Our discussion prompted Matthew to share this article from Cooper.com.

From Cooper.com (Matthew’s Synopsis)
The counter-argument to giving freedom to creative people is they will fritter it away enjoying themselves but not moving the company forward. This can be a valid criticism in companies that lack a worthwhile corporate goal. However, if creative people know what that goal is, they will work hard to achieve it.

What business leaders must do is make certain creative people know the goal. They must hear it stated clearly, unequivocally, boldly, loudly, unanimously, and frequently. They need to know what successfully achieving the goal looks like. They need to be publicly and positively acknowledged (rewarded is good, too) when they advance the business mission.

Article from Cooper.com

Smashing Magazine: How To Build An Agile UX Team: The Culture

I’m eager to meet some of the 1,200 attendees, 40+ exhibitors and other ministries.

What’s Next
Leading up to our efforts to get our first graphic novel out for the Iota Soul project, we’ll be heading down to Lima, Peru to visit Robert Barriger’s church and orphan minisitry. While we’re down there we’ll be getting video, talking to the kids, and anything else we can do to help the children.

Donate to the trip…every little bit helps!

A/B Split Testing is an important tool in the arsenal of online business. That’s one of the reasons I found this post by 37 Signals so interesting. It was extremely clear and straight to the point.

Just like any industry, vendors come in at all levels. Entry Level up to Top Tier Enterprise vendors like Exact Target and Responsys.

Short List of Quality Email Vendors

• Responsys
• Exact Target
• MyEmma
• MailChimp
• Blue Hornet
• Additional Vendors

While we’ve used several email marketing vendors over the years at daveramsey.com, I’ve been really jazzed this weekend while working on my side project to build awareness about the 175 million orphans worldwide.

My project is still in it’s infancy, so there’s no big budget to leverage. That’s why I was so jazzed to run across MailChimp. Yes MailChimp, but they’re not monkeying around. It’s a solid little tool just perfect for someone like me with a start up project. However, they’re also prime for some strong mid and high level business needs.

I’d heard the name before, but never had the need for an email marketing tool outside my work for Dave Ramsey. MailChimp is a feature rich tool, with a slick and easy to use interface. Honestly, it’s a lot easier than many of the other tools I’ve seen while researching email tools for daveramsey.com. Best of all, it’s free for lists up to 2,500 people, and it’s good for 12,500 email sends a month…FREE!

After an easy rollout of my first legit email marketing campaign for iotasoul.com, I felt compelled to put in a good word for the Mail Monkey responsible.

After making my first hire in 2002, I’ve been honored to screen and hire 70+ people with varied skill sets including programming, support, admin, marketing, creative, and project management. Looking back over the years, I’ve been very fortunate. At the time, I did what came naturally. Each new interview allowed me to gain experience. Having never received any training on conducting interviews or recruiting, it’s been a pretty good run. However, I did encounter a few failed interviews and hires that would have been nice to have avoided. So how could this journey have been done it differently? Where do you get good training and resources for conducting interviews as a small business leader?

Several months ago, I was fortunate to come in contact with John Kepley, CEO of Teknetex. While meeting with John and conversing about the Nashville tech recruiting scene, he mentioned a book. Who? The A Method for Hiring. Recently, I finished the book on a rather lengthy plane trip to LA. I wish someone had given me this book 10 years ago!

Some high level takeaways

• Hire A players. Hire the people that will give you a 90% chance to accomplish what only 10% of the people can achieve.
• Follow a process: 1) The Scorecard, 2) Source: Generating a Flow of A Players, 3) Select: The Four Interviews for Spotting A Players, 4) Sell: The Top 5 Ways to Seal the Deal

“Who” is the first book I’ve read with a solid repeatable interview process. While the process I’ve been following for years has proven to yield solid results, I’ve already begun integrating some of the “Who” principles into my process. Thanks Geoff Smart and Randy Street!

Web 2.0 Summit Interviews

During my prep time for a meeting on mobile technology today, I was looking for good info on several mobile trends. Not surprisingly, another Mary Meeker presentation popped up on the BusinessInsider.com website. It’s a very solid presentation with compelling data.

I used several really good pieces of data provided by Mary.

1. iPod, iPad, iPhone units shipped in the first few quarters of their launch
2. Google Android units shipped in the first few quarters of their launch
3. Shift from www.com pc based website usage to mobile usage in Japan. Fundamental shift in how companies are dealing with the mobile landscape. The US will follow.

A hot topic right now is how the iPad adoption rate by the market has eclipsed all other product launches in volumes shipped after launch (first several quarters). It’s astounding, and some say it is a precursor to a fundamental shift in how consumers use the web. Mobile is a big deal. (understatement) Possibly as big of a deal as the internet has been in shifting traditional business models to the web.

Take the time. View Mary’s presentation.

I recently ran across this post he made after attending one of our Momentum events in Nashville. It’s not as good as visiting our Nashville office, but it’s a nice reflection on some of the core principles we operate by at Dave’s place. View the Post

Apple Usurps Google (Yahoo)

Apple Topples Google (MacWorld)

View the Complete List – Brand Z’s Top 100