Local Conversations

• Updated twitter icon & profile name for ncsocial account #
• @newsobserver I know you’re a bot but to really make this work you should follow people on twitter too #
• Updating profile picture and name for http://twitter.com/ncsocial account #

If you’re new in an environment like I am, you may want to look into a few conversation starters. In today’s digital age not only should you look into offline conversation starters but online conversation starters as well. Both offline & online conversation starters can be general and consist of topics like sports, weather, local news and your political status. Both can lead to establishing friendships as you find out that yourself and others have a common interest or it could lead to a serious argument.

It’s easy in a work environment to start a conversation, you overhear someone talking about the latest reality TV show that you saw last night, compliment someone on their attire, or discus your general likes or dislikes for the workplace. But what about online conversation starters? Online conversations are generally a litter harder to establish. For example let’s take a look at this blog “Local Conversations” one of my goals with this site is to build relationships with the local community. For this site to reach its maximum potential I first need to reach out to the community with blog post to engaged the readers to participate and share their thoughts, ideas and suggestions. Can you consider blogs as conversation starters? I would say yes, especially a successful blog.

Therefore let’s talk, I’m looking for you; let’s discuss ways to improve communication in the workplace, at home or among your friends.

Have you worked on a project where the biggest problem is the lack of communication?

What online tools do you use to share information in the workplace?

Does your online reading effect your offline conversations?

• Creating blog mission, adding twitter roll & working on design for http://blogs.wncn.info/wsutton/ #

Today marks my eighth day on the job here at WNCN - NBC17 and so far it has been a pleasant journey. On day one I received my trusty Dell laptop, e-mail address, had meetings and from there I’ve been asking Ginny questions (more about her later) on who, why and how. But Ginny is new too. She and I are two new community content mangers at NBC 17. What do we do? Well, that will come later too. The interesting part of it all is that I’ve met probably half of the staff, and I’ve noticed that Ginny is what I would call a social butterfly. She’s energetic, funny and likes to bring cupcakes to work. Myself on the other hand, I’m not what you call an introvert, but I’m no social butterfly either. For example, my preferred method of communication is text message first, email second, phone call third. But that’s not going to work here at NBC 17.

Here the environment is like a beehive or an ant mound, people are yellow, scanners are talking, emails are flowing, and why? For the news, for North Carolina, for communication, and for you. As I get settled into the position here the most challenging part so far has been trying to remember names, positions and, of course, try to match faces with both.

As this new adventure as a community content manager begins, I’m listing to those around me, slowly engaging in conversations and learning how information travels from Internet, e-mail, phone, radio to TV. It’s exciting and what’s coming in 2008 is even more exciting. Even though I’ve been here for only eight days I have a vision for us, and it’s like one of a company from 1984, “Apple” remember this?

Quoted from the historic world changing commercial via wikipedia “Our Unification of Thought is a more powerful weapon than any fleet or army on Earth. We are one people. With one will. One resolve. One cause.”
Now there is a lot more to the commercial than what I quoted and it has taken Apple almost 23 years to really achieve its 1984 mission but the one people with one cause is what it takes for any successful organization or company to succeed. Each person must be on board and with the program. But where does it begin? It begins with the “Unification of Thought” and like Apple we have a mission, I have a role, this blog and my role here is part of that mission and I’m ready to get started. I’m going all in and by the end of the 2008, I’ll be able to evaluate how well I’ve done and look back on how we have done as a company. But hopefully with everyone working together, we too shall be like the commercial stated: “We shall prevail!”

• Adding twitter updates to blog & updating blogroll at: http://blogs.wncn.info/wsutton/ #