CISSP and SANS GSEC - Comparing Security Certifications

The two most important security certifications are CISSP and SANS GSEC. The rest aren't significant in comparison, although I’ll later comment on a couple others briefly.

With certifications, there are two things to consider: the value of the certification, and the value of the knowledge. Presumably you need to learn or at least review something to pass the certification test/requirements. That’s certainly true for CISSP and GSEC. Security is a broad enough area that almost no one can just waltz in and pass the tests for either of these.

CISSP is THE best known security certification. SANS GSEC is second, although rapidly increasing in prominence. CISSP has been around roughly twice as long GSEC, which accounts for at least some of its preeminence.

They are both excellent programs with significant overlap as well as some significant differences.

SANS GSEC material is more practically oriented than CISSP. Some comment that CISSP is more managerially or theoretically oriented than GSEC. I’ll comment that CISSP has some bizarre stuff in it! For example, no one cares if something is "Bell Lapadula" or not – not in industry at least. Bell what??? “Bela Lugosi??” – wasn’t he the original movie “Dracula” or "Batman?" (GSEC also mentions Bell Lapadula although very briefly). Most of the material in both programs is very useful.

SANS GSEC training has 10 hours of hands-on training whereas most CISSP programs do not. There is more emphasis on learning "how to do things as compared to knowing things” in SANS GSEC. CISSP requires four years of experience in security whereas SANS GSEC has no such requirement. SANS GSEC certification consists of online exams plus a “practical component.” CISSP certification requires you to report to an authorized test site for a rigorous, and many people say scary, examination.

SANS GSEC training is developed and run by The SANS Institute, who are essentially the GSEC people. I don’t know of any other sources of GSEC training. CISSP training is available from many sources including The International Information Systems Security Certification Consortium, better known as (ISC)2, the CISSP people.

CISSP and SANS GSEC training is intrusive! For example the SANS GSEC “Boot Camp” (as it’s often called) is six days long including most evenings. It runs over the weekend and I've never heard anyone complain. CISSP programs tend to be 5+days long as well. Depending on your level of experience, additional study may well be required before taking the certifying exams. It is very possible to get certified without taking training.

I can't tell anyone how valuable being CISSP or SANS GSEC certified will be to them. I’ve consulting on Information Security for well over a decade, and none of my clients have ever asked or cared! Others have told me that it’s been invaluable to them. My informal research shows that these certifications are slightly more useful on the East and West Coast of the USA than in the center. In Asia-Pacific, CISSP seems to rule.

That said, the knowledge learned while getting certified is valuable itself. Security is a broad enough field that certainly no one knows everything. Having a certification can't hurt, and sometimes it can help a lot, especially if you are just developing your expertise and experience.

What about other security certifications? TruSecure has a TICSA certification aimed at “IT Practitioners.” I was certified as a TICSA Subject Matter Expert at one point, or so TruSecure told me, but apparently they lost my paperwork! A good program, which appears to still exist, even though TruSecure doesn’t exist anymore.

I’ve also heard good things about the CompTIA Security+ certification, but have no experience with it. It seems to be more of an entry level certification than CISSP and GSEC.

SANS and (ISC)2 actually have a number of additonal certifications as well.

There are actually a lot of Certifications out there, but in security, CISSP and SANS GSEC are the biggest by far. I haven't even touched on vendor specific certifications, and there seem to be hundreds of those in the security space.

Disclaimer: I’ve been involved in security and security training for a long time. I occasionally teach security classes for SANS. I’m SANS GSEC certified and may eventually get around to taking the CISSP exam as well. TruSecure was a client of mine while they existed.

Updated - click for new copy here.

FOR DAMN NEAR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

I wrote a joke press release. I'd never writing one before, joke or otherwise. It began with "FOR DAMN NEAR IMMEDIATE RELEASE" and the rest was equally ludicrous. In reality I was creatively procrastinating.

I "released" it to a few friends via email. One of them happened to be legendary PR Guy Dan Janal of PR Leads. I thought he might get a smile out of it.

My phone rang within about 30 seconds. It was Dan. "Make these two minor changes and release it." I determined he was serious - I wasn't sure at first. He had to explain some basics to me, like how I would actually "release" it.

Hey, the Press Release says I made 19 cents via Google AdSense - not exactly a home run! I talk about maybe being able to buy a beer in a few weeks if the profits continue. This is a real Press Release? You want me to fax it where?? You want me to do what with it???

Dan was right of course. It got a lot of attention and I had fun.

BTW, I like Dan's new blog and hope he keeps on blogging!

Evil Dubious Bogus Anti Spyware

Ever wonder about some antispyware - especially antispyware advertised by spyware?

Some of it is simply EVIL! Like spyware itself.

spywarewarrior.com has a fascinating (and long) list of dubious spyware as well as some other good info on spyware.

For the record, I can personally recommend:
Microsoft AntiSpyware Beta
WebRoot
Spybot Search and Destroy

We all agree spyware is bad, very very bad, even evil! Now if we could just agree on what exactly spyware is.

Ted, Scoble made you famous

I had several emails this morning with titles ranging from "Scoble made you famous" to "Ted, you hot Sh*t."

I was mentioned in Robert Scobles extremely popular Scobleizer.
Robert was amused at my news that he's popular in Siberia.

Next, I'd like my picture on the cover of the Rolling Stone. But for right now I'll settle for another cup of coffee . . .

Art of Public Speaking by Trump

From Donald Trump's book "How to Get Rich," with commentary from me.

1. Think about your audience first.
2. Get your audience involved.

Absolutely Donald! It's all about the audience. I often poll my audience ahead of time or at very least try to talk to several of them briefly before my speech.

3. Be prepared.

Be super prepared, if you can. Sometimes you will find yourself in front of an audience with no advance warning, and some of these speeches have been among my favorites! For example, see My Favorite Speech of Last Year.

But when I'm paid for a keynote, I prepare, prepare, prepare. And when I'm not paid, I STILL prepare, prepare, prepare.

4. Be a good storyteller.

And tell appropriate stories that relate to the points you're making. Don't tell stories for the point of telling stories, regardless of how good the stories are! Unless you're a professional story teller . . . .

5. Be aware of the common denominator.

I don't dumb my speeches down, but do avoid acronyms and techno-babble as appropriate, and try to pick reasonable topics for the audience.

6. Be an entertainer.

That's part of your job! If you're dull, you should be doing something else. You need to entertain, especially if your topic is somewhat arcane, obscure or technical. Especially if you're speaking after a big lunch, or after a dinner with alcohol - keep them entertained and awake!

7. Be able to laugh at yourself.

You are an object of humor. Everyone is an object of humor. Laugh at yourself and the audience will too. Don't laugh at yourself and the audience might anyway . . .

8. Think on your feet.

Spontaneity is good. Although you should prepare thoroughly, you're not reading a script! You should be interacting with the audience and modifying what and how you say it on the fly.

10. Have a good time.

And the audience will notice and have a good time too. If you don't like public speaking, what are you doing in front of an audience?

11. Study Regis Philbin.

Ahhh, Donald, I *think* I know who he is, but am not sure. I don't really watch TV, except children's programs with the kids. I will however take your advice and check him out.

And I'll add my own #12:

12. Know what the intended results of the speech are.

Are you primarily supposed to motivate, entertain, educate or something else? Very often there is one person in charge - the one who's budget your fee comes out of. You should know what they want you to accomplish, and you should ideally hear it directly from them, not through a well meaning intermediary.

And last but not least, remember that the audience wants to like you, and they almost certainly will.

See Ted's Speeches

My First Guerrilla Speech

It was the early 1980s and I was in Berkley California to see The Grateful Dead. I was dressed appropriately - head to foot tye-dye. I wasn't quite the typical deadhead as instead of hanging out waiting for the show while drinking beer or perhaps indulging in mild hallucinogens, I was playing an energetic game of frisbee and drinking martinis, scorching dry, straight up, with extra olives.

When I felt a need to relieve myself, instead of finding a nice tree to hide myself behind like a nice hippee would, I ducked into a school building. After the restroom, I noticed a noisy classroom. It was obvious from the buzz; the professor was late.

I walked in on autopilot and started to address the class. The professor was unavoidably delayed and I would be taking over until he arrived. Now where had they left off last time?

I was a living non-sequitur. I didn't look like I belonged in front of the class, but I had the appropriate self confidence and demeanor. The class was mesmerized. I was energized. I knew no one would question my authority.

After a few minutes, I heard footsteps in the hall. I excused myself and stode out the door with confidence as an unaware professor hurried in the other.

Who was that tye-dyed man?

Blogs I Read

I'm not a blogrolling kind of guy for some reason, but I do read a lot of blogs. I tend to read lots of different blogs all the time - I call it research. Hey, part of my business is advising and helping to implement business blogs. I help a few friends out too, and even do some basic HTML hacking - although I haven't programmed seriously in many many years (I think a few 100,000 lines of code is enough maybe?).

So, without further ado, realizing I'll no doubt miss and probably offend someone, here are some blogs I've been visiting periodically over the past several months:

Troll Journal - my old friend Furry John, the first blogger I ever knew. This qualifies as a person diary type journal thing. Oh yeah, he calls it something else. Check it out. He's a bit of a pioneer who rants but doesn't take himself too seriously. And to help the SEs, he's "John Foster" and goes by ccjohn. He also knows NYC bars very well, a quite useful skill.

PaulTech - Pauls's blog makes me feel like I*used* to be technical. I deal with the stuff every day, but everytime I visit Paul's blog I learn something that makes my computer experience better. And that is INCREDIBLY valuable.

Schneier on Security - close to required reading for security dudes. Bruce digs up some interesting stuff. Great discussions in his comments too!

A Fine Kettle of Fish - stuff on advertising and marketing trends by Bob Cargill, plus whatever else he wants to write. Most blog like! I'm not an advertising or marketing guy, barely understand the stuff, but Bob writes in a very accessible and amusing style. I learn a lot here.

Phedo - I like Bill's blog a lot. Info on both general good blogging approaches and business blogging in particular. A blog about blogging - I dig it!

Business Blog Consulting - I can't remember if Rick ever answers my emails or not, but if you follow developments in using blogs for business purposes, you want to check this out! Oh, I already used the venacular "check it out." Let me rephrase. "... examine this with interest."


Notice no political blogs?? I try to be apolitical. But seriously, buy me a beer someday . . .

My Favorite Speech of Last Year

I gave a lot of speeches last year that I enjoyed a lot.

I gave very enjoyable keynotes on "Technology and The Future of IT." I had a blast talking about "Blogs and Their Business Uses." I gave a wonderfully self rewarding speech on "Technology, Its uses, and Problems" to a non-technical audience, highlighting that computers annoy us all, even we computer nerds! They dubbed me a "Standup Technologist," a title I gladly accepted. My "Excess in the Pursuit of Excellent" keynotes were very well received and generated a lot of discussion! (and some told me they would flop - Ha!)

But what was my all time favorite speech of the last 12 months?? Easy, it was an impromptu speech introducing a film I knew *nothing* about, not even its title!

My old friend Chip Hourihan was showing his film Glissando, or rather he has trying to. I was looking forward to seeing Chip for the first time in many years as well as his film. I sensed something was wrong, very wrong. I barged my way into the projection room, where Chip nerviously explained there were technical problems beyond his control and it would be quite a few more minutes. The audience was getting restless, so I offered to "introduce" Chip's film.

I didn't wait for him to accept. There was a podium and I seized it! No microphone, but no problem - I have a booming voice. I mesmerized the audience with my vague platitutes, starting with Ed Sullivan's "We've got a really really great show for you tonite" and went from there. They expected a movie, not a speaker, but I made my introducing the film seem natural. Although perhaps full of it, I was honest: I admitted I hadn't seen the film yet but was very much looking forward to it as they were. I went on for at least 15 minutes, until the movie was ready.

I had fun, the audience had fun, and Chip was relieved as well. As far as I can tell, no one figured it out, because there was nothing to figure out. I spoke to the audience, I related to the audience, I shared the audience's anticipation, I WAS part of the audience. I just happened to be the part of the audience standing up in front at the podium with no microphone shouting!

The only downside? I didn't get paid for this one :)

Oh, the movie? Superb!! No wonder it won awards!

More About Ted's Speeches

I’m a business consultant. I admit it now.

As Yogi Berra once said, “If you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

I’ve just taken it.

I’ve been in high tech for over 20 years and love it. My first consulting project was 1984. I started hacking at a “modern” computer in 1977, and built a mechanical computer years before.

You can't spend 20+ years in high tech including reviewing dozens of business plans, surviving a few startups, and over 15 years in consulting, without developing some business skills and insights.

I’ve been periodically doing some business consulting for some of my IT clients at their request, sometimes reluctantly. I’ve often heard: “but you’re the best one for the job – you understand the business and the technology,” “you’re a trusted neutral third party,” and “hey, you’re already in here, why not do this project too.” This consulting has included helping with entrepreneurial issues, conducting customer and employee surveys, and providing advice on business blogging. It’s also included dope-slapping executives when necessary and offering “outsider” opinions.

I’m a technology guy, and will always be fascinating by technology and especially IT security! That said, more clients are starting to tap my business knowledge and I’ve stopped resisting.
Most of my business is and will remain techno-centric.

I’ve come to the fork in the road. I’ve taken it. I’m a technology consultant. I’m a business consultant. I admit it now.

Gene Koprowski's new blog

I've always enjoyed Gene's articles on technology for UPI.
I'm happy to see he has a new blog.

I'm even happier to see he quotes me in one of his first posts!

I'm adding his blog to my short "must read" list

Cool Web Search - CWShredder - spyware

Cool Web Search is one the most evil, and imaginative, pieces of malware out there. It buries itself so deep in so many places in your system that it’s extremely hard to get rid of.

Typically referred to as a “browser hijacker,” it can render a system close to useless. It waltzed right by my antivirus (shame on you antivirus companies for ignoring spyware – but that’s another story) and seemed to come in via an Internet Explorer hole. Webroot, Microsoft’s AntiSpyware beta, and Spybot would all kill and remove various parts of it, but not in it’s entirety.

It kept changing my homepage, giving me endless popups, redirecting my browser wherever it wanted, and generally causing mayhem and slowing down my system to the point of near unusability. I performed surgery on Windows XP and finally killed it by manually deleting files and killing processes.

I wish I had known about CWShredder ! This great free utility has one goal in life, ridding a system of Cool Web Search. It seems to do a fantastic job, and I hope to not need to verify that again :)

So how do you know you've gotten hit by Cool Web Search? Easy, your antispyware tells you, but can't seem to get rid of it!

Book Review: The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell

I had trouble with this book – trouble putting it down! Although I had briefly glanced at it a couple of times in bookstores and couldn’t quite figure it out, it quickly consumed my interest when I started to read it.

The big idea in this book is that the way to understand many “mysterious” things in daily life such as fashion trends, teen smoking, and crime waves is to consider them as epidemics.

Epidemics have three primary characteristics:

1) contagiousness

2) rapid change

3) very importantly, small changes can have big effects

The “Tipping Point” is the moment of critical mass when rapid change occurs.

When an Epidemic Tips, it tips because of a change in one of the follow:

The Law of the Few – social epidemics are driven by the efforts of a talented few. Gladwell characterizes them as: Connectors – people specialists who know many people, Mavens – information specialists who love to spread information, and Salesmen – persuasion experts. It turns out I am not one of these few :)

Stickiness Factor – does the message make a significant impact? Small but critical changes to a message can radically affect its stickiness. The quality of the message is not the issue.

Power of Context – humans are incredible sensitive to context. For example, removing graffiti and subway fare cheaters substantially reduced serious crime in New York City subways.

What makes this book work so well is the great examples. Gladwell has obviously spent a lot of time painstakingly researching this book and it shows.

Why did Paul Revere make such a big impact on his famous nighttime ride when William Dawe’s simultaneous ride flopped? Why are Sesame Street and Blues Clues so successful? Why is teen smoking such a problem when smoking isn’t and never has been cool? (hint: smokers are cool). All these questions and many more are within the scope of “The Tipping Point” and are answered in detail.

Now if I can only find a way to use Gladwell’s information to my benefit I’ll end up a rich and happy man. In the meantime I’ll remain amused and informed by this book. I’m picking up his new book tomorrow!

Book Review: Managing Upside Down, Tom Chappell, Tom’s of Maine

It took me a long time to read this book – I kept stopping to think. That’s usually a sign of a good book!

I’ve never met Tom, but I imagine he speaks like this book is written. I’m also guessing that he had to fight to get this book published the way he wanted it written – editors often insist on “correcting” everything. Tom uses commas, where he wants to, not where grammatical rules dictate they go. He probably puts them where he would have a natural pause in his speech (he likes parentheses a lot too, and so do I). It is written is a simple, homey, no-nonsense style – what you would probably expect from Tom of Tom’s of Maine.

The big idea in this book is simple: instead of managing a company strictly according to profit and loss, companies should be managed according to their principles first and foremost. Tom admits this is a radical notion, and not easy to do. The book is full of examples from the journey of Tom’s of Maine towards achieving this ideal.

It’s easy to say, “Wait, Tom’s of Maine is a ‘Hippie Toothpaste’ company (Tom’s description). Idealism is simply good business for them; good PR and good marketing.” While there is some truth to that statement, it’s obviously not the whole story. Companies typically put profit first, certainly NOT marketing and PR.

Everything we see is flavored by our own experiences, and this book is no exception. Tom calls his ideas radical and believes they will be hard to accept for many people. My business experiences are largely from the world of Information Technology, and I would have agreed until after the Internet Bubble, which popped around 2000, after this book was written. During the Internet boom, we collectively held an underlying assumption that getting rich was a noble pursuit. It was the “best” thing anyone could do. During the Stock Market boom similar ideas were collectively accepted.

The Internet culture as well as Wall Street, at least during their respective boom years, valued money – which they strongly correlated to intelligence, much more highly than previous generations. By Internet boom standards, Bill Gates was a greater person than Ghandi, Marc Andreesson was certainly cooler than Nelson Mandela, and a cog in the wheel almost killing themselves at some Internet startup for fortune and stock options outranked both the Pope and the Dalai Lama! If you made money honestly, and ‘honestly’ was somewhat loosely defined, you had presumably added value somewhere and benefited people. If you were smart enough to make a lot of money, you had benefited a lot of people – perhaps humankind as a whole. You might even be close to sainthood if successful enough!

Those ideas are popularly dismissed these days. Life Balance is a popular “buzz term.” Excess is unpopular. Being a do-gooder is back in style. And many of Tom’s ideas have become popular. Even Donald Trump in “How to get Rich” emphasizes how it’s important to respect every employee and how anyone, regardless of position or title, can have great ideas. Of course Tom espouses these same notions in his book.

Some of Tom’s “radical” ideas in this book have been validated since the few years since it’s been published. Yes, there is still plenty of “upside down” non-conventional thinking left, but the book is not as "far out" as when it’s been published.

Tom has started “The Salt Water Institute,” a not for profit organization whose charter is to support those who want to manage in a more values-centered way. I’m hoping to see Tom speak on behalf of the Salt Water Institute soon, and will report back!

Disclaimer: I’m a long time user of Tom’s products – from before I cared whether they were natural or not. They are simply good products.

Creative Business Environments

Scene: End of dinner at a Chinese restaurant. A plethora of empty dishes and umbrella drinks adorn the table. Ted opens and reads his fortune cookie out loud.

Ted: 'You use your creative talents to transform a business environment.' [laughter] "Finally a fortune cookie that’s accurate!"

Fresno Frank: "Ted, I think it would be more accurate to say your professional buffoonery lends levity to business situations and allows creative potential to emerge."

Ted: "They say there's a fine line between something and something else."

Fresno Frank: "Yeah, that and the Court Jester served a similar role in medieval times by inserting humor and not letting the King and his court take themselves too seriously. The Jester was the only one who could make suggestions that transcended conventional wisdom and allowed for breakthroughs in thinking."

Ted: " Hmmm, . . . ." [Ted's voice fades away]

Lights fade, curtain drops. Scene end.

World Class Procrastination

“Anticipation, is making me wait, is keeping me waaaaaiting, . .” used to be the Heinz catsup theme song.

Mine starts, “Procrastination, . . .”

Yes, I’m a procrastinator. I could rationalize it, saying:

· “I work best under pressure,”

· “First instincts are usually right and doing things early gives one time to overanalyze and screw up,”

· “Work expands to fill the available time,”

or a bunch of other things. But I’ll just get it out:
I’m a procrastinator. It’s part of who I am!

A couple of examples. I just came back from central Siberia. I was there as part of a foreign adoption. I met a wonderful little girl I’m trying to adopt.

I was warned that it would be very emotional meeting Anastasia and not to underestimate it. I was told to expect to be quite emotional, perhaps even reduced to tears. And before I left my wife added, “don’t drink the water and be careful of what you eat.”

I met Anastasia twice and played for a couple of hours each time. I also ate damn well whatever I pleased and also accidentally drank a little water a couple of times.

I’ve been home three days now. Finally, I’ve gotten around to getting travelers diarrhea. And now, just today, I’ve become emotional about my meeting with Anastasia, tears flowing from my eyes every couple of hours when I think of her.

Procrastination over, time for diarrhea and emotions. Is there a Guinness World Book of Records category for procrastination?

Excess in the Pursuit of Excellence

They say that on your deathbed you don’t regret the things you did, you regret the things you didn’t do.

I’m a pretty enthusiastic, and I know what I love. What I love might evolve somewhat over time, but there are always a few things I’m intensely interested in.

When I find something I enjoy, I prefer to enjoy it a lot. Especially when I’m getting better at it. Especially when the effort is paying off! Becoming excellent at things I enjoy is the biggest thrill to me. If I die today I can honestly say I’ve spent a lot of time doing things I love and have become pretty good at many of them!

For example, when I first tried ocean fly fishing I immediately loved it. It is not easy, at least not how I do it. It’s not uncommon to find me standing in knee deep water perched on slippery rocks in the surf. To add the to the difficulty, my favorite quarry, the striped bass, is nocturnal so I’m often fishing in the dark. Although I loved it from the beginning, it is far more fun now that I’m good at it. I catch more fish. I can confidently fish in more types of locations giving me flexibility and a wider range of beautiful places to fish.

In order to improve, I’ve been known to take entire months and dedicate them to fishing! Yes, partly this is hedonistic: it’s fun! I also experience absolutely beautiful places I’d never see otherwise, whether a nearby beach at sunrise or the massive lagoon on Christmas Island (directions from the US: go to Hawaii, bang a left, stop a few miles before the equator). Partly this is intellectual: I enjoy learning more about nature including the tides, fish, bait types, migration patterns, etc. And of course partly it’s competitive – you either catch fish or not! They are either big or small.

Many would say my fishing is, or at least has been, excessive at times. One spring/summer/fall I fished almost every night (I was in the emergency room one night after an accident and missed fishing). But my concentration on fishing that year has paid BIG dividends. I’m a much better fisherman now. Even if I sneak out for only an hour or two, I enjoy it more and have better chances of catching fish because of that year I dedicated to improving my fishing skill. My effort that year is still paying dividends, and probably will my entire life! It was an excellent investment of time and effort in something I truly enjoy.

I find that regardless of how much I might enjoy something, I don’t do it excessively and compulsively unless it’s something where the excess matters, where the excess improves my ability and hopefully my pleasure, and where by making the extra effort I stand a chance of becoming truly excellent.

Excess is GOOD!

In “The Big Year,” Mark Obmascik says:
“If you had a year of your life to do anything you wanted, and you could only do that thing for a year, what would you do? These three guys all chose to chase birds.”

Doing any one thing for a year or even just a couple of months might seem excessive to many people! But is excessive bad? Certainly excess can be bad, for example alcoholism, binge eating, and other examples quickly come to mind. Chasing birds for a year could be “bad excess” if it involved avoiding responsibilities such as not seeing your young children often enough.

But excess is not fundamentally bad and can be extremely good. Certainly any aspiring Olympic athlete needs a training regimen that most humans would consider excessive. And most successful entrepreneurs will tell you that sometimes business requires almost Herculean amounts of efforts to succeed.

Excess is GOOD. Or perhaps it’s more accurate to say excess is good when properly focused. Excess is sometimes desirable or perhaps even required, and can more than repay for itself. Sometimes just a little more effort makes all the difference in the world – the difference between success and failure. Excess helps to ensure we get that extra effort that can make a big difference. We are not talking about “the straw that broke the camel’s back”; rather we are talking the extra effort that allowed us to achieve success, whether that success is personal or in business. When something really matters, “just enough” is a risky proposition. Several talented individuals may be trying to achieve similar desired results and obviously “just enough” may not be enough for several of them.

“My name is Ted Demopoulos, I am an excessive person, and I’m proud!”

Book Review: "The Big Year" by Mark Obmascik

Anyone who has ever been excited should read this book.

“If you had a year of your life to do anything you wanted, and you could do only that thing for a year, what would you do? These three guys all chose to chase birds.” There’s a term for this, a “Big Year,” and it’s a competitive event.

I like birds. I can tell a sparrow from a titmouse, and a crow from pigeon. I’ve seen bald eagles, but can’t tell you if there are any hairy eagles or other varieties. I can’t reliably tell a morning dove from a pigeon, but I feed them both and am happy seeing them out my windows. That’s my level of interest in birds.

I’ve met intense birders twice. One was a birdman named Lee, who had a grant from the World Bank to see if the natives in the Republic of Kiribati were eating rare birds, and generally check on the status of birds there. I was in Kiribati fishing with my friend Mabbott who actually managed to hook a few endangered species. Some are probably endangered because they are stupid - the boobys certainly were no rocket scientists! I met the other gentleman while flying to Alaska to fish. He was going to try to spot Siberian species not normally found in North America, but that are occasionally blown over when the wind goes the right way. These species play prominently in “The Big Year” as do trips to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska to chase them. Since I’ve been to both Alaska and the Republic of Kiribati several times to fish, it should be clear that I have my intense interests as well. Both men fascinated me with their drive and obsession. They knew what they loved and were doing it!

Competitions are no stranger to me either. I once fished the entire month of the Martha’s Island Fishing Derby. I was a regular before having kids. I never won, but do have a 3^rd place plaque for a fish I caught while flyfishing in a gale. I also regularly take part in ham radio competitions. They typically last 48 continuous hours and I usually manage to operate 45+ hours, much of that time with one radio going into each ear. I find the mere thought of a year long competition fascinating!

This book is a natural for me, but I think almost anyone with a passion for just about anything can relate, whether it’s their business, profession, a hobby, a sport, etc.

These three men are all very different people and didn’t know each other at the beginning. One was the reigning champion, having established the record years earlier, and was now trying to break his own record. Although he economized somewhat, neither money nor time were issues. One was a recently retired executive. He had a lifelong passion for birding, and plenty of time and money, but he had the least experience. Corporate life had contained his enthusiasm for decades and he was now busting loose. And the last worked a fulltime job amazingly, and was so broke he borrowed money from his parents and often ate dogfood – or was it catfood? They all shattered the existing record!

The excitement and love these men have is heartwarming. Their entirely reasonable excesses in having truly excellent “Big Years” are exciting and invigorating. And their passion is incredible!

If you don’t like this book you probably are dull and not a close friend of mine.

Internet Access in Siberia

I'll admit it upfront - I'm in Siberia and bored.

It's late, I'm jetlagged, and not sleeping anytime soon! I'm in my second Siberian city this week, Surgut, roughly between Kazakhstan and the Artic Circle.

There's a heat wave here! It almost hit freezing today! Good thing - the door to my balcony is broken and won't shut tight. No, I'm NOT joking.

Public Internet access is available everywhere.

It seems far more common than in the USA, where Internet cafes etc. seem less common than a couple of years ago. Perhaps Internet access is not as common in people's homes here?

We are talking not just dialup access, but slow dialup access. Broadband does exist - for example cable modem is available in Surgut, but is expensive. It's not flat rate pricing. Wireless seems nonexistent.

My hotel has an "Internet" room. It has one computer, and access requires a telecom card. It's about US$1 an hour for Internet access, although it also required having the security guard screw with the PC for about 30 minutes trying to make it work. Cyrillic Windows is tough - even if you can read a little bit.

The last hotel had a business center: one computer, dialup, and $6 and hour.

And in case you wondered as I did, cellphones are everywhere here.

Postscript:
Wireless Access is available at the Moscow Grand Marriott for about US$33 a day, or $10 an hour! They claim it's highspeed - bullshit!! Medium speed at best. I'm uploading some big files now - it's taking 30 minutes for about 35 meg and I'm not half through yet!

Who Should Write the Corporate Blog?

A blog is part of a company's public face and personality. Deciding who should write a corporate blog is an important decision. Obviously it depends to some extent on the purpose of the blog: is its primary purpose customer service, marketing, customer relations, internal communications, or some other use?

There are several choices:

-One person can write the blog.

-A team can write the blog.

-A 'fictional' character can write the blog.

A blog written by one person is very common today.

It tends to give the blog a consistent style and flavor, which is great.

However continuity can be an issue: what if the blogger, part of the company's public face and personality, leaves the company or needs to stop blogging for some reason?? Perhaps this is not catastrophic, but something to consider!

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Writing blog posts, newsletters, and articles

Ron Oltmanns of LeadSkill recently asked me how I managed my writing, specifically my newsletter - how I wrote it consistently. Ron writes the ezine Mastery.

Writing is tough! For example, I try to organically write my newsletter every month. When it doesn't happen, at least 40-50% of the time, I actually schedule time to write. Here are some tips that work for me:

If I get a good idea for a topic, I try to start writing immediately if possible.

I don't correct much as I go: syntax, grammar, flow, spelling, logic, etc. When stuff is getting written down I let it get written down. I correct and improve later.

When I suffer from "writers block," I sometimes make myself write ANYTHING. What comes out is usually better than I think. And if it's absolute garbage, I can usually get a laugh by reading it later before throwing it away

I often have multiple pieces I'm writing. Sometimes I won't touch something I've started writing for weeks. Having multiple choices increases the chances I'll finish something sooner rather than later!

I reuse everything as much as reasonable. Parts of training classes get rewritten and updated as articles, newsletters, and blog entries. Sometimes a popular blog post will get expanded into a article or newsletter. For example, I've been writing video scripts for WatchIT the last few weeks and they will be transformed into a series of articles, blog posts, etc. I've also been updating my Information Security for IT Practitioners class and at least a couple of articles, blog posts, and maybe a newletter will emerge as well.

I get good ideas in strange places. Traffic jams seem to be especially productive! I almost always carry paper and a pen so I can jot down ideas or outline an article.

I have no time deadlines, I have quality deadlines. If I don't like it, I don't use it! I've been known to sit on a finished and polished piece of writing for a couple months until I'm happy. Sometimes that requires rewriting from a different angle, sometimes it requires little or nothing.

I'm NOT a great or fast writer! Although I went to a great high school, in college I ended up in a remedial English class. 90% of everyone in class was from an inner city school and/or spoke English as a second language, and most of them wrote better than I do. They probably still do!

Hmmm, this would make a good blog post . . . .

Book Review: "How to Get Rich" by Donald Trump

I’ve previously picked up books by Trump twice, both times briefly in airport bookstores, and I’ve learned something each time. I find him a fascinating character, but I have to admit I actually knew very little about him, and it was time to read one of his books.

This is a well written quick read with lots of very short chapters offering advice from Trump. I’m guessing it’s probably ghost written (nothing wrong with that). I enjoyed reading it and it presented a much different view of Trump as well as his management and business style than I expected. It could be subtitled “Business Advice and odd personal details from The Donald” :)

His business emphasis is far more people-centric than I expected. Even his first chapter, “Be a General,” stresses how important the decisions of a business leader are because each can possibly affect the lives of all their employees, and that’s a big responsibility. In other parts of the book he emphasizes hiring creating people you can trust, the importance of setting a good example, and never expecting employees to work harder than you do. He talks about how great ideas can come from anyone, how people’s titles are unimportant, and gives several examples of people who started with extremely low level stereotypically dead end jobs at TrumpCo who have ended up with high level jobs at TrmpCo, for example vice presidents, because they were smart, trustworthy, and had good ideas.

A few things that resonated with me include:

The importance of momentum in business. I moved to Hong Kong from 95-97 and managed, with extreme effort, to keep my consulting business’ momentum going in the US. But afterwards when I took a well deserved 6 month sabbatical and then started messing with (sometimes less than half-assed) startups, my momentum crashed. Despite keeping up with networking and technology, when I decided to concentrate on consulting again I did not have lots of extremely interesting and high paying work, and needed to build things up again.

I loved his comments on public speaking. I think they’re right on the mark, although his remarks that all speakers should study Regis Philbin surprised me (note to self: who is Regis Philbin?? I know the name, but . . .)

Being stubborn. I wrote “nutcase plan” in the margins next to his plan for converting the old Commodore Hotel in New York City. It’s the Grand Hyatt now, but when he started planning he didn’t own it and even buying it, never mind getting any financing, seemed improbable. I periodically have my own nutcase plans – they work out often enough . . .

Donald Trump is obviously an interesting guy, and this book reveals some interesting details: he hates handshakes (a health thing), usually he doesn’t eat at his frequent black tie dinners and grabs junk food at a local Korean grocery store afterwards, he likes McDonalds, and he likes to read psychology and self help books especially anything written by Carl Jung. He was once compared to a Mormon, and he took that “as high praise.”

The book has a section of pictures in the middle of Trump, friends, and family, a reprinted chapter (“by popular demand”) on a typical week in Trump’s life, and ends with a chapter on “The Apprentice.” The “typical week” chapter was interesting, but two days would have been enough. I skimmed the end of that chapter. Although I’ve never seen “The Apprentice,” I enjoyed that part of the book.

The book is probably a must for Donald Trump fans, and a good short read for anyone involved in business.