Lets make is short. Below is a starting list of super smart people whom I would like to have 5-10 minutes conversation this year during my Babson journey. Why I publish this list? first - make it easy for me to go over this list as long as needed. second - make it easy for you to know or talk with a great bunch of smart new people.

Geraldine Alias
Colin Angle
Pano Anthos
Dave Barrett
Steve Bayle
David Beisel
Jeff Bennett
Woody Benson
Adam Berrey
Elon S. Boms
Dan Bricklin
Shawn Broderick
Joe Caruso
Jon Chait
David Cohen
Jarrett Collins
Matt Cutler
Richard Dale
Eran Egozy
Brad Feld
Bob Frankston
Daniel Gaffney
Michael Gaiss
Mike Grandinetti
Dayna B. Grayson
Chris Heidelberger
Jean Hammond
Will Herman
Eric Hjerpe
Nabeel Hyatt
Steve Kane
Alec Karys
Warren Katz
Will Kohler
John Landry
Margaret Lawrence
Rich Levandov

Chris Brogan wrote a great post about How Social Media Users Prep events.I think that Chris gave a great bunch of tips about few sites to find local events, people in your conference /event area. While I agree with Chris’s post, I would like to expand on the topic of meeting the right people using the tools mentioned there.

Maximize Your Free Time

Events are great. If you have free time, going to an eventcan be a great way to meet new people. The most successful business men and women, though extremely busy, still find the time to attend at least one event per month. Considering the limited time and the plenty of opportunities, maximizing your time becomes a very important goal. Choose events at which you are likely to meet people that will be advantageous to know.

Look Out For People

Using the tools mentioned by Chris, you can find the list of people and speakers attending the event ahead of time. Read about them in Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter. Find any common interests? Write their name on the paper. Make sure you have at least a few names at the end of the process. Now what? Think what value you can give them. Business partnership? Job offer? Kudos for some work they did in the past? Studying the “whos” of any event beforehand will keep you from missing out on opportunities to make personal connections.

Contact Before

Contact people in one of the networks hosting an event you attended, either before or after. Schedule sometime to meet them during coffee break or lunch. Be very specific about what you want to talk about. Make a list of two or three points on a paper. Don’t forget the paper on your desk!You will probably would not have more than five minutes with that person before you lose their attention.

During The Meeting

Arrive early! Say hello and share few insights about the event, or ask questions to learn more. That process should be more than two minutes. Be focused and tell him or her how you think you can help . Then shut up and listen. Don’t criticize, don’t blame. Think Win-Win. Try to have at least one action item at the end of the talk, such as setting another meeting date or getting introduced to another person.

Pre-Event Work

Add the people you met with to your LinkedIn network. So many people forget to do that. It’s one of the most important things to do. Why? Because now you can track those people changes in work and contact information. Don’t forget to send thank you message. Don’t write a generic message. You can start with a generic sentence, but then write a few words about your experience from the event or the meeting.

It’s a Lot of Work

Yeah, I know. Who has all the time for that? After few times, It will take you between 5-10 minutes before the event, and 2-5 minutes after the event. It’s worth it, believe me. Better network connectivity leads to better opportunities in the long run. The goal is to get more out of your time. Your time is important so spend the little extra time to get the best out of it.

For me, It’s one of the most powerful tools for networking.

What do you think? Have any tips? Please comment and share

Want to hear more?
subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter.

Photo credit dsevilla

When I think about the next leaders in the marketing area, I think about Chris Brogan.He is well known speaker and author of a few books. The beauty of his blog and books that he talks with you and about you, not at you.
Chris has been my virtual leadership and marketing mentor for the last 2 years. I had the privilege to meet him in person few days ago. It was the end of a long-term goal to meet Chris some day.

From thinking forward, to going on your success path, to building an online business, to winning with the crowd, Chris covers a bunch of leadership skills that you can use in any business.

Here are 5 life insights from Chris:

1. Work by heart - Money is important, but Chris businesses are powered by heart.
2. Capture your ideas - Spend the time every day capture your insights and ideas by writing or drawing them on paper. It helps to make some deep thinking about your ideas.
3. Listening is a daily thing - Chris spends a lot of his time to listen. He speaks a lot in events, but still find the time to listen. We all have a lot to say, we don’t really need to do that in a one time.
4. Use framework to guide you - Chris use mind-maps as a powerful tool to capture his ideas and model his framework. When you have framework, you have a path. When you have a path, you have vision.
5. Don’t forget your family - When it comes to business and passion, you can find yourself really quick in 30 year career path while your children are growing up while their dad is flying around the world. Chris puts his family in the top of the list as it should be.

I hope you enjoy these lessons as much as I’ve enjoyed putting them together.

I have done the hard work for you. See the “lite” view of the list in excel format for easy sorting, searching and funding!

Link to the file

Goal.  The word is one of the most commonly used words in the world. People love goals. Companies love goals. You love goals. It always starts well. You have dozen of goals in your mind. You want to be rich, happy, a good parent and many other things. Then, you have the motivation to start immediately. Next, nothing. You leave the room full of ideas, without making any change. In the last 12 months I have gathered a few techniques for goals setting. I have some ideas that I would like to share.

First Goals First

In my efforts to think about my life for the next few years, I started with my goals. Not all of my goals are related to business, some of them are related to my personal life and my family. Why are goals are so important to me? Because when I have my goals in front of me every day I can check with myself when a new opportunity comes in, whether this opportunity is related to my goals or not. Focus is a golden rule of thumb in my plan. It’s very important to start with a clear goal: “I want to lose 12lbs until the end of the year” is better than “I want to lose weight”. Be concise with your goals.

See the Bright Spots

By thinking about my goals, I’m trying to understand my passion or what I’m really good at. For example: I know that I’m not the operator, but I’m a great leader / thinker. Why is seeing the bright spots so important? Because your goals must be aligned with your strengths.  Want to start quick? Thing about the three things you are the best at.  Using this method, You can see what you are really good at, but also what you really need to improve this year (or the following years). Again, start with the basics. Make today a list of the three things you do best. Check the list after one week and see if what you wrote stays true. If yes, you’ve taken one step forward to find your strengths.

Connect All to Actions

You know your strengths and your goals, what you have to do now? Make it actionable. Many people fail at this step. I think that this step is the most important one. If you want to lose weight but you are not sure how, you are not going to lose weight. Period. Keep in mind that actions without deadlines are like trying to lose weight all your life. I have dozens of ideas to share about how to make a great switch. Reading the book Switch is a great start.

So what you can do today?

• Think about your strengths
• Think about your goals for this month, year, three years from now
• Split every goal into a list of actionable tasks
• Make it simple and clear

If you didn’t have goals yet, try to set a small one today. Over the last three years, I had one major goal - get into a top MBA program in the USA. Now that I have decided to join Babson’s MBA program this fall, I want to share “why Babson and why now.” The following ideas are only my own views. You should see the big picture and merge your own goals with your own perspective.

My Rank

Financial Times ranks Babson’s MBA Entrepreneurship program #1 17 years in a row. When every MBA prospective student starts to look for an MBA school he has the general rank in his mind. Babson is not a top 10 school on other lists. There are many reasons for that: it’s a small school, and many students start new ventures after studies leading to low employment numbers. Babson’s MBA 2-year program probably never be listed in the Top 5, and I’m glad about that. When I looked for a biz school, I searched a biz school which would fit my goals (remember goals?) in the next 10 years. As I do want to work in small business or start my own new ventures, I’m drawn to the diversity that Babson provides, bringing together people from many industries and countries.

Me and America

I’m living currently in Israel, so I’m going to move to Boston in the next few months. This will be a big change for me. As a someone who was born and grew up in Israel, moving to the USA is an amazing switch and a huge opportunity. I’m sure I will post a lot about my MBA journey, but I want to set goals and talk about them. I’m going to meet new people, experience a new culture, learn new language (Ok, maybe that’s not so new J). I’m drawing the plans for the next three years. Yes, three years is a lot of time, but that’s the way in which I will see the maximum results – by planning ahead of time my goals. Without a plan you don’t see results. Period.

Boston – Big City, European Culture and Entrepreneurial Atmosphere

Boston is really a great place for students. It has more than 50 universities. In addition to Babson’s programs, those of MIT and Harvard offer a great way to participate and interact in many events. I do like the way that many top MBA program around Boston organize events together. That way, students from Harvard can network with students from Babson and vice versa. Boston is a the twenty-first largest city in the USA. Being based in a big city will be a great opportunity for me and my family..

MBA That Fits You Not Others

Babson does have some disadvantages, like Stanford and MIT. No college is perfect. The question is what you want to do in the next 10 years and How you MBA school can help you reach those goals.

Don’t worry that I didn’t talk about the great people whom I have met and plan to meet during my time in Boston. It will by privilege to talk about the amazing people in my future blog posts. This, to me, is the best time of my life. It’s the best time for me to grow and develop more businessexpertise. From now on, as things get exciting, and I hope to share my lessons with you.

Want to hear more?
subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter.

Photo credit fassina

Amazon reviews are not reliable in my point of view, but many people are still taking them as a guarantee that a certain book is good. It’s funny to see many reviews conveniently posted on the same day / week, of that book’s launch date, suggesting that the reviewers are actually affiliates and inside marketers posing as book fans.

I would like to share my own tips now.

Kindle To The Rescue

As avid reader of books, I see my great Kindle device as a great platform to find the best books. Why? Because many books not only suck but also waste shelf space.  I’m using Kindle to weed out the sucky books and find the best titles.  How do I find one? The rule of thumb is very simple. If I finish the half of book in one shot, that is a great book to finish, because I couldn’t put it down. If I start reading it and get bored to death, stop quickly.  When I do find one, I order it in Amazon for reading it again in paper format.

Books = Value  ?

There are too many books on every topic to select from. 99% are worthless. Few of them bring a real value by sharing a life experience and giving a great value for the readers. Many books have been written by successful but egotistical people who brag about their own success rather than share their own life lessons. Many other books will tell you how to be successful entrepreneur by a non-entrepreneur (the author). Only a few books really bring an amazing value to the reader.

Rework

Over the last few days, I have been reading the book Rework.  I was wary in the first chapter like I am while reading any book, but then authors Jason Fried and David Heinemeir plucked amazing tips from obscurity and shared them with me, the reader, in a concise manner. The authors are very generous to share their own experience, and they have a lot. I really felt during reading the book, that somehow the authors were attentive to the market reactions from the first day of the company. Rework is a great example of the Customer Development concept by Steve Blank. If you’re not familiar with the innovative thinking of Steve Blank, make sure to bookmark my site–I will talk more about Steve Blank in future posts.

Want to hear more?

subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter.

Photo credit babblingdweeb

You will probably meet at least one new person every day. If not, start doing it from today.

There has been a lot of discussion about the power of first impressions, but that’s not what I’m not going to cover in this post. Instead, let’s talk about “hype.”
As someone who is very involved in social media, I meet a lot of new people who are using hype words such as “social media marketing,” ‘Facebook marketing,” and “brand marketing” at the start of every conversation. All too often, the purpose of these words is to impress the other person and to show their understanding of the specific topic. I can honestly say that 90% of the people have no idea what they are talking about!

The power of words

Words influence every aspect of our lives. The power of words to deliver our message is even more important at those times when we are introducing ourselves to someone new and pitching our companies. We want to make sure that we use the right words and that we ourselves understand what we are saying. After all, wouldn’t it be ridiculous to hear a singer say “I know how to build an aircraft”?

The wrong way for feedback

Over the years, I have developed a specific method for filtering these people within 2-5 minutes at the start of any conversation. My method for dealing with these types of people is a mixture of experience and questions.
Please note: many people use fashion words to feel better about themselves in the start of every talk. By nodding your head and smiling at these people, you are using the wrong approach!
While some people just smile at these moments, others react in the wrong manner by blaming or accusing the other person for using specific terms without knowing what they really mean.
Accusing people is the worst-case scenario! Don’t do that. Always remember, there is a big difference between people and their words. By asking the right questions, you can dig a bit deeper and find out whether such people actually do know what they are talking about. And remember too, there no connection between how well people express themselves and how smart and nice they are.

The simple approach

A few weeks ago, I met a very nice woman who told me that advertising on Facebook was not working.
What would most people do in this situation? Simply go and repeat to their friends that advertising on Facebook doesn’t worki?
That would be the wrong answer. Advertising on Facebook does work, but only for specific goals. So how can you keep yourself from jumping to the wrong conclusions? First of all, by asking the “why” question.
Once you ask the question, “Why is advertising on Facebook not working?”, you will usually see a different view. That’s a start, but it’s not enough. Asking “why” is easy, but still not the perfect way.
Ask yourself as well, why does this person assume that advertising on Facebook is not working? Maybe the person hates Facebook and prefers Twitter for unknown reasons? Yeah, that could be a better answer. Would you go now and tell your friends that advertising on Facebook is not working? I’m sure not!

See the difference?
More about asking the right questions in the next posts.

Want to hear more?
subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter.

Photo credit seandreilingers