Jane Genova: Speechwriter - Ghostwriter

9 Ways to Carve a Pumpkin - Martha Stewart So Irrelevant, Annoying

An object lesson for all of us who figure we can put off change: Think of Martha Stewart still trying to sell us 9 ways to carve a pumpkin.  If we can even afford the time and money to schlep to the store or field and buy a pumpkin, that's about as good as we expect things in the Fourth Quarter of 2008.  No surprise, the earnings for Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia aren't all that hot.

What could Stewart be selling?  Answer: Dignity and Hope.  That can be packaged in a segment on TV or in her publications about making discount shopping both an adventure and productive.  She could lead us around big boxes as well as those dollar stores.  Then she can demonstrate how we can enhance those purchases so they look great in our homes, in our offices, and on us.

Why doesn't Stewart change?  The same reason the rest of us have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the challenges of the current economy.  We only remember past success and attempt to apply it in the present.  The reality that it doesn't fit can be happily ignored, until our employers, our own businesses, and our nest egg hit a bottom.  Let's hope Stewart can get hold of herself and what she should be peddling before that bottom rises up and carries her enterprise away.

That Fairytale Marriage - Are the Edwards Splits-ville?

According to "Page Six" in the NEW YORK POST, it might be splits-ville between long-suffering Elizabeth and cad John Edwards.  Not only was the latter a cad to his wife when he had the affair with another woman.  He let down the American people as well as his own political party by running for president with that secret in his closet.

On "Page Six," Richard Johnson reports that when Elizabeth recently delivered a talk in Washington D.C., there was no wedding band. There has been no official confirmation from the Edwards that they have separated.

Layoff & POV

We can get laid off and ask ourselves, maybe for years, what we did wrong.  Or, we can get laid off and tell ourselves, "Hey, we better look for another job or start a business."  It's that difference in point of view which separates those who become stuck in the trauma of losing a job - and that's all it is, a loss of a job, not of self, talent, experience, or future - from those who position the event as raw reality.

Lesson for hard times: There's no payoff reading too much into setbacks, obstacles, or even downright disasters.

My [Voluntary] Vow of Poverty - 5th Anniversary

My [voluntary] vow of poverty will be five years old on November 6th.  How did it go and will I stick with it?

It went fine.  It accomplished what I intended: To find out how far my writing/communications consulting talent would go if I stopped aiming to max earnings and how much pain I could stop.  In my communications niches, I am a star of sorts - almost famous.  The pain throbs only when I am being pushed to change, yet again.

I will continue with a modified version of the vow.  My eyes are open to increase earnings, but my way.  I know. I know.  Good luck working that out.  Desire breeds more desire.  No I don't want to be back where I was.  But I tried out this experiment. It went great.  Now for something different.

"Without a Trace" - Looks like Jack The Player Gets Job Back

Jack Malone has turned out to be a player.  He pulled all the right moves to get his job back.  In a high-profile case involving a little white girl Jack did what it took to find her before she was murdered.  His boss Clark will get the credit and the possible promotion.  Obviously, it was pay-back time for Jack.  Jack said what he wanted was his job back.

889.35

With the DOW up 889.35 points, it's easier to sell.  And there are more folks out there willing to buy.  Today my phone, which had been silent for what seemed forever, jingled with prospects interested in hearing about my services and getting a rate quote.

But, bad times for the DOW or any other economic indicator don't get us off the hook from hustling.  In January I anticipate tons of pent-up demand for communications jobs that need to get done.  If I'm not prepared with new additions to my portfolio, new ideas, another new e-book and a few new skills, I won't get that work.

There is no bad time to push for a job or new business.

Framing everything as good news

Not that bad news was ever welcome.  Lots of wisdom in that cliche that the messenger bearing bad news is shot.  But bad news, except in the media where it is brisk business, is particularly unwelcome today.  Oy vey, we can't handle one more bit of it.

Necessary reality:  Frame all negative developments in a wrapper of positive thinking.  Got canned today?  Roll this out as the push you needed to get unstuck from that old job, career path, being a scapegoat in the office.

Note:  Even therapists want to hear good news from their clients.

Mean Streets of Jersey City, NJ - Proven Executive Coach

Over-education bundled with greed for middle- and upper-middle class goodies led me away from the career/life wisdom assimilated in the mean streets of Jersey City, New Jersey.  Fortunately, in 2005, I dumped all that dumb stuff and returned to my early socialization.  Here you can read all about that in this e-book which more than a 1 million confused worker bees/entrepreneurs have also read Download CUsersjasneDocumentsjg.pdf.

The short version is: The smell of fear is what does us in.  Forget anyone having mercy on us when we allow that smell to permeate a transaction. 

How to delete fear?  Strategic thinking.  Sure, when we size up the situation, we may have be decide to fold, for at least then.  But the message we communicate is that it's not fear driving us but reality. 

In the lion's share of tough encounters I have had to back down about 20 percent of the time.  Overall I now have the advantage of surprising my opponents, enemies, and even allies.  They rarely if ever expect anyone to be strategically thinking the way out. 

Takeaway: Replace fear with strategy.  It never fails.

Forget the Big Picture - Off we go looking for assignments, jobs

That Big Picture which they breathlessly discuss on CNBC has little to do with us working stiffs.  So forget it.  Our focus is on developing new business for our little companies, pitching to customers, or finding a job. 

The day we are paid to pontificate about world economic affairs is when we can take our eye off our own little struggle for survival.

Wall St, Park Avenue, Greenwich, CT, Inside the Beltway - Everything did change

The lion's share of those good jobs on Wall Street aren't coming back [Anita Raghavan, FORBES, October 27, 2008]. 

The same is true for many of those equally good paying jobs in public relations on Park Avenue that are disappearing as digital communications pros and management consultants eat their lunch. 

As for those seven-figure gigs in Greenwich, Connecticut, some of those who held them might have to hustle for any kind of work after they leave prison.

And on K Street, Lobbying Central, in Washington D.C., a Democratic Administration will inflict massive job loss with perhaps no where to go - or to hide Inside or Outside the Beltway.

But even before the current meltdown, everything was changing.  Post-meltdown, post-grassroots outrage, the change was completed. 

Those shifts had been put put in play way back in the late 1990s by digital technology.  Thanks to the Internet, how we do business became decentralized.  Influence and power became unbundled from wealth.  Oddball Matt Drudge in a studio apartment could get a president impeached. And talent in manipulating search engines could trump traditional brandnames. 

Now those shifts are the new way of doing business, presenting ourselves in business and putting together a comeback in business.  All that is very different from how success used to be gotten.

From my coaching displaced executives, I've learned this. Those who can and will bounce back, perhaps stronger than before, are the men and women willing to cut their losses, find out what of their experience/skills are marketable out there, and get really shrewd about selling them. 

Here is an e-book I wrote this year about staying employed in the 21st century, one day at a time.  Yes, you can download it free Download savingsoulsonparkavenuekstreet.pdf. 

Before you tackle that, though, you might want to boost your emotional IQ.  This isn't new.  It was always the C students who got to be the bosses of the A students.  That's because when the A students were booking it, the C students were enhancing their knowledge of people, running for class president, and collecting favors on campus.  Here is another e-book I published this year.  Communications clients and executives I've coached requested this primer.  Please download it free  Download CUsersjasneDocumentsjg.pdf.