The same applies to other important things in life, like love. Like innocence. Like trust.

Trust is a tricky one, and yet it is so vital, in every kind of relationship.

We need an empathy of attention. Attention is something that can't be refunded or recalled. Once it's gone, it's gone.

So, what have you done to earn it?

Seth Godin

The top of the pile

[Can earning (... and losing) someone's trust be that simple?

Oh yes, ladies and gentlemen]

Earning trust, the right kind of, takes time, effort, consistency, hard work. It means showing up day in and day out if you say that you will do so, it means underpromising and over-delivering and not only once, it means being able to demonstrate that you care. For real. On a regular basis or when it is needed the most.

The good old motto "Show, don't tell" is hale and hearty. How can you show your skills?

Have you ever heard about Harvey Mackay?
Do you know exactly what a business columnist actually does?

I have to admit that I discover this sharp man and motivational writer, born in 1932, thanks to a very empowering quote that has a big impact on me lately, like it should be the case with very powerful ideas.

A mediocre person tells. A good person explains. A superior person demonstrates. A great person inspires others to see for themselves.

Harvey Mackay

To me, it seems to be a reloaded and even better version of the good old "Show, don't tell", that still happens to be very effective and true.
And how about this one?

["Time is free, but it's priceless" Oh yeah, Mr. MacKay.

Why I didn't discover you about ten years ago?

Oh well, today is the second best moment for it, I guess]

Tears on my pillow? Better a giant Ryan Gosling, thanks!

Crazy, Stupid, Love. was funny, but also a little bit too conventional. But with that Dirty Dancing scene...

The Believer is like an hidden gem. How many people have seen it? It's from 2001 and it is absolutely still worth it!

The Notebook was toooooo sweet and in Italian I would say 'Too much saccarine for me, thanks'. But the famous scenes with all that kissing were amazing. Which girl wouldn't like to be kissed like that?!

Murder by Numbers was the typical Sandra Bullock movie. Take it or leave it. I will take it.

[Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone in Crazy, Stupid, Love

These two actors are just so good together]

I really enjoyed Half Nelson for the bravery of the plot. 

And I think that Lars and the Real Girl is better than a lot of anthropological essays about our society, systemic therapy and group dynamics.

Blue Valentine made me almost cry. Ok, you got me. I cried like a baby.

And All good things was disturbing and challenging, even if I always wanted to visit Vermont, once in a life.

Everybody has seen The Ides of March, most because of George Clooney anyway.

But Drive is really something special, even more special if you know The Driver by Walter Hill, with Ryan O'Neal, Bruce Dern and Isabelle Adjani.

I have missed out The United States of Leland, The Slaughter Rule and Remember the Titans, it's true. And I can't imagine Ryan as a young Hercules at all.

But I can say that I know Ryan Gosling's movies pretty well and that I like a lot his acting style, his professional and personal choices and the way he wants to be something different from just another hot guy like the others and he works hard for it.

So I really had to smile when a friend of mine sent me this Ryan Gosling "Husband Pillow": something that a lot of women could consider perfect for bad days, bad hair days, bad eye-liner days and for every other day as well.

[Image Source: Life for Films]

Genial, isn't?

I am sure that a company that would actually produce this kind of commodity would become rich in a couple of weeks. Or maybe hours...
And what a hell of perfect gift for the woman that has "almost" everything already...

Thanks T. for the link!

Tags: Ryan Gosling, Hey Girl meme, Drive, Ryan Gosling Husband Pillow

What to read next:

'The Notebook', or why Ryan Gosling as Noah Calhoun is considered kind of a mirage by women of the Facebook generation

'Position, Promotion, Placement and Price' are the famous four P of traditional marketing. How many of them do you need in your relationships?

Position, Promotion, Placement and Price.
You know them for sure: they are the famous - and sometimes infamous - 'Four P' that have ruled traditional marketing in the last century in practically all Western countries.

People into marketing, and people not into it but forced to deal with it anyway, should also read and cherish  that seminal marketing book about the fifth P that Seth Godin published back in 2005:

[Purple cover of one of the many different edition of Purple Cow
How cool is that!?]

Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable (Paperback)
by Seth Godin
Penguin, 2005
160 pp., ISBN 978-0141016405

What's a purple cow, besides a mainstream cow painted in lilac for some Milka chocolate advertising campaigns?

[Seth Godin playing with the funny special promotional packaging of his book

Purple cow milk is, of course, delicious... and dairy free!]

Take the common cow, a ruminant with coat colors varying from red to black to brown and to white with colored points...