The final track that I attended was given by Whitney Hess (twitter), and was by far one of the most inspiring and influtential tracks of the IA Summit. Her message was simple, to be a success and be part of a community you have to get involved. The following are my tweets from her session:
http://thisisindexed.com/ Takes complex problems and talks about them in simple lines
It is bullshit to say that you can’t change the world if no one knows your name.
“Your voice and your name can be decoupled — that one CAN make a diff behind the scenes” – @KathySierra
Unless you practice your talents and share your knowledge you will never be a rockstar.
Can you explain why you are important in a single sentence? If not than that is something you need to work on.
Know what your strengths are and your weaknesses are. Accept your weaknesses and build on your strengths.
Having a blog is about sharing your expertise, it doesn’t help keeping that knowledge to yourself.
USE TWITTER – that is all D
Share your ideas and opinions, find people that inspire you, communicate with them. Find your voice.
Don’t be a lurker on twitter, you need to engage and bring value to the group
Google is your resume, your online presence is out there and people will find it.
You are a representative of the community, if you make yourself look bad you make us all look bad.
You don’t have to be an extrovert to network, some of the best connectors are introverts.
Connect with everyone on LinkedIn if you meet them personally they deserve to be on there.
There is no reason to be private on any social network, make yourself public.
Use twitter to network, use your real name, fill out the one-liner, link to your blog.There is no reason to protect your tweets
Think hard about what you say and what that says about you.
No matter what social network you use link back to your blog, use the same email address, and use the same usernames.
Seek out events, no matter where you live there is a community there. You just have to find it.
How to overcome shyness? Have a goal that you want to accomplish before meeting people.
The best thing to do is just walk up to someone and say ‘Hi’, if you do this you are networking
Always have a card to give someone, even if you just meet them in passing.
Follow up with everyone that you meet and solidify the relationship that you started.
Find out what people are working on, learn about their work. You are able to reach out to them for help in the future
In the end we are each other’s resources, we can’t be everything and we need to know who to go to for help.
Exude Confidence – “If you think you can or think you can’t, you are right” Henry Ford.
3 types of confidence – about yourself, making others feel confident in you, and helping others find their own confidence.
Which of these three are you good at? Identify that, but try to build up the other two.
Act ‘as if’ you are worthy. Doing that will eventually make you worthy.
Be willing to walk away if you find yourself surrounded by negativity. Remember that not all feedback is negative.
Admit your mistakes, learn from them and move on.
“God gave us two ears and one mouth to use in proportion” – unknown.
How to become a leader? Organize events, mentor others, give feedback and recognition, connect the dots.
Call Mentorship going out for coffee if it makes you feel better.
All this is about communicating hope, optimism, and enthusiasm. Take that in and share it.
We are helping each other get to a better place. So in the end don’t feed the trolls. Ignore the haters.
There are no rules, she is just making all this up anyway 
, but you need to follow your gut.
Go forth unafraid @whitneyhess
‘I think a lot of people want to be modest” – @whitneyhess
“You can put better stuff out there on your blog than my mom.” – Whitney Hess
Following the advise that Whitney puts forth, anyone should be able to become a vocal advocate in their field. She shows how tools like blogging, Twitter, and LinkedIn can be used to get yourself out there and how best to use them. If Whitney wasn’t able to get someone to go out and starting blogging, twittering, and connecting with like minded folks I don’t know what would.
View more presentations from Whitney Hess.