The ancient Greek scholar Archimedes was wrestling with a problem. Hiero II, king of Syracuse, suspected that he was being cheated by the goldsmith who had cast a votive crown for a temple. He had asked Archimedes to confirm or deny his suspicions, but substituting other metals for gold in an irregular object was not something that was easily done in the days before laser scanning and 3-D imaging. One day while lowering himself into his bath, he noticed that the water level rose as his body sank into his bathtub. He was reported to have repeatedly shouted “Eureka! Eureka!†loosely translated to “I have found it!†as he ran naked through the streets of Syracuse. He had suddenly realized that the density of an irregular object could be determined by the displacement of water. Archimedes received a good performance appraisal from his King and the goldsmith got a pink slip and became an unemployed [and probably headless] job seeker.
I look for eureka moments. Although getting ready to tackle the Daily To-Do list never finds “Eureka Moment†in the top ten items of importance, there is a hidden agenda that hopes to stumble onto something special. Sometimes there is a sudden realization that someone else has the answer to a problem and sometimes I delight in seeing the eureka moment happen in someone else because of something I have said or done.
- We all know that most conferences are all about the networking and learning that takes place between sessions. Deciding between conflicting sessions can be a frustrating but powerful driving factor in the success of a conference. Last year at the SocialHRCamp in Boston, I wandered into a session on Talent Communities led by Leanne Chase. I had participated in discussions, arguments, and Twitter chats about talent communities, but if I had ever said anything relevant it was probably accidental or coming from some remote automatically respondent part of my brain. There on the screen was my eureka moment on this subject. It was a simple depiction of people connected like the spokes of a wheel rather than inward or outward arrows that had connected in my mind. Being a very visual learner, there was suddenly meaning to a dimension I had not seen before that moment. Fortunately, I was able to restrain my enthusiasm and did not run through the streets of Boston naked, but it was tempting.
- It is also possible to lead from the sides of the conference room table instead of the front of the room. Once at a staff meeting of human resources colleagues, the topic of social media and the value of connection and collaboration went around the table with roughly half of the room being totally in the dark. There were some people there that I had attempted to reach on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn and the proof of their non-belief in the concept was more than obvious. Out of nowhere, I heard my voice saying, “If I connect with you on social media it is because I am interested in what you have to say.†The elaboration on that point is irrelevant because I instantly saw light bulbs going on. Their eureka moment was the realization that they had something to offer and the best way to share it was to use electronic means through social media. Before they all ripped off their clothes and ran into the streets shouting “Eureka!†I think I also mentioned that I did everything online… even reading the newspaper. There was no need for print medium to line the birdcage after the canary died.
I hope I have another eureka moment today. Maybe it will be in someone’s blog post, maybe I’ll see it on Twitter, or maybe I’ll just make one of my own. After all, the value of networking is to give more than you receive.
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