My blog is about “what keeps me up at night”.  For people that never read my blog,  they get the impression that these things are things that worry me.  It couldn’t be more opposite.  It is the passion and excitment about a new idea, new opportunity and new potential that keeps me up at night.

Last night, I tossed and turned with that excitement.  Hearing the new president elect Barack Obama speaking on the theme of “Yes we can” last night resonated with me.  I was moved.   “Yes we can” is at the core of American innovation.  The same curiosity that pushed our manifest destination to expand from ocean to ocean is core American.   I’m looking forward to seeing our country move forward with an intense curiousity which was void in the last administration.  Intense curiosity makes you ask “why not” when you start to realize what the possibilities are.   If enough bright people as “why not”,  soon people are believing in “yes we can”  vs. just saying it.   I’ve always believed we can.

I’m thinking that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. believed in yes we can.  Nearly half a century later,  the majority of Americans truly accepted a man by the “content of his character”, not just to be a friend or acquaintance, but to be their leader.  Wow.

Yes we can. One of my passions is seeking alternative energy sources.  This is the time for yes we can as it relates removing our dependence on foreign energy sources.  Anyone who doubts the possibilities should review the work that our good scientists, American scientists, are doing at the National Ignition Facility (http://lasers.llnl.gov where they are working on nuclear fusion.  How about unlimited energy that is clean, can produce more energy than it requires to make it and we can export it to the rest of the world for a good capitalistic profit.  Why not?  Yes we can!

I’m basically a very curious person, so in getting ready for SourceCon, I’ve been getting some questions ready in my head to ask those movers and shakers in sourcing. Here is one I’d like to throw out, it’s something that I need to solve at Broadlook.

Let me give the problem some background:

15 years ago, few people used email. It got popular.

10 years ago, few people used instant messaging. It got popular

5 years ago, few people used SMS or text messaging. It got popular.

Now we have Skype, LinkedIN, Twitter, iPhone GPS, and they are getting popular.

What I am pointing out here is that Contact information is no longer limited to explicit forms of contact information. (i.e. Name, title, phone, email). A few form of contact information is the Implicit. It is important to classify those implicit forms. If they are not classified, they are not recorded. If they are not recorded, they cannot be leveraged. For example, a personal blog is a form of implicit contact information, I can follow the URL to the blog and learn about the person (candidate in a recruiters case) and get the scoop on them.

What are the new forms (actually I prefer “venues” of contact information? Here is what we have so far at Broadlook, if anyone has suggestions for new forms, please ping me.

Contact Venues (not including traditional like phone/email)

1. SMS/TXT

2. Instant message – (different from SMS, as it needs a network, whereas any cellphone can Text another)

3. VOIP – (skype, etc)

4. Blog – wordpress, blogger, twitter (twitter..we consider micro-blogging)

5. Social network – LinkedIN, etc

6.GPS – debatable, but where you are is an aspect of Contact information

7. Domain – The corporate domain, as important today as knowing the company name they work fo

Why am I doing this? The next generation of Broadlook Technologies tools will be capturing all Venues of contact information. If anyone doubts the utility of such an endeavor, take a look at my email signature:

Getting up a 4am tomorrow to beat the Chicago traffic to eventually end up in Cleveland. I’ll be visiting our friends at Main Sequence Technologies, makers of PC Recruiter. It will be a fun road trip and I encourage anyone to call me on my cell 414-899-4204 if you have ideas on the venues of contact information.

In fact, anyone who can convince me of a new venue of Contact Information, which I did not include here, I’ll reward you with a $500 credit towards any Broadlook product  (SourceCon attendees only).