Whenever my mother or some other evolved being tells me "a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step" I have to stop myself from shaking them by the shoulders and saying,

"OK fine! You sit next to a screaming child on a plane.  And you're right, my journey is going to begin with one big fat single step - noise canceling headphones!"

Goodbye San Jose

For all of you who will be leaving the National Arts Marketing Project  Conference in San Joseand flying home and might find yourself in the unfortunate position of being seated next to a very loud little person, spend the two bucks for a headset and pump up the volume.

Here are some other travel tips:

Like many before me and many to come, I came to Silicon Valley for the Chips -- specifically, Chip Heath, co-author of Made to Stick and Switch, and one of my heroes Chip Conley, owner of Joie de Vivre hotels (who I actually admitted to having a brain crush on via Twitter). Both Chips were keynotes at the 2010 National Arts Marketing Project Conference held in San Jose this weekend.

The first time I listened to Chip Conley (who tweeters at the conference have immortalized with the hash tag hotchip) and as I read Peak, I thought a lot about how Arts Alliance Illinois, primarily an arts advocacy organization, could “refresh the identity” of Illinois arts practitioners and leaders through advocacy.

But this time, maybe because I’m still thinking about Election Day, I was thinking about a Hierarchy of Needs for elected officials. Specifically, what is transformation for elected officials. If you were an elected official, what would it mean to be all you can be?

Before you begin the snarky comments, let me take a step back – for all of you wondering what the Hierarchy of Needs is, how this is connected to Chip Conley, and what it means to refresh an identity.

You may have heard the term “Hierarchy of Needs” in a psychology class or on your Lincoln-Douglas debate team if you’re a dork like me. Abraham Maslow, a professor of psychology, invented the term when he decided to shift the gaze of psychologists from the “worst case scenarios” in humanity to those living the happiest and most satisfying lives. He discovered a hierarchy of needs – from basic survival to transformation – that defines human existence. Here’s my rendition:

Photo credit: Flickr user Khalid Almasoud.

The bottom layer is all about physiological needs: food, drink, air, and sleep. Next up are your safety needs. Then there are needs related to love and belonging, followed by esteem needs. On top of the pyramid is self-actualizing, being all you can be.

What's CRM?  And why are we talking about this at an arts marketing conference?

These questions inspired me to attend today's panel discussion: "The Brave New World of Customer Relationship Management Technology" to find out what CRM was all about, and hear how arts organizations are using it.

Illuminating the topic of customer relationship management in relation to the arts was Steven Roth, President of The Pricing Institute; Ruth Davidson, Director of External Affairs for ArtsEmerson: The World On Stage; and moderator Eugene Carr, Founder and President of Patron Technology who gave Brian Sayre, Director of Ticket Services for PlayhouseSquare's presentation (Brian was not able to make it to the conference).

Let me begin this post by saying: If you're an arts marketer but aren't on Twitter, get an account before next year's conference in Louisville. I promise you that you will have a richer conference experience because of it. Seriously.

Why? Twitter brings people together. It's such a powerful, real-time communication tool that naturally facilitates dialogue. One of my favorite experiences at this conference is actually meeting people in person that I follow on Twitter. In a way, I actually feel more of an affinity towards them because of the fact that I've read their tweets! We're not just tweeting back and forth and never engaging in conversation in real life; if anything, Twitter is an online tool that actually facilitates face-to-face communication at events like conferences.

Twitter's also a great way to experience other parts of the conference, like other sessions or roundtables that you're not able to attend. It's pretty easy to take a general snapshot of how attendees are feeling just by monitoring what's going on with the event hashtag (which is #NAMPC10 for this conference). If there's a strong reaction, positive or negative, to something that's said in a session, you will know about it. You'll know what funny quotes are said, valuable insights are shared and random observations are made. Thanks to Twitter, I know I'm not the only one who was confused by the cricket chirp ringtone in one of the sessions!