New Year's Traditions

The past week I write about Christmas traditions, this week I want to share some of our new year's activities. Which one of these you share?

In Mexico there are a lot of different activities we do as a tradition on our New Year's Eve celebration, some of them it's really fun to do in group, so seize this day to have some good time with your friends.

Tradition 1: Colorful underwear, you can use it red or yellow.... or whatever color you like. Some of them represent love (red), the yellow one means money. If you buy some and take them to the party you can have a really fun time with your friends taking some pictures with this underwear placed on top of your clothes. 

Tradition 2: Eat 12 grapes with the bells, this activity can be related to the next tradition that is to make some purposes. Each grape represents one purpose you have to finish at the end of the year. The funny thing here is try to eat each grape with each bell, because on the general no one can eat and finish it's grapes, the same as the purposes, we start with a lot of intentions but not finishing the purposes.

Tradition 3: Make some new year's purposes. Some of them usually include loose some weight, stop smoking, making some exercise. In my case I have make promises of all of them, some are really easy to finish, and my recommendation is to make a commitment on a few of them and finish them. One useful tip on this is to share your purposes with your friends, and this way you will be more committed to finish them.

Tradition 4: Make a toast. Take advantage of the party and be thankful to the things that happened on the past year, remember your family and friends, your trips, and also be thankful of your friends.

Tradition 6: Take out your luggage. The theory says that you should walk around the block if you want to have a pleasure trip on the year. If you want to make it VIP you have to introduce some money inside the suitcase. The fun thing here is to take the walk with your red or yellow underwear on top and having lots of fun with your friends. Yo have to be a little brave to do this activity.

Tradition 6: Fireworks. In Mexico all the social networks are trying to stop this activity because the pets have a bad time with this cracking sounds. Even though there are a lot of houses that throw fireworks and have fun with the younger ones.

I hope you have a very fun time with your family and friends. HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015.

Season Traditions

Do you know some different holiday traditions that are held in different parts of the world?

Searching on the web, I found some of them that can be different on the way we traditionally live the Christmas in Mexico:

In Ukraine they decorate their trees with spider webs.

In Czech Republic, young Lady's throw their shoe above their shoulder and depending on its landing position they can predict if they will be marrying the next year or they have to wait a little more.

In Japan they celebrate eating KFC Chicken, all because at some time someone get confused with Colonel Sanders and Santa Claus images.

In Catalan, there is an image of the Caganer that is placed on the nativity scene as a prosperity and good luck charm for the next year.

In Guatemala they burn the devil, this tradition is also done in Mexico, but instead of doing it in Christmas we have this tradition on Easter and instead of the devil we use a Judah's image.

The variety of activities done to celebrate in different sites could be wide. I share with you a video with 20 different traditions that can be interesting to review if you want to go at some time to any of this places and have an idea on how they celebrate.

Adaptation Networking

Have you seen a customer service employee delivering at your car window?

An interesting event that happens when it comes to adaptation on the different circumstances that surround different places. At Mexico City parking spaces are few and expensive, the convenience stores do not have this facilities at most of their establishments. I miss living at a smaller city where this parking spaces were available at a 30 step walk.

In this big city, the space and the square meters are really important, so the managers have developed new service formulas to adapt to this situation. Innovation some may say. I have to tell you that a few days ago my son give me a call and ask me to buy for him 30 tamales to take to his posada (event party). It was 3:30pm and at that moment I haven't seen any tamales sold at the regular stores that I shop. In Monterrey tamales are sold at any supermarket and in some convenience stores too.

So the first thing I did was to ask a Mom that knew about this type of requests. The answers came fast, some of them lead me to different places where I can buy my tamales, but they remember me that it's better to ask for them with 2 or 3 days advance.

One of the mom's told me to go to a specialized store that has at least 12 different franchises. So I do my research in Internet, get the phone number and make a call. Jesus, store manager, answered and he explain me that he had the tamales, how to drive to the store and he offered that when I was near him I just "honk" and he will go out and deliver my request.

I had never lived a similar situation, and of course, when I was on my way to the tamale's store, I kept stuck on traffic and lost. This happens here a lot, but I take the phone and call Jesus again, as soon as he answered he gave me some new directions and get me to my way. He also told me that I should call him again when  I were near the Pizza Restaurant and he will gave me my tamales.

I still not catch his instructions, but I'm pretty obedient and when I was in front of the Pizzas Restaurant I call him again, I was at half a block from his store. He then told me turn on your flashers, then he asked about my SUV model and color and 2 seconds more he was at my window giving me the tamales, I do not have to get out of my car, neither wait for him. He also told me how to get back. This was an interesting experience.

Now my suggestions

a) If you do not have the parking spaces availability, look for different ways to give your customers service experiences less stressful, give them a taxi, have different alternatives or in as in this case make the "auto" delivery.

b) Organize with your customers the possibility to make their orders by Internet or by phone and then review the different options of delivery. 

c) Have fun in the process, Jesus helped me a lot with my driving directions and also give me some tips on the places I was lost.

Attitude

Stop being who you are and start being who you should be (Robert Kiyosaki)

Season events

Is the beginning of December and I'm really excited about the many networking activities that I'm going to get soon. How about you?

Is Christmas season and we can have one or all of the following cases:

1. Annual closure
2. December parties
3. Christmas Break

Particularly in Mexico happens the event called Guadalupe-Reyes Marathon that concurs with this time of the year. It begins on December 12th when Guadalupe Virgin festivity is held and ends by January 6th when the Wise Men celebration also is held.

In the meanwhile there is the 9 day celebration of the Posadas that start on December 16th. Then Christmas Eve and Christmas day (December 24th and 25th). We don't forget about our fools day that is on December 28th and then December 31st New Year's Eve with its January 1st New Year Day.

We end our Party Marathon on January 6th. This is a hard job for people that like to meet and greet with friends and family.

This event also has job implications because the companies seize this opportunity to finish the year's activities, plan for next year strategies and enjoy with employees the achievements. So be prepared to celebrate with friends and acquaintances, we are at the perfect time and moment to do it.

Network Use

Do you know how to use social network? Have you experiencie with the most common and what are they for?

Fernando Mol, this blog editor and my friend, send me the next thoughts that I want to share with you:

" I was invited to an event and the organizers put me in charge of the social network, they insisted that it has to have a lot of publicity over there, but neither of them has a Twitter account and their use of Facebook was only to family pictures exchange.

Young people, use the social network in a natural way, they are a little bit irresponsible, on their use, but they are really familiar to them.

I believe you have to share a tip for non-users. Tell your audience which are the ones recommended for professional use. What about the information you share on them and what you can find there. Personally I use frequently: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Vine, Reddit, Youtube, Vimeo, Pinterest and Linkedin.

Twitter is the most popular among executive levels, but is not that intuitive and people didn't find use of it and left it behind. Facebook is seen as a family network in Mexico and a lot of people use it for fun, not to make business. Instagram is for young people, and the older people can't imagine that Youtube or Vimeo are social networks. If you say Pinterest, you may get a "Bless you" answer. A lot of people has a Linked In account, because someone told them "You should have one", but after opening that account thay never reviewed it again.

Here my advice for the social network use:

Twitter is important because of 2 scenarios, first you can get information on what is going on for an especific theme, for example the stock exchange, sport results, or in a city you can know about traffic information, weather among other things. The second scenario is about your own material production, by this mean you can self promote the information you want and engrose the information about your own interests.

The now famous # (hashtag) that you may observe on the social network, was generated on Twitter, it helps to search for tendencies, and in this blog's case you can find us when you write #networking, you may find some other authors writing about the same thing.

Fernando Mol says: "Before you speak about Facebook, I will recommend using Twitter, but empasizing on the news information and people of interest, you may learn how to use hashtags, that are the main characteristics on this network. The people may use Twitter as if it was a Facebook account, following only their friends, and that may be not as interesting as following famous people's accounts: Bill Gates (@BillGates), Richard Branson (@richardbranson), Deepak Chopra (@DeepakShopra) and Maria Popova (@brainpicker) are some examples."

Facebook (an account for sure you have)... will gave you the opportunity to review different business scenarios, I have a lot of invitation to events from this social network, some of my friends make promotion on their products and services, and you may have restauant reservations or different opinions from the service. This blog, is related to a Facebook page and has more visits from this network that from the Blog per se.

Instagram is a lighter version of Facebook, but you may modify your pictures, integrating special effects that may lead you to perform as a professional, you may share them with # and review what other people is doing at some point. I haven't seen a lot of people above 40 using this network, but I have met a lot of youngsters, that are photograph amateurs using this resource to improve their selfies.

I'm going to skip Youtube, Vimeo, Reddit and Pinterest to write about them on another Blog post, I think this networks deserve special information, and because its a little bit harder to understand them. So lets go to Linked In.

This is a business social network, please be aware of this, it doesn't matter your age, postition, if you are not well prepared to do business, do not use this network. You have to be able to promote yourself as a professional searching for business opportunities, if you are a housewife, I don't recommend to make a profile, unless you have a business proposition. Please don't ask for cooking recepies, news about entertainment or publish information not related to business. This social network is perfect to have an approach to different companies, job search, providing services, meeting professional groups.

The social networks present enormous possiblitites, and the younger generations have some more interactional elements, gave yourself some time to perform with some experience and use them carefully, in the next 10 years you will be reviewing this networks as a megatendency.

Networking importance

Why is so important to have a solid networking?

When we create social connections we refer to each people we know that can be helpful once in our lives. A network allows to handle a lot of different elements, we can relate to neuronal connections, information technologies, transports, telephonic, social among several others.

When you take time to construct a network, you take base on your personal values, expectations and accomplishments, the history that precedes your performance and the results you get.

Great leaders have a lot of useful connections that allows them to innovate inside their companies. Reid Hoffman, linkedin co founder, consider this ability as a must and it's one of the mail elements on this social network. Robert Kiyosaki (Rich father, Poor father) expresses that the investors and visionaries construct network that allows them to see beyond what it's evident.

How many contacts do you have on Facebook? Do you keep a certain level of communication with them? If you have the need to ask for a favor, do you have the level of confidence to ask for it?

Taking care of our friends and contacts translates in little details, likes at their publications, eventually organizing a sort of event to promote the bonding. It's easier to have a business encounter with a person you know and have permanent contact.

Networking Spaces

How you decide on the space you will need for your networking event?

On my personal point of view, networking is not that difficult or complicated, somehow it has to have attitude and interest. Meeting a new person, get interested on his needs, establish some agreement points and follow up. This can be done at any place, but there are some spaces that make easier this task.

The past week I participate on the inauguration of the learning commons. This event make me think about the possibilities of networking that could be done depending on the spaces.

Here I share a recommendation list to consider and have a networking event:

a) Food and beberage accesibility. It can be a restaurant or a coffeshop, if there are some awkward moments at some point, you can always speak about food and drinks and there you go.

b) Connectivity and technology access. A lot of business conversations are made from information that we have on the cloud, a USB or a presentation. Make sure you can expose the information.

c) Whiteboards, flipcharts or white paper to write down your ideas. A lot of people can take notes on the presentations, the posibility to make a scheme, outline, drawing or doodle, make the process of thinking a little bit easier.

d) Last but not least, comfortable furniture. Maybe the meeting take only 15 minutes, but if you are going to be there for more than one hour, you'll be grateful to have some ergonomic furniture that make your networking easier.

Antinetworking

How to make an entire team work in a few minutes?

I have to collaborate at some events each other day, among some activities that I participate are the attention at events, conferences, lunch, simposiums. The starting moments at these events use to be stressful for the organizers, and a lot of things could go wrong: Information, Presents, Spaces, Microphones, Guest Attention, Materials.

Some people work a complete year to get the event done and they make an effort and collaborate to achieve the goal that on the inauguration day everything runs smooth. Somehow the boss came in and with only a word, or the lack of it, the enthusiasm passed away and the people demoralizes.

Other kind of attitudes that "kill" the support spirit include: don't stop to greet the people, ignore the personal, talk in a rude way, give incomprehensible orders, think that people understand without giving the proper training, criticize the decision making without proposing different alternatives.

This attitudes are called the "anti networking" events. Walt Disney should explain it: "What happens off stage, is shown on stage". So to avoid this attitudes I recommend:

a) If you aren't aware on what your personal is feeling about an event, collaborate on one or two activities that you were not supposed to make, like welcome the guests or pass the microphones at a conference, so you can feel the stressful moments and you have the feeling on how to improve the performance.

b) Even if you are tired, control your voice and intonation with your member team. You can improve the team spirit with a good attitude, but if you have bad temper, the consequences could be a disaster.

c) Give some kind of attention, congratulation or applause for the well performed actions. Seize the moment and tell your collaborators what they have performed well, this little details can help you on your next project.

Cancelation Networking

Sure this has happened to you or you heard a story about it, you are at the airport and suddenly by events beyond your control,  the airline cancel your flight ... 

Last Thursday I had to take a flight at 8:00 am, I arrived at the airport with my regalement 2 hours in advance. To this point I have spent so much on the airports I've learned to take my precautions.

The airport seemed as a market day with your paycheck with you. You'd think they were giving away tickets or stays, since it was a lot of people there, the most interesting is that although the time was more regularly for working travelers, plenty of tourists were delivering their luggage. I think I was waiting for an hour to deliver my suitcase. Eventually as I walked in the control line, and went to the waiting room.

Oh surprise! the speakers began to notice that due to bad weather conditions, the airport was closed for operations, that means no flights arriving or leaving. A dense fog was observed through the windows of the waiting room, but I kept thinking that soon somebody would announce that my flight would depart from gate number 43.

Minutes passed and nothing, the speakers were announcing that passengers should wait for some more indications. And suddenly my flight that had the status of "on time" appeared a horrible "cancelled" in red letters and the whole thing. If you are going to cancel a flight, at least they should not make it so dramatic, but anyway, I went to the service station of the airline, and of course the lady who attended was not aware of the cancellation. I asked her politely what should a mere mortal like me do? And I thought she would answer me to buy something like Credit Card "X" and with that we give VIP status, but no, she spread a paper with a phone number and told me that my situation should be solved by telephone only.


The speakers suddenly told that people from my flight were directed to another station, in a separate room, with more trained staff or the understanding that they would be more informed than the girl in the other room. Finally the time came and I had been front half of the plane and the other half from the airport, because while I was thinking, more flights were canceled and that things there really started to get complicated.

I stayed on line for another half hour, but the lady with a very nice attitude, told me that I was going to lose my flight and would get on it the next day, until then I had not reacted, but at that time I pointed out that: 

1. I was not missing a flight, which was missing two flights (all because of the airport connections)

2. That I was going to do any major scandal, because I was sure that they should send me to my final destination. I just wanted to go straight to the beach.

Sure my non reactionary techniques, the girl should already have a signal (because there were several cases that morning) that from the flight from Madrid, they had to send landing Queretaro, or arriving from Bogota, had been unable to land and had gone to Toluca. And she will have noticed that there were some passengers who would be losing the connection. So I was assigned a place in the next direct flight to the beach :).

The nice lady gave me the following indications: Miss you are going to have to leave these waiting rooms, collect your luggage in the bands, go again to make baggage drop out, go back through the security line and ready. I was not going to lose bad mood, until then, all we lost was a flight, but according to the itinerary of my new flight, I will arrive at my destination about 15 minutes after the scheduled time, not bad for a cancellation .

What happened next is the result of Networking and commented to the note of what one can do in these cases and not spend so badly. To get out, no special ramps, one has to regularly go out in the designated areas, but I had not reached these areas, so I went to the security filters to exit. At that time there was shift change, so they were all serving security guards receiving their day assignments. But they not allow me to get out, so I have to say "please I'm going to lose another flight" and of course someone take care of me and told me the password to get out of there: "Jimenez"

OK, I was out, but I had to get to the delivery area of luggage, to go back, I passed through the filter of the airport staff, not to mention, I was wandering around all interior corridors until I got to where I would found easily my suitcase, but like everything went well on the day, of course it was not my case over there. Neither the passengers flying to Matamoros and San Luis Potosi. 

We all got talking and waiting, spent about 20 minutes waiting for the luggage and then Matamoros came in. 20 minutes after the San Luis Potosi flight luggage arrived. But nothing at all about my flight, and worse, no passengers, it was kind of strange.

Again no offense to affect the wonderful work of the staff of the airline, I had to tell them that or they I gave my suitcase, or we would have a pretty severe transportation problem, and asked for my suitcase, which arrived in about 20 minutes, the apparently estimated response time at this airline.

In the process, the man at the gate got a large group of passengers, supposedly would get to Sonora, but even if they were already on the plane, they take them down, I think that will make me get angry. 

With my suitcase I returned to the baggage drop off, and before it had taken me an hour to deliver, now 2 hours. There were many people making changes, asking them to give tickets for another time, etc. In a situation like this people can get very violent.

So my recommendation, when you pass something like that, take it easy, learn something in life, in my case two hours later arrived at my destination, but ultimately I arrived and had the best time.

Alive were taken...

How to get involved into a social cause? How to help when one is not in context?

About a month ago, from some causes not yet clarified, 43 teacher students from a little town called Atyotzinapa become abducted, this means, no one knows where they are, or if they are still alive. There hasn't been communication with them, neither the government nor their families are aware of their whereabouts and the information on the communication media is random.

This has been a hard situation to my country, because it make us realize that there are failures related to security, communication media, investigation formats, among others. This is a regretful situation, but I don't want to focus on what I can't do, this should be a time, family, press and government issue.

I like to think over the unity that has been raised on behalf this sad situation. Because the information is not circulating, civil society has been organized to demand some type of answer and find this 43 people. This situation includes different educative institutions that are leading the efforts to organize and promote what has been done about this event. It has been a month and no one has given a reasonable answer related.

I like to observe that the conveying power has been good, and that a lot of people has added their efforts to find out or pressure the authorities. I could not stop thinking about this students, I feel kind of related to them, as myself has 2 boys that also are students. Some of the social activities done to promote attention to this event are: a) Mega marches, b) Rallies, c) Handouts, d) Toll locations taken, e) Highway closure.

The parents involvement and the student peers has been important, they had left their usual activities, and made the society to be aware on what has happened by different media. For example, the Toll locations, has the implication to let the people get through them, but they asked about money collaboration to get forward to this cause and continue to pressure the authorities to get resolutions.

The highway closure, made a lot of people not to transit during the "rush hour" but it was on Sunday, so the inconvenience didn't affect a lot of people, and you could continue and get a little late, the complete way is just about 4 hour driving. Yes this causes affect people, but it was not in an aggressive mood, it was more like "please be aware of what has been happening".

Marches and rallies, affected the turbulent roads on Mexico City, but these were planned on a Thursday night or on a Sunday, trying not to affect the complete city. I think this is a way to show leadership and pressure, without affecting a lot of people. A really interesting position.

Of course there were people that seize the opportunity, and make some disturbs or thefts, but the movement leaders, immediately desvinculated from this provocations and make a statement that it was not their position.

Now my personal reflection, I hope that sooner it could be an answer to the families of this 43 boys, I support the civil society, the parents and the students. If in my hands I had the opportunity to help in some way, I will do it, like posting this information, I consider this social movements should wake up the citizenship about this situations. Our Mexican society is really peacefully, and we have to make a statement that we don't want more students disappeared.

Italoregio

I was at one of our informative sessions when I met Andre, an Italian guy that is actually living in Mexico City and with whom I start talking about cultural differences.

Andre is married with a girl from Monterrey, so we share a common theme. Andre is actually very young, I think he is about 30 years old, and to be an Italian, I couldn't think he will be married. So I asked directly how he has taken that important decision.

He told me that there were 2 different facts that influenced his decision, first of all his wife has spoken to him and because they had about 3 years going out, she told him that she will not be waiting for him eternally. He told me that I suppose to understand more about that, he didn't understand why the girls in Monterrey decided to get married and not to continue with their professions. As if it was contrary to get married and work. For his wife it should be difficult because she is one of the 10% of her friends that decided to continue working and raising a family. He told me that it was something they had to negotiate before the wedding. I couldn't answer directly, because I have met a lot of professional women that become working moms or working wives, but also I had a lot of friends that decide not to work and be housewives. I think that some of the different customs do not change.

The second situation that influenced his decision, has to do with the economic crisis were Italy is at this moment. He told me that the reception is not making progress among the different industries at his homeland, and is directly affecting the ways the young people is having fun right now. On different times they used to go out to a bar or a restaurant, now they prefer to stay at home and make some pasta, this changes make people settle and that is the reason they choose to get married. I had never thought about this situation, but maybe a crisis should change some type of customs, like getting married.

Before I leave, I ask about the wedding party and he told me they get married at Italy, at a town near Venice. He told me that the celebration was really important to his family, because on the first place they were not the ones that throw the party, as in Mexico the brides family should do it. But because he was transferring to Mexico they negotiate that the wedding should be held at Italy. So the preparations begin and they manage to make an event previous to the wedding day, a meal at a friend's vineyard. They invited 250 close friends, and they consumed 350 wine bottles, but this event prepared the whole event to make friends and ground the conditions to make some Mexican Compadres. The wedding day became a celebration among friends, because they had shared a previous friendship. 

When our 5 minute break ended I had a lot of information to share, so I can give you some recommendations when speaking about deeper issues:

1.- Ask to your new friend, what make him get into the city, region or country. For sure you will get an interesting story.
2.- Make some questions about the change process, in this example it was a wedding, but you may find out some other activities that you may seize to learn more about your new friend.
3.- Genuinely get interested about the information you are getting, make some deep questions and learn about new customs.