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Eliminate the Online Distractions in Your Life

Posted on May 12, 2015 // Leave a Comment

Someone or something online bothering you? Eliminate it. Slice it out of your life with no remorse. Take a walk, breathe fresh air, and return to doing YOUR work. We all have a shortage of time – never enough time to get it all done.

Ignore meaningless external stimuli, as there is clearly no shortage of that.

To the very best of your ability, circumstances willing, focus on your work, and toil diligently to shut out the trash talk, the insults, THE COMMENTS SECTION! None of that helps you achieve anything except feeling like crap.

And in the irony of all ironies, I invite you to DISCUSS IT HERE ON FACEBOOK.

Filed Under: Business Performance // Tagged: , , , ,

Two Quotes I Live By

Posted on February 9, 2015 // 3 Comments

I once did a monstrous blog post entitled “The 50 Tweets That Businesses Should Be Doing.” It was my far-reaching attempt to coax clients (and you) onto Twitter. “We don’t have anything to tweet about,” I’d often hear. Nonsense. You have much to discuss; it’s just that some of it doesn’t have anything directly to do with selling stuff. I followed that post up with one entitled, “10 Tweets To Leave on the Cutting Room Floor,” or something like that.

One of the tweets I advised you to cut from your tweeting repertoire was offering the quotes of famous people. To me, they just seemed empty and pointless. Now, I just wrote a book that, like many books, offers inspirational quotes at the beginning of each section. So basically I’m a total hypocrite. Or perhaps, I learned from my mistakes.

Recently I was emailing my friend Joshua Arnao some advice, and he asked me, “What are one or two quotes that inspire you?” In an attempt to answer his question, I came up with what you see below. The first quote is from me (I’m not famous!) and the second is from Maya Angelou. Let me be clear on this first quote: no, I do not inspire myself! Rather, I just want you to know that this is one of the prisms through which I view life. And of course, the Maya Angelou quote is actually a “famous quote,” and she did inspire me during her lifetime (and still does).

Let me know what you think down in the comments (if people still do that).

1. “The literal ability to perform an action and the advisability of doing so are two very separate things.” ~Chris Reimer

Here’s what this means to me: To a varying degree, we are all given power in our lives. Power at home, power at our jobs, power to shape the lives of others. We have the green light to fire someone if they break rule XYZ. It’s in the Employee Handbook. However, the green light does not always have to mean “Go!” For instance, decisions made while angry have an above-average chance of being short-sighted, damaging – what you’d call “wrong.” As I allude to in my book, in life there are the blacks and the whites – the extremes – and then there’s a very deep pool of grays, and that’s where most of the swimming in life is done. So get to know that deep water. Understand it and the other people swimming in it. This is important! I like to live my life in a results-based way – what am I trying to accomplish? – versus following every single rule to the letter. You do not merely possess the power of “do.” Don’t look at it that way. You have the power of “choice.” The choices you have been entrusted to make are not preordained “correct” simply because you are The Big Cheese.

2. “People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But people will never forget how you made them feel.” ~Maya Angelou

I quote this in my book. It means the world to me. Achievements aside, what’s really left at the end of the day, and at the end of our lives, is how we feel. Hopefully we feel accomplishment, and hopefully we feel good about ourselves and the world around us. It’s hard work to do right by people! Don’t kid yourself. And we too often ignore the people in our lives and what they’re going through. We should not ignore each other’s struggles any longer. Our work lives depend on it, not to mention our overall health. The world needs more empathy, and I think Ms. Angelou provided us a strong, crystal-clear reminder of the importance of treating each other with love and respect.

Filed Under: Business Performance, Doing What Is Right // Tagged: , , , ,

R.I.P. Rizzo Tees (2008 – 2014)

Posted on October 30, 2014 // 5 Comments

I Hate Pants Forever

Hi everyone. This is going to be a weird blog post, perhaps too little too late, but I’ll do my best to make it interesting, understandable, and fun.

Today, October 30, 2014, on the 6th anniversary of the birth of Rizzo Tees, I announce its death. Happy 6th birthday, old friend, and I hope you don’t mind being shut down! Today is your official last day.

This is not meant to be dramatic, and at this point, how could it be? To anyone observing, it has been readily apparent for at least two years that the business was no longer getting my attention. I haven’t debuted a new tee design in years. There are probably some steps I should have taken earlier to make something great happen with the business – either ramp it up, or sell it. I got so busy with transitioning to a new career, with trying to learn to be a great ad agency salesman, with trying to write a book, with finding a publisher, with actually writing a book, and now with trying to sell a book … there was no time for Rizzo Tees.

And really no desire either. For the first few years, I loved concepting tee designs, working with amazing tee designers to bring them to life, and I loved debuting the designs. Some sold amazingly well. Some barely sold. I quickly learned what success and failure felt like. But that list of stuff I mentioned in the last paragraph – especially the book – captured my imagination and didn’t let go.

I’ve had several people ask me if I wanted to sell Rizzo Tees. I don’t know … whatchoo got? I sheepishly told several interested parties that I don’t even have time to sell it right now. All of my energy is going into my current job, and my book marketing efforts. I have no cranial capacity to think about selling the business. I don’t feel like dickering over price, and don’t want to be told it’s not worth what I think it is, or whatever.

Anyway, the death of this business is OK with me. Even with a mixed record, I can say I accomplished everything I wanted to with it. I learned so much, met all of you, and left my old CPA career. Knowing that a career change was the goal from day one, I say “Mission Accomplished.” For any of you who have known me since 2007-2008, you know that’s what I wanted to see happen. I even made this video outlining my dream of leaving accounting by July 1, 2011. I beat that date big time, and I’m proud of that.

And now a new mission has begun. This book of mine, Happywork, seems infinitely more important than the tee biz ever did. I know that’s not true, that my feelings are being temporally affected. But yes, let’s just run with it – the message of this book is important to me now, and now is now, so it’s the most important thing going on in my life. I think my message of happiness at work is going to be my number one priority for years to come. We’ll see where life takes me.

Gary Vaynerchuk Props to my TweepsEpic Meal Time

To all the people who bought shirts, especially the bacon ones – after all, I was once known as the Baron of Bacon (TY Shelley Niemeier for that moniker) – THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart. It was a joy to make you fun shirts. It was a thrill to see the Epic Meal Time guys and Gary Vaynerchuk wear them in their videos. Mostly, it was just fun making things. There is glory in making stuff (and I draw a direct distinction between this and being a “social media guru”). When I talk to my two young daughters about their future, I tell them to never shy away from making things. Making food (chef), making living spaces (interior designer), making coffee (barista), making art (artist), making clothing (fashion designer), making buildings (architect), or making stories (author). Whatever you do, I tell them, please make something for the world. I’m happy that I did that with Rizzo Tees, and I think the greatest chapter to come will be written by my first and hopefully not last book.

Thank you everyone for being a friend of mine. In 2015 and beyond, let’s make great things happen.

 

SUPER-AWESOME POSTSCRIPT

This sort of thing makes it fun to be in business. I mean, how cool is this?

Filed Under: Business Performance, Doing What Is Right, Marketing, Uncategorized // Tagged: , , , , , ,

The Price of Soda at Work – A Discussion with Mark Reardon of KMOX Radio

Posted on October 30, 2013 // Leave a Comment

Through the haze of Obamacare website snafus, government shutdowns, gun control and all of the other sticky issues of our day, only one topic is worthy of serious discussion and consideration here on my blog: what should a can of soda from the work soda machine cost?

Don’t laugh! There’s simply no way a can of soda at work should cost 85 cents. It’s too expensive, but this was the price we were paying at Falk Harrison until the owner of the machine pulled it from the premises and explained he was not making any money.

For some additional backstory on why this issue merited discussion on the radio (something I’m still not sure of), take a listen to my appearance on Mark Reardon‘s show on KMOX.

Listen by clicking here

If by chance the link above isn’t working, proceed to this page and listen to the last sound file on the page.

Filed Under: Business Performance, Humor and Silliness, TV or Radio Appearance // Tagged: , , , ,

What’s Your Personal Positioning Statement?

Posted on October 17, 2013 // 3 Comments

I’ve been giving thought to the notion that I do too much. I have Rizzo Tees. I speak. I consult. I sometimes give free advice. I volunteer. I work at Falk Harrison. I have clients. Sometimes, I find it hard to describe myself.

So I decided to try to distill it all down into a single sentence. Well, two sentences – one for work, and one for my personal brand. It may be a mistake to have two, but I have personal interests as well as a job. This is my first crack at writing a personal positioning statement:

WORK: I help organizations tell their story both online and off.

PERSONAL BRAND: My mission is to help people see the world from other people’s point of view.

What’s your 10 second elevator speech?

Filed Under: Business Performance, Social Media // Tagged: , ,

Books I’m Recommending Tomorrow at My United Way Seminar

Posted on July 25, 2013 // Leave a Comment

Chris Reimer book recommendations

Tomorrow I’m conducting a social media seminar and Q&A at the United Way of Greater St. Louis. Attendees from United Way-funded organizations will hear me speak about social media, and then will fire several hours of questions at me.

One thing I’ll be recommending off the bat is self-education. When working to understand social media, I have found that practice does make perfect. One hundred and ten thousand tweets later, I do have experience I didn’t before have. However, backing up one step, I’ll want the attendees to be in the right mindset before using social media to say what they have to say.

The books above will be getting a shout out, and I do hope the attendees give these works a chance. I’ve learned so much by taking to heart the messages these authors offered to the world.

Filed Under: Business Performance, Doing What Is Right, Marketing, Social Media // Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Defining Success Podcast With Zeb Welborn

Posted on May 7, 2013 // 2 Comments

I recently appeared on Zeb Welborn’s podcast “Defining Success.” We talked for about 40 minutes, covering entrepreneurship, networking and social media. Thank you Zeb for the invitation, and I hope to return when my book debuts.

HAVE A LISTEN BY CLICKING HERE

Filed Under: Business Performance, Social Media, TV or Radio Appearance // Tagged: , , , , , ,

Focus on the Customer, Not the KPI

Posted on April 22, 2013 // 2 Comments

Should a business focus on its customers, or the ROI of the strategies it implements and the KPIs their employees are responsible for monitoring and exceeding? I’m sure this is overly simplistic, and perhaps these need not be mutually exclusive, but I gravitate towards the former. An obsessive focus on those you serve often results in delighted customers, positive word of mouth (still the most powerful form of advertising), and bottom line results.

I was reading this short post about Apple, and found a passage that resonated with me and aligned well with my work past.

Focusing on the customer/consumer resolves all the horrid debates people from different departments have, especially when the people around the table have to meet their own individual KPIs, quarterly results, or agendas etc. If not properly managed, these debates often result in compromises in strategy and watered down solutions.

That says it all for me. When departments fight over territory and compromise so it’s a win-win for everyone, that often results in a vanilla solution. Which is totally awesome if your company makes vanilla! Not so good otherwise.

You can’t give away the farm, but taking really good care of your customers should trump the findings of a committee. If I go over and above for a customer and therefore blow a KPI because I spent too much time with said customer, I believe I’m measuring the wrong things. Data is great and more power to you if you want to measure everything, but I’m just not wired that way. Delighting one’s customers is still the most important strategy in my tool kit (yes, way more so than social media).

Filed Under: Business Performance, Social Media // Tagged: , , , ,