Crisis Averted: EMCWorld 2013 - Day Three

"When written in Chinese, the word 'crisis' is composed of two characters. One represents danger and the other represents opportunity." -John F. Kennedy

For each of the attendees to this year's EMCWorld, at some point in the day, week, month or year, a crisis will likely occur. While each of us in attendance are enjoying meeting new people, learning of new technologies and getting to test the newest gadgets, the business of our life continues.

There will be those issues back at work which draw you away from your temporary enjoyment of the conference. For me, there are those things that come up and I thoroughly enjoy jumping into the fire with my customers to help them get it resolved. This gives them the opportunity to get back to the conference and the enjoyment of it. I have had my share this week and to in the larger crowd of people the crisis may not seem such a big deal, but to the individual it is.

Your crisis might be deemed small or huge. It might involve keeping or losing your job. It might be a relationship or possibly mean life and death. Whatever the case, crisis will enter your life. How you deal with it determines your outcome on the other side. Some people do not handle it well and end up in worse condition while others are stronger and much better for the experience.

As you walk the convention halls of EMCWorld or even the halls of your life back home, know that there is hope, opportunity and greatness to be achieved through crisis. Come out on the other side renewed and greater for the experience.

Stay inspired my friends.

Connected Dots: EMCWorld 2013 - Day Two

"Make it a habit to tell people thank you. To express your appreciation, sincerely and without the expectation of anything in return. Truly appreciate those around you, and you'll soon find many others around you. Truly appreciate life, and you'll find that you have more of it." -Ralph Marston

An impressive first day that truly didn't disappoint myself or any one of the nearly 15,000 people in attendance. I always develop certain expectations of what these days are going to be like. Am I going to run into someone that I haven't seen in a long time? Will I remember their name? Will they remember me?

What I have come to the conclusion is that of all those connections made over the years are lasting if I have committed to the relationship without expectation of something in return.

That means if we develop friendships, help other people and do all of this without a requirement of getting something in return, the connection is much stronger. This is what happens in the business world and can work for you in your own life. At EMCWorld and in our every day business, EMC personnel work hard at developing the relationship. If we build a business trust with each other first, the rest is rather easy.

You can attain the same type of relationships in your own business and personal life. When you approach life with a serving attitude, the connections become strong and lasting. In fact, your day is filled with serving others and you may not even realize it. Allowing someone in line as you drive to work, opening the door for someone or simply doing your job. You help your spouse with the dishes, the kids with homework or a neighbor move a desk.

Most everything you do throughout your day is comprised of serving others. And this elaborate intertwining of peoples lives means that you are served as well through out the day. What you receive in return is directly proportional to the level of servitude you extend to others.

It can be humbling but you need to have confidence in yourself and a positive attitude that you can change other peoples lives through small acts of kindness. Serve with a joyful heart and with the knowledge that you will receive in kind the same. You have nothing to lose and all the world to gain. We are never too young or too old to ask, "Can I hold open that door for you?"

Stay inspired my friends.

Viva Las Vegas: EMCWorld 2013 - Day One

"In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit." -Albert Schweitzer

Are you one of the thousands of people attending this year's EMCWorld Conference in Las Vegas? If not, it starts today and the crowds of people roaming the halls of the Venetian Conference Center are proof of what you might be missing out on. From my perspective in the Unified Storage Division, the large amount of events associated with just our division is quite big...Big Data!

• USD Keynote: Rich Napolitano, Wednesday May 8th 8:30-9:30am, SVP Unified Storage Division
• Technical Breakout Sessions: 32 sessions repeated twice
• Birds of a Feather Sessions; Hands-on Labs; Unified Storage Booth; Meet the Experts Whiteboard area
• Demonstration stations covering several topics including Applications, Management, Virtualization/VDI, FLASH 1st
• Theatre Presentations in Partner booths: VCE, VMware, Avnet/Metalogix

Wow, it is big.

But what is even bigger are the people in attendance, the interaction, the conversations and the collective human connection. It reminds me of what we can do when we come together. This week I look forward to meeting new people and renewing old acquaintances. When each of us leave at the end of this week, we'll be better prepared to solve challenges in front of us and see new possibilities.

All of this will happen because we connected with each other. You might be at @EMCWorld 2013 or at home; just keep on connecting with people you meet. You're going to learn, enjoy and live a better life. And above all, don't forget to stay inspired my friends.

New You

“How would your life be different if…You stopped allowing other people to dilute or poison your day with their words or opinions? Let today be the day…You stand strong in the truth of your beauty and journey through your day without attachment to the validation of others” ―Steve Maraboli

I do it.

You do it.

All of us do it.

Each and everyone of us self evaluate our own worth and value as humans. Researchers say this has to do with the various parts of our human make-up; self-esteem, self-image and simply knowing that we exist.

In an article by Leon Pomeroy, Ph.D., George Mason University, he asks the question, "Must we be habitual self-evaluators? Cultural conditioning makes it likely! However, we have a choice! We can choose to go through life striving to be a success for all the wrong reasons; or we can accept that we are unconditionally worthwhile, and strive for success for all the right reasons."

The hardest part for many is to simply accept we are worthwhile in and of ourselves. We struggle with a constant inner voice berating and putting us down. For each of us to overcome is to find out the reason for the voice and destroy it. Maybe it was a very poor parent, teacher or person of authority in their life that engrained it so much the voice lives on. Those with this voice feed it daily and keep it strong in their life.

One needs to learn how to choke off the life of that negative voice and find a new inner voice to feed. But just how does one do that? In several articles I have read over the years, it tends to boil down to these basic ideas to turn your world around

1. Take inventory of yourself: It is said, "You can’t fix what you don’t know." Take a piece of paper, draw a line down the middle and on one side write: “Strengths” and on the other write: “Weaknesses.” Make a list of ten items in each column. Now you know what things you have to change and those you need to work on. Just make sure you do something with the list; strengthen the strengths and weaken the weaknesses.

2. Explore Yourself: You may know about yourself due to step one above, but you must also open yourself to new opportunities, new thoughts, a new way of doing things. This could be new opinions, new friendships or new vision of where you want to be in life.

3. Set Realistic Expectations: Nothing harm your self-esteem more than setting unrealistic expectations. Setting attainable and stretch goals will help you end negative thinking about yourself that reinforces negative self-esteem.

4. Stop Comparing Yourself to Others: Nothing hurts our self-esteem more than unfair comparisons. this can be difficult to do, but stop comparing yourself to others. You are them and they are not you. Challenge yourself to be the best you can be by raising a BAR of expectation in your life.

5. Set Aside Perfection, Grab a Hold of Accomplishments: Perfection is not attainable despite all of the air-brushed models in advertisements or perfection of families on television may seem. None of us are ever going to be perfect. Take those accomplishments (large or small) and revel in each one of them as you achieve them.

6. Be Willing to Adjust: Self-esteem is useless if it’s based upon an older version of you that no longer exists. Keep adjusting your self-image and self-esteem to match your current abilities and skills, not those of your past.

For me, there is a God factor in all of this as well. Yet it is for you to find that aspect of your existence. Additionally, all of this is going to take time. There will be points of great strides forth and times of falling backwards. The point is to move in a positive direct and over time you will find yourself like yourself a lot more.

Stay inspired my friends.