Posted by Elena del Valle on October 16, 2017
Stacey Hanke, author, Influence Redefined
Photo: Stacey Hanke
A podcast interview with Stacey Hanke, author, Influence Redefined Be the Leader You Were Meant to Be (see Corporate trainer shares her ideas on influence) is available in the Podcast Section of Hispanic Marketing & Public Relations, HispanicMPR.com. During the podcast, she discusses Influence Redefined with Elena del Valle, host of the HispanicMPR.com podcast.
Stacey founded Stacey Hanke, Inc. in 2004 to provide keynotes, training, and coaching for organizations in manufacturing, healthcare, retail, advertising, financial, and insurance. She wrote Yes You Can! Everything You Need from A to Z to Influence Others to Take Action. Stacey holds a certification as a Speaking Professional for the National Speakers Association, is a Member of the C-Suite Network Advisors, and a Member of the Forbes Coaches Council.
To listen to the interview, click on the play button below, scroll down until you see “Podcast” on the right hand side, then select “HMPR Stacey Hanke” and click on the play button below or download the MP3 file to your iPod or MP3 player to listen on the go, in your car or at home from the RSS feed. Some software will not allow flash, which may be necessary for the play button and podcast player. If that is your case, you will need to download the file to play it. To download it, click on the arrow of the recording you wish to copy and save it to disk. The podcast will remain listed in the October 2017 section of the podcast archive.
Click to buy Influence Redefined
Posted by Elena del Valle on October 12, 2017
The Participation Game
Photos: Norty Cohen
Old style advertising has become an act of indecent exposure, that is out of touch with Millennial consumers and indicates the degree of desperation of the advertising brand. That is what Norty Cohen, chief executive officer, Moosylvania, believes after examining the replies of paid mobile survey respondents aged between 17 and 37. In his first book, the product of two years of labor, he outlines his thoughts on the subject.
The Participation Game How The Top 100 Brands Build Loyalty in A Skeptical World (Ideapress Publishing, $24.95), was published this year for marketers “hoping to reach millennial consumers – which is a broad 20 year demographic, born in 1980 to present.” The 226-page softcover book is divided into nine chapters with limited text, some black and white photos, varied font sizes and types, and graphic design elements.
When asked what promoted him to write a book he said by email via his publicist, “Yes – the process of writing a non-fiction book was enlightening. It starts with a thesis that can be supported in a compelling and differentiating style. Since our inception in 2003, we have served clients with both an integrated marketing agency and a research facility. Originally, we used our research tools to answer the questions we needed to better serve our clients. Once we had traction, we decided to share it with a larger audience.
The success has been that we have been able to bring our clients through a logical thought process of how to use the research we conducted over a 5 year period.
We believe there is a continued gap in understanding the deliverable of messaging. Consumers have learned to curate messages out of their life. They are their own marketers. They are in control. Media has always worked from the concept of delivery. We must now look at our connectivity with consumers as a partnership that is a living, breathing entity.”
Norty Cohen, author, The Participation Game
When asked which market segments the respondents represent Cohen said, “We worked hard to get a diversified base both demographically and geographically. All surveys were mobile only. The age segments from this year’s report were in 10 year increments, 17-27 and 28-37 years old. Some years we broke it into 5 year segments but we kept it the totals and measurement even.”
The first part of the Top 100 List 2013-2017 is filled with easy to recognize company names beginning with Apple. Next in descending order are Nike, Samsung, Target, Amazon, Sony, Wal-Mart, Microsoft, Coke and Google. Because some brands tied there are more than 100 brands on the list. The last names, also in descending order, are REI, Mazda, Carter’s, Publix, Anheuser Busch and YouTube (tied), Urban Decay, Anthropologie, Subway, Johnson & Johnson & PG (tied), Guess, and Ross.
“Our research show that consumers choose to participate in brands, they do not consume advertising,” he said when asked how and why consumers adopt brands. “We found that word of mouth from friends and family, on line word of mouth, infleencers (influencers) and written reviews are 2.5 more likely to encourage brand adoption that TV, Facebook and You Tube ads combined. Consumers create the exponential reach that makes them a dominant force.”
To what is the take away for a non profit or small company on a shoestring budget – how can they develop brand recognition? he replied, “Ultimately it comes down to delivering great ideas that get consumers motivated to share with their friends. It’s not about your target market. It’s about your target’s market.”
Click to buy The Participation Game
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Filed Under: Books
Posted by Elena del Valle on October 5, 2017
The Eureka Factor
Photos: Random House, John Kounios
There are two types of thinking, procedural and insightful, each one with its own characteristics. So say Mark Beeman, Ph.D. and John Kounios, Ph.D., psychology professors who have researched human thinking processes for more than a decade, in The Eureka Factor Aha Moments, Creative Insight and The Brain (Random House, $28).
In the 274-page hardcover book, published in 2015 and divided into 14 chapters, they outline their findings and theories about both, focusing on creative or insightful thinking. To study the brain under controlled circumstances (in the lab) the authors relied in part on remote associates problems, which may be solved using either type of thinking. Publishing their book took five years.
“The target audience is everybody,” said Kounios by email when asked about the primary target audience for the book (although Beeman replied to emails he was unavailable to answer questions for this note for personal reasons). “People in business, the arts, education, the military, etc., are all interested in creativity and its enhancement. So we tried to make the book accessible and inspirational. We also tried to make is useful for psychologists and neuroscientists by including references and technical explanations in the endnotes.”
Your mood affects your thinking; watch a feel good movie and you might stimulate your creative side, the authors say. But, on the other hand, you can’t remain on a constant loop of creative thinking. Watch the news or a horror movie to change your mood and your style of thinking too, they explain.
If someone is working on a problem, is it accurate to assume that relaxing and being in a good mood is likely to prompt insightful thinking? “Yes, this is one of those indirect ways of facilitating insights,” Kounios said. “When you are in a positive mood and relaxed, this literally expands the scope of thought to allow you to consider remote associations – crazy, long-shot ideas – that are the stuff of creativity. But when you are anxious, you have mental tunnel vision. You focus on the immediate, straightforward, and obvious. That facilitates deliberate, analytical, Type-2 thinking, but it squashes creative insight.”
Why do the types of thinking matter? Because many of us seek to control or at least learn how to stimulate our creative abilities in order to be inventive and think out of the box at work being aware of the factors that influence our style of thinking is a first type in that direction, the authors say. They point out that your surroundings also matter. Outdoor colors such as blue and green are helpful to promote insightful thinking, but red has the opposite effect.
When asked if mental training works Kounios replied, “When you ask if mental training works, I assume that you mean does it work to increase creativity. The answer is yes and no. Mental training can teach you strategies that you can use to come up with creative solutions to problems. But these strategies probably won’t make you a creative person. Cognitive psychologists distinguish between two types of thinking. Type 1 thinking is unconscious and associative. You can’t easily affect it. Type 2 thinking is conscious, deliberate, and methodical. You can be trained to learn Type-2 mental strategies, but you can’t learn Type-1 strategies because there aren’t any. Your unconscious mind doesn’t care about your strategies, deadlines, etc. It does its own thing. Aha moments, what psychologists call “insights,” are unconscious creative processes that suddenly burst into awareness. So, insights are the product of Type-1 thinking that can’t be directly influenced. However, you can sometimes use Type-2 strategies to come up with ideas. The limitation with Type-2 strategies is that they only work when you deliberately use them. When you aren’t deliberately using them, they don’t work. However, you can have a Type-1 insight anytime and anywhere, for example, while daydreaming in the shower. And these aha moments sometimes give you the answer to a problem that you didn’t even know that you had, a problem that you weren’t previously aware of. Training won’t teach you to have such aha moments, but there are indirect ways to influence your unconscious mind to have more of them.”
John Kounios, Ph.D. co-author, The Eureka Factor
“The best way is to unleash unconscious, Type-1 thinking,” Kounios said when asked what is the best way to increase creative thinking. “This is involves expanding attention and the scope of thought. To do this, get yourself in a positive mood, be in a large physical space that will allow your attention to expand such as a large room with high ceilings or outdoors; isolate yourself from demands (i.e., be alone and turn off your phone) and things that grab your attention because those your scope of thought; and get lots of sleep because during sleep the brain purges useless information and enhances potentially useful details and associations. Of course, sleep also improves your mood. The important point is to allocate blocks of time in which you are alone, relaxed, expansive, and in a good mood. Then pick a topic and let your ideas flow freely without forcing them into particular directions. This is how many great ideas occur.”
Kounios is in the early stages of a new title that looks at creativity from a broad perspective and features new research. Since The Eureka Factor was published there have been new findings.
When asked about them the author said, “Yes, several new findings which will be published in the coming months. I’ll mention just one that was recently published. We looked at peoples’ solutions to four different types of puzzles. For all of these puzzle types, when people offer a solution that they say that they got by a sudden insight, it is more likely to be correct compared to solutions that they say they derived methodically and analytically. It seems that when a person is thinking analytically, they tend to get sloppy or rush or not check their thinking, so they make mistakes. But the unconscious thinking that results in insights can’t be rushed – it occurs in its own time and yields an answer when it is complete. This means that it is more likely to be correct. That’s why genuine aha moments – ideas that suddenly pop into awareness and seem striking and obvious – are more likely to be correct than ideas that are the product of deliberate, logical thought.”
At the time of publication Beeman was professor of psychology of Northwestern University, and Kounios was professor of psychology and director of the doctoral program at Applied Cognitive and Brain Sciences and Drexel University.
Click to buy The Eureka Factor
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Filed Under: Books
Posted by Elena del Valle on September 25, 2017
Orla Baumgartner, chief sales officer, e-com
Photo: Jörgler
A podcast interview with Orla Baumgartner, chief sales officer, e-com is available in the Podcast Section of Hispanic Marketing & Public Relations, HispanicMPR.com. During the podcast, she discusses connect by e-com with Elena del Valle, host of the HispanicMPR.com podcast.
Orla, originally from Ireland, has been living in Austria for 20 years. She studied Marketing Administration in the college of Marketing and Design at the Dublin Institute of Technology in Ireland. Prior to working at e-com beginning in November 2016 she I worked for two large international airlines. She is in charge of a variety of functions including translations, social media and international media and business relationships. E-com is the creator of the connect app.
To listen to the interview, click on the play button below, scroll down until you see “Podcast” on the right hand side, then select “HMPR Orla Baumgartner” and click on the play button below or download the MP3 file to your iPod or MP3 player to listen on the go, in your car or at home from the RSS feed. Some software will not allow flash, which may be necessary for the play button and podcast player. If that is your case, you will need to download the file to play it. To download it, click on the arrow of the recording you wish to copy and save it to disk. The podcast will remain listed in the September 2017 section of the podcast archive.
Posted by Elena del Valle on August 31, 2017
Influence Redefined
Photos: Stacey Hanke
After 25 years of experience teaching others how to communicate Stacey Hanke is convinced 95 percent of leaders are less influential than they think they are. It is called Illusory Superiority or the Above Average Effect when people judge themselves better than average, she says in Influence Redefined Be the Leader You Were Meant to Be, Monday to Monday (Greenleaf, $23.95).
In the 251-page hardcover book published this year for leaders, directors to C-suite, and sales professionals Hanke outlines what she believes are the issues leaders face in today’s highly digital business environment. She says the classic definition of influence is outdated, emphasizing that if a leader’s audience isn’t paying attention to him or her she or he can’t influence them.
When asked what prompted her to write the book now, the author replied by email via her publicist, “After partnering with leaders over the past 15 years to help them enhance their influence, the same challenges came up. Most individuals believe they are more influential than they really are. I have a passion to increase leaders awareness of how their listeners perceive them rather than what they believe to be true. To give leaders practical and immediate how to’s for growing their influence Monday to Monday®. Why now – because we are living in a new world of work called noise. 24/7 every day we are receiving messages. Therefore it is more difficult than ever before to stand out from the noise, to be memorable and to influence Monday to Monday.”
The book is divided into 12 chapters in three main parts: Influence Redefined, The Drivers of Influence and The Elements of Influence. At the end of the chapters there is a bullet point summary followed by recommended action steps.
Stacey Hanke, author, Influence Redefined
From idea the publication it took her 3.5 years to publish the book. She explained, “I wanted to make sure I had the keys to why some individuals are more influential. I wanted to take the time to do the research and to interview top influencers. Narrowing down all of the content and ideas I had for writing the book was the greatest challenge. The greatest reward has been the positive feedback I receive from my readers!”
“Influence means your body language and messaging are consistent Monday to Monday,” she said when asked to define the term. “The second part of this definition is moving people to take action long after the interaction has occurred.”
When asked what factors affect people’s influence most she said, “Body language being consistent with message, consistency – no one ever needs to guess who is going to show up, adaptability – being able to adapt your message on the fly to meet your listeners expectations without ever skipping a beat, impact – having impact on your listener that makes you and your message memorable and un-resistible to act on your recommendations.”
In response to a question about the impact of gender, age, race bias, socio-economic characteristics on influence, she replied, “Influence is a choice. Anyone can have influence Monday to Monday® if they’re willing to do the work, be consistent and never stop learning.”
Click to buy Influence Redefined
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Filed Under: Books
Posted by Elena del Valle on August 21, 2017
Jody Foster, M.D., author, The Schmuck in My Office
Photo: St. Martin’s Press
A podcast interview with Jody Foster, M.D., author, The Schmuck in My Office 10 Difficult Work Personalities & What to do About Them (St. Martin’s Press, $25.99) is available in the Podcast Section of Hispanic Marketing & Public Relations, HispanicMPR.com. During the podcast, she discusses what to do about difficult people at work with Elena del Valle, host of the HispanicMPR.com podcast.
Jody is a clinical professor of Psychiatry in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, vice chair of Clinical Operations, Department of Psychiatry in the University of Pennsylvania Health System, and chair, Department of Psychiatry at Pennsylvania Hospital. Her clinical practice includes general psychiatry, with a special emphasis on treating acute inpatients, psychopharmacology, and corporate development that provides support and evaluation services to executives.
She completed a residency and a chief residency in psychiatry and a fellowship in clinical psychopharmacology and mood disorders at The Institute of Pennsylvania Hospital. She also attained her masters of business administration, with a concentration in
finance, from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
To listen to the interview, click on the play button below, scroll down until you see “Podcast” on the right hand side, then select “HMPR Jody Foster, M.D.” and click on the play button below or download the MP3 file to your iPod or MP3 player to listen on the go, in your car or at home from the RSS feed. Some software will not allow flash, which may be necessary for the play button and podcast player. If that is your case, you will need to download the file to play it. To download it, click on the arrow of the recording you wish to copy and save it to disk. The podcast will remain listed in the August 2017 section of the podcast archive.
Posted by Elena del Valle on August 17, 2017
How To Retire with Enough Money
Photo: Workman Publishing
Are decisions about retirement on your mind? How much should you save? Where should you keep your money? Should you rely on an investment specialist? In How To Retire With Enough Money and How To Know What Enough Is (Workman Publishing, $12.95) retirement expert Teresa Ghilarducci (see Listen to podcast with Teresa Ghilarducci, author, How To Retire With Enough Money about her book) outlines what she considers the essential facts to prepare readers financially for the final years of their life.
“I wrote How To Retire With Enough Money because I found too many people were racked by guilt and shame because they didn’t have enough savings to retire,” the economist said by email. “But it’s not their fault entirely, the system is stacked against most people’s retirement savings. I wanted to empower people to overcome the forces barring them from having enough money in retirement.”
The 128-page easy to read hardcover book was published in 2015 and is divided into six chapters: Facing the Facts; Bringing Your Picture into Focus; Working; Saving, Spending and Debt; Investing and Allocation; and Voting and Civic Involvement. Described on the back cover as a having “just financial common sense that’s guaranteed to work,” the book offers a positive and succinct approach to retirement. The author favors downsizing before retirement and offers strategies to cut back on spending. She strongly advises against relying on a financial advisor and urges readers to relocate their assets to low-cost index funds.
When asked how she would measure the success of her book she replied: “I will know I succeeded if people reading this How To Retire With Enough Money lowered their investment fees, fired their “guy” (the conflicted advisor), saved at least ten percent of their income by reducing debt and increasing their savings, and kept a monthly budget. Keeping a monthly budget is the key, the trailhead, to the path to financial empowerment.” When asked if the book was sponsored in any way she replied, “I received no money or benefit from any firm mentioned in the book. (I praise Vanguard from genuine regard and respect.).”
Teresa Ghilarducci, author, How To Retire with Enough Money
The book required three years of work. She wrote it for workers of all ages. The author emphasized that saving at younger ages is a lot less painful than waiting to catch up; and that a person reaches the same financial goal by saving a much smaller share of their income if they start in their 20s rather than their 40s.
Regarding retirement issues, the author said, “The greatest obstacle to retirement saving is that most employers don’t offer a way for people to save at the workplace and when they do the law allows people to withdraw their money before retirement. Also federal government subsidies, in the form of tax breaks, favor the wealthy.”
About the challenges she faced when she set out to write the book she said, “One small challenge was convincing my publisher that I didn’t want to make people rich, I wanted people to have enough. (It wasn’t that hard, the publisher was fantastic and taught me a lot.) The main challenge was to write the book so I didn’t scold the reader like other financial books tend to do. The last thing anyone needs is yet another book that simply says, save more, and if you don’t it’s your fault.”
“I am developing an interactive space on our Retirement Equity Lab (ReLab) website where I answer questions from anyone. And my follow-on book is coming out in January, coauthored by Tony James, about what the government can do to save retirement (Columbia University Press),” she said.
Ghilarducci is an expert on retirement, pensions, and personal savings, and the Bernard L. and Irene Schwartz Chair in Economic Policy Analysis at The New School for Social Research. She has a Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Berkeley and taught previously at the University of Notre Dame.
Click to buy How to Retire with Enough Money
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Filed Under: Books
Posted by Elena del Valle on August 7, 2017
Hilary Linden, director, Indivisible
Photo: Kudzu Films
A podcast interview with Hilary Linder, director, Indivisible (see With video – New film showcases challenges faced by Dreamers) is available in the Podcast Section of Hispanic Marketing & Public Relations, HispanicMPR.com. During the podcast, she discusses her film with Elena del Valle, host of the HispanicMPR.com podcast.
Hilary combines her knowledge in the fields of international development and humanitarian relief with her passion for nonfiction storytelling as the director and producer of Indivisible. She is the founder and president of Kudzu Films, a production company dedicated to spreading social justice through film.
Hilary monitored humanitarian emergencies for USAID’s Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance and served as a programs manager at the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, where she managed projects aimed at promoting job growth and smart, sustainable economic development. Hilary also has established education scholarships for children in Zimbabwe and Tanzania and conducted independent HIV/AIDS research in Rwanda. Indivisible follows three undocumented immigrants as they fight for a pathway to citizenship and a chance to reunite with family members.
To listen to the interview, click on the play button below, scroll down until you see “Podcast” on the right hand side, then select “HMPR Hilary Linder” and click on the play button below or download the MP3 file to your iPod or MP3 player to listen on the go, in your car or at home from the RSS feed. Some software will not allow flash, which may be necessary for the play button and podcast player. If that is your case, you will need to download the file to play it. To download it, click on the arrow of the recording you wish to copy and save it to disk. The podcast will remain listed in the August 2017 section of the podcast archive.
Posted by Elena del Valle on July 31, 2017
Teresa Ghilarducci, author, How To Retire With Enough Money
Photo: Matt Furman
A podcast interview with Teresa Ghilarducci, author, How To Retire With Enough Money: And How To Know What Enough Is is available in the Podcast Section of Hispanic Marketing & Public Relations, HispanicMPR.com. During the podcast, she discusses her book with Elena del Valle, host of the HispanicMPR.com podcast.
Teresa is an expert on retirement, pensions, and personal savings, and the Bernard L. and Irene Schwartz Chair in Economic Policy Analysis at The New School for Social Research. She has a Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Berkeley and taught previously at the University of Notre Dame. Visit Teresa on the web at teresaghilarducci.org and on Twitter: @tghilarducci
To listen to the interview, click on the play button below, scroll down until you see “Podcast” on the right hand side, then select “HMPR Teresa Ghilarducci” and click on the play button below or download the MP3 file to your iPod or MP3 player to listen on the go, in your car or at home from the RSS feed. Some software will not allow flash, which may be necessary for the play button and podcast player. If that is your case, you will need to download the file to play it. To download it, click on the arrow of the recording you wish to copy and save it to disk. The podcast will remain listed in the July 2017 section of the podcast archive.
Posted by Elena del Valle on July 26, 2017
From Indivisible
Photo, video: Fuse, Kudzu Films
In February 2013, Hilary Linder began work on a project that would lead her to the making of her first film, Indivisible, in which she followed the lives of three undocumented immigrants for almost three years. The 78-minute documentary about three undocumented immigrants, screened in 25 film festivals already, will air on Fuse, a cable network, at 10 p.m. ET July 29, 2017. Scroll down to watch a trailer.
Renata, Evelyn and Antonio meet their relatives at the United States-Mexico border
“Renata, Evelyn, and Antonio were young children when their parents brought them to the U.S. in search of a better life; they were teenagers when their families were deported,” Linder said by email when asked to describe the film. “Today, they are known as Dreamers. Indivisible takes place at a pivotal moment in their lives, as they fight for a pathway to citizenship and a chance to be reunited with their loved ones.”
When asked about the goal of the film, she said: “I selected immigration reform as the focus of my first film because I believe it will shape the identity of the United States for generations to come and because I knew there was an incredible human story to tell. When Congress introduced a comprehensive immigration reform bill in 2013, I grew frustrated that media coverage was focusing on numbers and statistics rather than the actual people at the heart of the debate. Knowing that immigration reform is a highly politicized topic, I set out to make a film that would humanize the issue and that both undocumented and documented audiences could relate to—a film about families.”
In the United States she filmed in Massachusetts, New York City, Florida, and Arizona. Overseas, she filmed in Colombia, Brazil, and Mexico.
The documentary, funded mainly by the filmmaker with $30,000 of support she fundraised online and in person, premiered at the Cinequest Film Festival in March 2016.
”
The most common reaction is that they had no idea that families were being separated by deportation or what it is like for families to be separated, and, now that they know, they want to do something to change our immigration system and prevent this from happening,” Linder said when asked about people’s reaction to the film. “Before the election, many people indicated that the film had changed their mind about who they would vote for. And today, at such a scary time for immigrants in the U.S., audiences overwhelmingly ask what they can do to help. We like to direct people to our Take Action page on our website (indivisiblefilm.com/takeaction), where they can sign petitions, receive information about contacting their Members of Congress, and sign up to host their own screening of Indivisible.”
