Net Cotton Content / On Life and Marketing, Creativity and Ethics

Talk tonight

A couple weeks ago, I mentioned that I've been invited to deliver this year's Heisler Lecture on Business Ethics at Ohio Wesleyan University.

I've worked up a passionate and, I hope, informed talk on the Ethics of Speech in Business (and Life).

Tonight is the night (Monday, April 7) and...

You are cordially invited.

Admission is free. The organizers expect about 170 attendees.

All you have to do is come to the Delaware campus. Here's the Google map to get you to the Benes Rooms of Ohio Wesleyan University’s Hamilton-Williams Campus Center 40 Rowland Avenue, Delaware, Ohio.

The talk starts at 7:30 p.m.

(Spoiler alert: Don't peek if you are attending. Here are the slides I'm using.)

But what if you can't wait until 7:30?
What if you want to hear a talk, any talk, right now?

Then, dear reader, you have issues.

So here — in the convenience of your computer — is another talk from TED ("Ideas Worth Spreading") that is wonderfully interesting. (Thanks to Tina for sending it my way.)

In the following video, a brain scientist finally explains the idea of Right Brain/Left Brain in a way that even I can understand. She understands the difference, because she personally had a stroke that interrupted the left side of her brain.

Here's Jill Bolte Taylor describing My Stroke of Insight.

(If the video below takes too long to load, just click here and you'll go straight to her talk on the TED website.)

Recessionary Tongue

We're all geniuses during economic expansion.

We feel like dopes during a recession.

Welcome to the recession, ya big dope. (Don't feel bad. You're the smartest of the dopes.)

When we feel like dopes, nerves get frayed.

...and tongues get loose.

My smartest friends say, "If only folks wouldn't talk about it being a recession, perhaps it wouldn't be a recession."

This might sound simplistic, but let's be honest: what we say leads to what we do.

Time To Measure Our Speech
Rather than talking negatively about the economy — or anything or anyone else — let's celebrate the coming of Our Recession by examining how we talk.

And examining how how we talk leads to how we live. (How how, brown cow?)

To help, the lovely people at Ohio Wesleyan University have asked me to deliver the Woltemade Center’s Annual Heisler Lecture on Business Ethics. Here is the announcement — and your invitation.

So I'm going to do it, by golly. (You don't have to ask me twice.) Together, we will explore the ethics of speech and how businesses — and our lives in business — are shaped by what we say.

It's free and open to the public. This means you. Please come. Here are directions to the event.

On Finding Courage

What a treat to spend the lunch hour yesterday with the courageous board of trustees and senior staff of The House of Hope for Alcoholics, Inc.

Why "courageous"? Because they are devoted to charging through stereotypes, into the messy reality of combating alcoholism and drug dependency — both fatal diseases if left untreated. In a world where booze and drugs are misperceived as fun and freedom, the House of Hope offers a sane, wholesomely counter-cultural alternative for treatment.

That's bravery.

A New Presentation
Our topic was Finding Courage, a new presentation for organizations that must overcome fear so they can overcome enormous challenges. Click here for details on the presentation and for the slides in the PowerPoint presentation.

You Can Get Involved
Want to get involved with House of Hope? You can get started by contacting these development folks.

I'm grateful to the House of Hope for helping me write Finding Courage.

Living a more creative life

Want to come hear a one-hour talk on how to live a more creative life?

If so, come to The Ohio State University Business Builders Club on Tuesday, October 30th at 7:30 p.m.

Let me know if you are coming, so I can look forward to seeing you.

The Last Lecture

What would you say if you were giving your last lecture?

Here's a four-minute news video from The Wall Street Journal on an inspiring last lecture from Professor Randy Pausch at Carnegie Mellon. The entire lecture is in the window below. (Professor Pausch recommends skipping the first eight minutes of introductions that he says he doesn't deserve.)

Professor Pausch's website offers additional insights, as well as a transcript.

Beyond the wise content, there is a lot to be learned by Professor Pausch's poise during what is planned to be his last months of life.

Ethics of Speech in a Public School

It was such a treat for me to face the highly intelligent and engaged students of Columbus Alternative High School's International Baccalaureate program. These are Columbus Public School students who were truly ready to wrestle with the college level, ethical aspects of daily communication.

Here are the slides from the presentation. Let me know if you have a group that would be interested in learning about the ethics of speech. The presentation is intensely practical and always inspires constructive argument.

Teaching Creativity to MBAs

I am so glad to be teaching a course on Creativity again, starting in September at The Ohio State University Fisher College of Business.

If you are a OSU MBA candidate, here are the details being passed around campus:

Course Overview: Can creativity be taught? Before you say “no,” consider the question from another side: Can what you say or do inhibit creativity in yourself and others? The simple truth: you can increase creativity by simply no longer suppressing it. In Creativity: Skills and Practice, Artie Isaac teaches managers how to foster creativity by making their thoughts, emotions and actions more positive — and by devoting simple resources toward a return to creativity. In the end, the teaching of creativity is actually each student re-learning the creativity of childhood.

Rainmaking at Chester Willcox

During the past 16 years, Young Isaac has enjoyed working with law firms of all sizes. The legal business has evolved into a marketable industry as the legal canon permits more expressiveness -- and as lawyers themselves recognize that the competitive legal marketplace rewards those who lever intelligent, attention-getting, ethical marketing.

Some of the work we've done is for Chester Willcox & Saxbe. Click on the little photo on the left to see some strategically sound, refreshingly different new airport advertising.

So, while I've been working with lawyers, I've always admired those that know how to develop new business...

Young Professionals of Columbus live more creativity

Last night, the Young Professionals of Columbus let me speak on How to Life a Creative Life. Those that were there might enjoy reviewing some of the slides -- just click here.

If you weren't there, you might consider joining the Young Professionals of Columbus. If you are young. And professional.

If you want to know more about my creativity teaching, check out the creativity syllabus for my MBA class at the Fisher College at The Ohio State University.

For public speakers

A couple of years ago, I was invited by Sanford Meisel, an adjunct design instructor at CCAD, to write a short article on public speaking. Here is the result, called "Public Speaking To Naked People: How To Present To A Group."

“Look at the audience and imagine them as if they were naked.”

Naked. That was the first advice I ever received about public speaking. My speech teacher wanted me to avoid being intimidated by the audience. “Sure, they outnumber you,” he said. “So you win the upper hand by imagining them as vulnerable. And there are no people more vulnerable than naked people.”

In the decades since then, as a public speaker, professor, advertising executive, stand-up comedian and college actor, I have addressed thousands of audiences and imagined tens of thousands of naked people. Perhaps even you. (Sorry. Hope you enjoyed the speech.)

So, look at them as naked people. It works. It makes you smile and relax, so you can speak well, without fear.

To avoid fear, here’s my schedule before I give a speech.