An Bui, Spelled An With 1 N

University of Oregon

I recently attended the Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide (ELAW) annual meeting & Public Interest Environmental Law Conference (PIELC) at the University of Oregon Law School.

As I generally work with tech startups and tech companies, I figured that this trip would provide the opportunity to work with and interact with a different group of people.

Little did I know.

Lessons learned:

There’s a real need to share information. ELAW started by Professor John Bonine and early on, adopted email to build their network to connect public interest environmental lawyers with resources to help them with their work. Now, they’re looking to leverge social media tools to share information more effectively.

Many human rights/environmental rights issues are addressed in languages other than English. I really wish my Spanish were better.  Regardless, I’ve learned quite a bit about the challenges faced by the rainforests, villages in Asia and South America, the effects of mining and mineral extraction.

One of the most inspiring stories I’ve heard came from Pablo Fajardo. He’s from an Ecuadorian Amazon village and is involved in litigation against Chevron/Texaco - four years after getting his law degree. He’s faced with threats from his work, such that his family has to live in separate villages, for their protection. He’s a simple man, from a humble background who is fighting because he loves his land, his people and he does this for his children and his children’s children.

Who knew that the question “So what project are you working on?” could be both powerful and humbling?

blogged in Eugene, OR at the University of Oregon Law School

An Bui en Flight to Astoria, OR

Some of you noticed that I’ve been pretty quiet lately, after I finished 10 Principles of Social Media. Well, people began to engage us on different real-world applications.  One of these was the University of Lisbon who asked for a brief thought-exercise.  They wanted us to think of ways the 10 Principles would apply to education.

We applied the 10 Principles to educations’ need to:

• Broadcast Value
• Streamline Publication
• Increase Communication
• Increase Access to Information and Resources

You can download Modus Cooperandi’s paper on Social Media for Higher Education for the University of Lisbon by clicking the link.

Bill Anderson and Jim Benson also guest-hosted a Yi-Tan call that covered: (1) how Agile formed, (2)  its central tenets, and (3) lessons for the rest of business. I participated on the IRC backchannel (shh - it was my first time using IRC).

Agile methods have been applied for the last decade or so to programming teams.  Agile metholodogies provided structure to minimize poor communication, unrealistic expectations, and unpredictable deliverables.

Agile primarily focuses on:

• Acknowledging that change is part of any endeavor
• Greatly increasing the frequency of discourse and review
• Assumptions are the rope from which the noose of business is tied

Click here to listen to Jim Benson and Bill Anderson discuss Agile

Craig Sutton was also so kind as to interview me for his blog, The Bit Boss. I share my thoughts on Twitter, what I do, social media, what motivates me, and my favorite book. So I’ve been busy - 2009 has seen me in Boulder and San Francisco. I’ll be going to Eugene and back to Boulder shortly. It’s also a matter of time before I go back to Bay Area as well.

Last night, I had some beautifully plated, delicious food. As I took pictures of said meal and uploaded them to the Web, I fell into discussion about why I would broadcast my meal, and why I would share my activities so freely, be it over Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, blogs, or any other social media outlet.

It Depends

Why I share the information I do varies by context. I try to share only valuable information, but the recipients’ value depends on who they are. So before I devolve into a metadiscussion…

Professionally

I share information because value comes from the decisions on what to do with the information. With my role at DocuSign, the provider of electronic signature and online contract execution services, I often proactively reach out to individuals who are looking for help with our product and general electronic signature information. Why? Because DocuSign enables users to eliminate the costs of overnighting physical documents/contracts and accelerate business processes by reducing cycle time, much like email did for busines correspondence. Do people make this connection? Some bloggers have, and these stories are shared on the DocuSign blog.

Tools like blogs, Twitter, forums, and others enable me to reach out to the group. Customers are already there, having the conversation. Others, like Tim Jackson of Masi Bicycles, Richard and Lionel of Dell, Tony Hsieh of Zappos and Frank Eliason of Comcast  have used these tools to help fulfill the brand promise of these companies and deliver/develop customer-centric value. If Masi were to build a 38cm w/650cc wheels (or I were to grow another 3-4 inches in height) I’d buy a Masi because I have an emotional connection to the brand, thanks to Tim’s digital presence. Because of Tim, I know why Masi doesn’t build a bike that small - it’s the size of the market.

I spy with my eye a Masi

In a world where many of the purchases made are either commodities or have close substitutions, service can be a key differentiator.

Personally

The personal question is more challenging one to answer. Does my IRL life suffer because I’m blogging, twittering, texting, tumblring? Do I put myself at risk to be stalked/harrassed? What about information that could fall into the hands of future business partners, employers, employees, or my parents?

No whine with this cheese!

My general rule is “What Would Google Show?” before I post. I assume people don’t care that I’m eating lunch. But they might care that I’m eating lunch at Purple and it looks like yummy. Readers can then decide if they want to try Purple someday.

I prioritize my IRL interactions, synchronous voice communication and lowest on the list of priorities is asynchronous forms of communication. Does that change my patterns of interactions? Yes - interested parties now have more information with which to vet me. For this, I get the ability to surface new, interesting people.