I often get asked the following question: “How on earth do you learn and stay up to date in a field that is changing so quickly (i.e. digital engagement)”?

I thought I’d provide an answer on my blog so that I have a place to point people to that ask similar questions in the future.

First and foremost, it should be noted that I love what I do and am genuinely passionate about it. If this was not the case, I wouldn’t be taking the time to write this.

Travel

If i didn’t have the opportunity to travel, both for business and pleasure, I would feel incapable of doing my job. Studying cultures, languages, and most importantly, other ways of doing things, is what allows me to absorb information and try to make sense of it from different angles. Travel is not travel without actually meeting new people and genuinely building relationships. To me there is no better way of traveling than socializing with locals (from various social classes) and getting a glimpse into their day to day lives. The personal benefits and life lessons one can attain are invaluable. There is so much to explore on our planet and so little time.

People

I am fascinated with continually meeting new people and learning from others. I am particularly interested in people with different communication styles, personalities and approaches to problems, especially when they don’t align with mine. Through my travels and day-to-day speaking, training and consulting, I interact with thousands of new people every year. I truly believe that I wouldn’t be able to do my job properly if I didn’t have this privilege. The main reason being is that it allows me to constantly train myself in being able to communicate properly, read people, study body language, tone, posture, etc…a skill that will surely take me a lifetime to perfect.

Reading

Yes I read books made out of paper. My Polish family upbringing instilled the importance and value of books, history and culture from an early age. Before the era of Google, one of my favourite approaches towards learning something that I didn’t know much about, or had been stumped on in a debate, was to get every staple foundational book on the matter and read it. I used this approach for a wide range of subjects (e.g. religion, philosophy, alternative medicine, chaos theory, mysticism, astronomy, physiology, war, public speaking, etc…you get the point, anything I wanted to know more about). The only thing that has changed now in terms of my physical book reading is that I will use the internet to figure out which books I should buy. Occasionally I will purchase an e-book version in addition to the physical copy so that I don’t have extra weight in my luggage when travelling. Within my area of expertise, I have favourite authors, but I also like to occasionally get something serendipitous from the business or marketing sections of my local bookstore. Of course, a ton of the reading I do now comes from the blogs and rss feeds I subscribe to, the links my community shares with me, the discussion forums I belong to and other forms of social media. It’s not the bulk however. I also subscribe to various magazines (e.g. Economist, Canadian Business, National Geographic, Marketing Magazine, Wired) , newspapers (Ottawa Citizen), and even academic journals and publications relating to my industry.

Acceptance

I accept the fact that I will never know eveything there is to know within my field and I will never be up to date on every single little thing. Acceptance of this fact allows you to move forward and learn crucial new techniques of knowing where to find information and who to ask if you don’t know something yourself (often via social media). This is actually a big initial hurdle for people that used to feel up to date by watching the 6 O’clock news and now feel overwhelmed because there are too many sources of potential information. As a result they give up on being informed altogether. Key point: You don’t need to know everything to be considered well informed.

Self-awareness

A while back i went through some mysterious health issues that kind of slowed down my life for a few years. Being inquisitive by nature, i spent a good junk of those years trying to figure out what was wrong with me and learn as much as i could about different forms of medicine and healing (from all areas of the world). After years of trying hundreds of therapy techniques including building meditation into my lifestyle, i eventually realized that simply being aware of the fact that we need to be in tune with our own bodies (physically and spiritually) was already half the battle. Thanks to my medical ails, I ended up learning far more about the intricacies of my own self, which helps me move forward in my personal and professional life every day.

Other

It should also be noted that I am a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) addict. I listen to CBC radio 1 (91.5FM) here in Ottawa and occasionally still enjoy watching The National along with a range of their other quality programs. Additionally, when i’m commuting from client to client I often listen to podcasts from a range of industry professionals.

So there you have it, a quick summary of my approach to learning.

So what is the purpose?

To occasionally share general digital media landscape thoughts and sometimes specific digital marketing insights and learnings, which I’m continually amassing from my journey as a consultant, trainer and speaker for various public and non profit sector organizations around the world.

What can I continue to promise?

I can promise you that I will always be transparent, honest and sometimes quite blunt. Things will be said on here that probably wouldn’t fly in a client deliverable, although nothing will be said on here that I wouldn’t say in public. Duh.

What am I really fascinated with the most within this space?

People. I have a constant curiosity/addiction for learning new ways of doing things from other cultures, sub-cultures and individual personalities. I have a fascination with alternate worldviews, thought patterns and paradigms. I believe most problems, no matter how large (war) or small (your boss thinking social media is a passing fad) stem from clashes of one or many of the above and a reluctance to try to understand them. This is why I focus so much on people before tools, why the books I read are about people not purely technology, and why I don’t like being called a “twitter expert” or “social media guru” (discussed in a prior post). I apply a mix of strategic business thinking, marketing theory, sociology, psychology and common sense to the way I approach problems. Most importantly thought, I like to bounce ideas off of others through various social channels.

Where else can you find me?

I tend to be most active on Twitter and LinkedIn from a professional angle, and Facebook from a personal angle (including photography). I do dabble with Foursquare, although I also have my hesitations. For a full list of my social channels, you can go here.

As always, I like to start with a definition:

“Privacy is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves and thereby reveal themselves selectively. The boundaries and content of what is considered private differ among cultures and individuals, but share basic common themes. Privacy is sometimes related to anonymity, the wish to remain unnoticed or unidentified in the public realm. When something is private to a person, it usually means there is something within them that is considered inherently special or personally sensitive. The degree to which private information is exposed therefore depends on how the public will receive this information, which differs between places and over time. Privacy is broader than security and includes the concepts of appropriate use and protection of information.” -Wikipedia

Somewhere along the last few years, millions of people traded off the concept of privacy (as it was known up until recently) for convenience. Facebook is now a behemoth 550 million member platform, location-based social networks are exploding, chronically ill patients are sharing sensitive personal medical files, and the line behind your personal self and business/professional self has been permanently blurred.

Oh and let’s not forget the fact that even if you think the Internet is the devil and you refuse to do anything “online”, plenty of people all around you are constantly snapping photos, recording audio, writing, and sharing it with the world. Do you seriously think that you’ve never had a photo/video taken of you that could be floating around the Internet somewhere? Even if it was taken well before the Internet era, it could easily have been digitized by now.

Through the various audiences I interact with during my speaking engagements, I have learned that in most cases, people don’t yet have an idea of the scope or implications of what is happening here. Nor do I claim to have that knowledge. This is in large part because, the aggregate benefits people tend to derive from social media have so far outweighed any risks. And the longer people go without any negative consequences, the more they are willing to share. You can see this concept in action by looking at the Evolution of Privacy on Facebook as an example.

As little as a few years ago, sharing your exact location in real-time with others was still seen as “risky” even by mainstream social media users (think back to the initial reactions surrounding Google Latitude). Some people immediately caught on to the potential implications (i.e. www.pleaserobme.com), however most remained oblivious. Today, due to the widespread use of smart phones, there are not only plenty of dedicated location based social networks in existence (e.g. Foursquare, Gowalla), but now existing social media platforms are starting to add “check-in” features (e.g. Facebook “Places”, Yelp).

So what does this mean in terms of privacy as a concept? Is it dead?

Personally, I don’t think so. I just think that for years it was stagnant in terms of evolution and hence nobody really paid attention to the fact that, as stated in the definition, privacy “differs between places and over time”. In the last decade the evolution of privacy went into turbo mode and thus an average Joe’s comfort level with sharing personal information today is light years ahead of what it was as recently as the year 2000.

What does that leave us with?

Our own judgment based on our own comfort level. The first step however is making people aware of just how permanent digital data is, so that they can make an informed decision. I’m still waiting for the day when “responsible digital engagement” is taught in every school, by every employer, and by every parent. The current privacy pitfalls are purely in the widespread lack of awareness, which often leads to innocent mistakes. People need to know when to use which channels, rather than treating them all as one and the same. At the end of the day, our only true privacy for now may be our inner thoughts. Let’s leverage that while we still can. If the recent developments in biometric data reading applications are any indicator, very soon there will be an app for that as well.

Cheers,

MK

I usually don’t use this blog for personal events in my life, however I decided to make a little exception since this event in particular will keep me away from the digital space for a few weeks. Most of you that either know me well, follow me on Twitter, or are my clients, are likely aware that I am getting married next week. The planning for this has been well over a year in the making and I couldn’t be more excited. Immediately following the wedding, my fiancee and I will be flying off to Maui for our honeymoon. Needless to say, my cell phone will not be used aside from a few travel apps that may come in handy. As for emails, I plan on not responding to them until October 1st. If you see me working, please call me out on it!

Jokes aside, I’m thrilled to be marrying the girl of my dreams and will be back in early October energized and ready for a whole new season of speaking, training and consulting. Having just got back from the Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington I can tell all of you Cannucks interested in this space that we have a lot of work ahead of us! Stay tuned for my Gov 2.0 Summit debrief blog post coming as soon as I get back.

Aloha!