My last day…

Tomorrow is my last day as an Intel employee. Sad? A little.

Excited for what’s next: DEFINITELY!!!

While I’m a bit schmultzy, I’m generally more into what’s next. (When I was little for instance, I would excitedly tell my mom that “next year I’ll be 10!” And she’d tell me…”but you’re not even nine yet.” Which was true, but I was right too…..there’s a part of the year when next year you’ll be two numbers older than you currently are.) I’m rambling…but this just to say that I was always, or rather, always wanted to be ahead of myself.

I have, in the past two years at Intel, been frustrated by many things. I ranted about our ridiculous corporate vocab, excessively text-heavy boring-ass PowerPoint presentations, and our often incommunicado executives. BUT…then I’d go to conferences, talk with other communicators, see other people’s intranets and realize that despite it all, we have it pretty good at Intel. We’re not perfect. But we know it and there are a ton of brilliant, hard-working people always looking to make things better. It’s been a pleasure working with these people. I will miss them…though I’m certain through FaceBook, LinkedIn, Friendster (yeah I still have that old page), and getting together over drinks (my preferred method of “social networking”) we will stay in touch.

Thanks Intel….it’s been great. I mean: The time elapsed over the past eight quarters resulted in a strategic impact upon my qualifications and overall enjoyment. So thanks.

Corporate speak decoder needed asap

“Our business results are propelling our strategy”

It was bullet number 534 on a PowerPoint prezo I sat through the other day. I jotted it down because I had no clue what it meant and thought I’d ponder it some more later.

Week later.

Still no clue.

There is hope however…because generally when someone slaps up some meaningless string of buzz words together on a presentation, people in the room smile and nod like they know what the heck the person means. Not in this meeting. Someone actually dared to ask what it meant. Sad thing though, the person presenting couldn’t clarify.

So…can anyone take a stab at what this means? Corporate-speak translators needed!!!

Should your CEO blog?

I don’t know, I haven’t met your CEO.

I don’t think all CEOs should blog unless they want to, are prepared to relinquish some control, and can write without all the corporate babble!

Here’s a CEO doing it right: Ted Leonsis–former vice chairman of AOL (now chairman of Revolution Money). In an interview with Debbie Weil, Ted answers 10 Qs that talk about why he blogs, his scariest blog moment, ROI, and more.

A blog entry doesn’t have to be long

I was talking with some colleagues at Intel and some folks from a local health & sciences university today and was reminded: a blog post doesn’t have to be long. In fact…I prefer them short.

I’ve been having a lot of blog guilt lately since it’s been a week (or more—gah!) since I’ve posted. And so I’d been humming and hawing over what I should talk about, and just hadn’t got to it.

So today’s reminder is a good one…not just for me…but also for we comms folks who are encouraging our execs to blog…as many execs worry about the time commitment and what they’ll talk about.

It doesn’t have to be long. Or serious. Or thought-provoking. It can just be whatever’s on your mind.

So here goes: I’m busy. Haven’t been blogging. Got a new job. Will start it at the end of October. Am THRILLED!!!! Did I mention busy? Did I mention THRILLED!?!

So there it is. Blog on!