Financial Storyteller

Getting ideas at the Story Salon

According to Denise Withers, the organiser, to attend last Tuesday evening's Story Salon you

" ... don’t need to be a story expert - just someone who appreciates the power and value of using story for something other than art & entertainment ..."

That sounded good to me, so being as it's a New Year I thought I'd go along to something new and see what I could learn. I'm really glad I did!

I met a very erudite and engaging bunch of people. In addition to Denise, I met Nina Winham, Vivian Forssman, Simon Goland to mention just a few. Discussions were wide and varied leading to a whole bunch of recommended books to read and films to watch. I've listed the ones I remember over on the resources page of the Story Salon blog, hopefully I'll get to read/watch some of these then I can share my thoughts on this site afterwards.

I was not expecting to hear about Norse Gods and meditation, programs to help troubled children, First Nations cultural struggles, sustainability, European history and many other things all in the same evening!

I started making note not only of these referrals but also of choice little phrases that I heard over the course of the evening. "Storytelling in Social Change," "A language older than words," and my favourite; to describe a presentation when using slides as "Still Pictures, Moving Words!" The location was the Waazubee Cafe which I would describe as everything I'd expect from a cafe on Commerical Drive. The decor was eclectic, the drinks good, the service excellent. Add to that fascinating conversation it all made for a very worthwhile evening.

Congratulations to Denise for getting it going, if you are interested in storytelling outside of stand-up comics and children's stories, this is the place to come. I guarantee you will go away with at least one thing to follow-up on, a book to read, movie to watch, idea to try. See you next month!

 

Redefining my use of LinkedIn

I've been on LinkedIn since early 2004, when I started using it to connect with people in Vancouver. At that time I was planning a reconnaissance trip to the city, ahead of emigrating from the UK. LinkedIn put me in touch with lots of good people and I went on to meet a bunch of them during my visit. The contacts I made were very very helpful and a number have become the closest of my Canadian Friends, since we arrived as permanent residents in the summer of 2005.

My use of LinkedIn was for the longest time unchanged. I believed that it was a numbers game and the more connections you had the more likely you were to get a few that were of value. Of course that statement 'of value' is the interesting point. What does it mean? My general approach to networking has always been to look for what I can offer my network, rather than what I can take from it. What is 'of value' changes over time and although LinkedIn was helpful in the building stages of my network, especially in Vancouver - I had for a few months been rethinking my approach.

My 'policy' so to speak was to be generous in who I connected with, i.e. I didn't really mind if I knew them or not. Some I had brief email discussions with, but generally I didn't. Apart from a mass invite activity I did in 2004/2005 I've only actually invited people recently that I'd met, so change was on the cards. As LinkedIn added to their offering I started following a feed of my network's activity. Increasingly this has become frustrating.

Most of the updates etc I was reading came from people that quite honestly, I didn't really know. Consequently they were of little interest. What would be of interest would be a feed from people I did really know. That feed I would like to read.

So without pretending I have some highly intellectual plan I decided to reduce my LinkedIn network to what I thought of as connections which I have some kind of connection with. LinkedIn of course is a bit clunky when it comes to removing contacts, but I've finally finished my first pass. Below are the Before/After numbers:

Measure                              Before               After     Reduction

Connections                         1,615                 362            78%

2 Degrees away               489,100            126,800          74%

3 Degrees away            8,230,600         5,150,500         37%

Total contactable         8,721,300         5,277,700         29%

It's interesting to note that the more extended the network, the less impact this has had.  Is this the right strategy going forward? Time will tell, but for now it feels better and just maybe I can start looking at my connections and taking more of interest in what they are all up to.

Note: Due to the number of connections I removed, it's entirely possible I deleted some that I meant to keep. If you are reading this and think you are one of them, let me know!

 

The one about the Seabus, line-ups and the Barcamp kick-off

After deciding I should probably be helping Lefantler than attending Barcamp I set off home last night. On getting to to the elevated walkway down to the Seabus I was met with the biggest queue (sorry line-up) for the splendid transit service I have ever seen. For locals, I will say it was way back past that huge fan about half way along. I've never seen so many people down there. Occasionally I've only just managed to get through the turnstiles at the bottom, right about 15 feet from the doors to the Seabus. Tonight though it was was a whole different story.

These days I have become of the statutory pedestrian distance (SPD) that Canadians feel should separate one person from another on buses, skytrain etc. This particular line-up was a lot more intimate and more like the London or Tokyo equivalent. Additionally I knew that out of sight from the big fan are a couple of down escalators. I can only think someone must have hit the emergency stop to stop feeding piles more people into a crushed area below.

This reminded me of a recent trip to see the documentary film Helvetica. The line-up for this was very orderly but did extend around almost a whole block. On that occasion I noticed some people 'joined' buddies, or as I would say 'pushed-in' or 'jumped the line' not once but twice - although the second occasion had as much to do with a lack of any kind of line management by the organisers. At one point the number of people was getting very worrying, especially with yet another escalator feeding more people in to the crushed area and exceeding the SPD.

This time I simply turned round and headed off to the bryght offices ahead of the kick-off for Barcamp Vancouver at the Alibi Room. I stayed around for a drink or two before finally heading back to a back to normal Seabus. Talk was that the accident which closed Lions Gate Bridge meant that all the folk who get the bus across everyday from Park Royal had to revert to the Seabus. It's a useful reminder for me that although thankfully such accidents are rare, the bridges and the North Shore are co-dependent.

As for the Kick-off, lots of people, quite a few familiar faces and met and spoke to a few 'known names' which was cool. Here's part of the list, Duane, Rebecca, Scales, Boris, Lee, Trent, Travis, Dale, Dave, Pete and not to forget Roland and Kris. I'm somewhat disappointed that I will miss today's unconference, but as a saw on a twitter yesterday, given it's likely to be so connected with technology - do I physically have to be there? ;-)

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