Happy Easter to All Our Java Pals!

From darkness, Light.  From despair, Hope.  Do the Happy Dance, because we have a new beginning!

With both its somber rituals and its light-hearted frivolities, Easter refreshes me and reminds me again of my "life raft" scripture:

"For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." (Jeremiah 29:11)

Rejoice!

Huzzah! Gitanajava's New Bizcard ;-)

Our thanks to the fab folks at Moo.com (Twitter = @OverheardAtMoo) and the rocketeers at SlideRocket for their generous creativity, assistance, and all-around brilliance.

We'd love for you to share our business card with an emerging or established entrepreneur you know.  You can do it from the options below or from here.  Plus, your comments are welcome, so leave us a note ;-)

Full Speed Ahead - It's a Whole New Year!

Right now, you're either welcoming the new year with a fresh heart and clear head, you're feeling a bit fuzzy around the edges after a night of festivities, or during the first few wobbly days you'll need a gentle reminder that it is a new year.  We can help...

A Brief Tribute to Ambrose Thomas...

Last night, the courageous heart of our good friend, client, and business partner, Ambrose Thomas, owner of Gentle Bloke & co-founder of Carli Trading Group, gave out.

Only 26, Ambrose had survived Sierra Leone's civil war and much more.  He overcame Hodgkins Lymphoma, then created a line of skin products to help other cancer patients.  He and two business partners founded Carli Trading Group to shape a brighter future for his former homeland, Sierra Leone.

By some yardsticks, Ambrose had a short life, but he lived it with intensity, generosity and productivity.  A portion of Gentle Bloke's proceeds were donated to Operation Homefront, an organisation which had made it possible for his brother Joseph, serving overseas in the U.S. military, to come back to the states for a bone marrow transfusion critical to Ambrose's recovery.  A graduate of Texas A & M's Masters in Public Health program, Ambrose had been invited to the White House, and had recently learned he was accepted to Harvard to do his Ph.D. in Public Health.

Ambrose's brilliance and drive could occasionally swamp your boat.  His joie d'vivre, his wide-open smile, and his buoyant can-do attitude persuaded both competitors and colleagues. His mountain-top leaps from one idea to another meant you dare not doze off or let your mind wander.  But, if you challenged him, he listened.  Ambrose was the embodiment of Gitanajava Productions' company catchphrase, Get Javanated! -- he lived boldly and joyfully.  The occasional frustration or disappointment, in his hands, was transformed into finding a jet-fueled solution.

We are better for having known you, Ambrose. Your dazzling energy, your smile, your intensity, and your courage will live on in our hearts and minds.  We will work to fulfill your vision.

Caveat Venditor, Starbucks...

This cartoon is by the ever-brilliant Mick Stevens, New Yorker magazine
Buy the framed print at http://www.condenaststore.com/-sp/Braithwaite-Starbucks-How-may-we-help-you-New-Yorker-Cartoon-Prints_i8543850_.htm

"What Starbucks has created around coffee is

an extension of the front porch.

If you look at the UK, the English pub is an extension of

people's homes but for a different beverage.

Our stores have become a gathering and meeting place

in addition to the coffee."

~Howard Schultz, Chairman/CEO Starbucks

After several weeks of finding local store and office personnel unresponsive to issues regarding faulty Wi-Fi and an approaching remodel of the store, a group of us who are regulars at Starbucks Location X decided to "bump the thread".  We met, listed our specific concerns, and Gitanajava Productions drafted the following letter, written to Starbucks via their website.  We posted our letter the evening of Friday, 6th April 2012.  Now, we're waiting to see what, if any, response we'll get from Starbucks.

Buckle your seatbelts, here we go...

Make Yourself Merry!

I was looking for something evergreen, but phresh, to kick off my Christmas.  Thanks to friends at Google-Plus, I found just what I wanted, Sean Quigley's Little Drummer Boy.

You'll like this video so much, you'll want to own a copy -- buy Sean's work at www.cdbaby.com/seanquigley.  Follow him at Twitter, too -- @SeanQuigley204.  This guy is good.

The Coffeehouse Blues

Gitanajava = Gypsy Loves Coffee

(The original Rajah Coffee label was designed by Henri Meunier, 1897,

find it at http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rajah-coffee-ad-1897-henri-meunier.jpg)

(This post was originally written, published, and distributed under the title The Coffee Canticle in December 2008.  Although the coffeehouse in question has long since passed on to the celestial heights, the thoughts and sentiments about what remain the same.)


Starbucks #6262, alias Lower Greenville Starbucks, officially closed 2 PM, Friday 19th December 2008.  Even before the farewell party ended at 6 PM, the guerrillas from Starbucks HQ arrived.  While the corpus delicti was still warm, they began taping sheets of brown butcher paper across the windows:  pulling the shroud tight.


When is a cup of coffee more than a cup of coffee?  What recombinant DNA transforms a mere java joint into a legend?

Buried Treasure, Part 2

5 Steps to Creating a LinkedIn Recommendation
To view full sized, go to http://tiny.cc/Endorse

In the original Buried Treasure article, we discussed the professionals' methods for requesting, shaping, and leveraging effective recommendations from colleagues and clients.  However, in my perfect world, I would have preceded that instruction with tonight's post and asked this crucial question --

Un-occupy Gmail, Part 2

Since noting our strong objections to Google/Gmail's latest shenanigans in yesterday's post, Un-occupy Gmail, we're discovering other voices critical of their heavy-handed redesign.


Scott Wilson sees the Google/Gmail re-design rationale "shaping up to be an unmitigated disaster".

Un-occupy Gmail

If Necessity is the Mother of Invention, Who's Baby's Daddy?

Why We Won't Switch Voluntarily to the New Gmail UI

Over the past week or so, we've read all the blogs, news, and comments about the roll-out of Gmail's new look.  In the pursuit of truth, justice, and leaping tall buildings in a single bound, we even tolerated a couple of videos, and this is what it comes to:  until the G-men force us to change to the new look, we'll skip it.  It can roll right past us, thank you.

First, the "new and improved" Gmail UI is rife with advertising distractions.  The subtle "oh, by the way" is bye-bye.

Mercenary vs. Missionary....

Don Quixote's Windmill Adventure, by Dominica Alcantara
Find it at Fine Art America

On a Quest or For Sale?


A recent New York Times article recaps the failings of Netflix and CEO Hastings during the hasty and ill-considered move -- now aborted -- to divide the company and its customers into two camps with the creation of Qwikster.  How Netflix Lost 800,000 Customers and Goodwill, does more though, perhaps unintentionally:  it brings to light an interesting phrase delineating two principal entrepreneurial styles, the Missionary versus the Mercenary.

Forgotten Heroes, Abandoned Children, Devalued Seniors

1 of 5 prototypes for Stony Mountain Ranch logo & bizcards.
See them all at http://tiny.cc/STONY

The Challenge

What do the following people have in common?

• Aged-out foster children
• Military veterans returning to civilian life
• Devalued seniors

Happy All Hallow's Eve, Everyone!

To see original image & download as your holiday wallpaper, go to
http://tiny.cc/Spoooky

See you on the patio - boo!

In Pursuit of Defining Yourself...

Senorita La Tinta, a/k/a Miss Inky, taking her photo opp

I was not looking for anything remotely like Ken Robert's essay when I stumbled across it in one of those blessed web serendipity moments.  La, la, la, la-lah, I was skipping along the 'net path, gathering posies, en route to some somber research for a client.

For we RPISH* entrepreneurs and contrarian thinkers wrestling the challenges inherent to re-structuring ourselves and our work, the scant few minutes it will take to read "We’re So Ashamed of Changing (This Is Why We’re Crazy)" at Ken Robert's blog, Mildly Creative, will be minutes well spent In Pursuit of Defining Yourself.

While you're there, check out KR's self-description, too.  If Ken's blog is food for thought, his About page is the whipped cream and cherry on top.  Read and ponder, Unicorns, read and ponder!

Appearing Soon at a Theatre Near You

In a day or two, in consideration of that whole re-structuring topic, we will return with some ponders.  Stay tuned!


*RPISH = Round Peg In A Square Hole

See you on the patio!

Buried Treasure

Not long ago, I wrote a colleague, the former chief exec of a client organisation, asking for his recommendation.  We have a sound, genial professional and personal relationship, and we have communicated regularly by phone and email since parting ways a few months ago.  Although we didn't get the happy ending we strove for throughout our last adventure, I was proud of the exceptional effort and dedication we had given.

I'd spent four years nurturing the growth of his organisation, first on a pro bono basis, and when the small but feisty nonprofit hit a sizable financial and regulatory speed bump in late 2009 and the crisis took on life-or-death dimensions in early 2010, I stepped in as full-time formal consultant to him and the wounded organisation.  I liked these people, I liked their organisation, and I wanted success for them.

Don't Be Afraid of the Kid in You!

I don't care what anybody says, I like the Teletubbies.  I also dig Schnuffelbunny.  I'm a happy subscriber of Peter Rabbit and the rest of his posse, Jemima Puddle-Duck, Squirrel Nutkin, and Hunca Munca.

I've never needed an excuse to enjoy a retreat to childhood joys and fantasies -- when I was up to my eyeballs in the nightclub business and then later, music management, marketing and distribution, it was a welcome relief to arrive home in the pre-dawn hours, just in time for the local broadcast of Teletubbies.  Just the same, I'd like to thank my niece and nephew in Germany for sharing the welcome news of their soon-to-come baby.  If I need it, I have a cover story for why I'm singing the Schnuffelbunny song.

When you find yourself mired in cynicsm and the weariness of grown-up responsibilities, sing the Schnuffelbunny song to yourself, my friend.  It'll do you good.

See you on the patio!

Lotsa Communicating, But Less Connecting?

This image courtesy of Steve Kryger, CommunicateJesus.com

During the Get Javanated! workshops I conduct for entrepreneurs' groups, I use a chart not dissimilar from this one discussed a year or so ago at Steve Kryger's church marketing blog, Communicate Jesus.  Customised to the special needs and challenges of each audience, I also include an additional building block:  blogs.


The best blogs can be superior  communication tools, with a level of intimacy and authenticity varying by how well the blogger at the hub performs his/her role as presenter and moderator.  Readers' comments and interchanges with the blog author and one another act as the sine qua non of how successfully this momentary intimacy is consummated.

To extend your thoughts re people feeling more lonely than ever despite today's Social Media Wonder Tools, consider what Wayne Cordeiro, senior pastor of New Hope Church, Oahu says in a talk entitled "People Hiding in Plain Sight" (the vidcast version at  http://www.enewhope.org/videob... shows the title as "Hidden in Plain Sight").

In a pair of sermons on Social Networking delivered 11th April 2010 (BFF - Best Friends Forever, Pastor Elwin Ahu) and 18th April (Hidden..., Cordeiro), Cordeiro and Ahu re-define and most importantly, re-direct, listeners' attention to the fact that digital communications -- Facebook, Twitter, texting, et al. -- are most successful when --

• (A) we remember the tools are meant to serve us and our needs for friendship and community (fellowship), and
• (B) we use these tools with forethought and intentionality.

"In this socially connected world, *people* are still not connected....In this world of social connectedness, it [social media] can never become a substitute for F2F, face to face....I want to challenge you today, when you see this social networking increase...use it to motivate yourself to go face-to-face with people."

New Hope's well-designed website contains a wide array of digital media -- livecasts with a chat room enabling viewers to ask questions and offer comments; downloadable vidcasts, podcasts, sermon notes, and newsletter; a journalling process for personal faith-building and to share as devotionals through "Doing Life Together"; a "prayer wall"; and "iNeed", their own online classified ads (imagine a scrupulously cleaned-up Craigslist!) -- plus, thoughtfully deployed social networking, New Hope Oahu could be held up as a model for the faith community of a church who have adapted well to modern realities. But, as Cordeiro and the pastoral staff consistently point out, the tools and toys would be hollow and meaningless without "'ohana".

In Hawaiʻi, 'ohana is family - extended, adopted, blood relatives, or anyone sharing fellowship in Christ with one another for an hour, a day, or a lifetime.  And when you have 'ohana, there are connections, face-to-face and heart-to-heart.  The Social Media Wonder Tools are there to serve the spirit of 'ohana by building and connecting the New Hope family.


When you and I review our own whiz-bang technomarvelous tools, let's do a reality check:  what spirit are we building?  Are we deepening and strengthening our connections or are we just beating our drums louder and longer?


Just asking....

See you on the patio! 

Simplicity, Simplify: A Marketing Lesson from the Toybox

 Simplicity, Simplify

A few years into my brilliant marketing career, I learned an important lesson, albeit from an unexpected source.  A six year-old boy taught me how too many choices and too little opportunity to filter one's options can overwhelm and even disable the buying decision.

Kahve: The Joys of Java

"Ca Phe Sua Da" on the verandah

Vintage Coffee Packet Label

The Coffee Tribe

Once upon a time in the U.S., a "good cup of coffee" had less to do with the coffee's roast, grind, brew or flavour, and everything to do with the beverage being hot, plentiful, and cheap. 

Big Biz on a Bev-nap...

Business negotiations are happening around us all the time, often when we're least aware of them.

A naive entrepreneur or wet-behind-the-ears business person might expect Big Deals to happen in elegant board rooms over glossy conference tables or over five-star dinners in exclusive restaurants.  They might wrap up there, they may be feted there, but Big Deals begin in discreet places  -- on the patio of the local coffee house or during happy hour at the inauspicious hotel around the corner, over a greasy breakfast at the truckstop diner or while leaning against the car boot, at the ninth tee or between rounds at the dart tournament.

Depending on the deal and the deal-makers, the more's at stake, the lower a profile is wanted for those "agreements in principle".  Many the bargain has been struck during a smoke break in the parking garage.