Call for Pecha Kucha Presentations to CI Division Open House at SLA 2011 in Philadelphia - June 13th

[Arik Johnson]

I am proud to announce Aurora WDC will sponsor the SLA CI Division Open House at the 2011 Annual Conference & INFO-EXPO in Philadelphia, scheduled for the evening of Monday, June 13th, 2011 from 5:30 to 7:30 PM.

 

The most exciting part of the news is this year's CID Open House will feature the first annual Future Ready Pro/Am Pecha Kucha Tournament, echoing the "Future Ready" theme of the overall conference, where six (6) presenters (3 pros plus 3 amateurs) will be chosen to address the question:

How can we apply Competitive Intelligence to equip ourselves, our organizations, and our clients to confront the challenges of an uncertain future?

I am sure you all have a lot to offer in response to a question like that and, if you're thinking of attending SLA 2011, we encourage you to propose how you would address this timeless issue. The deadline for selection is April 29th, so you only have two weeks to submit your idea, story, method or lesson proposal.

 

What's in it for you, you ask?

 

In addition to all the fun, fellowship, lessons to be learned, drinks, snacks and sheer challenge of telling your story in 6:40, Aurora's also giving away an iPad 2 to the presenter deemed "best in show" by our panel of judges.

 

 

 

Even if you don't win, you'll still receive a small library of CI analysis-related books handpicked by special guest and Master of Ceremonies, world-reknowned competitive intelligence educator, author, researcher and luminary, Dr. Craig S. Fleisher.

The event is open to anyone and everyone with an interest in CI, SLA members and non-members alike (though you'll need to buy a ticket into the SLA conference).

 

What precisely is a Pecha Kucha, you ask?

 

Pecha Kucha (or PK) is an innovative presentation technique designed to overcome the age-old and much maligned problem of "Death by PowerPoint" which plagues meetings everywhere. Each PK presenter is allowed only 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide to present their ideas on the topic theme of the evening. That's right! If you can tell the story of how CI makes you and your organization or client future-ready in six minutes and forty seconds, then we want you! Here's an example by Mark Dytham, an architect living in Japan and one of the inventors of the PK method:

There are two ways to submit your proposal - via Email or on Twitter.

 

Just email your name and PK idea to Chad Groenhout ([e-mail]) along with your PK title and rationale for why the audience would find the topic compelling in answering the question of how CI helps organizations become more "Future Ready".

 

If you'd like to demonstrate your concise insights in public, do the same on Twitter after mentioning @slacid ... or, if you're even more brave, you can reply here to this discussion and show the world how innovative your topic is going to be (I'll make sure it gets into the proper hands). We'll be group-voting on Google Moderator for all of the topics submitted to finalize the Final Six who will be invited to present in June.

 

The PK tournament begins at 5:30 PM and will be spaced out through the close of the Open House at 7:30 PM the evening of Monday 13 June 2011. I'll be there in person myself and will be honored to introduce you around to everybody from SLA's CI Division community, as well as special guests, like SLA President, Cindy Romaine, who will be one of our judges.

 

Thanks in advance for your consideration - I'm looking forward, hopefully, to seeing some of you in Philly this June and to a lively exchange of how CI can make us all Future Ready!

 

- Arik

[Arik Johnson]

Oh, and, in case you'd like to contribute with a blog post on Future Ready 365, the SLA group blogging project on the subject, April 11th marked the 101st post. I've posted there myself earlier this year.

Commemorating this milestone, there was a special post from the SLA 2011 keynote speaker, James Kane, a leading consultant and author on loyalty and relationship building. He is working with SLA on a project to build a stronger, richer sense of community within SLA's chapters and divisions. In his post, James tells an interesting story and offers a provocative perspective from which to think about satisfying industry demand. Here's some info on the success of the FR365 project from SLA directly:

"Traffic reports for March are in, and the FR365 blog has had over 1,000,000 hits to date! Thanks to all who’ve contributed posts. They’ve come together to form a valuable source of insight for the SLA community – a true resource that continues to grow. Be sure to stay tuned-in to the blog moving forward, catch up on posts you’ve missed, and weigh-in with your perspective to http://futureready365.sla.org if you haven’t already."

[Jill Heinze]

I'm not sure that I'm particularly brave, but I'm happy to get the ball rolling for what promises to be a fun event. My proposed topic is: Info pros apply CI to help their clients frame the right pictures. By this, I mean that the competitive landscape is a jumble of facts, rumors, and data points that have no real meaning until someone asks the right questions to create a framework that makes the information manageable and actionable.

 

Thanks!

 

Jill Stover Heinze

[Arik Johnson]

Sounds really compelling Jill - I forward to Chad to get it into the Google Moderator list for voting - I'll post that link back here again in a couple days.

[August Jackson]

My PK proposal: Developing a social media persona that strikes the right balance between personal and professional.

In the past month I've delivered two presentations that touched on social media to two audiences of CI and information professionals. Each presentation went down a DEEEEEEEEEEEEEP but worthwhile rathole on this very topic. In both instances the audiences draged me there-- it wasn't on my agenda. It's clear that this is top of many people's minds.

[Arik Johnson]

Excellent! Thank you August!