Raised Eyebrow Blog

Two years ago, Emira & I went to South by Southwest (AKA SXSW) for the first time, and presented a panel called “Boss Lady” that featured tips for online business owners from several of the savviest women entrepreneurs we know: Vickie Howell, Jenny Hart & Alex Beauchamp, all of whom appear in the pages of our book, The Boss of You. We had such a good time that we knew we wanted to go back as soon as humanly possible, though last year we were too busy getting our book out the door to attend the conference.

But this year we’re back, this time with a panel that we hope will prove helpful to geeks of both the design and techie varieties – both camps are in full force at SXSW’s Interactive conference, which is a pure, 24/7, all-out geekfest – who are looking to bring their values into their paid work, whether it’s by learning to work with clients in the nonprofit sector, creating apps that help mission-driven organizations work more effectively, or infusing some environmental or social-justice savvy into their workplaces. The panel’s called “Socially Conscious Geek: Makin’ Money While Doin’ Good”, and it takes place Saturday, March 13^th.

The topic was inspired by a topic our friend Noah Scalin (of Skull-A-Day and Another Limited Rebellion fame) spoke about at the 2009 HOW Conference. His focus was more on graphic design, since that’s his area of expertise, but when I asked him about riffing on his ideas for an interactive design audience, he shared his materials with me with typical generosity. (This is a guy who lives and breathes a DIY, share-and-share-alike mentality that a lot of designers could learn from. But that’s a topic for another day.)

This time I’ll be attending the conference solo, while Emira spends some time with her new baby; my co-facilitator for the session is Leif Utne, a friend and colleague who works for Zanby, a software company that specializes in supporting online social communities for change. Leif’s background includes a stint as the publisher of Worldchanging.org, and lots of experience building online communities; he’s also a journalist, activist and social entrepreneur.  Zanby is used to support The UpTake, a web video community that among other things was heavily involved in documenting the RNC and DNC prior to the 2008 election, and was also engaged in citizen vote monitoring during the election. He brings both amazing facilitation skills as well as a solid understanding of how businesses and nonprofits can work together in mutually beneficial ways.

We’ll be conducting our session in a highly interactive, inclusive format called a Core Conversation: Leif and I will be kick-starting the discussion and planting some seeds, but the idea is that whoever shows up will have a chance to step forward and contribute questions and ideas – so I’m really excited to see how it develops.

We’re hoping to address questions like:

• What is a socially conscious geek?
• How can I specialize in socially conscious work and earn a living wage?
• What are some of the unique opportunities and challenges of specializing in socially conscious work?
• What is the difference between non-profit and no-profit clients?
• How do I make the transition from corporate work to working with non-profit and/or mission-driven clients?
• What is the “triple bottom line” approach to business?
• What are some examples of alternative business models that are emerging among socially conscious geeks?
• How is socially conscious work different than “green” work?
• What are some examples of clients I might be able to work with as a socially conscious geek?
• How should I market myself to values-driven clients? Is it different from marketing to corporate clients?

Ultimately, though, the decisions about what we cover will rest with whoever shows up. So please help us spread the word – and if you’ll be at SXSW, we’d love to see you there!

Are you a nonprofit or other self-defined “do-gooder”? Are you looking for tips and techniques on how to rock the social media stuff everyone’s talking about these days?

If so, I recommend you check out Net Tuesday’s free event next Tuesday (details are posted on both Meetup and Facebook — choose your poison). Here are the details:

Mini Social Media Camp for Nonprofits & Other Do Gooders!
When: Tuesday, April 28, 5:30-8:00 PM
Where: Workspace – #400 – 21 Water St, Vancouver, BC

Topics may include:

• How can my organization use Facebook to be more awesome? Should I use Pages or Groups?
• How can I use Twitter to find new supporters?
• How can I use free analytics tools to measure my success?
• How can my NGO use free Google adwords?

You’ll get a chance to pick three topics; each topic will be discussed in a 30-minute breakout group. I’ll be leading sessions on Twitter!

Please spread the word to friends and colleagues; I know there are a lot of people in the nonprofit sector who can benefit from this stuff!

I’m working on preparing a “How to Blog” workshop for a client this month and have been scouring the web for follow up resources to leave the workshop participants with. Now I  happen to be a pretty big CBC Radio 1 geek and am in particular a fan of Nora Young’s show Spark (not suprisingly since it merges my love of public radio and technology into one smart package), and last year she did a great series with web vet Merlin Mann that stands as a kind of Blogging 101.  There’s a summary of the series with 6 pretty short podcasts that are well worth a listen if you’re struggling with how to start a blog or, like me, feeling like you could brush up on your current blogging technique. The lesson that I’ll be taking from the series and trying my darnedest to apply this year? Just write. You don’t need to worry about publishing all your blog posts, but get back in the habit of writing them (if you’ve fallen out of it like I have) and then publish the ones you think are worth it.

(PS: If you’re on the Twitter train you can be like me and follow Spark and Nora).