CHAPTER 7
Shift Your Engagement
IT’S ABOUT BEING ACTIVE, NOT JUST BEING PRESENT
Shane Johnson © 2011.
Where am I? Where are you?
Principles
1. The theory goes: as the level of awareness and understanding about an issue or cause grows, it becomes possible to engage individuals more deeply and, through that engagement, to expand the reach and impact of an effort further.
2. Activity is just activity. Measuring activity only gets you a measure of activity, not necessarily engagement or impact.
3. More and more people are sharing information and having conversations, and every small act that an individual takes to get more information and express more of their own personality and perspective on something, the more they contribute to the creation of a connection that is important to the idea of engagement.
4. The reasons that people connect, join, and ultimately engage with an organization are ultimately personal. How we create opportunities for people to engage must, therefore, be personalized as well.
5. The benefits of deeper engagement are many: not only are people likely to take more (and potentially more complex) actions, but the likelihood that they will abandon your cause for another diminishes as the level of engagement grows higher.
In the critically acclaimed 2009 film Up in the Air, George Clooney plays Ryan Bingham, a man who fires people for a living. Bingham’s own ...
