Open up your mind and say, ahh...

The other day, walking through Grand Central, I bumped into a friend, here on vacation with his fiancee.

I got to thinking about why New York City attracts so many tourists, more than just about any city in the world. Not because of natural wonders or even outdoor sports activities. It might be because:

• It’s different here (as in not the same)
• You can find someone to have an argument with, about just about anything
• There are fringes–cultural, educational, architectural, societal
• More than 42 languages are spoken at the Queens public library
• You can get something that’s not the regular kind
• There are profit-seekers who will happily sell you something, anything
• There are many who do things for no profit at all and will eagerly entertain, entrance and change you for the better
• You will find a diversity of religious belief like no other
• It’s changing
• The food hasn’t been entirely homogenized
• People are active
• A stranger will go out of his way for you, perhaps, and more often than you expect
• There is more information per minute, per meter and per interaction
• Neighborhoods are more important than homogeneity, and co-existing is most important

The thing is, here can be anywhere. There are New Yorks going on in towns large and small, in companies big and tiny and in families that support and respect at the same time they embrace and encourage difference.

I remember ten years ago like it was yesterday, looking out the window of my office and wondering if it (all of it) was over. I remember those that suffered and were lost, and those brave enough to risk everything. Not sure we’ll ever forget, or if we should.

But now more than ever, I believe we have an obligation to stand up, stand out and to do work that matters. Wherever you are, there’s an opportunity to be different, with respect.

Carole Mallory was Norman Mailer’s mistress. Seducing him probably wasn’t that difficult, though, as he was already on his sixth wife at the time.

Marketers seek to seduce. So do painters, authors and job seekers. The most important thing to understand about seduction is this: it only works when the other person cooperates, contributes and is at some level interested in being seduced.

In short: it’s a lot easier to seduce someone who’s worldview and attitude makes them open to it. If you want to be successful at whatever form of seduction you have in mind, seek out the right people.

Some people were seduced by the iPad. Many ignored it. It wasn’t that the iPad changed from person to person, what changed was the audience’s worldview and openness.

And yet…

And yet as marketers we seem to want to treat everyone the same, want to please everyone, want to come up with the magic words that open every heart.

An idea turns into a meeting and then it turns into a project. People get brought along, there’s free donuts, there’s a whiteboard and even a conference call.

It feels like you’re doing the work, but at some point, hopefully, someone asks, “what’s the point of this?”

Is it worth doing?

Compared to everything else we could be investing (don’t say ‘spending’) our time on, is this the scariest, most likely to pay off, most important or the best long-term endeavor?

Or are we just doing it because no one had the guts along the way to say STOP.

Are you doing work worth doing, or are you just doing your job?