The 5th Gear: Marketing, PR, and Ideas for 11/25/13

One of SHIFT’s 7 core values are connected which means much more than just having a full Address Book app on your phone. Connected means knowing what’s going on, knowing what’s worth reading and sharing. Here are the top 5 most interesting reads that SHIFTers found this past week. Let us know what you think in the comments!

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Fast Company, Get Busy: Pharrell’s Productivity Secrets

Senior Account Manager Katie Clark-AlSadder on why this matters:

I’ve long admired Pharrell, who has followed his music talent and business savvy to build, as Mary Kaye Schilling puts in this inspiring Fast Company Work Smart profile, “a hive of creativity that is also profitable, with a heavy dose of altruism.” Some of the takeaways for me as both a team leader and a creative professional are:

*Curb the urge to speak to be heard, or as he puts it, “Sometimes you just gotta put your pride aside and be quiet so that you can absorb not only what a person is saying but how they are saying it–their energy, their body language. It’s all for a reason.”

*Empowering your team, in addition to being the right thing to do for them, means less stress for you, which helps unfog your mind for max productivity.

*Give yourself the freedom to zone in, to obsess – don’t submit to the siren song of multitasking.

And, one point of criticism lobbied at him I can personally refute – this is not a man all about the private jets. My favorite airline run-in was Pharrell and his entourage at JFK flying commercial just like the rest of us. Fair enough, the rest of us weren’t wearing camo Ray bans and Louis Vuitton backpacks, but still…

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Mentally Strong People: The 13 Things They Avoid

Account Executive Sarah McDonough on why this matters:

It’s an interesting list of “don’t-dos” practiced by people who are dubbed “mentally strong” – something I definitely aspire to be.

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This Twitter Account Will Bring You Back to the Day JFK Was Shot

Senior Account Executive Paulina Bucko on why this matters:

The 50^th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination was all over the news this week. NPR did something creative by “live tweeting” during the day as many news outlets and reporters do. What a creative way of connecting history with technology.

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ATL24

Media Relations Manager Matt Nagel on why this matters:

CNN.com produced what it’s calling a “longform project” titled ATL24, which examines a 24-hour period at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. The project combined the efforts of three dozen journalists. It’s a stunning piece of interactive media that frames the airport as a “city within a city” through video interviews, photography and written word. CNN TV also plans to air segments of ATL24 up to the Thanksgiving holiday.

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Still on Facebook, but Finding Less to Like

Snap Out of It: Kids Aren’t Reliable Tech Predictors

Vice President Karl Scholz on why this matters:

I found these two perspectives on Facebook’s future fascinating. The New York Times and Wall Street Journal draw starkly different conclusions. What do you think? If you agree with Hegel, then perhaps the answer lies somewhere in between.

Chel Wolverton
Senior Marketing Analyst

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