Paul asks, “What can marketers do to ensure the ethical use of AI in their marketing?” Ethics isn’t something machines understand. They’re still fundamentally calculators at their core, no matter how sophisticated the AI, and a calculator is nonmoral, non-ethical. They’re tools, so the burden of ethics is on the users of the tools. If…
Monina asks, “How can marketers adopt a data science mindset? Outside of hard, analytical skills, what soft skills should marketers possess?” Data science is exactly what it sounds like: performing science with data. The soft skills which make for a great scientist thus transfer to a data scientist and any marketer who wants to adopt…
Summary In today's episode, I explore the cultural symbolism of the Lunar New Year, specifically the Year of the Bright Metal Rat, and what its zodiac energy and elemental cycles might mean for how you approach the months ahead. Here's what this means for you. You get a fun thought exercise for framing decisions, confrontations,…
One of my favorite exercises that I’ve performed every year since he first introduced it is Chris Brogan’s Three Words. Rather than create resolutions which are difficult to keep, the three words exercise puts together three words that form your mantra for the coming year. My twist on it is to restrict it to just…
We’re well past game over. We know it. From the destruction of large swaths of the Amazon to ever-accelerating carbon in the atmosphere, it’s game over for the human race. We had a decent run, and we all know who will be running the place long after we’re gone – our friends, the roaches, who…
What does it mean to be a data-driven company? Companies generally aren’t created as data-driven, data-centric entities from the beginning; for most companies, it’s an evolution in their culture and strategy, a journey that can take years. To become data-driven, companies evolve through five stages: Data-resistant Data-curious Data-aware Data-savvy Data-driven Data-Resistant The mantra of the…
Mark asks, “For a business professional, what are the personal measurements we should be using to improve our ‘game’ and remain relevant? Does anybody out there have metrics on yourself?” This is an important question; the answers will depend on how self-aware you are. I use a framework I first saw from my friend and…
We love Big Ideas. We court them, we share them, we follow them. We pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to conferences so that speakers can share their Big Ideas with us. Yet, at the end of the day – or the end of the quarter, or the end of the year – when we’re…
We’ve reached the end of 2018. I hope the year ended with you set up to succeed in 2019. On the one hand, the change of a year is immaterial; one day isn’t significantly different than the next. On the other hand, it’s an opportunity, should we take it, to reboot and stop doing some…
I often receive intriguing questions about various topics. Recently, someone asked me about the difference between change and improvement. At first glance, these concepts may appear to be similar, but upon closer inspection, they are quite distinct from each other. Change involves doing something different, while improvement refers to getting better at doing the same…
