William Shatner calls back

Well, in fact, his associate producer (AP) calls back. Encourages me to "take a meeting" (sic.) with the producer, who will be in Boston in August.

The production company Heart Beat of America finds and promotes smaller businesses with the show Keeping America Strong. "Mr. Shatner wanted to get behind these companies because so many were hit so hard after 9/11," AP said. What I get is video and CD-ROM of the "full half hour show about your company" to use in whatever ways will build the business - web site, trade shows, copy for sales staff and distributors, mail to client prospects. Theoretically, 11 million viewers of the American Life cable network also could see the show.

"Mr. Shatner waives his six-figure fees," AP explained, "but we ask companies to share production costs in the amount of $15,000. To go into the studio yourself could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. But if I feel the company would be right for the show, I recommend they meet with the producer."

I take the meeting.

It is Balloon!

Hot air balloons descend on East Baton Rouge, Thursday morning, 8:00 a.m. It's all balloons all the time this weekend. This crew is aloft over the Mall of Louisiana near the corner of Perkins and Bluebonnet Blvd., not far from my bivouac home. Folks are a-twitter over the dozens seen so far, their size and lumbering lightness making us drive erratically and giggle like kids.

Leadership. Opportunity. Missed.

How do you get people to participate in leadership without starting the speculation engine? Two days ago an executive asked us to shift our paradigm(s). He went to the source (Thomas Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions). He asked us to take off our shoes. “How does that feel?” It’s a relief, and disconcerting, he said. True. “Try on the shoes of the person next to you.” Good exercise, poor hygiene. “Now that you see how important it is to get out of your ‘comfort zone’ and ‘think outside the box,’ divide into five groups.”

“You’re consulting teams. Find a way to do the remainder of this project better,” he said. “The most radical idea wins a prize.” All of the ideas had potential to save time, money, or work. A few were fresh approaches. We voted, which is to say, we chose the concensus option. And over lunch we asked these questions: How bad are things? Who’s responsible? Why were radical ideas discussed a year ago not on any flipchart? What’s my prize?

His good faith effort to involve the team was poorly conceived. The radical ideas were centrist. And the effect has been the spread a generalized doubt about the manner and results of our work. Regardless what comes next, that whining you hear is the high revs of people asking “What does this mean to me?”

William Shatner wants me on TV

At any rate, his associate producer called to tell me that "while I can't make any promises," she'd like to talk to me about a patriotic (?) program called Keeping America Strong, which Shatner hosts. The show profiles businesses, broadcasts and then packages the shows on video and DVD. I haven't had a chance to talk to her, but I'm accepting suggestions on how to make my business sound fascinating, growing, and spirit-of-capitalism patriotic. Maybe being bigIdea consulting and communications is the "it" of the entrepreneurial '00s.

Apparently they want Canadian companies keeping America strong, too. http://www.laurenwood.org/anyway/archives/2005/03/10/keeping-america-strong/