Time is relative

Its being a little while since a post something. First thing, I am sorry. Second thing, I am sure it will happen again. A post per day is challenging and sometimes impossible. Life just insists to get busy and busy with time. As a girl of theories, I have one now.

Theory Statement: a post posted is better than two posts in your head.

For now, I have millions ideas on my head, but not time to copy-paste, study and write a post. How to create time? How to make time flexible?

When I had to study for an exam, that was all I did for the whole day. Busy Busy.

When I had to finish a project and go grocery, that was all I did for the whole day. Busy busy.

When I had to help at home, cook, write a paper, go tothe doctor, pay the bills, prepare for a meeting, clean my wardrobe, that was all I did for the whole day. Busy busy.

Now I have to work for a multinational company, study for my MBA, write my final project, work on my side projects, read, get references, help at home, produce my music, release my two books, that is all I do for the whole day.

Busy busy!

Time is relative like truth. You can just make it.

And wins who makes more nad better.

Sharing my new hobby!

I just want to share one of my new greatest achievements: Rowing in the Lagoon!

I decided to start canoeing classes two weeks ago. The basic fundaments are given inside a tank, where you should row for a while. Then, you pass to the next step, the actual Lagoon.

I wanted to learn the positions and techniques, so I hit Youtube to check on videos. I ended up wathcing a really funny and scary edition of 23 people falling in the water. Hahaha! So, that´s why I was really shaky and nervous bellow, but I did not fall! That´s good so far!

Anyway, rowing is a great exercice, not only for being a complete work out, but for also being mind provoking, refreshing and beautiful. The water is delightful, the sun is marvelous, the scenery is astonishing! It always end up being a great inspirational moment of the day.

What is yours? What do you do to inspire yourself daily?

How Brazilian Cultural Incentive Law works

Let me explain how things work here in Brasil if you want a cultural incentive for your project from the government, its really interesting, but really hard.

You have a project in your mind. You write this project down with all idefault parts for a project (mission, vision, description, justification, innovative and differential values and aspects, reach, target, credits (staff) and credentials and, most importantly, budget, for example). You enter the governmental site MINC, Cultural Ministry, log in and submit your project. If you are lucky, the government will get back to you saying you are approved to get financed with a incentive law by sponsors for the specific project you submitted and for the specific budget you requested. Know that getting approved to the Rouanet's Law is to get the permition to your sponsor have discounts in the value they sponsor through governmental taxes. ok?Uff! So, that's the easy part.

The hard part is to get a sponsor. With the government's approval secured, you have to find out which company works with this specific cultural incentive law you applied. Found that, you knock many many doors until you find a company that says YES to your project. They give you the money and you put it on your project the way it was approved by the cultural incentive law. The company will get a discount in the amount they sponsored in their next year's income tax. And everyone is happy!

Of course, there are good and bad points. For example:

1. The companies are the ones that judge the projects and select which  are worth sponsoring or not by their on rules;

2. The company disburse the full amount now and will get the money back in their tax income months later. That can affect their cash low in 4 months at least;

3. You have lilttle flexibity to change your project if something changes in between and this process can take a while;

4. The salaries are limited by the government. If the government things 15k is too much to pay the director, he will limit your paying to 9k and you will have to deal with it. Your project will only have 9k of incentive law for the director salary. All lines of the budget are discussed.

Thats how works here in Brazil. What about your country?

How to stand out from the clutter?

How to get the attention of your consumers? Nowadays, there are so many ad interruptions and product/service choices, that it is really hard to make YOURSELF or your product stand out from the crowd.

Seth Godin makes a point in his speech at the Business of Software conference:

1. Most professionals are solving a problem that people don't think they have, so they are not looking for a solution, for your solution. Therefore, you are invisible.
2. We are in a hiper-clutter momment. Where it used to be 3 options of drinks, now there are 3.000. Cullter is not your friend, principally, for small companies.
3. People are too busy with ads they get wether they want it or not.
4. You or your product should be worth make a remark about.
5. You or your product should matter, you should make yourself or your product worth talking about.
6. Explore the direct communication.
7. Create a direct users business because every interaction with your customer is a "change for a up or down."
8. Give people something to talk about, for that you should build the story, live the story, bring up the story. All types of sellers are story tellers.
9. When you give people lots of choices, they take it. They want personalized services or products that fullfills their needs.
10. Consumers are connected to consumer. Users are connected to users. The model of connecting users to eachother is how you are going to grow.
11. Your effort should not be in "how many" people you ad to, but "who" you reach.
12. Share of wallet is way easier than share of market. Go for the share of wallet.
13. The people who is failluring are the ones who do not acknowledge that commitment comes before success.
14. Make it easier for people to integrate to your tribe.
15. A tribe is an identity that stands for something that matters.

Resume Cicle:

Be remarkable > Integrate and connect deeply with customers > Tell a story to your sneezers > Provide tools for the story to be told > Customers connect to eachother through tribes > Customers connect to customers > Customers spread the word > They persuade others > You get permission to tell another story

* These insights were collect from Seth Godin´s speach in the link above.

The Levy Flight Theory

Mathematician Clay Shirky taught Seth Godin who taught me the Lévy flight concept. The main concept is that "an animal that forages will hang out in a small area, looking for nuts or berries, then will realize it has used up all the likely sources in this spot. It will then head off in a random direction, walk many paces, and start foraging again."

In marketing or social analysis, the concept translates like this: someone discovers your site (your website, bar, restaurant, hotel, product, etc); they poke it; they love it; they return with friends; they hang out and become regulars for a while. Then they get bored and start browsing again. This kind of thinking is much more effective if you apply to your consumer behavior understanding and strategies other than brand fidelity or random web surfing. I count with your constant visit though :)

This concept can also be applied to Jackson Pollock´s paintings. Check out the interesting article "Fractal Expressionism" by Richard Taylor, Adam Micolich and David Jonas.

Seth Godin

The marketing guru, Seth Godin, posted in his blog (04-04-2010) a little insight about artists. Here you go:

"The best thing to say to an artist of any kind might be, "someday, people will think what you did is really important." If it's popular with everyone right away, it might not be art, it might just be good marketing. But if it earns attention and respect over time, if it wins over the skeptical, then you've really created something."

Another post that I find interesting is about your chances to succeed and where should be our efforts and hopes. I personally believe that happiness should be in the path itself, not in achieving the goal. The goal should be a mere detail.
 
"One in a million

The chances of a high school student eventually becoming first violin for the Boston Philharmonic: one in a million. The chances of a high school student eventually playing basketball in the NBA? About the same.
In fact, the chances of someone growing up and getting a job precisely like yours, whatever it is, are similarly slim. (Head of development at an ad agency, director of admissions for a great college... you get the idea). Every good gig is a long shot, but in the end, a lot of talented people get good gigs. The odds of being happy and productive and well compensated aren't one in a million at all, because there are many good gigs down the road. The odds are only slim if you pick precisely one job.

Here's the lesson: the ardent or insane pursuit of a particular goal is a good idea if the steps you take along the way also prep you for other outcomes, each almost as good (or better). If pushing through the Dip and bending the market to your will and shipping on time and doing important and scary work are all things you need to develop along the way, then it doesn't really matter so much if you don't make the goal you set out to reach.

On the other hand, if you live a life of privation and spend serious time and money on a dead end path with only one outcome, you've described a path likely to leave you broken and bitter. Does spending your teenage years (and your twenties) in a room practicing the violin teach you anything about being a violin teacher or a concert promoter or some other job associated with music? If your happiness depends on your draft pick or a single audition, that's giving way too much power to someone else."

Tips for becoming an artist

Here are some tips to become a great artist:

1. Get to know yourself;
2. Be honest with yourself;
3. Become a sensitive observer;
4. Identify your artistic weaknesses and strengths;
5. Study with masters;
6. Be always hungry for information;
7. Read great literature everyday and build a reference library;
8. Explore different mediums;
9. Watch TV and spend time on the internet wisely and selectively (less is more);
10. Exercise your body and spend time in nature every week;
11. Develop an original style and find your own language;
12. Ask for help and critiques from people you admire;
13. Learn to accept failure as a positive thing (No is an enriching path to Yes);
14. Develop your career plan;
15. Set deadlines and goals for your projects;
16. Make a deal with your spouse or partner or family to give you 5 years to focus 100% on your art. (read “The Agony And The Ecstasy” by Irving Stone);
17. Work at least 4 hours daily;
18. Have a stunning online gallery of your work in your language and in English;
19. Attend a major art event every week, speak with at least 10 people, and give each one of them your business card with your website address;
20. Create your own art event (workshop, lecture, happy hour, art walk, exhibition, performance, etc);
21. Answer every request for information, every email, every response to your mailouts, every phonecall to you;
22. Have a stunning online gallery of your work;
23. Learn the value of inspired persistence;
24. Learn the specifics about your segment. Also, you should have at least a basic knowledge of finance, management, and marketing. (reference: "The World’s Wealthy Artists Are Business People"  by Daniel Tardent);
25. Get over your fears. They do nothing, ignore them by trying;
26. Practise, practise, practise;
27. Laugh;
28. Don't masturbate after sex. Enjoy when you make art and allow people to have pleasure with your art afterwards. Don't go praising your own art and elevating it. Let it to others. Be a vouyer;
29. Have a "BIC IN THE ASS" posture. Imagine a pen BIC entering your asshole, instinctively, all parts of your body will get erected and connected. That`s a "ready for anything" or a work posture for actors;
30. Commit;
31. Never surrender!

Do you have anything else to add to this list? Send me your tip and I will add to it!

* This post was based on the "18 tips to be the great artist of your dreams" by Daniel at The Art Marketing Secrets.

Michael Kaiser

I am crazy about finding new art references from all over the world in the internet, but I find it really challenging to find art management study references. Here in Brazil we dont have many art business courses or books. So I crave anything. If you know any link, e-book, web-site you think is good, please, e-mail me!

Here is a really insightful lecture by Michael Kaiser hosted by MIT Sloan. Michael Kaiser is the president of The Kennedy Center in Washington DC (USA). Known as the "the turnaround king" for his work at such arts institutions as the Kansas City Ballet, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre and the Royal Opera House, Kaiser has earned international renown for his expertise in arts management.

I loved his last book "The Art of the Turnaround: Creating and Maintaining Healthy Arts Organizations" as it "....presents a ten-step . . . program to save or revive struggling arts organizations. The author's program is practical, and he follows it with a series of case studies in which he works his magic over and over again. He offers interesting anecdotes, and the portrayal of the logistics of traveling shows deserves particular mention . . ." -- Choice. You will find yourself writting down notes and ideas to use in your own company!

His main tips for an art organization turnaround are:

1. Someone must lead;
2. The leader must have a plan (and the organization a clear mission);
3. You cannot save your way to health ("you cannot save an art organization by saving money");
4. Focus on today and tomorrow, not yesterday;
5. Extend your programming planning calendar;
6. Marketing is more than brochures and ads;
7. There must be only one spokesman and the message must be positive;
8. Fund-raising must focus on the larger donor, but don't aim too high;
9. The board must allow itslef to be restructured;
10. The organization must have the discipline to follow each of these rules.

The truth is that turnarounds are not a miracle, but the determined implementation of a coordinated planning and the "lack of sleep".

Enjoy and let me know your opinion!