Employer video testimonials

More than 14,000 businesses and organizations hired ITT Technical Institute graduates in 2011-12, disproving the notion that we were just a "diploma mill" leaving students with more debt than results. With no initial budget, our team at headquarters devised a strategy to have each of ITT Tech's 140 campuses across the U.S. identify the local businesses in their cities that employed ITT Tech grads and would be willing to answer a series of prepared questions. We knew we were dealing with amateur, supplied footage, and that was OK. We ended up with more than 450 raw video files, which we produced for each campus to use in their open house recruiting endeavors. Some of those clips were placed on the ITT Tech YouTube page, giving outsiders a great impression when they landed on our site. We invited employers across the United States -- from Boeing to Universal Studios -- to talk about the relationship they have with ITT Technical Institute, and to share observations about the ITT Tech graduates they have hired.

ITT Tech video testimonials

Thanks, boss

I publicly shouted a thank you to a former boss, and here's how she publicly thanked me!

Being social

I had another great opportunity to do journalism-like reporting of a couple of events involving groups that I am involved with - Indianapolis Social Media, and the #Social46 Super Bowl Klout-recommended group that helped spread the word about Indy during the Super Bowl. The two items couldn't be more different in style. I used Storify to chronicle Live-tweeting an organ transplant. Indianapolis-based IU Health's communications staff provided a play-by-play of commentary from the operating room on June 13, live tweeting a kidney transplant. Kristofer Karol and Gene Ford explained how they prepared for such an event at the IndySM breakfast, hosted by Indiana Blood Center.
I also used Storify for BrewhouseFoodie makeover menu in Indy. The marketing geniuses at @brewhouse want to create a buzz about all the changes coming to the menu and thus hosted a tasting for some social media folks in Indy. No expectations other than to use the hashtag #brewhousefoodie when we posted.

Jim Brown's MBO, 2012

No matter how far along you've brought your company through its journey with social media - either as its strategist or advocate, you should always be ready to go back to the beginning. What is the fundamental purpose of the tool. That's not just reciting your mission statement or a providing a snapshot of your metrics or spouting off the number of posts, the number of daily likers, your follower count. Those are all important - they justify the expense. Headcount isn't cheap. It can be - and should be - even simpler. Anyone familiar with an airport's TSA screening area has concluded their cattle-chute experience by using the "recovery area" – the group of benches and metal tables where you repack your laptop and retie your shoelaces. This area has always felt refreshing after a traveler has endured the disheveling experience. Yet it's also an oddity - a traveler has endured a gauntlet on their journey, one that puts you on track to your gate. Despite all that you are still just unfettered steps from being back in the main terminal. This aviation experience offers a good lesson for businesses that communicate to external audiences via social media. No matter how far along in your journey with social, you should be able to explain to newcomers within your company what the fundamental purpose of the tool is. I need refreshers which is why I like being a member of a social media club, or supporting those that do it, such as Jim Brown. Whch brings me back to my first point. I decided to attend the session just as much to see what's being said by speakers, but also because of the knowledge that you gain from attendees about the very topic of this blog post. Do they take the same approach when it comes to explaining social within the context of the company? I’ll give you an example, retaining the aviation theme. I attended a ginormous helicopter convention in Orlando, FL in 2011 and was pleased to borrow a coworker’s first-generation iPad, hook into the civic center’s wifi and tweet out news for my company. It felt so productive. But on the shuttle back to the hotel, I found myself having to explain what Twitter was to about a half-dozen marketing and sales department heads. As Jay Baer describes it, digital illiteracy in the boardroom regarding social media is still a huge issue for company social media specialists. When I worked at my old newspaper job, I was not just tweeting news, but helping to legitimize my company as an authority in social media, which is a small piece of the pie when it comes to credibility. We use social, so we get technology, so therefore we must be competent, we can be trusted. We’re with it. I’ve carried that same mentality into two successive jobs. But speaking social is like speaking Spanish. You’ve got to be fluent with outsiders, then be willing to translate your words to the English-speaking executive, or your mission will fail terribly. I don’t tend to social media conferences because I don’t see their value, beyond learning the characteristics of a particular campaign, which is extremely helpful. I’m defining my own approach. Oh yes, I keep tabs on what everyone else is doing. Experts at a conference like MBO are able to step away from the conveyer belt, take a look at the products being created, and assess not just the total numbers and efficiency but ask: is it worth it? I can then absorb those lessons, add them to my own mental equation and give an even better answer when I am asked what the fundamental purpose of the tool is.

INTF-1 at southern Indiana tornadoes

The Indiana Department of Homeland Security activated the FEMA asset just hours after tornadoes struck in southern Indiana. This isn't necessarily a big deal for media, but since I was in the process of gathering research for a book about the Urban Search and Rescue program, it was a good idea to again use Storify to identify material that could be of use later down the road. Here was my Storify: Indiana Task Force 1 at historic, deadly 3-2-2012 tornado

#Social46

A (subjective) "elite 46" were picked as ambassadors to the Circle City for activities associated with Super Bowl 46 on Feb. 5 in Indianapolis, Indiana. We were in charge of promoting a zip line, more bands than at Bonnaroo, and warming stations. Take that, winter!

I decided to use another social media site, Storify, and wrote "Indy aims to have most social Super Bowl ever" to chronicle what the group was doing, and to quantify output in some meaningful way. The second installment "I'm in it to spin it" proved even more popular.

High-profile bloggers took notice!

The excellent @JayBaer of Convince and Convert wrote, "Generally, the group has taken to the cause like a crafter to Pinterest, with dozens of tweets, photos, blog posts, and more popping up daily – and the game isn’t for another 10 days. Former reporter, now PR guy Tom Spalding is chronicling the blow-by-blow with regular Storify collections from the Social 46 trenches." Read his post here.

I got about 1,000 page views from installments 1 through 7. They were, in order:

Part III: A welcome to #SB46 Indy from #Social46 & friends!

Part IV: Football? #SB46 Indy feels pretty #Social46 to us

Part V: #Social46 has a picturesque impression on #SB46

Part VI: #Social46 welcomes Day 1 of #SB46!

Part VII: Ziplines, #SB46 & #Social46 odds 'n ends

Ex-firefighter is a Parkinson's activist

As Gary Coons talks about the security challenges that come with Indianapolis hosting the 2012 Super Bowl, he fidgets with a small patch of cloth. Holding the fabric helps still his hands from the shaking associated with Parkinson's disease.

"I try to keep my fingers from moving," said Coons, chief of the city's division of homeland security. "I do my best to hide it."

Coons, 39, believes he contracted Parkinson's during his days in the Beech Grove Fire Department, where he worked from 1998 to 2006.

Parkinson is an incurable, degenerative and debilitating disease. It also afflicts "Back to the Future" actor Michael J. Fox; Janet Reno, former U.S. attorney general; and former boxer Muhammad Ali.

Scientists are just beginning to explore whether there could be a link between exposure to heavy metals like manganese and Parkinson's disease. Coons thinks his could have been triggered that way. He thinks his may have come from breathing toxic air at a paint store fire three years ago.

In 2008, Coons founded "Firefighters with Parkinson's Disease," an Indianapolis-based organization working to educate firefighters and public safety employees about the dangers of suspected chemical triggers for Parkinson's. Coons is also raising funds for research.

His work led to a state law that enhances benefits for Indiana public safety workers who contract Parkinson's.

Richard Nass, an associate professor of pharmacology and toxicology at the Indiana University School of Medicine, has been inspired by Coons and his story.

Working with a neurologist, Nass is trying to examine the connection between toxins, such as lead and mercury, and neurological disorders, such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.

He plans to take samples from firefighters' coats and swab their noses to determine how high their exposure to heavy metals may be.

"We want to make sure . . . that whatever conclusion we draw is the truth as much as we know it," he said. "I know of nowhere else in the country where we have this opportunity."

Coons hopes first-responders will wear their breathing apparatuses, even after a fire is extinguished, to avoid inhaling toxic air from leftover vapors.

"I want to make it safe," he said. "I don't want somebody coming down with a disease."

Coons was a career firefighter for 15 years before retiring in 2006 with a line-of-duty injury. In 2005, he went through a series of surgeries to repair his shoulder and back damage related to his line-of-duty injuries. During this time, his wife, Trish, began noticing he was moving more slowly, his legs shook, he had blank stares and he stooped as he walked.

He became aware of increased stiffness and pain in his shoulder and lower extremities, smaller handwriting and soft speaking. They both related these symptoms to his injuries and sought medical help from multiple physicians. They offered therapies, but his injury was never connected with a neurological disease.

It took two years before Coons was diagnosed.

The mathematical probability of Coons (who was about 34 when he started developing symptoms) developing Parkinson's disease was 1 in 100,000. But a smattering of research suggests that firefighters run a much higher risk of developing the disease.

It's unclear how many firefighters have Parkinson's, as many younger victims don't come forward out of fear that they'll lose their job.

Charleston (S.C.) Fire Chief Thomas Carr also has the disease and believes his is "most likely" attributable to exposure to toxins during fighting fires. His assignments, including searching the rubble after the April 1995 bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, all doused him with toxins.

"I'm interested in Gary and Gary's work," said Carr, 56. "We're trying to leverage all of these connections with the fire service. . . . We have to teach our people."

Coons, whose professional career has ranged from firefighter to an administrator of the rescue group Indiana Task Force 1 and trustee of Perry Township, was named to his current job in 2010 by Public Safety Director Frank Straub.

Straub was aware that the person responsible for bringing together police, fire and emergency management personnel and resources under the homeland security division has an affliction that requires taking as many as 14 pills a day.

"I never once considered Gary's illness as a bar to appointing him to his current position," Straub said. "In fact, it is virtually impossible to slow him down."

Coons thinks he's sharper because of the constant flurry of activity. In early February, he shuffled between helping coordinate the city response to an ice storm and being a part of the delegation of officials who took a fact-finding trip to the Super Bowl in north Texas. He thinks his constant challenges and workload help him manage his symptoms.

His energy has earned the praise of Scott Newman, the former Marion County prosecutor who was diagnosed with Parkinson's while in office. He is also a former public safety director.

Usually those with Parkinson's can't handle too many competing stimuli that "can cause a freeze-up," said Newman. Coons "manages to ride through that . . . so full of energy that he leaves people in his dust."

Star reporter Shari Rudavsky contributed to this story.

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