Many people have told me how much they like the ideas presented with A Bigger Voice. My theory is that once individuals achieve a level of competence in their careers, gotten that promotion, created a reputation and earned a decent salary, they look for meaning. So it's no wonder that the idea of applying their professional skills to achieve social good is appealing. 

Quite honestly, it's one thing to like the idea of being a wisdom entrepreneur. It's another to start on the path. And the first step can often be the hardest one to take. If that sounds like you, keep reading. This post is about inspiring you to take the first step by seeing those who are further down the road.

Here are a few wisdom entrepreneurs that I know who are actively applying their professional skills and experience to do good and do well in the world:

www.Topplers.org.

Wisdom Entrepreneur: Herb Morreale, the founder of Topplers, is a serial entrepreneur and a techie with a strategic bent.  His wisdom comes from a combination of hitting mid-life and all of the questions about meaning that comes with it and having built companies with a rigorous business mind (e.g., points of leverage, metrics.)

Wisdom: Great things can be achieved with small, purposeful actions. Topplers' tagline is "Setting Big Things in Motion."

Question for the Community: What's possible when the pay-it-forward concept becomes both goal-oriented and trackable?  Can a collection of strangers achieve stunning results, just by "doing their part?" 

Find out more: Join the Topplers Facebook page. 

www.WorkingMinds.org

Wisdom Entrepreneur: Dr. Sally-Spencer Thomas, the Executive Director of the Carson J. Spencer Foundation, is a trained clinical psychologist and an expert on suicide prevention and workplace violence prevention. Her wisdom comes from the convergence of her academic interests with the real-life experience of having her brother commit suicide, a successful entrepreneur who was described by the Rocky Mountain News as "a bright star that burned out too quickly."

Wisdom: Most people who complete suicides are of working age. Therefore, workplaces can be a vehicle for education and support, to prevent suicides. Carson J. Spencer Foundation's tagline is "Sustaining a Passion for Life."

Question for the Community: What do you do with employees who are no longer productive due to mental health issues? 

Find out more: Denver-area breakfast seminar, Promoting Resiliency and Preventing Distress at Work, from 7-8:30 am on November 10, 2009.

www.microfranchisesolutions.com

Wisdom Entrepreneur: Grant Hunter, founder of Microfranchise Solutions, LLC, has been a corporate trainer as well as a franchise broker. His experience with both showed that the quality of the training and support is a critical success factor for any franchise owner. He also saw how the franchise model could help individuals who lacked the "entrepreneurial instinct" to become successful business owners.

Wisdom: Micro-franchises in the developing world hold the key to eradicating poverty and ensuring sustainable livelihoods for millions at the base of the economic pyramid.

Question for the Community: What are all the ways the franchise model can be used in developing countries to help lift people out of poverty?

Find out more: Grant's LinkedIn profile

www.money-masters.org

Wisdom Entrepreneur: Lisa Dworkin, founder of Money Masters Foundation, has been a successful futures trader as well as a passionate teacher of grades K-12 and adults. In her work with adults, she saw how the basics of personal finance were not known by many otherwise competent working professionals.  As a school teacher for a wide age range, she found the ideal age to target learning about financial literacy.

Wisdom: The best time to teach financial literacy is during the middle school years, when kids can see the impact of their financial decisions and before bad decisions create situations that are hard to recover from.

Question for the Community: How can financial literacy be taught in a way that  invites in and engages middle-schoolers?

Find out more: Lisa's LinkedIn profile

www.hautenet.org

Wisdom Entrepreneur: Ben Hafele, founder of Haute, spent time in the Peace Corps in Guinea, a developing country in Africa, before doing graduate work at London School of Economics and becoming a forecast analyst at Caterpillar. He saw in Guinea the type of poverty that doesn't just leave people hungry, but ends up literally killing them. And with his business background, he could see how entrepreneurship could lift entire communities out of poverty.

Wisdom: Not everyone is cut out to be an entrepreneur. Focus on those individuals who were already choosing to be entrepreneurs in developing countries and give them basic business training (e.g., accounting) to help them be more successful.

Question for the Community: What does it mean to believe in the African entrepreneur?

Find out more: Peoria-area newspaper article about Hafele and Haute. 

So, if you are still on the sidelines, thinking this wisdom entrepreneur thing is a good idea, I challenge you to contact any of the above role models. Ask them for advice on getting started. They'll all tell you that it hasn't been easy and that there are times of discouragement (maybe even yesterday.) But you'll also hear what it's like to get a little closer every day to "doing good and doing well."

For a better understanding of developmental networks, listen to this interview I did with one of the authors of the article, Dawn Chandler. The interview was originally posted on site for an online networking group that I run. (You'll hear me make references to principles of "networking naturally.")

While A Bigger Voice focuses on networking as a way to build your community, I hadn't realized the importance of networking for my own personal development until this last year. Networking has allowed me to find mentors to fill gaps that I have as an entrepreneur--e.g., finance, marketing, experience in starting up a company that required more than just me to run it. This past summer, as I was deep into the formation of My Alumni Link as a business, I was tapping into at least half a dozen mentors on different topics. We were meeting on a regular basis, on specific areas of expertise pertinent to that mentor and what I needed as an entrepreneur. Photo by Biology Big Brother.

One of the best ideas of developmental networks is that the sharing is mutual. I have something to give to my mentor as much as he/she has to give to me. I think of this as co-creating (one of those coaching terms that comes in handy to describe collaboration in a new way.)

Whether you are a traditional entrepreneur or a "wisdom entrepreneneur," having a personal board of directors helps. Who is on your personal board of directors? Start networking to find your board if you don't already have one.

And if networking is not your sweet spot, check out my Networking Naturally Program, which starts on Oct 27. Registration closes on Oct 25.

--Saul Kaplan

I came across Kaplan's blog post, "Stories Can Change The World," when he followed me on Twitter. (BTW--One of the best reasons to tweet is to expand your network of ideas and people.) The post is a wonderful reminder of how story, in pure form, is one of the most powerful ways that we can connect to each other and transfer wisdom. So simple, yet so profound. 

I left a comment and included this story of my own:

"Many years ago, I was working in telecom, and had transitioned from an engineering role to an organization development role. One of my tasks was to re-shape the new employee orientation. I decided to hold a monthly gathering where I invited a VP, a first line manager, and technical guru to tell their stories, to share the wisdom they had gained from a unique career path. They each had 15 minutes, followed by Q+A. We sat in a circle and I had lit candles in the middle. I called it our “corporate campfire.”

One VP in particular had trouble deciding what to say. I suggested that he think about what he would say to his grandchildren, on the eve of his retirement. It worked.

Employees would tell me afterward how they had more hope, knowing that people they admire had struggled and gotten through similar challenges. I was also struck by how this monthly forum impacted the speakers. One VP wrote me to say that he enjoyed the chance to speak from the hip/heart, without the usual PowerPoint. Another one talked about juggling child custody schedules with business travel. I doubt he had ever told his business colleagues of such challenges.

Knowing how to tell a good story is a rare skill in the business world. When you find someone who can do this well and in the appropriate context, they are often seen as an effective leader."

P.S. Check out the Innovation Story Studio on Kaplan's site, Business Innovation Factory. The videos are a real treasure and are reminiscent of TED videos (which is no wonder since Kaplan makes references to being guided by the founder of TED, Richard Saul Wurman.)

No, I haven't backtracked on the concept of A Bigger Voice, which is about developing a better way to turn an idea into a sustainable movement. But what I've been thinking about lately is that movements can be created based on faulty ideas, ego-driven leaders, and misinformed assumptions. It's useful to look for these red flags up front.

A few tips:

• Is the idea from the wisdom entrepreneur borne of experience--an insight to a problem that he/she has felt the pain of? Or is it political correctness that drives the cause?

• Is the idea a new twist to an age-old problem? Or is it rhetoric that can be identified as motherhood and apple pie?

• Is the wisdom entrepreneur humble enough to listen to other points of view, or is he/she driven by being right?
  

  

• Is the wisdom entrepreneur well-read and educated on the cause at hand to have validated the soundness of her idea? Or has emotion taken over any chance of looking at pertinent facts and figures?

Photo by joguldi

General Info:
Tuesday, September 8th, 2009
5 pm - 8 pm

Denver Athletic Club
1325 Glenarm, Denver, Colorado
$39 members;  $49 guests 

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Throughout these interviews, I've been delighted with the rich stories that both Chris and Tim have told. It's a wonderful example of wisdom entrepreneurs using story-telling in a powerful way.  In Part 4, you won't be disappointed. The Wendels tell probably their most powerful story at the end of this interview. Photo of and by Tim Wendel

This last installment is under 17 minutes long.

My thanks again to Chris and Tim for being a part of the A Bigger Voice community. We learn by hearing each other's stories. The Wendels have given us stories that will stick with us for a long time.

Provide your comments below. Chris and Tim particularly want your ideas on where to go with their community-building efforts. Let's continue the conversation, both here and on the Wendels' blog, Buffalo Nation. 

Contact info:

Chris Wendel: www.twitter.com/ckwendel

Tim Wendel, www.timwendel.com

You can find the book, "Buffalo, Home of the Braves" at SunBear Press.

But before we get to that part, the Wendels talk about an unexpected turn of events that increases their blog traffic from under 50 hits a day to over 1000 hits a day, literally overnight. It doesn't hurt for wisdom entrepreneurs to get a lucky break every once in awhile. Enjoy Part 3 of the interview, which is just under 19 minutes long.

This story just keeps getting better and better, doesn't it?

In our last installment, the Wendels talk about the nature of community--how it plays into a new era in business as well as how it encourages us to go deeper into the topic at hand. Ultimately, communities force us to examine what we know, believe, and feel.

The audio is 11 minutes long. Enjoy!

If you aren't convinced after Tim's story that community should come before monetizing, nothing will convince you!

In Part 3 of our interview, I talk to Chris and Tim about the unexpected death of one of the best known players from the Braves, just after the publication of their book, and how that became an opportunity to serve and engage a larger community.

I caught up with two wisdom entrepreneurs from our pilot last year, author Tim Wendel and small business consultant, Chris Wendel. The Wendel brothers, as they were affectionately known throughout the pilot, worked with A Bigger Voice in the summer of 2008. At that time, the writing of their book, Buffalo, Home of the Braves, was largely complete (Tim's job as the author.) Chris was in the throes of adding in the visual component (read: tracking down photos from 35 years ago) and handling all the other stuff that goes into producing a book.  The Wendels also had a complementary blog with a small following of hard-core Braves fans.

In this first installment of a four-part interview, I talk with the Wendels about finding their community, and the surprises along the way. Don't miss the last few minutes where Chris tells some remarkable stories about their community members.

The audio is 12 minutes long.

In Part 2 of our interview, we talk about the vibe of community and how in-person and online community-building come together.

More information on the Wendels and links to their blog and book:

Chris Wendel works with both aspiring and established entrepreneurs through his work with the Michigan Small Business & Technology Development Center. His work utilizes the imagination, desired outcomes, and problem solving skills of his clients. To hone his own entrepreneurial skills, Chris founded SunBear Press, a publishing company that specializes in niche market books. SunBear Press recently released “Buffalo, Home of the Braves”, a story that chronicles the meteoric rise of a National Basketball Association franchise that played in Buffalo, New York in the 1970’s.

Tim Wendel is the author of seven books, including "Red Rain: A Novel" and "Buffalo, Home of the Braves." His writing has appeared in Esquire, The New York Times, GQ and USA Today, where he is on the op-ed page's board of contributors. A graduate of Johns Hopkins University, he teaches nonfiction and fiction writing there. More of his stories can be found at www.timwendel.com.

Blog, Buffalo Nation

The book, "Buffalo, Home of the Braves"

• Skimping on "dream" time. This is a big one for me. As someone who likes to get things done, I can rush through the phase of dreaming about what I want, envisioning how things could look differently. I settle for a "rough sketch" of the future or worse yet, a small dream, and move on to tactics and implementation. Stay in the dreaming phase as long as you can stand it. Revel in possibilities and what ifs. Give your imagination a work out. Photo by MysticMoon14

• Relying on observation instead of action. Finding great examples to inspire and model after are great. But eventually, you have to figure out the solution to your specific situation by moving into action. Success is created experientially, not theoretically. I once had a coaching instructor say to me, "Carol, you can't just be an observer of life. You have to be a participant."  Be a participant. Try stuff out and see what happens.

• Action that's not grounded in essence. I can get caught up in the doing, without being grounded in the essence or core of why I'm doing something. This is otherwise known as "being busy." If you find yourself frenetic, with no feeling of progress, go back to the core of your message, the essence of your idea.  Essence relates more to feeling than thinking. Once you have the feeling, then bring in purpose. Align essence with purpose with action. If you have trouble aligning those three, reassess the need for action.Photo by jurvetson

• Losing the essence altogether. I have to admit that this is probably where I've been for the last few weeks. While focused on building a new business related to my Networking Naturally Program, I lost sight of the essence of A Bigger Voice. I forgot about the magic that comes with building a community, how the seed of an idea can blossom into something larger than a single individual, how communities can produce unexpected and stunning results.  It wasn't until I caught up with a couple of our pilot clients from last year, and heard how the concepts of A Bigger Voice have been put into practice, that I got excited about working on ABV again. In the next few weeks, I'll post portions of my interview with the Wendel brothers, Chris and Tim.

You may be wondering, "How does this relate to the three phases of A Bigger Voice?"

We can know the recipe but still be reluctant to cook. We can follow the steps but not know what it is we are preparing. We can lack the anticipation and excitement of imagining what the dish will taste and look like when it's done. We can forget that we are hungry, more hungry than we know. The three phases of A Bigger Voice--Crystallize, Build Community, and Sustain--provide the recipe. Just like a cook sees the recipe as the start, so should the wisdom entrepreneur see A Bigger Voice--as a roadmap for a long and wonderful journey.

Which trap have you been falling into lately? 

Photo by erix!

Whether you are a wisdom entrepreneur or a traditional entrepreneur, here are a few lessons to keep in mind:

1. It's a marathon, not a sprint. I forget and want everything in the next  release of the product. I forget and think that I have full control of the Universe. I forget and feel driven by deadlines instead of common sense. Photo by epimetheus.
2. Be scrappy. Make every dollar count on the expense side, independent of how many dollars are coming in. Look for value. See what you can get for free before deciding to spend money.
3. Build to what's good enough. Don't over engineer. This is related to number 2. The perfect solution may not be noticeably different from the good enough solution in the eyes of the customer (or the community member). 
4. Put one foot in front of another. It's easy to get overwhelmed if I think everything that needs to be done to launch a business (or a community.) Juggling sales, marketing, business process work, and product development can drive you nuts. But if I only look at what needs to be done today, and tomorrow, and this week, it's manageable. 
5. Networking requires patience and rewards me with magical results. I've done my share of networking recently to find allies, collaborators, and customers for My Alumni Link. Things don't always move as fast as I would like, and that's okay. I've been blessed with incredible support from my network, especially when I ask for what I need. 
6. Create plans and goals but don't be attached to the outcome. I figured this one out in time to rescue my sanity. This is where the task master in me can go off the deep end. ("No you cannot go for a bike ride! You have more emails to send!" Ughh....)
7. Focus on creativity. I used to think money fueled growth.  But I found out it's the power of the mind to create something from nothing, to meet a user need, that results in growth. Photo by Bohman.
8. Understand your break even point. Know what Plan B is. Without that, I ended up chasing imaginary goals and numbers. Urgent or not? Necessary or not? I had no idea.
9. Take a warm lead. Always. This relates to number 5. One person leads you to another to another. If you can get introduced, even if it takes going through two or three people along the way, it's worth it.
10. Work on yourself. Taking care of your mind, body, and spirit is just as important as working on your business or your cause. Time to rest and rejuvenate is just as important as time to focus and get down to work.

I love being an entrepreneur. I used to think it was all about creative freedom. What I'm experiencing is the joy of the learning curve, the delight of meeting new people, and the magic of how the pieces come together, when I least expect it.

Tomorrow, I journey to Houston to give a talk on "Finding Your Voice" at the Juvenile Arthritis annual conference. More learning, new connections and seeing the pieces fit together. Fun!

Photo by alicepopkorn-busy

A bonus: Our very own Simon Young is quoted from one of his blog postings here, for the article.

One part of the article specifically quotes a Twitter user as saying that the search feature on Twitter is more useful than Google--because the information is not only findable but updated in real time with real users. Users that you may then want to connect with and folllow. Think about it. People looking for specific information-- whether it's the details of a court case or where to meet for to show support for the Iranian people or tips on managing a chronic disease--can now find not only the information they want, but the source of the information, someone who is likely to be a kindred spirit. That's what we have today, at the flick of a few fingers on a keyboard. Amazing isn't it?

Photo by NOIZE Photography

One voice can start a community. Communities create stunning results. It's even more startling when it's a world community, from a top columnist for a US paper to the anonymous voice of an Iranian woman. Two voices on Iran:

Peggy Noonan's column, Whose Side Are We On? You Have to Ask?, points out:

"Twittering and YouTubing made the story take hold and take off. But did the technology create the rebellion? No, it encouraged what was there."

She goes on to say,

"Revolutions are revolutions and rebellions are rebellions; they don't work unless the people are for it. In Iran, Twitter reported and encouraged. But the conviction must be there to be encouraged."

Wisdom entrepreneurs take note. Noonan is saying that the technology is a tool that amplifies. But the voice must be there first, with conviction, and I would say, commitment.

The other voice is a simple but powerful one, one that tells the story with minimal words and photos. It paints a stark portrait that only those who are there can fully comprehend.

Note that this YouTube video was created on Friday, June 19, less than a day ago. This morning, at about 9:30am Mountain Time, when I first saw the video, it had 300+ views. I found it from a friend on Facebook who had posted the link (thanks, @kareanderson!) Now, several hours later, as I'm posting this, the video has over 1700 views. That's how fast we can connect now.  When there is so much at stake, when we are compelled by history in the making, the ties between us are created with mind-boggling speed.

The following question has never been more important or pertinent:

What will you do with your voice?

Photos by .faramarz

In researching who already is doing this in the JA world, I came across a wonderful online community, called Creaky Joints. The site was started by Seth Ginsberg, when he was still an adolescent. Seth is now 27 years old and the online community has grown to 32,000 members. He works on Creaky Joints full-time and in his words, "Creaky Joints has become much bigger than me."  He talked about how Creaky Joints had become a model for other groups oriented around living with a disease. Seth also is passionate about influencing policy makers on bigger issues that impact the JA community and beyond--like health care reform. With Creaky Joints representing 32,000 voices, Seth clearly understands working both bottom-up and top-down.

I'm struck by how Seth has taken his experience of someone living with JA and turned that into the fuel for a vibrant community. His blog serves as one person's diary of what it's like to live with the disease and navigate daily life, in a way that most of us take for granted, but which resonates with his audience. 

I connected with Seth recently and found out that he's attending the JA conference, for the first time in many years. I've invited him to be interviewed, as part of my presentation at the JA conference. I'm excited that by telling his story, on stage, he'll inspire others to find their voice, and/or to join his community.

Seth has also agreed to be interviewed for this blog. Stay tuned!

PS. For those of you in Houston, I'm trying to arrange a meetup/tweetup while I'm there. If you are interested in being included, please email me, carol [at] abiggervoice.com.

When I was in Traverse City last September, Dave and I walked parts of this property. It's lovely. I enjoyed seeing from the video what it looks like at other times of the year. BTW--Dave tells me that the music to the video is original and was composed by a fellow community member and music instructor at the reknowned Interlochen Arts Academy.  Another mark of community is the giving of one's gifts to the larger cause that the community embraces.



I've never asked Dave point-blank why he worked for so long on this project. I'm sure there were times when his enthusiasm waned and his frustration level rose like a childhood fever. My guess is that even he wouldn't be able to fully articulate why he hung in there for so long.

When passion takes hold, I am smart to follow and see where it leads me. Logic becomes secondary to what my heart tells me is important. In the end, I know of no other way to respond, in a way that keeps me congruent and in alignment with my deepest beliefs--about what is right or who I am. I'm guessing that Dave feels the same way.

A friend of mine, who is passionate about bringing the human spirit into business (something near and dear to my heart), cringed when I talked about how he could support his evangelists--people who believe in his ideas and want to help spread them.

His reaction? "Carol, I'm the anti-thesis of evangelism. I'm not about the super mega church. I'm the guy trying to shut the doors and telling them to go home."

My friend has the baggage of evangelism in the context of formal religions. He's a former monk.

Evangelists, in the context of A Bigger Voice, are those 1,000 True Fans, the ones who naturally resonate with your wisdom and ideas, and want to help spread it to others. They don't do it to build the mega church. They do it because it feels right to them, independent of the outcome. Evangelists form the core of your community. They are the 20% that contribute 80% of the ideas to shape what you've started. In the process, you might just create a mega church. But it's not your mega church. It's their mega church.

In the Networking Naturally Program that I just finished up, my evangelists are the people who showed up on a call to brainstorm improvements for the program, the ones who took the time to fill out and return a self-assessment of their networking skills both before and after the program, and the individuals who thought enough to provide comments on the participant-only blog. These are the people who are delighted to write a testimonial about their experience and who are pleased when they can contribute in areas where they have talent and expertise. The more that I reach out to my evangelists on networking naturally, the more I get excited. I can feel the momentum building. 

How am I supporting my evangelists?

• I try to connect with each person, one-on-one, whether it's with a phone call or an exchange of comments on a blog.
• I get to know each person as a unique individual, not just as someone who resonates with my cause.
• I ask each how I can support him/her.
• I provide each with material so that he/she can more easily share our common passion. In this particular case, I'm providing a set of slides that illustrate the 14 "Principles of Networking Naturally."

What are you doing to support your evangelists? How is it helping to build your community?

Photo by dheuer

My pet peeves in working with social entrepreneurs--places where they shoot themselves in the foot:

• Not committed.  See my post about why commitment trumps passion.
• Not respecting the power of grassroots and/or obsessed with power at the top to create change.
• Focused on the "big bang" of an event (front end) instead of the long-term conversation (back end).
• Thinking that someone else needs to make the first move before change can happen.

This is all about your head game--how you view the world, how you are being.

Seth Godin sums this up very nicely in his newest book, Tribes. He asks the question:

Are you worth following?

Indeed. If you're not committed, if you only are in it for the big bang, if you can only see power at the top, if you keep waiting for someone else to make the first move, you're not worth following. Pure and simple.

If you are passionate about creating change in the world, pause to assess whether you are worth following. Leave a comment below. I want to hear not only where you come up short, but where you really shine.

Photo by jhdtolentino

I have to remind myself that community-building is often just about connecting, for no other reason than that.  I forget and think that I have to "get somewhere." When in reality, there's no place I need to be other than right here.

Today, I spent 30 minutes on Facebook, connecting on many levels to half a dozen "friends."  It felt good.

BTW--The beauty of social networking is that it allows me to come into someone's life, intermittently and briefly, without skipping a beat.

Photo by jelene

This brings to mind a conversation I had this morning with a friend, about the distinction between communities and organizations. Organizations, by nature, try to control. People build organizations, thinking that it's a way to spread ideas and change the world.

In contrast, communities are uncontrollable. But they are excellent at taking ideas and making them bigger.  Social media is one way for non-profits to return to an emphasis on community and to remember that organizations are in service to the cause, not the other way around. 

Yes, I'm cynical about non-profits. And I think social media is one way to re-calibrate top down efforts with bottom up grassroots.

Photo by bobby-james

That's the message that marketing guru, Seth Godin, provides in this TED talk.

The question then is "How do you get your ideas to spread?" Two points that are particularly appropriate for wisdom entrepreneurs:

• Be remarkable. Have something worth talking about. For wisdom entrepreneurs, this means not only understanding what makes your wisdom remarkable, but then crystallizing it so that others "get it," right away.
• Speak to the early adopters, the people who are listening, who care about what you are talking about. In A Bigger Voice parlance, find your kindred spirits.

Enjoy Seth at his best: