Making Excuses

I don't usually blog about my work or the world my work touches, but with all the recent news about the demise of the newspapers, I felt compelled to jump into the fray.

Last week, I attended, in my role as Director of Business Development for a technology company that provides private label products to the newspapers an industry tradeshow. BIG MISTAKE. Now, don't get me wrong...newspapers aren't our only channel, but they are one of them and attending this tradeshow is part of our annual marketing plan and was budgeted for (and was no small expense).

The show (NAA's 'new' MediaXChange) was a combination of an old newspaper marketing show and the annual newspaper association of America's show. It was the WORST tradeshow I have ever attended, exhibited at, or participated in. Guess what??? It wasn't because the newspaper industry is in a tumbling decline ( you read about the Seattle Post Intelligencer this week, right? The Rocky Mountain News?). It wasn't because attendance was less than half of what is was just a year ago. It wasn't because of the newspapers themselves. I talk with the management of these organizations (digital management to be fair) and they, they care! They want to shift, change, grow...they don't want to die an ink stained death. They want to exist...they just need help figuring out how, before it is too late. You would think (but you would be wrong) that the organization that is supposed to support them, offer opportunities, suggest industry trends, would be leading the charge forward in the necessary paradigm shift towards a new age of 'news'. You would be wrong, misguided in your assumptions.

The show and organization management didn't get it (still don't as my PR guy pointed out to me this morning). They decided in some convoluted, bite the hand that feeds you sort of way to keep the paid attendees (read, the audience for the vendors and the reason they are there) away from the vendors. All opportunities for marketing, networking, or face time were avoided at all costs. Meals, snacks, networking events...organized FAR from the vendors, with enormous expensive barrier to entry. There were a few shining examples of 'getting it'...Brenda in accounting, she listened, let me vent and then tried to give me something small in recompense (tickets for my colleagues to a networking event). John, who runs around red faced and sweaty, at the very least wasn't avoiding the vendors.

Newspapers need companies like mine and many of the other exhibitors. They weren't just there to shake hands with old cronies (those days are past, as many of those old cronies are receiving unemployment checks and reminiscing about the good old days). They want ideas! They need to have an opportunity to evaluate, to see what is out there and to look at the different options for diversification and revenue share. What myopic, tunnel vision, dinosaur of an organization can't see that it is their role (raison d'etre?) to light the way forward for their members.

Ciao NAA. I won't miss you.

Non Negotiable

We are getting ready to take Robbie to Boston over spring break to look at three universities. He will be applying to colleges in the next 4-6 months and wants to make an 'educated' choice.



This is an exciting time for Robbie and I realized that since the day he was born (or maybe even before) that he was going to HAVE to attend a four year college out of high school.

What Robbie doesn't understand is that this is a privelege, not a right. He has numerous peers who come from different circumstances who's path is less certain.

Last Friday, I braved the unknown and chaperoned his AP Art History class on a trip to the Getty Museum in Los Angeles and the Huntington Library in Pasedena. This was an exercise in understanding Robbie better. I saw him in his 'natural' habitat, interacting with his peers, and I closed the day with a sense of satisfaction in his development.

I also spent time asking his peers about their plans for the future. These are the cream of the crop students, exceptional in the fact that they are enrolled and enjoying a AP level course in a fine arts. The stories were varied. There as the female senior who's dream is to live in London and who will attend Saddleback so that she can do the Cal State Fullerton program that will allow her to live abroad (apparently her parents have a small fund of money). There is Kelsey, who, odd, quirky and very much a fringe personality is taking classes (alot of them) at Saddleback College now, in her junior year, so that she can graduate with her degree AND an AA so that she only has two years of university to recognize her dream as becoming a marine biologist. Then there was Mark...shy...hanging behind, always a watcher, never a participant...who, when asked about the future, shrugged his shoulders and said.."I dunno...I haven't thought about it much".

Robbie...he knew, and knows, that at the end of the day, it doesn't matter where he goes, as long as he does. That the 4 year degree is not just a means to an end (a step in the direction of life long career success) but a unique transitional point between childhood and adulthood. A sheltered and unique writ of passage that will forever change him.