Weekly Alert: Seeking Randomness – and Finding Gratitude

mlns='> CMI Consulting Services can help you! [View Message in Browser]( / [Add Us to Safe Sender List]( Weekly News 11.27.20 Connect with CMI [18 Blogs, Social Media Posts, Podcasts, and More We're Thankful for This Year]( On this day devoted to gratitude in the United States, the CMI team shows their appreciation for some of the blog and social media posts, audio, and video that inspired us in this challenging year. [Read more]( By Jodi Harris [General Success Tips] Some more of this week's best stuff: - [How to Convince Your Company’s Brain Trust to Collaborate on Content]( [Sarah Mitchell]( Process and Teams] - [How to Do Inclusive Content That Helps Your Audience and Business]( Ann Gynn [High-Level Strategy] - [Brands Buck History, Give Home-Field Advantage, and More [Examples]]( Natalya Minkovsky [Content Creation] - [A Small Saturday, a Horoscope Personalization, and a Community Request [The Weekly Wrap]]( Content Marketing Institute Team [Trends and Research] Join Our Weekly Wrap News Crew Did you come across an exciting content idea, unique example, or puzzling trend this week? Help us share it with your fellow Content Marketing Institute readers by completing [this form](. If we include your submission in an upcoming Weekly Wrap, we’ll credit you as the source of the inspiration.  A Note From Robert Rose Seeking Randomness – and Finding Gratitude One of the overlooked stressors of our global, yearlong, lockdown (I’m using that term loosely), is something I call the danger of shrinking randomness. Humans love patterns, routines, and consistency. But we also thrive on new, random experiences. [This recent article explored why]( people feel so disoriented regarding time during the pandemic (isn’t it still March?). One reason experts point to is the loss of important routines and patterns, like leaving the house for work every day. But random events are also important for orienting ourselves and cementing memories. Seemingly forgettable occurrences take on more weight after the fact if the brain gets a hint that the event was important. The [Scientific American article]( that describes this phenomenon gives the example of meeting new people at a networking event. At the time, the conversations you had may have seemed unremarkable. But, if you later learn someone you spoke with there is on the hiring committee for a job you applied to, “suddenly the details of your conversation at the networking event become vivid and memorable – whereas the conversations you had with others at the event fade with time.” As content professionals, random events are critical to our ability to create. New, random experiences that go against our ideas about “how things are supposed to happen” are important triggers to creativity, [research shows](. Put all this together, and you can see how shrinking our exposure to randomness can hurt our ability to create interesting new things. You may think your pre-pandemic routines – walking to work the same way every day, sitting in the same office cube, seeing the same colleagues, and eating lunch at the corporate cafeteria – were a set of limited, templated patterns, too. But they were filled with possibilities for random exceptions to occur. In the virtual, work-from-home, stay-at-home world, our minds are starved for the tiny variations that spark new ideas. We miss the random conversation with a stranger waiting in the coat check line at a museum. We crave the unexpected coffee break story of the oddly dressed man someone saw dancing in the middle of Fifth Avenue. We lack the chance encounter in the elevator with Dan from accounting that reminds us we haven’t had lunch at that awesome sushi place in more than a month. We miss the sushi place. We even miss the horrible wait to get into the sushi place. Yes, I’ll say it. I even miss spending half a day in badly lit conference rooms overlooking a nondescript parking lot. Since I noticed the shrinking of randomness in my life earlier this year, I’ve tried to create new random moments. I reach out to friends I’d normally see only when traveling. When I mask up to go to the grocery store, I choose a circuitous route to see a neighborhood I’ve not been through in ages. I order things from stores I haven’t tried before. I hike different trails. My wife and I even switched sides of the bed for the first time in our 28-year marriage. This Thanksgiving, I’m grateful for so many things, including the random experiences I’ve had and the random experiences I’ve created for others. I’m grateful for you and the impact you’ve had on my year. As my grandfather once told me, “Every experience you create is the opportunity to have an impact on someone. You choose – as well as get to experience yourself – what that impact will be.” Here’s to the random nature of life. It provides the richness in our journey. It’s your story. Tell it well. Robert Rose Chief Strategy Advisor Content Marketing Institute This article from Robert is available only in this newsletter for you, the newsletter subscriber. If you have friends that would see value in Robert's weekly updates, please have them [subscribe](.  Sponsored Content 2020 Benchmark Report for Webcasts and Virtual Events Gain actionable insights & best practices based on real customer data from over 58,500 webcasts & virtual events. When you download this report, you’ll get: - The latest attendance, engagement, and viewing data from over 58,500 webcasts and virtual events - Examples of how organizations are shifting from in-person to virtual - Recommendations for how to improve your programming in 2021 [Download now »](   Sponsored Content The Extra 1%: Delivering a memorable content experience Your customers expect memorable, unique content experiences. However, most companies fail to fulfill these expectations, leaving behind a trail of unhappy and unsatisfied customers. In this guide, you’ll learn how to consistently deliver the extra 1% and provide customers with a memorable content experience. [View here »](   More from CMI Together we can build your effective strategic content operation. Our consulting and advisory service focuses on helping you and your team succeed with independent and pragmatic thinking across the entirety of marketing and communications. Sign a contract by 12/31/2020 for 10% off projects through 2021. [Contact Robert Rose today! »]( [COVID-19 CONTENT MARKETING RESOURCES]( Events [Content Marketing World]( [ContentTECH Summit]( [Master Classes]( [Content Marketing Awards]( Resources [Research]( [White Paper/eBook Library]( [Content VIPs]( [CMI Business Directory]( Education [Content Marketing University]( [Chief Content Officer]( [Webinars]( [Career Center]( Interested in advertising with CMI? 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