Another Advocacy Leaders Network event was held on March 9th at the offices of Bloomberg Government. We were thrilled to host a capacity crowd in the second of four events hosted by the Congressional Management Foundation and produced by Beekeeper Group.

The topic “Mapping Your Political and Economic Footprint: Identifying Advocacy Assets and the Art of Modern Storytelling” generated sophisticated conversation between our panelists and attendees.

Our first panel featured advice from speakers on effective ways for identifying and mapping advocacy assets for Congress. “Demonstrate to a Member that they have a vested stake in your issue, that they have a reason to listen,” said speaker Pete Eskew.

The second panel had a lively discussion about the art of modern storytelling and the different ways to share those stories. Sean Collins noted that in order to make your story compelling “You must personalize your message. Truly understand your audience and try to make connections.” Cheryl Miller agreed, suggesting advocates should “Try to make a personal connection on the Hill by integrating your message with Member priorities.” “The key is to make your stories both sharable and worth sharing,” added social media expert Carie Lewis.

ALN Event Series Continues this June

The next Advocacy Leaders Network event will be held Friday, June 15th! The topic will be “Getting Cats and Dogs to Play Nice in the Office: Integrating your Lobbying and Grassroots Operations.” Tickets for this event are available here: http://advocacyleadersjune15-eorg.eventbrite.com/.

Last month, I had the pleasure of speaking to a group of undergraduate students at the American University here in Northwest D.C. I was there to talk to the ‘Public Relations Portfolio’ class about how building their “profersonal™” brand – a term coined by Jason Seiden – starts even before they join the workforce.

During our conversation, I realized that for Generation Y, particularly the communicators, the blended brand requires really no transitioning at all – no shift in mentality. For those of us who are older than this newest group entering the professional world, the concept of a “profersonal” brand is a bit more of a challenge.

Today, students see that their jobs, colleagues, people they meet in person (or friend on Facebook), groups and associations are all connected. And these aspects of their lives are definitely connected to them online. The group of AU students have already become well-adjusted to the mix of social media in their daily lives –whether that meant they were connecting with others online over the basketball game score or a class project.

Check out my slide presentation below to learn 5 key tenets for your social media success. Then, tell us your additional thoughts for blending your personal and professional brands for career in the comments below!

Earlier last week, I had the pleasure of attending a NetSquared DC meet-up featuring a discussion with Clay Johnson on his new book The Information Diet. Clay develops a clever metaphor throughout his book by comparing America’s overconsumption of junk food to an overconsumption of junk information.

With a quick phone call, one can bypass the hassle of cooking at home and have a pizza delivered right to their front door. People consume this kind of junk food, despite its processed, unhealthy ingredients, because it is cheap, convenient and tasty. Many parallels can be drawn between this custom and the way most people go about consuming information. The plethora of different mediums (Television, Radio, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit etc) for information consumption mirrors our many options for junk food. And in today’s age of instant gratification, we want access to news that is as cheap and convenient as a delivery pizza. What makes this worse is a natural gravitation towards sources that reaffirm us of our own beliefs – after all, similar opinion ‘tastes’ much better than impartial news. Bring these things together and you have the ingredients for junk information obesity – a constant echo of cozy bias that dulls critical thought and mental productivity.

There is hope however! After receiving pressure from customers and government alike, Walmart launched an initiative aimed at reducing sodium, sugar and industrially produced trans fats from the food choices they provide. In similar fashion, Clay has set forth a call to action, providing some ideas to combat this epidemic by trimming the fat from your information regimen. Here are some tips for slimming down your intake:

• Consciously consume – Avoid losing whole hours to surfing the web with tools like RescueTime, which monitor productivity and produce efficiency summaries for users. Designating specific times for using social media outlets like Twitter and Facebook can also help effectively manage your consumption levels.

• Seek information, not comfort – “Mass affirmation is the carbohydrate of the mind.” Too often individuals are searching for news that reinforces their own beliefs rather than informing them on actual fact. Be sure to have a variety of biases in the news you read or hear and always consume information, regardless of source, with an element of skepticism.

• Be a producer – Start your day with a producer’s mindset. Producing is the natural counterbalance to consuming and will help keep things in their proper proportion. Before you consume any information in the morning, write 500 words. The subject doesn’t matter so long as you are writing.

Is it time for you to go on an information diet? Pick up Clay’s book for more ideas and let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

Every once and a while, we at Beekeeper Group like to post about bee-related stories in the District and beyond.  So when I heard that my alma mater, GWU, recently developed its own urban apiary, I couldn’t resist sharing the story.

It turns out that the new bee colony is something to be proud of.  Through a partnership with Founding Farmers, one of DC’s greenest (and tastiest) restaurants, GWU has helped establish the largest restaurant-owned urban apiary in the country.  The University’s Lisner Hall roof now hosts six beehives, and it is estimated that each hive could eventually produce between 20 and 120 pounds of honey for Founding Farmers each year.

This sweet partnership will provide GWU and Founding Farmers with more than just honey, however.  GW’s biology department will use the bee hives to research the insect’s behavior patterns, while the student selected to oversee the apiary each year will receive a generous scholarship from Founding Farmers.  For both the university and the restaurant, the partnership also presents the opportunity to further their shared goal of promoting sustainability and green living.

You can follow the story of the Founding Farmers-GWU apiary on Twitter at @FFBees, and watch the video below to learn more about this exciting project:

Cities Abuzz with Urban Beekeeping

Thank you to the hundreds of you that participated in our Bee Mine Valentine’s Day contest. The three lucky Bee Mine contest winners are Katie Taylor of the American Heart Association, Sarah Nordstrom of Novo Nordisk, and Karen Metivier-Carreiro of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. Watch their priceless reactions to the Bee’s special Valentine’s delivery in the video below:

So what does it take to get attention in today’s competitive online media landscape? Well, a life size bee certainly helps, but isn’t necessarily a requirement. We use our bee campaigns to bring attention to our model of building community both online and offline, and also to demonstrate how you can use similar tactics like online video, engagement through voting, creative media moments, and of course social media, to bring attention to your brand, cause, or issue.

It’s Not Just What Komen Did Wrong, But What Planned Parenthood Did Right:

Lessons Learned from Both Sides of the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Backlash

This blog post was originally published as a guest posting on the Salsa Labs blog.

Almost everyone in the nonprofit community is doing some level of reflection in light of the overwhelming response to Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s decision to withdraw Planned Parenthood’s eligibility for funding (which has since been reversed).   What likely occurred as a fairly straightforward, seemingly politically-covered boardroom decision is now being deemed a potentially unrecoverable failing of one the most prominent cancer fundraising organizations in the world.

Where did the Susan G. Komen Foundation go wrong?

The Boardroom Is Now Public

Organizational decision-making can no longer take place in a vacuum.  In fact, as we just learned, it won’t.  Whisperings about the true political intentions of some Komen leadership spread quickly, fueling the firestorm.  Organizations can get ahead of these types of decisions by releasing details of internal processes, which should include addressing potential dissent, in step with or before news of a major decision.

The financial eligibility restriction against those under federal investigation decision would have been an ideal discussion within the Komen blog.  The Komen community could have provided valuable feedback to Komen while giving the organization the opportunity to be the venue for, and a participant in, the dialogue.

Real-Time Communications

With social media such a well-known tool for managing media relations and crisis communications, people have become accustomed to real time responsiveness from the players in a controversy on these platforms.

While the Komen camp undoubtedly worked diligently behind the scenes on a response, their social media platforms sat silent, making way for the opposition’s campaign to surge.   Komen could have used social tools to let their loyal following know that their opinions were being heard and the decision was being reevaluated.  Instead, Komen’s silence inspired further retaliation as the online community likely interpreted this as willful ignorance.  Furthermore, impassioned anti-abortion activist messaging then became the most prevalent response.

Building Meaningful Community

The real lesson here is that building community is about more than just getting people to wear your ribbon or donate money.  It’s about building a relationship of trust and opening up channels of two-way communication about where the money is going and what causes you represent… and then standing by that commitment in both actions and words.

So what did Planned Parenthood do right?

Smart Social Media

Planned Parenthood immediately took to the web to grow support for their message.  The results proved that they already had a solid online community in place before the crisis that was ready, willing, and able to go to bat for their cause. According to The Washington Post:

Planned Parenthood blasted news releases via e-mail and Twitter and posted the information on Planned Parenthood’s Facebook wall. More than 2,000 supporters shared that post with their own friends on the social network. On Twitter, Planned Parenthood wrote ‘ALERT: Susan G. Komen caves under anti-choice pressure, ends funding for breast cancer screenings at PP health centers.’ More than 500 Twitter users reposted that message.”

Soon enough hashtags were trending on Twitter and even more of the public was taking notice, including prominent media and policy makers.  Donations to Planned Parenthood skyrocketed, and the community continued to fight on principle.

Running with a Media Moment

Planned Parenthood embraced the opportunity to bring women’s health and reproductive choice issues to the forefront.  They didn’t let perfection and ownership of the message stand in the way of “good enough” and “getting it out there.” The result?  Timely communications in an organic tone that people could relate to and easily share with their friends and families.

Support from Partners & Affiliates

There is, not surprisingly, a lot of overlap in organizational missions in the nonprofit world.  Often, organizations will band together into a coalition for a long-term fight.  But in the short term, it might be worth it to call in a favor or perhaps others will swoop in voluntarily in your time of need.  Thanks to organizations like MoveOn.org and Credo Action, Planned Parenthood’s call to action reached an exponentially larger number of activists than its base community.

Although none of us would want to be at the Monday morning meeting at Komen’s offices, we can and should do our own intake of the situation.  Many of the tools facilitating the downfall of one organization were the same tools providing opportunities to the other.  The difference is how they were used.  Most importantly, these tools give us the opportunity to get it right, even after we get it wrong.

The Beekeeper Bee had a busy day traveling all over DC to hand-deliver Valentines goodies and well-wishes to our three Bee Mine contest winners (and their appreciative office coworkers). Without further ado, they are: Katie Taylor (below, right) of the American Heart Association, Sarah Nordstrom (below, left) of Novo Nordisk, and Karen Metivier-Carreiro of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. Thank you to everyone who participated! We had a great time. Check out our Twitter and Facebook pages for photos and recaps of the visits!

Voting for the Bee Mine competition has closed and the Bee, back from Miami, has been very busy preparing to surprise his new Valentines. Attendees of the Public Affairs Council 2012 National Grassroots Conference voted in large numbers for coworkers and colleagues to receive a surprise visit from the Bee. Three lucky winners will receive quite a shock today when the Bee arrives at their office to wish them an extra happy Valentine’s Day. They’ll be greeted with an array of goodies and a very excited Valentine!

Who could these winners be??? Be sure to watch Beekeeper Group on Facebook and Twitter today for live updates, and check back here on Wednesday for a post featuring the Bee visiting each special Valentine!

Beekeeper Group was thrilled to be part of yet another first-rate Public Affairs Council Grassroots Conference last week in Miami Beach. It’s pretty tough to beat warm weather, a cool breeze, sandy beaches and of course, the top Public Affairs professionals in the country! Corporations, non-profits, trade associations and prominent vendors and consultants gathered from all over for a week of presentations, networking and professional development. Here are our top 10 highlights:

1. Congressional Management Foundation’s Bradford Fitch gave an excellent presentation on how technology is changing the way Congress works, using CMF’s Inside the Hill video series.
2. Kathryn Harbath of Facebook shared her wealth of knowledge in a presentation on creating the ideal Facebook page for advocacy. She also offered superb Facebook 101 and 202 workshops on utilizing all the grassroots tools Facebook has to offer-.
3. Our own Travis Gianchetta was part of a new panel entitled “Going Public: Identifying and Recruiting New Advocates Online.” After opening with a water mishap and a warning to future presenters on the hazards of the podium’s slanted top, Travis discussed strategy for identifying and recruiting new advocates online.
4. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce gave a comprehensive presentation on social media strategy, complete with a “PLS RT” license plate from speaker Nick Schaper. Talk about dedication!
5. Voting was very competitive for our Bee Mine contest, with participants eager for their colleagues to receive a surprise visit at the office from the Bee on Valentine’s Day (stay tuned for updates and winners).
6. The Public Affairs Council discussed the results of a new, landmark survey on public attitudes on business and government. The results demonstrated the expectations people have for companies and which lobbying techniques resonated most with the public.
7. Entergy, American Heart Association and American Motorcycle Association were this year’s recipients of Grassroots Innovation Awards.
8. Justin Beland and Yvette Williams won our honorary comedians of the conference award as they shared some hilarious hospital related humor in their presentations on grassroots advocacy at the state level.
9. Uh, did we mention the conference was in Miami?! Networking sessions held beachfront were a great way for us to enjoy the local comforts while mingling with other professionals. Can’t beat this view!
10. David Lusk of Society for Human Resource Management presented on the art of building grassroots champions to speak and lead on your behalf.

What were your favorite moments of the 2012 PAC Grassroots Conference? Share them with us in the comment section below!

Recently, I was honored to be one of just a few select women technologists invited to the White House to advise members of the Administration on how we can use technology to promote equal pay for women.  This recent meeting, along with other National Equal Pay Task Force activities, represents the President’s commitment to stop violations of equal pay laws that still occur across our country.

According to the blog post announcing the Equal Pay App Challenge authored by U.S. CTO Aneesh Chopra and Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis:

In America, women make up half of the workforce and two-thirds of our families rely on a mother’s wages for a significant portion of their income. Yet, women, on average, make less on the dollar than men, and the gap is even greater for women of color and women with disabilities.  Lower pay not only means less economic security for women, but also for the families that depend on them.

The most recent (and exciting!) outcome of these activities is the launch of the Equal Pay App Challenge, where developers can create interactive applications to educate the American public about the pay gap and help promote equal pay for men and women.  For me, this challenge represents the intersection of two of my great passions – promoting women in the workforce and using technology to solve problems!

Since the Equal Pay App Challenge is part of the Challenge.gov movement, those involved have the opportunity to win awards and scholarships through this contest, in addition to the good deed of supporting equal pay.

What are you waiting for?  It’s time to get working on your equal pay awareness app!