Livingston

Sep
15
2008

Build Heroes

It’s a time for the individual. Social media has unleashed personality, and delivered the power of opinion and voice. We can each become individual superstars in our own right. But great leaders will see social media as an opportunity to do more than become well known.

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Frank Gruber, Aaron Brazell, Brian Solis, myself, Nick O’Neill, and Rohit Bhargava. Image taken by our own Qui Diaz.

See, it’s somewhat difficult to be well known in the community, but in reality, many people are doing it. That person — the influential — can be found within two to three percent in any given market segment. Some can just be considered internet famous, others are true thought leaders.

But how many of those leaders are creating the next generation of thought leaders? Or do they prefer to shine on their own?

Lee Iacocca was a man who turned around Chrysler. But once his fame distracted him and he eventually left the company, Chrysler collapsed. There was a leadership void. Lou Gerstner turned around IBM, and groomed another generation of leaders to supersede him. Like him or hate him, Jack Welch also developed a corps of leaders at GE.

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Bill Walsh not only coached the 49ers to three Super Bowl victories, he mentored ten head coaches who won or led their teams to Super Bowls (totaling 7 additional victories, collectively).

I believe that you have to pass on your skills. Nothing that I have, nothing that is in my head is really, truly mine. Mentors, influencers, and authors have all directly or indirectly passed their wisdom on to me, giving me the tools that I needed to succeed.

It’s my personal belief that I am obligated to give away what was so freely given to me. Great leaders know they are a product of others, that they are there to be of service to their organization, and as such, act as trusted servants.

At Livingston Communications and publicly on the Buzz Bin we live this ethos. That’s why you see other people like Qui (recently featured on BlogHer) and Larissa Fair delivering quality content on the blog, and making a name for themselves in social media. Newer bloggers Marinel Mones and Mike Nelson are learning how to deliver quality content to you every week.

In my opinion, the greatest result of this company can achieve is not the societal change we can affect for our social cause clients. Nor will it be the results-oriented marketing campaigns we create for companies. These — while worthy results — cannot compare to enabling the next generation of great communicators.

It’s hard to make it, and then make a difference in your profession. But it’s even harder and more worthwhile to build heroes who can affect more change. There is great satisfaction in helping others succeed and achieve results that benefit society. It’s my great hope that we can deliver meaningful growth and actionable experiences to our team members.

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by Geoff Livingston | Geoff, Livingston Communications, social media |

7 Responses to “Build Heroes”

  • Dan Schawbel Says:

    September 15th, 2008 at 9:05 am

    I think the key terminology you are mentioning here is “succession plan.” If you have someone following your blog for long enough, they will have a lot of your knowledge that you are “passing down.” In this way, you are indirectly creating successors or at least evangelists that can help spread your influence.

  • Geoff Livingston Says:

    September 15th, 2008 at 9:39 am

    @Dan. There’s a difference between succession plan and building great talent. Building great talent assumes that most workers today won’t stay with you more than two or three years.

    It’s incumbent on talent managers to do everything in their power to give people meaningful experiences and help them grow. That’s what great leaders feel compelled to naturally. And it’s inevitable that some people will stay in such an environment, creating succession.

  • Craig Says:

    September 15th, 2008 at 11:48 am

    Contributing to ones success will also only lead to more success for you in the future as well. Either by helping developing talent where hopefully loyalty will keep them around and allow them to prosper in your environment. Or if they leave, that established loyalty and good karma will come back in the future when the time is right. As being younger in the industry it’s nice to have a mentor to look up to and gain valuable insight to help me grow so that in the future I can do so for another individual.

    Craig
    http://www.budgetpulse.com

  • Ari Herzog Says:

    September 15th, 2008 at 5:34 pm

    The irony of your well-intentioned post about supporting individuality and instilling values of social change in future generations is that your picture, with speaks 1000 words, was photographed in an obvious Barnes & Noble Bookstore.

    How does B&N support individuality? There’s a reason why you’re writing your powerful words, Geoff, on livingstonbuzz.com and not cnn.com.

    Might I suggest that future photographs intended to enhance individualistic posts be captured in independent bookstores?

  • Geoff Livingston Says:

    September 15th, 2008 at 10:38 pm

    Ari: We were at Barnes & Noble for a Now Is Gone book signing, which is my book. So, um, obviously they found my independent words of fire to be good enough for them…

  • Ari Herzog Says:

    September 16th, 2008 at 12:59 pm

    Fair enough, but would you agree that the concept of an “individual” is akin to an independent bookstore, formed by inspiration from others, and in business to provide knowledge and community for others to rise up; whereas a chain bookstore is capable of shining on their own and cares less about building heroes?

  • Geoff Livingston Says:

    September 17th, 2008 at 8:53 am

    No, I think if you are good enough you can use the Internet to breakthrough in the book industry, and into the chains.

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