Brick by brick

October 5th, 2009

   A friend who owns a travel agency once told me that she was building her company one vacation plan at a time. Or, as she put it, brick by brick.

   I thought about that comment last week when I wrote an insert for an Olympic legacy story for EXTRA, a newspaper in Rio de Janeiro. My contribution was about the impact of the Olympics on Atlanta – development in the inner city, the phenomenal growth in business, increase in international consulates, surge in tourism, etc. It was just 356 words. But, my contact at EXTRA put my company’s name, Worldwide Editing, on journalism Web sites in Brazil. He’s also helping me gain additional exposure for an international business consultant I am representing with Pearlman Associates, a Decatur, Ga., public relations and marketing firm I recently joined as a senior associate.

   Brick by brick.

   Projects for this week include:

  • Reconnecting with several businesses who have expressed interest in writing and editing services but who haven’t had the budget to move forward on their projects.
  • Having coffee and lunch with former colleagues.
  • Attending a meeting for health care communicators with Marilyn Pearlman, who has been very sensitive about wanting to make sure that I keep my identity with Worldwide Editing while also working for her. This, by the way, is how I see the new business landscape working: alliances and partnerships to combine skills and experience to make individuals and companies stronger and more effective.

   Brick by brick.

   Also on the agenda this week: Staying in touch with an associate in Taiwan who is representing my writing/editing interests in Asia and who arrived in Los Angeles today. He is in the United States to open the U.S. office of a foundation that is an innovator in Earth-friendly agribusiness production systems and global health initiatives.

   Brick by brick.

   Last, but not least, I’ll be contacting vendors I met in Raleigh at the recent Garden Writers Association Symposium. Several suppliers of garden-related products want to expand into the Southeast and may need branding help. I also want to write about the “peony lady” I met who grew up in Taiwan who now produces exquisite peonies at a nursery in New Jersey.

   Brick by brick.

   As I go through the week, I’ll also be thinking about people at the company where I used to work. They are facing the next stage in their lives as the newspaper industry continues to restructure. Some are wondering what the future holds if they leave their familiar surroundings and try to build a new life in a still-unsettled economy. Several have asked me for advice. I tell them everyone has different circumstances and it’s an individual choice. But, if you do leave to build a new life or your own business, make sure you have a plan. And then build it … brick by brick.

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Back to the future in America

September 24th, 2009
Dr. Lowell Catlett

Dr. Lowell Catlett

However passionate you might be about the “green” and “sustainable” movement, Dr. Lowell Catlett can help you understand it in a way that will touch your soul.

Dr. Catlett, a professor at New Mexico State University who is an exciting futurist with a deep knowledge of technologies and their implications on the way we live and work, gave the keynote address at the 61st Garden Writers Association Symposium in Raleigh today.

Standing beside the podium and speaking without notes or PowerPoint and in a rising and falling voice punctuated with exaggerated gestures to emphasize his points, Catlett took his audience back to the future to understand how got America got where it is environmentally and where it is going.

Catlett told the 600-plus garden writers, the second largest gathering in the group’s history,  that he grew up on a dirt ranch in the Panhandle of Texas where there were no trees and it was so flat you could see your dog running away for three days. Whenever he would complain about ranch chores, he said his father would tell him, “Lowell, when you get through whining, the cows need feeding.” He said he was so different that his mother once told him that “from the day he was born he was weird as hell.”

When his dad died, he said his mom asked him if he wanted the ranch. He said he told all he wanted was to get out of the dust bowl. Now, he says, the man who owns the ranch next to his has wind turbines on the property to generate energy and is making a tidy sum. I guess I’m not very smart, either, he said with a laugh.

This was a time when many American families didn’t have a lot. His father, he recalled, was proud he could put meat on the table every day. People’s lives at that time were about trying to make a living and just survive. It was a time he said when survival wasn’t predicated on a working spouse because it was a time when women did not have traditional careers. Then the men of that generation went off to war and saw real poverty. When they came home, those who did, they wanted concrete roads because they had never had them. His parents’ generation lived in real spaces. Today’s generation, he said, wants to live in a dream space. They can do that, he said, because we get to stand on the shoulders of giants.

The Baby Boom generation he says, is not about a vocation but an avocation. It’s not about making a living, but about creating a lifestyle. It’s a generation that wants love and acceptance and is the first generation ever in the United States that has no concept of retirement, he said.

He told the audience about the the time they took his grandmother to a retirement home. She brought her cats, but they wouldn’t accept them. Lowell had to take them in. Now he says there are assisted living facilities that take pets. There’s even one he knows of where there are stables close by so the residents can touch the horses. “You cannot have healthy humans,” he said, “separate from plants and animals.” He said he loves his dog, a Chesapeake retriever, so much that if the dog needed a kidney he’d give it one of his if it would fit.

Where his parents’ generation built concrete medians, we’re ripping the concrete out and planting flowers and trees. Once people are used to flowers in the median, they’ll never let anyone rip them out. And once they hear a chicken crow in a backyard coop in the garden or can pet a horse in retirement they’ll never live without them. “Folks,” he said, “that’s the greening of America.”

Do not sell people a product or a service he urged the garden writers. Give them their dreams. And after a pause and a slow look around the room, he closed by saying ….. “I’m bringing my dog.”

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Hydrangeas and snow cones

September 23rd, 2009

   Day One at the 61st Garden Writers Association Symposium in Raleigh got off to a humiliating start in Atlanta when I had to borrow a phone at the Medical Center MARTA station and call my bride to tell her I left my phone at home. She and Louie had just dropped me off. Neither was amused at having to turn around and come right back. You know you’re in trouble when your dog gives you a “didn’t-we-just-do-this” look. I will probably never hear the end of this.

   The highlight of the day was an inspiring talk by a John Bartram impersonator at the First Timers meeting. Bartram was an 18th century plant collector from Pennsylvania who counted Benjamin Franklin among his friends. My favorite Bartram story is about his discovery of a camellia-type flower he found along the banks of the Altamaha River on the Georgia coast. This was in the early 1800s. He found it again on a second trip, made collections and named the plant Franklinia Altamaha after Franklin and the river where he found it. It’s never been seen in nature again and all the plants in cultivation today are from Bartram’s discovery. It’s also a very difficult plant to grow in a garden setting. Today’s take away from “John Bratram”: fall is the time to collect seeds to plant in the garden.

   The many vendors here in Raleigh love to give away plants. What they are hoping for is a homerun (remember Hydrangea Endless Summer? It blooms – you guessed it – all summer!). My favorite so far at this symposium is a paniculata-type hydrangea, “Vanilla Strawberry.” The panicles of blooms open white and then fade to a bright strawberry red beginning with the bottom flowers. The effect in the display photos (the blooms on the display plants hadn’t begun turning red yet) reminded me of a strawberry snow cone.

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The dirt on going ‘green’

September 22nd, 2009

   The Garden Writers Association 61st Symposium is joining the rest of the world in going “green” and emphasizing the power of social media. The keynote presentation is on the “Greening of America” by one of the country’s foremost sustainable Earth experts, Dr. Lowell Catlett from New Mexico State University. Several of the workshops, including a post-Symposium session, will focus on blogs and social media outlets for content-based features.

   The Symposium opens Wednesday morning in Raleigh, and I’m looking forward to a working break from a hectic schedule. I’m hoping to make garden writing a core part of my Worldwide Editing business. The goal in Raleigh is to develop story ideas and find representatives from gardening periodicals to pitch them to.

   This will be the second conference of this type in recent months. The first was the annual Cullowhee Native Plants Conference in Cullowhee, N.C., in July. My friend Eleanor Malone has been telling me for years that I needed to go to that. This year I finally made it. Western Carolina University does an outstanding job of hosting several days of stimulating lectures and field trips. Next year’s conference is already on the calendar.

   If you’re into the sustainable Earth movement and enjoy reading about gardens and gardeners, I’ll be blogging from Raleigh to bring you all the dirt.

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It pays to listen to your mother

September 21st, 2009

   Marilyn Pearlman of Pearlman Associates in Decatur recently e-mailed me to tell me that a friend of hers, Kate Siegel of Kartouche, a graphic design, writing and editing studio in Atlanta, has been assigned the “Looking Forward, Looking Back” cover story for the Nov/Dec issue of Oz magazine. Kate is looking for feedback – a hilarious, boastful and/or sensitive anecdote from 2009, and a brilliant, fearless and/or insightful prognostication for 2010, as she put it — from a broad cross-section of people in the visual communication industry.

   Marilyn recently and very kindly invited me to partner with her on several projects. I submitted the following to Kate, which Oz has generously given me permission to post on my blog:

 

    My career coach helped me craft an elevator speech in case I ever found myself in an elevator for 15 seconds with someone important. My mother taught me to always be kind to others. I’m glad I paid attention to both.

   I didn’t develop the elevator speech until after I retired from Cox Newspapers in December 2008, so I didn’t come away from an unexpected encounter with Barack Obama in an elevator in the Hyatt in Austin, Texas earlier that year with a high level government post. (He was a senator from Illinois at the time and in Austin for a debate with then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton before the Texas Democratic presidential primary.)

   However, holding an elevator door open for Marilyn Pearlman of Pearlman Associates at the Commerce Club in Downtown Atlanta where we were attending an Atlanta Press Club meeting has paid wonderful dividends. Since then, we have begun capitalizing on her 30-plus years of experience in owning and operating a Decatur, Ga., public relations firm and my 30-plus years of journalism experience and new Worldwide Editing business. We are partnering on half a dozen projects and have developed a delightful friendship.

   Our special blend of talent and experience and love for helping people tell their story and spread their message has impressed prospective clients. Several have said that because of the economy they’ll have to wait until next year to take advantage of our services. We tell them graciously that we understand and that we’ll stay in touch. Our belief is that the economic storm clouds will break next year. When they do, we’ll have new clients to add to those we are already helping.

   In the meantime, we’ll look for a few elevator doors to open. You never know who might come along for the ride.

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There’s more than one way to kill a computer bug

September 17th, 2009

This is going to be an off-beat post. I could use a little levity toward the end of a busy week.
As I was trying to edit a brochure this week, I noticed a creature about the size of an ant but definitely not an ant on my computer screen. Without thinking too much about it, I pressed a thumb against the varmint to squash him flat. To my astonishment, he crawled right past my thumb and went on his merry way. So, I tried to squash him again. Oblivious to my efforts to do him in, off he scurried yet again. WHACK! WHACK! WHACK! I’m now taking no prisoners and showing no mercy. Still, he’s crawling all over the place. Then it dawned on me. He’s inside my computer!
Reinforcements and a new strateegery were clearly needed, so I called the president of the Worldwide Editing Technology Division. (In keeping with privacy requirements, I’ll call him ‘Penny.’) The first words out of my mouth are, “don’t laugh at this.” To which Penny says, “this is going to be good, let me put you on speaker. Hey, Kerry (not his real name). Come here and listen to Mr. O. Marvelous. Now I’m going to be humiliated in front of the rest of my technology team. The conversation went something like this.

I’ve got a bug in my computer.
You mean, like a virus?
No. I mean like a bug with legs that moves fast.
Hah hah hah hah hah hah hah ……..
This is not funny.
You need to put out ant traps.
It’s not an ant.
Where is it?
Inside my computer screen.
Hah hah hah hah hah hah hah ……..
Will you please stop laughing?
OK. One of three things is going to happen.
• It’s going to crawl out and go away
• It’s going to die and nothing is going to happen
• It’s going to die, rot, decompose and ooooze dead bug juices onto a sensitive component and your computer is going to die and you are going to lose all your hard work. Hah hah hah hah hah hah hah ……..

I don’t know why I keep that guy around.
It’s hard to work with a distracting insect moving all around inside your computer screen, but I persevered. After awhile I didn’t see him anymore and wondered which of Penny’s three scenarios would play out. Then, AHA! I saw the little bugger beside the keyboard, out in the open and nailed him!
I called Penny to tell him I had reigned victorious in this encounter between creature and man. To which he replied: “Mr. O, You can now honestly tell people you can de-bug a computer.” And so I can!

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Olympics: Opportunities and memories

September 10th, 2009
The front page of the Sept. 18,1990 Atlanta Journal covering Atlanta's winning bid for the 1996 Olympics was turned into several kinds of memorabilia, including a paperweight. (Photo by Perry Patrick)

The front page of the Sept. 18,1990 Atlanta Journal covering Atlanta's winning bid for the 1996 Olympics was turned into several kinds of memorabilia, including a paperweight. (Photo by Perry Patrick)

   The Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce hosted a breakfast meeting Wednesday that opened a door full of opportunities. The meeting was part of the “Route to 2012: Business Opportunities in London” road show. It was in Atlanta as part of a multi-city U.S. tour that is aimed at highlighting the business opportunities London has to offer, specifically around the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012. I attended as a guest of Marilyn Pearlman of Pearlman Associates in Decatur. Marilyn has been operating her public relations firm for 32 years and we are partnering on several projects. Hopefully, Wednesday’s meeting will lead to new projects we’ll work on as partners in representing Georgia companies doing business in London with the 2012 Olympics.

   The London 2012 meeting also highlighted an aspect of being in business for yourself that I think has relevancy for people who’ve launched second careers. Where do you find opportunities to grow your business? My experience is that you have to get out of the house, attend mixers and other events and meet people. As valuable a tool as our computers and mobile devices and social media are, the strength in doing business is still relationships.

   On a personal note, watching video of the London delegation reacting when the IOC official announced London had won the 2012 Olympics brought back memories of Sept. 18, 1990 when Atlanta was awarded the 1996 Games. I was the news editor on The Atlanta Journal. The announcement was made in Tokyo at 9 a.m. ET, the exact time of the press turn on the morning street-sales edition of the afternoon paper. My friend Frank White, makeup editor at the time, Clyde “Can’t-Do” Spears, production manager, and I were in a room off the reel room and under the presses with six front pages and six runover pages of each possible winning city. They were ready to go on the presses, which were humming and waiting nearby with all the remaining plates bolted in place, as soon as we heard the announcement. We were listening on a transistor radio (Oh, God! The old days …) as Juan Antonio Samranch make the announcement. The sound was so scratchy we could barely hear. Our heads were almost touching as we leaned over the radio. “The 1996 Olympic Games are awarded to … the city of … Atlanta.” “PUT THESE PAGES ON THE PRESS,” I shouted to Clyde, pointing at the pages with the big, bold headline, “It’s Atlanta!” “Can’t do it,” he replied calmly. “Got to wait for authorization from Bobby Swain.” Frank almost fainted, and I thought I was going to have a stroke. After what seemed an eternity but was probably just seconds, Swain, Clyde’s boss, called to tell him to go with the headline that led to the largest-selling single-day run of either The Atlanta Journal or The Atlanta Constitution, which are combined now.  The days of that type of newspapering are likely gone forever. I love the Internet and news in real time, but there was something special about smelling ink and fresh news print, feeling the floor tremble and not being able to be heard by the person standing next to you as the presses of a big city newspaper raced at full speed. My friend Gary Borders once did a piece about the sound of newspaper presses for NPR’s All Things Considered when he was editor of a (now former) Cox community paper in Texas. He called it the sound of freedom. What a wonderful way of saying what newspapers have meant to this country. Here’s a link to the NPR transcript which, unfortunately, doesn’t include the sound bites of the presses running.  (Borders was in Lufkin when he wrote this. When last we worked together, he was the publisher at the Cox paper in Longview, Texas.)

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What’s your story? mine is some good news!

September 8th, 2009

   I received some really good news in the last few days. The slogan I worked up for my Worldwide Editing business, “EVERYONE HAS A STORY TO TELL What’s your story?”, has only one more hurdle to clear before it becomes a registered mark of my company. My patent/trademark attorney says the chances are slim to none it will run into any problems now that it has been cleared by the U.S Patent and Trademark Office. A service mark, incidentally, protects a service in the same way that a trademark protects a product.

   If you are a journalist working in your second life and doing business on your own, please know there are some critical areas of your new business you need to protect. Slogans such as the one are above are just one example. Another is publishing insurance. Truthfully, I didn’t even know this was available until I went to an Atlanta Press Club panel discussion on starting your own freelance business. Jim Walls, a former AJC editor who is doing such a wonderful job with Atlanta Unfiltered, which covers oversight and ethics issues for Atlanta-area government and private agencies (http:// www.atlantaunfiltered.com), talked about publishing and blogging insurance as part of the discussion. A First Amendment attorney I talked with about this said I was right on the edge of needing it for my business. I like some aspects of life on the edge, but not in this case. I’m now asking an insurance provider about this protection. The good news: It’s not expensive.

I’d like to know what other challenges people in second careers are finding as they start their own businesses. Please share your experiences. Let everyone benefit from what you are learning!

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Lightning can strike at networking events!

August 28th, 2009

I made a proposal today to perform an ESL edit for an article an Asian policy studies journal is writing for a publication in the United States. I don’t know yet if I will be chosen for the edit, but being in a position to make the proposal shows the power of networking. I found out about the need for the ESL edit through an online copy editing group I joined on the recommendation of a former colleague I reconnected with at a networking event.

Networking has paid off for me in so many ways. At another event, for example, I met a person I have begun partnering with on campaigns that require strategic public relations planning. We have a formal proposal to a prospect pending as a result of that partnership and are preparing another bid to an importer from Germany.  I met both prospects at separate events. There’s more, but you get the idea. Get out and be seen. Most of all, don’t be bashful about walking up to someone you don’t know, introducing yourself and asking them their name and what they do. You never know what might happen.

What networking events do you find most beneficial? Do you network at events that aren’t ‘designated’ networking events? Care to share networking tips or success stories?

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A 30-dash and a new chapter

August 28th, 2009

By Tom Oder

When I walk my dog at night, I like to pause at a nearby ridge where I can see the lights of Cox Enterprises’ 17-story corporate headquarters on another ridge a mile away. From my vantage point, I salute my former employer and give thanks for almost 40 great years as a mid-senior level newspaper editor, most of them in Atlanta with Cox. Then I urge the dog to do what dogs do on their nightly walks so we can put a 30-dash on another day.

I retired from Cox Newspapers last December when Cox eliminated my position as managing editor of Cox News Service and most of the department of which I was a part. Content is no longer important, a co-worker said a vice president told him. Friends occasionally still ask me if I am bitter. The answer is no. I wasn’t then and am not now.

The severance package from Cox was, I believe, the best in the industry. And it included being paired with a personal coach for six months. She helped me transition into the next phase of my life: launching my own writing, editing, business communications and media consulting company, Worldwide Editing. Which is the reason for this blog.

I want to begin a dialogue with other entrepreneurs about your experiences in starting your businesses. What are the hurdles you’ve had to clear? What bumps have you hit in the road? What successes have you toasted?

I began laying the foundation for Worldwide Editing almost three years ago when a colleague at corporate warned me that Cox was positioning itself to sell most or all of the newspaper division. I began working with remote clients through my horticultural interests, but couldn’t begin building my target client base while I was with Cox because I had to avoid conflicts of interest. Finding clients, especially those who have money in a bad economy, is my biggest challenge (the buyout does not restrict who I work for or with).

Luckily, I haven’t hit many bumps. The biggest has been the loss of infrastructure and technical support. Mercifully, I have friend who is still employed who patiently answers my technical questions. ‘BH’ has become part of his lexicon. Thankfully, he accepts lunches as payment for his ‘billable hours.’

I’m beginning to find interest in my services and have made several formal proposals that are under consideration. One of those involves strategic planning for an international public relations campaign. Because this effort would go beyond my area of expertise, I am partnering with a public relations specialist in making this bid. I also have a representative in Taiwan with whom I am working on a global health initiative. He is recommending me to companies in Asia to write the English portion of their Web sites.

What about you? How far have you moved forward on your journey? Learning about the hurdles you’ve jumped, the bumps you’ve navigated and your successes will benefit me and others. In the meantime, I’ll write about my life as a writer and editor after newspapers and occasionally offer a thought or two about life after newspapers as we know them. I want to make garden writing a core competency of my business and will sometimes write about horticulture – especially gardening with native plants and how to grow tropical orchids in your home. And I hope you’ll share your ideas so I and others can benefit from your experiences.

Now it’s time to go walk Louie and salute what those in Cox call the “mother ship.”

-30-

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