A Maternal Challenge

Last month I had to make a difficult choice: deliver my baby—anticipated to clock in at around nine or ten pounds—by c-section or risk a prolonged labor projected to last hours, if not days.

This got me thinking: would if I lived a century earlier or in a developing country? What would my options be? Without the benefit of western medicine, I would have been stuck, literally.

A woman dies in childbirth every 90 seconds. This I knew, from my time working with Health & Development International. HDI is an organization focused on preventing obstetric fistula, a gruesome and painful injury resulting from obstructed childbirth, especially prevalent in Asia and Africa where caesarian section is not available.

The decision I had to make—whether to have surgery or not—was ironically around the time of the launch of ABC News’ Be the Change: Save a Life Maternal Health Challenge, part of its year-long global health series. ELISE was instrumental in introducing ABC producers to a great partner for their challenge, The Lemelson Foundation, which, along with Duke Global Health Institute, helped shape the guidelines, developed a judging panel and encouraged students from around the world to submit a five-minute video explaining their idea for improving maternal health.

The winner, a Johns Hopkins University team, was just announced this morning. (Check out this video of ABC News Chief Health Editor Dr. Richard Besser telling the students they won.) The team will now work with experts to bring their emerging innovation in healthcare—an inexpensive, antenatal screening test designed to look like a pen—through the development and distribution process with the help of mentoring and support from The Lemelson Foundation and a cash prize of $10,000.

Although I did not have a team of experts to determine my own medical fate, I decided to have a c-section as it became apparent, after many sonograms, that my baby was too big for the birth canal. A very healthy and robust 9 lb. 8 oz. Margaret Claire made her debut on April 8. We have the good fortune of living in the United States, where medical miracles are possible.

Straddling the Atlantic: ELISE Clients this March

As cold as the winter was here on the East Coast, and as long as it felt, and as certain as we were that it was never going to end, March is suddenly upon us. With it will come the spring, longer days … and ELISE’s busiest time of the year. This March brings two major client events, one in Washington, D.C. and one in London, England—a mere three days apart.

On March 26, the NCIIA will host its annual Open Minds (formerly March Madness for the Mind) showcase of student innovation at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. This year, the event will feature fifteen collegiate teams with inventions ranging from a portable, affordable shower system for off-grid areas (pictured above) to an improved and cost-effective rickshaw that encourages operators to become entrepreneurs. The participating graduate and undergraduate teams are also participating in a video competition on the Inventors Digest website. Please go view them and cast your vote here!

Across the pond in London, the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) will be releasing its second annual Impact Report on March 29. The report is a snapshot of the small and growing business (SGB) space and will include case studies of ANDE members. For a few sneak peeks at the report’s contents, follow ANDE on Twitter this month, and be sure to download the full document on launch day from the ANDE website.

If you’re interested in more information about either event, leave a comment and let us know!

Remote, Controlled

Late last summer, we decided to make a big change: leaving our beloved Old City, Philadelphia, office and moving ELISE to a business model based on telecommuting. Our clients are based across the U.S. and even abroad, so we found that convening daily, when we are mostly meeting with our clients via phone or attending meetings in the cities where they’re located, was not the most efficient use of our resources. The change took some adjusting to, but ultimately it was made easier by some of the fantastic tools we adopted in the months leading up to, and immediately following, our move. We wanted to share a few of our favorites with you, below.

Harvest: Although we don’t bill by the hour like lawyers do, we do monitor our time spent on projects to make sure we are best handling the given scope of work. Signing up for Harvest was the easiest decision we made when we started looking at post-move technology, and arguably the best. We looked at a few other services—Timeslips and Outright, for instance—but Harvest was the most affordable solution for us, as well as the one most geared toward the way we work. Our data is backed up on their remote servers, so we didn’t have to install anything or worry about exchanging information between our home offices. They also have a small business package, perfect for our staff size, and an iPhone app that allows us to time meetings and track projects on-the-go when we might not be at a computer.

SalesForce:We compared SalesForce to FileMaker Pro, which we’d used and loved before. We ran into a huge snag with FMPro, though, when we discovered that we would have to pay for customer support for anything beyond basic questions—even during our trial period, when answers to our questions might have influenced our decision to purchase or not. We don’t have a staff IT person, so even though FMPro was more affordable on the surface, we were concerned that we would end up having to spend additional funds for assistance that SalesForce included in its fee. We also loved that we could access SalesForce through our iPhones, and easily import all of our old Excel-based contact lists into the database with minimal effort.

MyMediaInfo (MMI): Selection of our media database proved to be the most difficult decision of all. We compared MMI to MediaHub, as well as to Cision, which we had been using. We’d had some problems with Cision’s interface being less-than-user-friendly, so we were considering alternative options already. MediaHub came in a close second to MMI, but ultimately we loved how fully we could integrate MMI with our existing templates—like Excel-based databases (that we could then import easily into SalesForce) and PDF and Word-based reporter “briefing books” we could share with our clients before interviews. Now that we’re using MMI almost daily, we’ve discovered how much we appreciate that Twitter profiles and recent clips are included in profile pages, the extensive editorial calendar database, and how quick and responsive customer service is when we’re looking for missing or out-of-date information.

If you telecommute, we’d love to hear what tools you use to help you manage your work. Leave us a comment and let us know!

How to Win Followers and Influence People

When we first set up the ELISE215 account, we couldn’t wait to join the conversation. We followed peer marketers, our clients, journalists we wanted to pitch, journalists we just plain liked and really, whatever else interested us. Soon enough, we were overwhelmed. We were following close to a thousand people, and we were having trouble catching the good tweets through all the noise. We all found different ways to cope. Eventually, I started using HootSuite, which at least enabled me to set up search columns so I could monitor topics and hashtags I was especially interested in following. But there were problems, there, too. Much like Goldilocks, I found our full list to be much too broad, but these search columns to be much too narrow. No matter, we were missing the good stuff. I needed to find something that would be just right.

Enter Tweet Spinner. I don’t remember how we initially discovered the Portland-based start-up, but it’s been, if not life-changing, certainly productivity-enhancing. For a few dollars a month, the service combs the list of people you follow and suggests people you might be better unfollowing. These people might tweet too much, only tweet links, or, on the reverse side of the spectrum, not tweet at all. It would let us know who amongst the people we followed didn’t follow us back, and at the same time, tell us which of our followers we ought to take more of an interest in. In less than a month, we were able to un-follow nearly 300 people, resulting in a much cleaner, easy to follow, Twitter feed. That alone would have made the service a bargain at twice the price.

But something else happened, too: as the number of people we followed went down, the number of people who followed us went up. Sure, we lost a few followers at first, mostly people who were on the Tweet Spinner purge list, but our Twitter Counter reports (another service that we’d highly recommend) showed a weekly upward trend: since implementing Tweet Spinner last month, we’ve gained about fifty new followers. I think this was for one big reason: for the first time, we were following fewer people than followed us. Sure, most Tweeters want to be followed back by all of the people they follow—wouldn’t it be great if Oprah followed everyone?—but realistically, most users of the microblogging service only follow people they think are really worth following. Being picky about who you follow shows your worth just as much as being followed by lots of people does. And the two together make an awesome combination.

Tweet Spinner did more than help us manage our Twitter feed. It helped us to engage selectively. We still follow over six hundred people … but the number of people who follow us grows every day.

Another Female Entrepreneur Hits Manhattan

That’s a picture of me from kindergarten. In my business-inspired outfit from the early 80s, don’t I look prepared to be a female entrepreneur? From early on, my parents were grooming me for corporate America.

What I didn’t know as I sat in Catholic school doing long arithmetic that was neat and inside the lines of the yellow pad, was that I’d grow into a woman who was flexible.

And that, I think, is key to being a successful female entrepreneur.

Just this past week, I moved ELISE communications to its third location in four years. ELISE was incorporated as an LLC in Portland, Oregon, where we picked up The Lemelson Foundation and the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance, great longstanding clients who have stayed with us through the years. Then, on to Philadelphia, where I expanded ELISE into a beautiful loft office space with a dedicated team, and acquired equally interesting clients including the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Games for Health Project and author Paul Polak.

The latest metamorphosis this past week has been the move to NYC. ELISE will be run this time around out of my loft in Brooklyn, with satellite assistance from staff in New York, Philadelphia and California. While I will miss seeing my staff on a daily basis, I am excited about diving into the New York start-up scene and having more face-to-face time with journalists, thought leaders and fellow entrepreneurs with whom I have been communicating from afar. This new set-up will allow me to make room for being a mother as well: I am due in April.

So, like Jay-Z said,”New York is a concrete jungle were dreams are made.” I am eager to learn if he is right … in an outfit without the high white collar, of course, and perhaps with a stroller by my side. If you have advice that you are willing to share on being a female founder in the city that never sleeps, I would love to meet you.

Notes from TEDxPhilly

I rode the subway to Center City with my boyfriend last Thursday morning, something I haven’t done in quite some time. He was headed for work; I was bound for the Kimmel Center, where the first Philadelphia TEDx event was being held. It meant I needed to get off the train a stop before he did. As I was gathering myself to go, he asked me: “So, what exactly happens at a TED event? Really smart people talk about how great it is to be really smart?”

He was being flip, but he wasn’t completely wrong. TEDxPhilly really was a celebration of the human mind: its creativity, its ability to think abstractly. Its potential. The speakers ranged from high school teachers and principals to published poets to urban activists to prominent photographers. The audience members that I met ranged from architects to lawyers to computer programmers. We were a diverse group, united under the TED motto: “Ideas worth spreading.” And so in that spirit, I thought it only fitting to spread some of the speakers’ excellent ideas along to the ELISE network:

Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz, Author and Poet: “Turn [your] nerdy obsessions into things that can transform your life.”

Chris Lehmann, Founding Principal, Science Leadership Academy: “School should teach us how to learn [and] school should teach us how to learn to live … The people you want [next to you] are people who know how to live.”

Nic Esposito, Sustainable Practices Activist: “Human beings are a high-maintenance species.”

Jay Coen Gilbert, Co-Founder, B Lab (and friend of ELISE!): “When everyone claims to be the same thing, words matter less.” (Jay’s speech, as illustrated by Jonny Goldstein is featured above.)

Stanford Thompson, Director, Philadelphia Youth Orchestra‘s Tune Up Philly: The variations his students play of “Twinkle, Twinkle” display “fundamentals they’ll need the rest of their lives.” (An aside: there was not a dry eye in the house, Thompson included, when a small group of Tune Up Philly students took the stage and displayed the variations Thompson mentioned.)

Michael Solomonov, Chef and Co-Owner, Zahav: “Stay [where you are] and make something yourself.”

Simon Hauger, West Philadelphia High School Hybrid X Team: “Education isn’t one size fits all.” (Hauger’s students’ electric sports car made quite an impression on TEDx attendees and Broad street passers-by, all of whom were impressed that a group of inner-city high school students could compete in a real way with their vehicle.)

Billie Faircloth, Research Director, KieranTimberlake: “Design is happening at all scales.”

Iyad Obeid, Director, Neural Instrumentation Laboratory, Temple University: “If you can train a computer to be more human, can you make a human a bit more like a computer?” (On reading this in my notes, I have images of the Borg dancing in my head. But in reality Obeid’s question was less scary, more exciting: he was talking about the brain’s ability to adapt to neural implants associated with modern prosthetic devices.)

Ursula Rucker, Poet and Performance Artist: “Speak to me in real space and time, sometimes, please.” (I thought this was a perfect conclusion to the day’s activities: a reminder to the audience, asked to go into data detox for the day and leave phones and computers off during the proceedings, that it really is okay to correspond as people, not as computer users.)

Happy Global Entrepreneur Week

We are lucky, at ELISE, to work with several organizations that recognize the importance of entrepreneurship—after all, ELISE itself was started by an entrepreneur! From the NCIIA, which cultivates entrepreneurs in the college classroom, to ANDE, a network devoted to assisting entrepreneurs worldwide, especially in the developing world, our clients understand the impact entrepreneurs can make. And they’re not alone. Monday marked the first day of Global Entrepreneurship Week, “an initiative to inspire young people to embrace innovation, imagination and creativity.” The week is celebrated worldwide, with meet-ups, Facebook games, seminars, competitions and festivals, and although it’s nearly through, there are still opportunities to get involved, at home and online.

Earlier today the brand-new ANDE Brazilian Hub hosted its first public event, complete with keynote delivered by ANDE Director Randall Kempner, as part of Global Entrepreneurship Week. The event was attended by over a hundred people and featured two panels of social investors and entrepreneurs. We are excited to see our clients take up the spirit of Global Entrepreneurship Week, and thrilled that projects like the Brazilian Hub will continue well past the week’s close on Sunday, November 21.

Big Brother Is Watching You … But in a Good Way

I’ve mentioned before that in addition to my work at ELISE and my seemingly-eternal status as a graduate student, I also co-edit Phillyist, a cityblog dedicated to news and events in and around Philadelphia. We do a good amount of concert review coverage on the site, including, whenever possible, running original photos.

One of the best photographers for Phillyist is also an associate editor for the site, so she’s well versed with our licensing and attribution policy, handed down by the Gothamist network, our publisher. Which is why, last week, when she saw that a photo she’d taken had been used on someone else’s website, she requested that it be removed. The site credited her and linked to her Twitter account, rather than to Phillyist or to Gothamist, as specified by our terms of use, so we were surprised when the poster replied that he’d cleared the post with our publisher first. I got involved at this point and decided to verify this claim with our publisher who wrote back that he had not, in fact, given permission to anyone to use the photo … and that if he had, he would have let us know first. The photo has now been removed (after some rather spirited Twitter bashing). The moral of the story? Don’t misrepresent yourself on the internet, because nowadays there’s a good chance that you will be found out.

In the early days of the web, when chat rooms were new and exciting, you could go online and pretend to be anyone you wanted to be. The dumpy dude in his mom’s basement could, for the duration of a conversation, transform into a 5’11″ blonde supermodel from Switzerland. If the Army suggested that you should be all that you could be, Web 1.0 allowed you to be all that you ever wished you were. The ones and zeroes on the other end were never going to find out, right? But with increased accessibility to the ‘net, the world has gotten smaller. Sure, there are still people out there who pretend to be something they’re not (MSNBC has done a good job of capitalizing on some of the most problematic of these individuals), but there are also people out there who know someone in common with you, or know something better than you. So when the photo-stealer casually name-dropped our publisher, someone with whom I’m in touch at least once a week, he should have expected someone to verify the facts.

It all comes down to a mater of transparency. In communications, in the Web 2.0 world, a world in which services like Facebook and Twitter can allow us to grow close to people we’ve never met in real life or haven’t seen in years, in which we can log on to LinkedIn and see whom we know that knows someone else, honesty is key. It’s integral to the brand of an individual or an organization that you not lie or misrepresent yourself, because somebody out there, on the other side of town or the other side of the world, will be able to call you out for even a whiff of deceit. I’m not suggesting overshare, but I am saying that evasiveness is on its way out the window, and that name-dropping is no longer a golden ticket. Pretty soon you won’t be able to falsify your resume, to fake a quote for a story you’re writing, to lie about why your previous relationship ended, to keep yourself anonymous when detailing your brief fling with a U.S. Senate candidate, without swift and severe responses pointing out the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you Tim Berners-Lee. We are becoming our own moral police, a kinder, gentler Big Brother. And at the end of the day, we’re better off for it.

Why We’re Humming Marvin Gaye

We have the pleasure of working with wonderful people. From a philanthropy in Oregon that’s dedicated to supporting inventors and invention to a collective in D.C. whose members work to support entrepreneurs in the developing world, our clients are passionate, interesting, engaging … and often, funny. Recently added to our roster is Eric Smith (who turned twenty-eight yesterday), whose debut novel will be available just in time to make it on your holiday wish lists.

The book, titled Textual Healing and thus sending us to the R&B playlists on our Pandora accounts, is a light romantic comedy about a washed-up writer who ends up in a self-help group also called Textual Healing. Romance, on the protagonist’s part and others’, ensues—as does hilarity. For those who ever looked at Paris Hilton’s menagerie and thought: “Hey, I think I’ll get a sugar glider,” Eric’s book may make you think again about your choice of pet. Or not, but who am I to judge?

We first got to know Eric through his blogging, for uwishunu (which he used to edit) and Geekadelphia (which he still helms), and the world was made smaller when shortly after signing his contract with ELISE, Eric went to work for Quirk Books, whose building we shared until just recently. We will be working with Eric on promoting his book to a wider audience (he’s already in with the Philly blogs) as he prepares for his book to hit the shelves. We’ll have more information soon about the exact publishing date and launch event soon, but in the meanwhile you can cruise on over to TextualHealing.com to download parts one and two of the Textual Healing “podiobook,” Eric’s hybrid audiobook/podcast, and get a taste of what to expect in print next month.

Lovin’ the Elevator [Pitch]

Two nights ago I watched the Delaware Senate Debate. Although I like to keep religion and politics separate from business, being from Boston and having several relatives with government experience, you might guess which candidate I would vote for if I lived in Delaware.

Most fascinating to me were the candidates’ speeches: their one-minute introductions, 30-second rebuttals and closing speeches. Really none of these were speeches in the formal sense, but, rather, pitches. As an aside, I was VERY disappointed to see both candidates reading from a script they prepared for their opening remarks. Why script it out? How much more engaged would we have felt if the candidates looked at us directly, Bill Clinton-style, and spoke passionately about issues instead of checking their scripts to see if what they were saying was right? Boring.

Pitching your idea is difficult. It involves both sales and communications skills. It requires knowledge of what you are talking about and an understanding of your audience. In the debate, Chris Coons had the knowledge but lacked some of the communications skills to effectively grab my attention.  Christine O’Donnell lacked the knowledge but possessed sound communication skills, although she chose to channel them into an attack of Coons whenever she had a chance.

It’s a balance keeping all of this in mind—messaging, timing and audience—and often, those closest to the material and most intimate with the information have a challenging time translating their ideas effectively.

I recently ran a communications session at the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) Annual Conference in Glen Cove, NY. The conference was a gathering of more than 100 leaders—from investment funds, technical assistance providers, foundations and other organizations that foster entrepreneurship.

My session focused on elevator pitches and how to employ social media to get your message out to the world. The gathering reminded me of The View—mostly women sitting in comfortable, lounge-type chairs arranged in a semi-circle, confessing that maybe crafting an elevator pitch, no matter how well you know your brand or how long you have worked for your respective company or organization, IS challenging. Don’t misunderstand, we had a very experienced crowd, including managers and directors from Acumen Fund, the IFC (International Finance Corporation) and Fundación Bavaria, among others.

The intimate and interactive hour-long session included introductions; a brief lesson on the essential elements of a successful elevator pitch; case studies; and a social media overview. I then asked those participating to answer the following questions to help build the scaffolding of their own elevator pitch:

• What is your target audience?
• Who are your key influencers?
• What is your mission statement?
• What adjectives convey your brand?

The elevator pitch supports and defends your overall value proposition: what you are doing and why it matters to your target audience.  The participants then worked independently to draft their own pitch. Frustration and embarrassment were soon eschewed by encouragement and pride. Really, the results at the end of the session were remarkably better than the initial introduction each of the participants shared about the purpose and mission of their respective organizations.

And, that’s the thing. Communications can be messy. Crisp, clear and SIMPLE messages take time and consideration. That is why, when Coons kept inappropriately asserting that he couldn’t possibly respond to O’DonneIl “Because he didn’t know what she was talking about.” I felt like asking both of them: “Wait, what the heck are either of you saying?!”