The Road to UNBOUND - Two Weeks Out: An Orange Suit, an Inflatable Alien, and What a Personal Brand Actually Is
4 clips from this stop, with Klemen Hrovat, Chris Carolan, Rob Jones, George B. Thomas, Kyle Jepson. Copy the caption, download the video, post it wherever you like. No dates, no order, nothing to edit.
I took a pause, as Europeans usually do
The Road to UNBOUND - Two Weeks Out: An Orange Suit, an Inflatable Alien, and What a Personal Brand Actually Is
Session reservations opened, and I took a pause when the option to register appeared, as Europeans usually do. So when I was up and running in the evening, everything worked. There were no crashes. I only needed a few minutes to get to the sessions. Everything worked pretty nicely. So all good on my side.
The alien has clearance
The Road to UNBOUND - Two Weeks Out: An Orange Suit, an Inflatable Alien, and What a Personal Brand Actually Is
I ran a survey on LinkedIn: should I take the alien to UNBOUND or not? I expected different responses. There was one who kind of said no, but all other said yes. So I need to double check my batteries are full so my alien will be bloated for three days. The only thing I haven't checked yet is with the organization group, if security will pass me through with the alien. Last year I got the email confirmation that I can. I just am not allowed to have the alien when I go through the security, but the minute when I enter the venue, I can put it on. So I'll probably have the same screenshot from last year, in case someone asks me why am I wearing that alien.
I really felt silly having the alien
The Road to UNBOUND - Two Weeks Out: An Orange Suit, an Inflatable Alien, and What a Personal Brand Actually Is
If you're comfortable, you will be you in much easier way. And you will be able to just connect with people instead of try to be something that you don't want to be. My first INBOUND, when I started having the alien, I really felt silly having the alien. How will people treat me, as a silly guy? But then people started stopping by and just saying hi. And we had human-to-human interaction. Now even when I wear a shirt on a Zoom call with my alien in the background, the first two minutes enterprise clients ask, what's that? And I explain the story and they all laugh. And you have a human-to-human connection. Then we start a serious discussion. So now it feels natural to me. Like if you don't feel comfortable in a suit, don't wear a suit, period.
Fifteen hours of recordings, and no idea who said what
The Road to UNBOUND - Two Weeks Out: An Orange Suit, an Inflatable Alien, and What a Personal Brand Actually Is
I did an experiment last year which turned out to be a disaster. I was recording the full day. When I entered the hall, I turned on my mic, and when I went out of it, I turned it off. So I recorded every chat in a hall, every session. The challenge I had after three days, which means fifteen or whatever hours of recordings, I had zero chance of figuring out who said what. What was a presentation? What was a random chat in a hall? Who is who? So I need to do a better job this year. I plan to record everything in an ideally more structured way, and AI is now better, so AI should help me do a better job with processing that.