For all the years you might have followed me, I never sit still in one place for too long. That’s tricky to wrap your head around, especially in a world that really feels we need to categorize and understand everything. For me, I’ve always just chased after whatever problems seemed fun to solve, and I didn’t think much about any larger overarching narrative. If there was anything in common, it’s the easiest way to sum me up: I like being helpful and sharing what I know with others.
Over the years, what I’ve done with companies has changed a lot. I taught a lot of huge companies what business value might come from engaging people via the social networks and social media channels. I created content for companies and showed a few how to do it for themselves, assisting marketing departments and others in devising ways to reach out and connect more in a world that values different types of media.
Chris Brogan: Strategic Advisor
For the last several months, I’ve worked using some of my strengths in a really specific and pointed way. Strategy at its simplest is: “what’s the plan?” I spend a lot of time creating plans, sharing plans, ensuring that we’re working on the right parts of the plan, and often asking “does this fit into the plan?”
It’s a lot of language work. If we are going to show off how well the company’s products function in a “hybrid work environment” like everyone has these days, then I make sure we add in phrases like “and anyone can participate no matter where they’re working today.”
The client I’m working with is Appfire and I’ve been reporting directly to the CEO for a while now. They are a software platform comprised of over 200 apps that companies use to build better software to support businesses. Most of my meetings in any given day and almost all of my projects surround moving Appfire’s strategic goals forward, and it’s been fascinating. I’m learning about financial stuff, mergers and acquisition, and all kinds of detail around what it takes to guide a company from 200 employees to 400 and beyond.
Where Are You Focusing Your Attention, Chris?
This has changed a bit. While I still run Owner Media Group with Rob Hatch and that focuses on small business, I’m doing a lot in larger scale business and B2B companies these days. Appfire works on top of the Atlassian ecosystem, and doing my strategic work has led me to pay more and more attention to larger companies and strategy around that, as well as paying attention to how companies structure acquisition deals, and so forth.
Technology-wise, I’m really interested in just how far people haven’t come with digitization of common business practices. Both in B2C and B2B, I’m floored how many times a business process dips back into things like paper and telephones. (I can’t stand paper.) I feel like there are so many opportunities to do big work right now with helping companies digitize and work more like we should be in the future.
I watch all the gadget and tech updates all the time, but a lot of what seems to thrill other people (Clubhouse, Twitter Spaces) isn’t all that interesting to me. I’m fascinated with how we can move data closer to the real world application of it, and how tools like VR/AR (XR) will change how we can display data and information in the real world.
Oh, and I’m still very happily running The Backpack Show along with Kerry Gorgone. That show continues to be a gem.
So that’s me. What about you? Come chat me up. Email me at [email protected] or Tweet me at @chrisbrogan 🙂
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