RIP - Paul Timothy James, Jr.

Hello my faithful readers:

I lost a friend this past weekend.  Paul Timothy James, Jr was probably one of the few people that knew me best about 10 years ago.  He was like the big brother I never had; one of my biggest cheerleaders who made me believe I could (and should) do anything I set my mind to do.

It doesn't feel like Paul is gone.  I had not been close to him in years, although I was blessed to have caught up with him sometime last year, after we fell out of touch for quite a few years.   Social media was the sliver that connected us after all these years and for that I'm thankful to the power of Facebook for giving us even that briefest connection.

Paul always saw me as way more interesting and intelligent than I ever saw myself.  He was always encouraging me to strike out on my own and start my own business and we even worked for a while on producing a concert series called "Grown Folks Music."  We even went as far as trade-marking the name, but that's just the nature of Paul, always working on something.  There was always something going on with him and he was a man of great character - always fighting for the underdog in every situation.

The one thing that strikes me about Paul was that he had so many different friends from so many different walks of life.  Intellectually I always knew this, but it was made evident when I visited him at the ICU in his last week here on earth at Brooklyn Methodist Hospital.  I met people that I'd heard him reference over the years as well as people I'd never even heard of - people who mattered in his life.  That's the thing about Paul James, he took people under his wing and took care of them, even if he hadn't seen you in years, you had the assurance that he would remember you and give you the shirt off his back if that's what you needed at the time.

Paul James lived every last drop out of his life.  He was a warrior, fighting until the end, although he always fought more for everyone else than for himself.  I wish that he was still here so that I could give him one last hug and tell him (when he was awake to hear me), just how much he meant to me.  He was someone who knew me well, at a time when I probably didn't know myself.  I lost my big brother from another mother and right now I'm a bit numb right now.  In my way of coping, I can just pretend that he's off visiting with friends.  In reality, I won't ever get the chance to say to him what I should have said when he was alive to hear it, "I love you man, thank you for being my big brother.  I will miss you."

Peace and blessings to everyone who was touched by Paul for those who loved him know that he's in a much better place right now and maybe, just maybe, he's finally allowing someone to help him on the other side.

Paul Timothy James, Jr. (July 24, 1960 - July 20, 2013)

Best regards,

Georgia Peach

TV Junkie Digital Streaming Options Review - the Dish Hopper

Hello to all of you:

It's been a while since I've posted here, but I thought I'd take the time to share some of my recent experiences in digital streaming.  I am a TV junkie... (there I've said it).  I love great tv, plain and simple.  It's a bit of a challenge watching great tv, without actually paying for cable, but that just makes me a bigger advocate for streaming everything online.  I thought I'd start to blog more regularly here by sharing a few of my thoughts about the state of streaming from a casual, non-techy user experience perspective.

Just to explain why I'm so passionate about streaming - I moved to Belgium in 2009 for graduate school.  While there, I wanted to continue watching some of my favorite shows and I was able to do so with some of the early streaming site aggregators (although some were & remain quite nefarious in nature).  I was frustrated by the lack of legal ways of seeing the content (I tried Hulu, etc), but had to remain conscious that I was living on a limited budget.  In fact, when I moved back to the states and eventually back to NYC, it was my limited budget status that caused me to realize I had to make some tough decisions and I realized I'd rather eat dinner each day than pay for a super expensive cable bill!!

Unfortunately the marketplace doesn't have a great, simple, legal streaming solution for those without cable - yet!  There are companies that are working to change this, but if you have kind parents who will share their username and passwords to their TV Everywhere online streaming platforms, then you've won half the battle.  One that I'd recommend trying is the Dish Hopper. 

My thoughts on the Dish Hopper:  Overall the stream is pretty solid here, love the fact that watching live is available on all their channels.  I think their search functionality on the iPad app is horrible, it seems to be a much better experience when using my computer!  It's difficult to find shows on their On-Demand Platform here. I also hate that Dish now has some very limiting legal language about the number of devices you can stream on...I tend to stream from my computer and my iPad depending on how fast my ISP (internet service provider) is pumping my (very expensive) connection to me.

Channel Guide

DVR Recordings Display (on Computer)

Overall I give the Dish Hopper a solid A- on the overall experience.   If they came up with a lower priced web only a la carte solution, I'd be willing to give it a try.  Take note all of the other MPVD's (Multi-Channel Video Programmers) out there!

I'll try to blog next week about my experiences with some of the other streaming options out there next week.  As always, thanks for reading and I'd love to hear from you in the comments section if you've had any experiences with other platforms.

Mwuah,

Georgia Peach

Executive Presence

Yesterday I had the pleasure of sitting in on a talk by Evan Shapiro, President of Participant TV; he was addressing me and my fellow WICT NY Prime Access Mentees and our mentors.  It was a session on Executive Presence and to be honest - I was pleasantly surprised by his talk.  I had my pre-conceived notions of what it takes to fit in as an executive, especially as a woman (who happens to be African American) and Evan managed to address many of my concerns, which was a nice change from some of the talks I've attended that never seem to address haven't addressed these issues in a way that resonated with me.

One of my biggest concerns in regards to the idea of executive presence is the big elephant in the room - I'm a woman, I'm a minority (African American) and sometimes I've sometimes questioned whether  these characteristics (that I can't change) have impeded my career.  I know that I'm smart and talented, but time and time again I've seen myself and many of my peers in the same situations get overlooked for career advancement opportunities and shut out of the good ole boy and sometimes even the good ole girls clubs you find in the corporate settings in my chosen field.  Many who know me personally, know that I'm pretty unconventional...I've spent most of my career working in Entertainment and Media.  I'm quirky, I wear my hair in a crazy afro and I'm obsessed with the worlds of pop culture, digital streaming and social media in a way that some might consider frivolous.

Most people may not know exactly how ambitious I am, especially if you take a look at the zigs and zags I've made over the course of my career.  I have aspirations to make it to the executive CEO ranks and I tend to beat myself up pretty harshly about the fact that I haven't made it nearly as far as I think I should be in my career.  Getting to the top feels as likely as me scaling Mt. Everest and as a result I've spent a great deal of time in my head recently, second guessing some of the steps and missteps I've made along the way.   For most of my adult life, my entire focus has been on my career (13 years) and it's been tough hell for me to recognize that my path won't be the more linear one a lot of my peers have taken in their careers!

Evan mentioned in his talk that people, whom consider themselves to be a part of a minority group in some way often feel they need to change their approach to fit in (to the collective agency aka group think).  I've often thought about these things myself...wondering if I should change the way I dress, my hair or even the way I speak (remind me to tell you about the time one of my former colleagues told me I sounded like Beyonce to her in another blog).  But his words of advice to all of us in the room is that we need to be ourselves.  Plain and simple...we have to put our own approach on things and focus on honing in on what makes us our best us.  One of the quotes from Evan's talk that I loved most of all was "don't filter yourself to the point of blandness."

Evan had a few recommendations for us to get to our best us and I'll just mention a couple that resonated most with me.  He recommended spending two weeks evaluating what makes us feel strong and what makes us feel weak by writing it down every time we noticed.  For example yesterday I noticed that on a call with one of our clients to plan an event, the client recommended bringing in a major electronics manufacturer to giveaway their newest tablet to one of the bloggers at our event.  I immediately jumped into this idea with ways to expand this idea and make it much larger (and hopefully a win-win for all sides involved by leveraging all of the marketing channels all 3 brands have at our disposal).  After the end of the call I felt invigorated and in that moment I knew I was in the zone...that's what I love to do, make smart partnerships happen.  In making this list over a two week period, it should allow you to really focus on identifying your biggest strengths and major weaknesses so that you can start to arrange your days in ways that you can spend more time on your strengths and minimize the time spent working in your weaknesses.

Another thing recommended by Evan is that we should be deliberate about our careers, we approach our careers in the same way that we approach a project at work, by putting together a cohesive and deliberate plan for our careers.  This can involve seeking out opportunities and special projects outside of your current role (e.g. volunteer to help setup a charity outreach or mentoring organization), speaking on panels that position you as an expert in your field or simply by going outside of your peer group for ideas (e.g. talking to people who work in the medical /financial services/tech fields if you happen to work in media for innovations/ideas that could apply to you).  One big tip here is to be clear and ask for what you want because putting your head down and hoping someone notices all of your hard work rarely works!!

Evan left us all with a few succinct tips on improving our executive presence at the end of his talk:

1.  Write well
2.  Know your shit (keep up with what's happening in your space, read the trades, etc)
3.  Listen and listen wide
4.  Come to meetings prepared to talk (even if it's only one prepared comment/question, etc.)
5.  Become an expert and be known for something good

This talk made me realize that although I am doing some of what I need to in terms of managing my executive presence there is a great deal of room for improvement for me.  I haven't quite learned how to ask for what I want.  I also have to focus in on what makes me happy.  I was especially pleased to hear this as a part of Evan's talk yesterday - it's an often overlooked element when you get into career discussions.  We have to define and always keep in mind what makes us happy because most of us spend a great deal of time working (I know I do)!

What tips on executive presence have you heard over the years?  I'd love to hear from you in the comments section on this one.

As always - thanks for taking the time to read my blog.

Mwuah,

Georgia Peach

Change Is Going to Come...

Hi my faithful readers:

I hadn't written a blog post in over two years now and then earlier today I felt the urge.  For that I apologize...I have a few drafts of post  that I just came back and finished publishing a few drafts that I had written in the middle of my angst, but to be honest I felt too vulnerable at the time to actually share them at the time.  They felt too real, too raw, too honest for me to parade them around and display them.  This past two years has tested my patience, strained my nerves and I've felt more than a little angry, confused and nervous about my prospects and feeling as if I'd made a wrong turn somewhere. I've always wanted this blog to be a positive place and quite honestly I didn't want to be putting my negative energy out into the universe in the written word.  So, I have kept quiet as a result.

Now that I have a little perspective on the year, I realize that perhaps I needed this time to mature a bit and improve my character through some serious testing.  Overall, I'm still not sure what's happening with me, but since this past summer things have certainly started to look up for me.  I also think that my attitude has certainly changed for the better and I know now that to move forward I have to release some of the doubt, resentments and confusion so that I could begin to focus on the things that are good for me.  I also realized that most of my insecurities, goals and even some of the things I desired really mean very little in the scheme of things.  Quite simply priorities are changing pretty dramatically.

So, in this year of 2013, I'm dedicated to savoring the good moments in life, spending more time with my loved ones and not beating myself up so much when things don't work out quite as I'd planned them to...no small feat for me! If you know me "in real life," then if you see me slipping back into old habits and patterns feel free to say to me "G - I see you slipping."

Thanks for reading and I promise to do better and write a little more often.  It's time for a return to me...the image above was taken by me a little more than a year ago, when I had a friend visiting from Toronto.  I miss taking pictures...I think it's time for me to start taking them again.

Mwuah,

Georgia Peach

Is this thing on?

Hello to my faithful readers:

I can't believe I've waited more than a year to post anything on this blog.  My apologies for such a long break, but hey I've felt that if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all - life gets in the way.

I finally landed a job. I moved back to NYC and I didn't make such a big deal about it.  I think there are quite a few people who don't even realize I'm back in town nearly a year  two years after the fact.  I have also realized that it's quite easy to slip back into the rat race.  The past two years  for me have been ones that I haven't felt like sharing because I couldn't find the words.  I'm still not sure the words have been found, but here's my first stab at trying to share a bit of my journey.

Why didn't I make a big deal out of moving back or even getting a new job?  Coming back to NYC wasn't in the plans. I didn't want to come back to the big apple after my year in Belgium.   I still wanted something different.  But things didn't work out that way, bills had to be paid and this was the door open in front of me so I walked right on through it.

This past year I have spent an awful lot of time in my head.  I'm still processing the past two years.  I'm still not sure I know what to make of it all.  I recognize that my attitude has been half committed as evidenced by the fact that I still haven't fully furnished my apartment (after living here for nearly 2 years).   Six-year old me doesn't like to cook (grubhub is her BEST friend) and she really LOVES her junk food.

This year I've spent a lot of time frustrated with some of the choices I made.  I have to keep it real - I was getting caught up in the comparison game and when I looked around at some of my peers I felt like I wasn't stacking up.  Even though I own up to the fact that it was "ME" that made all of the choices - many of them left me with the feeling you get after going out on a few dates with a great guy who then stops calling you back because he got what he wanted because you gave it up too easy.  That's how I spent the first half of last year (2012) - feeling like I was just too easy!

The biggest challenge I face right now is not squandering my potential.  That's my struggle.   My inner voice keeps chanting "don't give up, don't give in - you can do this," but there are some days where my faith feels so far away.   It came to me a few months ago that this past year (and many times my relationship with God) has been like trying to reach orgasm.  Sometimes you have lots of fun trying to get there, but it takes the right set of circumstances, the right person to get you off.  But more often than not, when you don't get there you can end up very frustrated (and perhaps even a bit angry that you've wasted your time).

But after the frustration - perhaps there is light at the end of the tunnel...I'm finally starting to see the light.  Slowly.  I see the light.  So for now I'll sign off, but not with out saying as always - thanks for reading!

Mwuah,

Georgia Peach

PS - this is something I've written about a year ago and didn't publish at the time.