Stepping Down from SOBCon

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This is one of those posts that’s hard to write.

As many of you know, my gorgeous wife Lisa and I were part of the team that founded and put on SOBCon last spring in Chicago along with Liz Strauss, Terry Starbucker, and others.

This past week Lisa and I had a long conversation with the rest of the leadership team of SOBCon. In it we all agreed that the Cree’s would be pulling out of the partnership.

The decision was a very tough one for me to make. We know what a wonderful event SOBCon was last year. And we know how much higher Liz is raising the bar for the experience of all involved this year. Plus, I had a large part in crafting the original idea in the first place.

However, now that Lisa and I are 30 days into the launch of SuccessCREEations, Inc. as a full time venture we are realizing that I had fallen victim of one of the classic business start up blunders: grossly underestimating the amount of time effort and resources it takes to get a new business off the ground. I had this idea that once I left my previous full time employment we’d have lots of extra resources to devote to SOBCon.

I was very mistaken about that. We actually have less. Much less.

So rather than hold SOBCon back we’ve decided to step down from the leadership team.

Liz, Terry & the SOBCon team have a great event planned for everyone. Lisa and I still plan to be there. We just won’t be part of the team that’s running the show.

Tagged with Joe’s Promise

I’ve been keeping a very low profile on the bloggosphere of late. I’ve my reasons. I’m keeping my eye on my priorities. All is well.

This morning Liz Strauss tagged me with Joe’s Promise.

You see, Joe had been keeping a low profile too. He explained what happened in his post about a week back when he wrote My Promise to the Blogging Community.

Joe’s Promise

• I will be sure to comment on other Blogs if I can add to the conversation.
• I will respond to comments on my own Blog.
• I will acknowledge any links to my Blog with a comment on the linker’s Blog.
• I will continue to link to other Blogs that are pertinent to a posts content.
• I will once again be a part of the Blogging Community.
• That is my promise to the Community as a whole, in part, and individually.

If you feel you are losing some of the interaction that is an integral part of Blogging, you may want to join me in this Promise to the Community.

It’s a good set of promises to keep, whether you are brand new to blogging, or whether you are an old hat that like me that has been focused elsewhere.

If that is you, then just pick up the words, post them on your blog, and link back to Joe’s post. Tag it “Joe’s Promise,” and pass it on.

And to do my part passing it on, how about we hear from April, Jesse, Jason, Troy, Rick, and Dawud.

A Little SOBCon Levity

You may not know Susan Reynolds. But I’m guessing you probably should. She bills herself as a new media consultant. And she is very active in Web 2.0 stuff like Twitter and Second Life.

But don’t let that fool you. Susan also has a remarkable creative streak. You may recall from my birthday last month, it was Susan who created my very own Chris Cree postage stamp to help me celebrate.

Well Susan’s been at it again, exercising her creativity. This time she’s stepping over into video.

Susan posted some Spicy Buzz Hits of the Blogosphere featuring Yours Truly partnered with Liz Strauss strutting our collective stuff in a little salsa dancing.

I’ve been out of the loop for a bit and didn’t realize that Susan has turned this bit of silliness into a regular feature over at her place. It caught me totally off guard. Be sure to check her blog on the weekends and find out who her next victims will be.

Just one note of caution before you click play on this little video piece Susan cooked up: DO NOT take a sip of coffee before clicking the play button. If you do it just might end up all over your screen and keyboard. (I was laughing so loud when I saw it Gorgeous demanded to see it too. And yes, she thought it was hysterical too.)

Thank you Susan. I really needed that laugh last night.

Enjoy!

CREEating Value - 27 June 2007

CREEating Value

It’s been a while but we’re getting back on track with this feature here at SuccessCREEations.

Periodically I go through my feed reader and pull out a few gems that bring value to you as a business blogger.

With over 80 million blogs out there finding a few that are worthy of making it to your feed reader can be a challenge. So I’m trying to make that a little easier by pointing out some great blogs that I have in my reader that you may or may not have seen yet.

So without further ado, here are this week’s juicy finds.

Enjoy!

Letting me be . . . random wondering and philosophy (feed) - Did you know Liz Strauss has other blogs besides Successful-Blog? She does. If you are looking for a little thoughtful reflection check out her blog over on Blogger with storytelling that brings back memories.

Google Public Policy Blog (feed) - As long as we are talking about blogs running on Blogger, you might want to check out the Google Public Policy Blog. Worried about Big Brother learning too much about your web habits? Here’s where you can find out what Big Brother himself has to say about all that. They recently had a good post explaining their position on Net Neutrality. Well worth the read.

Making Life Work For You (feed) - Let’s round out this edition with a brand new business blogger who is doing a fantastic job right out of the gate. April Groves is a local Realtor who is blogging to promote her business. But she gets the whole thing about providing value to her readers and she shares much more than just real estate information. (Did I mention she’s a good friend of Gorgeous?) She’s only been blogging a few short months, but she’s well on her way. I expect we’ll see great things from her.

There you have it. This week’s blogs that are CREEating Value. It’s hard to believe this feature has been resting since before SOBCon. I’m finally finding my old groove again. Glad to be back!

Exploring a Couple SOBCon Takeaways

There is something amazingly exhilarating about sitting in a coffee shop overlooking picturesque Lake Michigan knowing that the entire world is just waiting at my fingertips to be explored.

As I’m reveling in that wonder and the potential of the unexplored I run smack into reality by breaking my blog. IE7 seems to have a little trouble with the Ajax side bar widget manipulation in WordPress for some reason. And that caused some of my widgets not to display.

Ah, well. I’ve been meaning to put FireFox on Gorgeous’ laptop for a while now. Since I didn’t put a wireless card in mine in the craziness before the conference, I’m using hers while she preps for the mother of all rummage sales later in the week.

My SOBCon Lessons

I sat down to write up a couple of the biggest takeaways for me from SOBCon this year. If we don’t make the effort to evaluate where we’ve been and what you’ve learned in an effort to improve, then we end up spinning our wheels and never move forward.

There were two things that really hit home for me this past weekend. Read more

Arriving at SOBCon-07

Gorgeous and I arrived at the Sofitel Chicago O’Hare yesterday. Man what a nice hotel!

We knew we were in good hands when the shuttle driver offered us a complimentary water for the 10 minute ride from the airport to the hotel.

We met with some of the hotel staff and walked through the rooms where we will be meeting for the conference. Everything we’ve seen so far seems top notch.

As the day progressed we caught up with Liz Strauss, who was talking with Lorrelle Van Fossen at the front desk. Right beside Rodney Rumford.

I had to laugh because Lorrelle happened to be wearing an outfit that was the same color as her blog. As I walked up I said to myself, “That must be Lorrelle.” The outfit seemed perfect.

We got a peek at Lorrelle’s new book on Blogging Tips which every attendee will get complimentary. The book is brand new. In fact, the book hasn’t even been released yet. The official release is tonight at the conference. I’m here to tell you the book is packed with great information that you can actually use to take your blogging to the next level. After it is officially released I’ll get you a link so y’all can get your own copy.

We all ended up in the lobby near the bar as the evening progressed. Liz and I caught Steve Farber checking in and went over to introduce ourselves. And before the evening was out, Diego Orjuela came by and sat down to chat with us.

All in all a good day. And things haven’t even gotten started yet!

Conference Double Whammy!

OK. This is too cool!

Have you gotten info about a conference but you couldn’t go? Maybe cost was an issue or your schedule wouldn’t allow you to take the time away.

Well Liz Strauss over at Successful-Blog is doing something to remove those barriers. She’s hosting a Virtual Conference on Monday.

“What’s a Virtual Conference,” you say?

Imagine 12 incredibly sharp people each sharing a little of what they know, and available to answer specific questions on all kinds of bloggy topics like laughter, graphics, creativity, blunders, branding, and yes, even business blogging.

Each speaker does up a post, and then gets an hour in the comment hot box (hot comment box?) for dialog and Q&A.

Here’s how Liz describes it: Read more

Expanding Horizons - Writing for Successful-Blog

Last Wednesday evening at this time I was sitting across a table in a little neighborhood restaurant eating some of the best Mexican food I’d had in a long time.

Outside there was a light snow falling, shimmering in the streetlights, just enough to make it look like one of those snow globes had just been shaken up. And it was so cold the weather guys said they were running out of adjectives to describe it.

But inside we were nice and toasty over our dinner.

I’d driven nearly an hour through the Chicago evening commute traffic for the opportunity to meet Liz Strauss face to face.
Read more

A Little Fun With Work

Last time I was here in Chicago I made it a point to check out the Sears Tower. I figure when you are in a city you should see the important things there.

This trip I decided to try to see an important person if I could. You all probably know that Liz Strauss over at Successful-Blog is one of my blogging friends. She’s a deep thinker who keeps one simple rule at her blog: Be Nice.

Who can’t like that? Well I was able break away from my commitments up here for a little while last night and connect with Liz for some dinner and great conversation.
Read more

Blog Shift

Those of you who have been following SuccessCREEations know that we’ve been on a journey of discovery here. And, as is the case with discoverers, the new things we discover sometimes lead us to make some changes.

SuccessCREEations is going though some changes.

Read more

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