Mark Kolier’s Blog

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At least for now. Only two years ago a friend of mine was completely joking when he was asked about his favorite pro basketball team (and mine) – the New York Knickerbockers when he said – you mean ‘America’s team?’ It was pretty funny at the time considering the Knicks of 2009-2010 were woeful and nearly unwatchable.

Unless you’ve been living under that proverbial rock you are no doubt somewhat aware of the NBA’s newest sensation Jeremy Lin (who is also on the cover of Sports Illustrated this week – no not the swimsuit issue although I imagine Mr. Lin would have been happy to pose with Kate Upton). The accolades are deserved and the story is irresistible (just ask anyone). However underneath it all is a very interesting development when you consider the dramatic change in the Knicks from being a bunch of guys who were on the court together at the same time, into a team that plays for each other and gives supreme effort all the time. And they play in a city that has fully and completely embraced them. Of course if they lose three in a row….the boo-birds shall return just as quickly.

New Yorkers are a hard-to-please and cynical bunch. And when it comes to basketball they know their stuff. I don’t recall ever seeing another crowd cheer defense the way they do in New York nor cheer when a point guard decides to run time off the clock by not penetrating or shooting near the end of a game rather than throw up an ill-advised shot or make a bad pass.

But it’s not only in New York that Jeremy Lin and the Knicks are causing people to pay attention. The Knicks are not only fun to watch (for the moment) and winning (seven wins in a row for a team that was languishing at 7 games under .500) they are playing with a spirit and intensity that have not been seen from them in a long time. Even more interesting is the all-for-one and one-for-all spirit that has been imbued. Lin’s teammates genuinely seem thrilled for him and are enjoying the ride nearly as much as Lin and the fans. The Asian community both in New York and around the world is nearly apoplectic in a way that was never quite the case with recently retired NBA star Yao Ming.

Boxer Floyd Mayweather’s tweet this week on Jeremy Lin – “Jeremy Lin is a good player but all the hype is because he’s Asian. Black players do what he does every night and don’t get the same praise.” was just so off base it makes him sound stupid and jealous. If Lin was black, had gone to Harvard, been undrafted, cut by two teams and then sat on the bench for over a month as a 12th man, then come into a game and turned an entire team (and city) around he would be every bit the hero he has become -not to the Asian-American community necessarily – but just about everyone else.

Lin’s humility and bemusement at the sudden turn of events over the past two weeks is endearing and genuine. That plays both in New York as well as on the national and international stage. Let’s see, an American-born Taiwanese playing in the nation’s biggest media market in the ‘World’s most famous arena’ with a team of guys both black and white that are united and (for now) indefatigable and unbeaten with a host of new fans as well as old who cannot wait to watch or listen to the next game so they can root for their newest heroes. And they seem to be having fun by working together and giving it all they’ve got.

Sounds like America’s team to me. Hey as a huge Knick fan let me dream a little longer and I hope I never wake up from this one.

If you have 4 minutes you can watch a video that outlines Lin’s development from college into a pro basketball star. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFCZ01Hiv8o&feature=player_embedded

For the past almost six years I have been a member of a CEO group called Vistage – www.vistage.com . I’ve alluded to my participation in the group on more than one occasion on my blog. My original reason for joining was to gain perspective on running a small business that would be difficult to obtain simply by reading newspapers, magazines, and the like. Vistage gives you the opportunity allows the CEO of a small business to get out of their fishbowl, (and committee of one), to see how others in similar situations deal with their opportunities and challenges. Before I joined the CEO that invited me to consider it mentioned that the other members of the group would ultimately become friends and confidants and he could not have been more right.

Our business has had a tough year and my company continues to undergo many changes and as such I felt the need to step away from the group to completely focus on the issues we are facing. This was not done without careful consideration. It is not inexpensive to be a part of the group. However in today’s business world every business conversations seems to begin with three letters – ROI and I can tell you that the value I have received from being a part of the group has far exceeded the financial investment.

For those of you that do not know – a Vistage group meets monthly for an entire day. Think about setting aside one day a month where you would not go to the office but actually sit in a room off-site all day, not answering emails or phone calls (or at least not constantly) and discussing issues related to everyone’s individual business. It’s always intense as we regularly have an outside speaker for 3 hours who will talk on any number of subjects, and then we meet as a group for the balance of the day going around the table updating our personal as well as individual company statuses. The meetings last 7 or 8 hours and I often found myself exhausted from processing issues and thinking deeply about subjects that were discussed at the meeting. We feel the responsibility to be accountable to one another as peers and that responsibility is not taken lightly by any of the members. It’s one big reason why it works so well.

Each CEO also meets with the ‘Chair’ or group facilitator once a month for 1 ½ hours to tackle issues directly related to our business. One responsibility of the Chair is to get a CEO to do things that he or she would prefer not to do but knows that they should. It’s probably akin to herding cats at times.

The bonds I have formed over the past six years with my fellow members run deep and that was evidenced today by the groups abject refusal to accept my stepping down in what they consider a time when I could use the collective intelligence of the group more than ever. Not only did they implore me to come back to report as a ‘guest’ and keep in touch with the group, I walked out feeling that I have 14 very smart, very dear friends for life. And that’s very personal.

What do you do to get out of your own fishbowl?

I attended the OMMA http://bit.ly/q9cZ36 (Online media and marketing association) conference in New York City yesterday. While it is a two-day event I could only steal away for the opening sessions on Monday morning. I’m glad I went since the opening keynote was delivered by Jimmy Wales – Chairman Emeritus and founder of Wikipedia.com. Mr. Wales did a really good job in his short fifteen minute keynote (which by the way seems to me to be an ideal amount of time), and I gained an ever greater appreciation for Wikipedia.com and its mission.

If you spend any time on the internet you are no doubt aware of Wikipedia.com. Touted as the world’s free encyclopedia Wikipedia is available in 282 languages. There are more than 3.7 million articles in English, 19.7 million articles in all with more than 90,000 regularly active contributors. Of course there are reports of errors and vandalism that most of the time are corrected – and corrected quickly. And yes my source is – Wikipedia.com.

The content on Wikipedia.com is all user-generated and contributors are not paid. The crowd acts as its own police force when it comes to what is accepted as content and what is not. The accuracy (as of 2005) as reported in Nature showed that the science articles they compared came close to the accuracy of Encyclopedia Britannica. Personally I have come to rely on the accuracy and concise and easy to digest information contained on Wikipedia.com. I may never buy another set of encyclopedias again.

When Wikipedia.com founders Mr. Wales and Angela Beesley determined that there were topics that did not fit a traditional encyclopedia model, they then started Wikia.com. Wikia’s user-generated wikis range from video games and movies to food and environmental issues – it is considered a collaborative publishing platform for pop-culture. Wikia, Inc. attracts more than 45 million unique visitors per month to its 275,000+ enthusiast communities. Particularly popular with the gaming community, Mr. Wales noted that some Wikis are started and then simply die-off due to lack of interest. It would have to be that way when you really think about user-generated content and the areas of interest in which people would feel compelled to start a Wiki.

What I like best about this ten-year old platform is that at its core it is all about making the world a better place.

I wonder if and how much Julian Assange’s Wikileaks.org (unaffiliated with Wikipeida.com) has damaged Wikipedia.com’s brand?