Digital Casualties

How you are you keeping up in our digital and globalized world?  Hopefully you're faring better than Kodak who, after 130 years in business and at one time enjoyed a 90% marketshare, filed today for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. 

Once a blue chip company, Kodak actually developed the digital technology that has since cannibalized its own market.  That sad irony is only heightened by the many good decisions of Kodak's management which included setting digital aside in order to focus on products and services because this is what their customers wanted (at the time).  But as the seminal, The Innovator's Dilemma demonstrates, the path of blind customer service can kill innovation and is littered with the corpses of once thriving organizations.  

On the other hand, we have the entertainment industry.  Music, film and television companies have been fighting for years what consumers want: digital access to content.  The music industry brought us the bitter fight over Napster and the recent efforts of SOPA and PIPA have created a firestorm with popular websites shutting down in protest to successfully sway Congressional support.  SOPA and PIPA are backed by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) who see their power, and their bottom lines, disintegrating. Many of these industry players are as old as Kodak and have held a monopoly for close to a century.  But the democratization of content production and distribution, made possible by the digital technology and the Internet, is disrupting these old business models.  

I feel for the entertainment companies at the center of the SOPA/PIPA controversy and who are struggling to protect their copyrights and battle piracy.  I am an advocate for artists and content creators who should be compensated fairly for their work.  After all, without protecting the talent, perhaps this SNL skit is a glimpse of a bleak future in entertainment. 


As is indicated by Kodak's bankruptcy and MPAA/RIAA's flailing efforts to save their skin, these old business models are dying hard as the new business models struggle to take shape.  It is easy to look backwards to understand how business "should be done".  As we recently discussed in our Digital Consumer class, it took decades of observation of traditional business to come up with the classic Four P's (price, promotion, product and place) taught in every Marketing 101 class.  But with the advent of digital marketing and digital consumption... well, that's still a new frontier and the business principles governing success are still being discovered.

Its not just business models that are being disrupted, however.  The bankruptcy of Kodak and the struggles of the entertainment establishment are centered in the respective "company towns" of Rochester, NY and Los Angeles.  As these cities struggle with the economy they are a microcosm of larger shifts happening throughout the United States and the rest of the world.  They reflect the Brookings Institute's latest study which reveals a very real economic and power shift from the West to the East.

A look at an interactive map from the study illustrates that its not just certain cities and certain industries that are struggling to adapt to the new realities of a digital world.  As the U.S. and Europe struggle, other regions are gaining ground.  Competing as individuals, as organizations and even nations require re-shaping business models and business practices.

Hopefully you're not filing for bankruptcy or facing a radical shift in your specific industry, but are you keeping up in the digital landscape and adapting? If not, why not?  As I tell tech-phobic clients, "give it a try... its not like you can break the Internet!"  A great place to at least start is with Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies and The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company that is Connecting the World.  After all, if you're not learning... you're dying.

Digging Deeper

The dust has settled and yesterday's euphoria has faded. Yep, we had a successful pitch yesterday - our team has even been approached by multiple people about making the business plan a reality... but its Friday night and I'm back doing homework.

I did take today off a bit. I was just drained after yesterday, so I slept in... did some family stuff... even caught part of the Tennessee Williams marathon on Turner Classic Movies.

But looming over the day were the three Branding & Promotion papers I wanted to get out of the way today so that I'd have the weekend free. You know, free to study for Tuesday's Digital Law final exam. Free to study for Tuesday's New Venture Creation final exam. Free. Yay. Free.

Well, two papers are down... one to go. After the 2nd paper I hit the gym to feel alive again. I admit it... I was pretty bitter about another weekend eaten up with school. But then I blew out my eardrums at the gym with this gem from Linkin Park and I'm ready to dig deeper... cause after the finals on Tuesday, I'm free.

PS - thank you PW for introducing me to this stress-busting song!

I Got My MBA Today...

OK - not really. We've got one more semester to do this spring... then we'll officially have our MBAs... but today... we earned our stripes today!

New Venture Creation has been one of my favorite classes in the program. In this course we've taken just about everything we've been learning for the last year and a half... Marketing, Finance, Branding, Accounting, Law... seriously, ALL of it, and in a mere 6 weeks have applied it by creating a business from scratch... then today we pitched that plan to a panel of judges and potential investors for feedback.

Holy $#$%^. We've done A LOT of presentations and public speaking throughout this program, but this assignment was like fighting for your life. These panelists didn't hold back in their critiques so we had to come prepared to NAIL it. Throughout the course of this class we've had other professionals and entrepreneurs provide us with feedback as we've developed our pitches. From this it seems that 1/2 the lesson has been to stay open and flexible to this professional feedback and make adjustments as needed; the business plan my team and I pitched today was very different from that first pitch we did in the beginning - you know... back when we simply had a "good idea". In the interim, my hardworking teammates, Britni McCotter and Gabe Maldonado and I reshaped this mere good idea into a viable business plan with high earning potential.

Congrats to my dMBA cohort - it was a blast celebrating w/ you this evening on a job well done!

The Grind, Part II

Not a day off for 3 weeks.
8 hour days on the weekends: researching, writing, reading.
The Grind.
Its worth it, right?
I'm not complaining really... just a drooling vegetable.
I miss poetry & art.
24 days till the last final.
Then LA.
24 days till working out at Wild Card.
Wild Card.
Where I just train.
That's me at my happiest.
If I can stay standing in the ring during a workout w/ Ray... I can do business school - no problem.
I'd rather go another 3 minutes w/ Ray than read another Law case.
I miss poetry, art, LA and Wild Card.

The Grind

My head just exploded.

This is why (WARNING, your head may explode by reading the following passage):

Using standard HTML, SoccerMANIA.com’s webpage might, in fact, be in-line linking to the Pelé photo stored on, say, “SoccerPASSION.com.” If that is the case, when the person seeking to visit SoccerMANIA.com’s webpage uses his browser, the browser would (1) download SoccerMANIA.com’s webpage, (2) parse through the various HTML commands of that webpage, (3) per HTML code, display the text “We proudly show this photo,” (4) also per HTML code, Dear God, stop now! Save yourself! ...follow an in-line link to the image stored on SoccerPASSION.com, (5) download the photo to the user’s computer directly from SoccerPASSION.com, and (6) display the image in the browser below the text. Because the visitor cannot see any of these actions take place, he probably—but mistakenly—will assume that the copyrighted photo of Pelé is stored on and served by SoccerMANIA.com. Indeed, even though the image was actually transferred directly from SoccerPASSION.com, the address shown on the user’s browser will still indicate something akin to “http://www.SoccerMANIA.com/webpage.html”. This is because browsers display the address of the file (here, a webpage) that they are currently rendering; they do not in any way indicate the location from which each component element of a webpage (such as an image) originates. (Perfect 10 v Google, Inc. et al.)

This goes on for nearly 50 pages. Yes, 50.

I've always wanted to read "the classics", you know, Austen, Tolstoy, Joyce. In grad school I'm reading the classics alright - the classic cases and high-court decisions in business and digital law: Campbell v Acuff Rose, Sony v Universal, Napster, Grokster, Perfect 10 v. Google, etc.

I'm learning a ton... important stuff about the application and evolution of law in the digital age - in particular about copyright law.. but this is the grind of business school... reading till I'm cross-eyed. I've recently quipped that after graduation I will never read again. My boyfriend thinks that I should then taking up knitting - but I suspect he is purely selfish on that point and just wants free, custom-made knitwear. Whatever, too much to read till then.

What's keeping me going right now? This awesome quote from our New Venture Creation guest lecturer, Ryan Gravelle*:

Entrepreneurs have a chance to make the world a better place and solve big problems. We've already got enough ways to post pictures of lunch.

I look forward to graduation. Not simply because I'll have time to learn to knit (maybe - who am I kidding?), but because I am chomping at the bit to start putting my dMBA education into practice!


* Ryan attributed the quote to Kevin Neuse, but Kevin told me it was from an article he Tweeted about. If you know the name of the article, lemme know!

Looking Back, Looking Ahead

Since starting this blog about my experience of St. Eds' dMBA program, I've had prospective and future students send me questions about it. The most common questions have been about how to best prepare for the program.

My answer is pretty simple: come academically prepared and have an effective stress coping strategy.

To academically prepare, 1st, check out the list of required courses and look for your weakest areas. This will, of course, be different for everyone depending on your work and undergraduate experience. For example, I've worked in Marketing pretty extensively, and in undergrad I was a Sociology major, so I felt pretty comfortable with Marketing and Statistics. Because I have written copiously in my career and, as an undergrad, took way more writing component courses than were required and completed an independent study research project, writing and Marketing Research weren't an issue. My areas of weakness however, were Accounting and Finance and that's where I had to work the hardest.

2nd, upon identifying areas to strengthen from the list of required courses, begin to fill in any knowledge gaps now. You can do this by taking a course at your local community college, or, at the very least, pick up a "For Dummies" type of book to familiarize yourself with key concepts - trust me, your future self will thank you! Before starting the program, I took Accounting at Austin Community College, and boy, am I SUPER glad that I did!

An effective stress coping strategy is just as critical to the program. I can't emphasize enough how quickly this program moves - 3 new classes every 7 weeks. But don't be fooled, that doesn't mean the curriculum is watered down - we're being prepared for the national MBA Major Field Test (in 2 days - wish me luck!). Throughout it all, my favorite stress release has been training in Krav Maga at Fit and Fearless (2 blocks from campus!) 3 - 4 nights a week. There's nothing quite as physically and mentally refreshing as punching the heck out of a bag for an hour.

On the eve of starting my 1st year, the best advice given to me came from a dMBA graduate who advised, "Its not rocket science, you just gotta do the work." That summation became my mantra, reminding me that I CAN do it and that, if it was easy, everyone would be doing it. So, as I reflect on my successes and perhaps, even more importantly, my challenges over this 1st year, I'm grateful for the how well the dMBA program has been preparing me to continue forward to pursue my passions.

Who Said, "Grad School Isn't The Real World"? Part Deux

OMG - SO freaking excited! I am THRILLED to tell the world that I've landed the coolest internship this summer with Participant Media in Los Angeles! In addition to its upcoming features, The Help and Jodie Foster's The Beaver, Participant is most notably known for its Academy Award Winning/Nominated narratives and documentaries including Charlie Wilson's War, Good Night and Good Luck, North Country, Food Inc., An Inconvenient Truth and The Cove.

I will intern in the Social Action department, working with Kristen Irving, the Director of Campaign Development, to develop a social action campaign aligned with a soon-to-be announced major motion picture.

I've long been a fan of Participant's films, but its since starting the dMBA program, that I've begun to study their practice of creating social action campaigns in depth. In fact, it was in a Marketing class in our very 1st term that I began to research their business model. Since that time I've continued to follow them closely with the hopes of landing an internship there. So I'm happy to say, my hard work and persistence has paid off :)

As excited as I am about this opportunity, its taken me a couple of weeks to blog about it... "life has gotten in the way", as Professor Nair from HR likes to say. Almost immediately after accepting their offer, my Grandmother was admitted to ICU with pneumonia... and just a few days after that, she passed away. My Grandmother has been a very influential person in my life - so much so, that I've been filming her and working on a documentary, Grandmother Storyteller, about her for the past several years.

Losing her has been devastating. In the days between her passing and the funeral, all I could do was eat Lucky Charms and listen to the '60's gospel-meets-psychedelic-rock hit, "Spirit in the Sky." And oh yeah, see to the "minor details" of grad school (you caught the sarcasm, right?).

The timing of these 2 big events, coupled with the fact that hard work must still be completed, reminded me of something I noticed recently in my 100,000,000th viewing of the classic, "Rocky". You know the famous workout scene which culminates with Rocky triumphantly ascending the steps of the Philly Museum of Art? Its an iconic feel-good scene where Rocky is experiencing the pay-off of all his hard work. But here's the kicker - immediately after that, we cut to Rocky the night before the big fight - he's restless and agitated. He wanders the city and ends up in the Spectrum where he runs into the fight promoter whose comments completely shatter Rocky's fragile confidence. He goes home and tells Adrian he can't go through with the fight. After speaking with Adrian though, he realizes he must go on and his goal becomes to simply "go the distance" with the Champ.

What floors me about this is how quickly Rocky goes from his ultimate high, on the Art Museum steps, to his ultimate low. My own high and low hadn't yet happened, so at the time I was simply struck by the well-crafted writing and how it beautifully juxtaposes such tender human experiences at such extreme ends of the spectrum.

I'm getting back in the saddle now with school. It was hectic for a while - being at Grannie Annie's bedside in her last few days - giving and receiving support with my family - planning the funeral - somehow managing to pull myself together to give her eulogy. During all that, I didn't miss a deadline with school.

Sure, I thought about asking for a little wiggle room from my professors, but I didn't. Each round of classes is only 7 weeks so there is little room for wiggling - it just seemed easier to suck it up and do my homework in her hospital room while she slept rather than to put it off. Besides, I'd look up to occasionally catch her proudly watching me study - and she wouldn't have put up with me not, "going the distance". She was as tough as they come.

I'm off the Lucky Charms now and I'm back to focusing on this exciting opportunity with Participant. After all, it was Grannie Annie and her gift of storytelling who taught me about the powerful impact of a well-told story. With that I leave you with a quote about my Grandmother - one that succinctly explains her grand style of telling a story:

Its a Texas thing.

If you can't improve on a story, why tell it?

Who Said, "Grad School Isn't The Real World"?

OK, so maybe the unexpected craziness of our recent mid-term exams doesn't have the consequences of the "real world". But with looming deadlines and demands to perform with grace in the face of ambiguity, yesterday certainly required the coping strategies and flexibility of many "real world" scenarios.

Scene: Austin Texas, a place known for its relatively mild winters making it rather unprepared for snow or ice.

On the morning of 2 mid-term exams, Austin was hit with freezing rain, leaving traffic snarled and many schools and organizations opening late. Our Accounting professor, bless her, sent us an early morning email warning us off the roads and instructions on taking the mid-term online. Now, if there's one thing I learned in the 2 years I worked in IT, its that technology is great only when it works. There were many false starts and issues in setting up the online test, keeping our poor professor on the phone most of the morning with tech support. By the time it was fixed, we had just over an hour to start the exam before running off to our Information Systems (IS) mid-term.

The IS test. How do I describe it? It was a KILLER. My brain was numb when it was over. Perfect state of mind to dash home and wrap up the Accounting test before the deadline. Except the online test was still having issues, including not saving the answers from completed problems! Seriously. The answers were G.O.N.E. So once again, our beleaguered Accounting professor was on the phone with tech support and all there was to do was sit and wait. Oh yeah, and pray the answers it took me an hour to come up with could be retrieved.

As I waited, I watched the clock as it ticked closer and closer into early evening (had I really been doing this all day ?) and towards the time for my regular Wednesday night Krav Maga class. After such a harried day, I knew an hour of punching the heavy bag was exactly what I needed. But with the clock counting down, I began to doubt that I would make it. So I waited. And waited. And then I did what any reasonable person would do. I CRANKED up my iTunes and started dancing. Why not? I was already fully prepared for the test, so I could have spent that time fretfully watching the clock, or dancing.

I chose dancing.

That's when I decided I was going to Krav no matter what. I took off to class and got in a great workout - thank you guys at Fit and Fearless, you've helped keep me grounded after more exasperating days than this!

By the time I got home from class, the test was up and ready to go. But me, I went to bed. A fresh start was what I needed to complete that albatross of a test!

That, dear friends, is a day in the life of a graduate student. And you know what? It wasn't so bad. I actually kind of thrive on pressure (why else would I sign up for a program that goes for 2 years at a summer-school-pace?). Plus, at some point it dawned on me, all this was really, was an inconvenience. Nobody wrecked their car on the ice and we're all here to slog it out another day.

Function in disaster, finish in style. (Jean Harris)