Whether it be losing weight or being more outgoing, we’ve all decided to change something about ourselves for a fresh start on New Year’s Day. Many people, especially in America, resolve to get fit or make healthier choices for the coming year. Now that I think about it, maybe that’s why we party so hard on New Year’s Eve. It’s your last “hoorah” when it comes to possibly bad decisions for the next X amount of days, weeks, months, or years.

The only problem with making New Year’s resolutions is that most people only stick with their plans for the first couple of weeks and then they fall off the wagon. New Year’s resolutions are similar to Lent for Catholics; however, instead of 40 days, the object is to commit to your goal for the rest of the New Year (yes, all 365 days). This commitment obviously presents a challenge in consistency and perseverance, which is why many people start to make smaller, more attainable goals with each coming year. Investing in a feasible goal for the New Year can help one’s chances of success quite a bit. However, the downside to this can sometimes be complacency. If you are setting easy goals, you may be settling with your weaknesses.

There should be moderation in setting a New Year’s resolution, as evident in some of the following goals from our Red Sky team. For the most part, being a health-conscious agency, everyone at Red Sky has committed to some type of health-related goal, including working out more, eating better, and becoming more mentally healthy. “My resolution is to treat my body and mind like I want it to last awhile,” Matt said. “Even if it means abusing it at the gym everyday.”

Some of the Red Sky employees have outlined other non-health related goals as well, including Danae’s goal of finding a hobby or something she is really passionate about. Chad also outlined a goal of reading and writing more. I’ve since established a similar goal of reading 25 books this year. Many of us have multiple resolutions to round out our goals and strengths, giving us more options and variance for the New Year.

One thing that is a significant factor in your New Year’s resolution success is having supportive people around who know your goal and want to help you achieve it. “It helps having a support group and not someone trying to sabotage good work,” Gloria said. Whatever your goals are, having advocates there to help you along the way is vital. Do what you can to help those around you stay on track, and they just might do the same to you in turn.

-Kalyn Neils

Situation
Our children’s health is a hot topic nationally. You cannot turn on a news program or read a newspaper without hearing how overweight our nation’s children are becoming. If you haven’t heard, this generation will be the first to die before their parents (or at least have a shorter life expectancy).

Idaho is no exception. Statistics show:

• 11.8% of Idaho children and adolescents ages 2-19 are obese (CDC)
• 82% of Idaho high school students consumed less than the recommended 5 servings of fruit and vegetables a day in 2009 (2009 YRBS)
• One in five (20%) students bought at least part of their lunch from a vending machine during one or more of the weeks prior to the survey (2009 YRBS)

In 2010, Red Sky was contracted by the Idaho Physical Activity & Nutrition Program (IPAN) through the Department of Health and Welfare to help combat the trend and conduct outreach to Idaho schools regarding grand funding available for Idaho schools/districts willing to institute policy changes regarding foods and beverages vended and sold – through avenues outside of the USDA breakfast and lunch programs – during school hours.

Opportunity
IPAN staff realized there was a gap in what schools are teaching about health and nutrition and the environments and policies related to vending and “competitive foods” (foods offered during the school day outside of the USDA’s school breakfast and lunch programs) that had been established within the schools themselves.  After receiving funding from the CDC, IPAN staff and Red Sky set out to identify the best path for helping Idaho schools/districts create environments that make the healthy choice the easy choice.

Strategy
In order to encourage participation in the pilot program, Red Sky led a coordinated outreach program to Superintendents, Principals and PTA/PTO organizations across each of Idaho’s School Districts via letters, emails and updates in the State Department of Education’s weekly newsletter.

In order to ensure that schools/districts that applied were serious about making policy-level changes and implementing the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Standards for foods and beverages offered through vending, school stores, a la carte lines and other “competitive food” avenues, the application required signatures from both the principal and the superintendant of the district.

After review of the applications, Soda Springs, Jefferson County (in Rigby) and Richfield School Districts were selected to receive funding. Like the majority of Idaho districts, these three are relatively small and in predominantly rural communities – providing an excellent chance to learn how small districts with limited funds can create and sustain changes that will positively impact the overall health and performance of students.

Red Sky visited each of the districts to discuss the plans they had for their funding, to outline the changes that would be expected as part of the funding, to ensure that each district understood the standards that they would be implementing in the 2011-2012 school year, taste-test foods that meet the IOM Standards and to begin to help the schools pull together the action plan IPAN and CDC required in order to receive their funds.

In an effort to make this change as easy as possible for the schools, Red Sky (in conjunction with our dietician partners Sue Linja and Dara Jezierny) developed two important tools:

• Allowable Foods List (a “living” document of foods that meet the per serving/as packaged calorie, sugar, salt and fat requirements outlined by the IOM)
• IOM Calculation “Cheat Sheet” (a reference sheet for reading food and beverage labels and how to do the math)

In early November, Red Sky facilitated the mandatory collaborative conference call in order to check in with each of the schools/districts regarding where they stood against their action plans, discuss progress and challenges with each other and answer any questions. We anticipated that schools may be having a difficult time finding items that met the IOM standards. What we heard was that by taking the Allowable Foods List and the Cheat Sheet on their shopping trips, they have been able to find items that meet the requirements relatively easily.

Another victory was that every district was able to revise their policy and have it approved by their School Board and Superintendant without any difficulty, demonstrating that these districts are serious about making sustainable changes to benefit the health of their students.

While each of the districts was expected to modify their existing wellness policies to require all vended and competitive foods served during school hours to meet the IOM Standards, each has taken a different approach to their activities for creating the environmental change.

Soda Springs High School
In Soda Springs, funding is being used to purchase a refrigerated vending machine (for the high school) that will stock fruits and veggies, low-fat milk, low-fat yogurt and other nutritious options.  Other activities include:

• Student taste-testing via Health and Occupational Living classes
• “Golden Tickets” through vending purchases – providing students not in the Health and/or Occupational Living classes the opportunity to “win” a spot in the taste-testing
• Changes to foods offered at Parent Nights, Open Houses and other functions
• Tracking revenue and what items are selling vs. what aren’t
• Changing options in current vending machine to meet IOM Standards

Jefferson County Joint School District
Jefferson County’s action plan is focused on improving nutrition standards for all vending and competitive foods options available in each elementary, middle and high schools with in the district. Activities include:

• Evaluation of current food and beverage options vended and available within school stores and a la carte lines
• Removal of all items that do not meet IOM standards
• Monthly tracking compliance of vending and school stores
• Conducting student surveys and taste testing for healthy food choices
• Including non-food options for sale in school store environments

Richfield School District
Richfield’s action plan allows for student engagement through:

• A student-led nutrition fair
• Blind taste-tests with students and parent to determine items meeting IOM standards that are popular
• Education of students, parents and teachers regarding healthy nutrition options (through school newsletters)
• Implementation of healthy snack offerings through lunchroom snack line

Results
While the results of the pilot won’t be realized until the end of the 2011-2012 school year, the ultimate goal is to have these schools/districts implement policy change, develop the environment to support the new policy and be able to sustain the changes beyond the grant-funding cycle. Prior to the end of the 2011-2012 school year, Red Sky will conduct site visits, develop collateral for educating Idaho school districts on how to institute policy and environmental change in their schools and collect success stories to serve as a model for future efforts in creating environments that support making the healthy choice the easy choice.

- Jenn Connor

One of the most profound things I took away from the conference (well, several things, actually) was from the slight genius of Cal McAllister, during his presentation titled “Thinking.” (Yes, I am one of many people who will pay good money to listen to Cal think.) The first thought of Cal’s that stuck with me was how Wexley School for Girls thinks of itself, and the brands they work for, as a “fan factory.”

Wexley is a fan factory. We take your money and turn it into thousands, tens of thousands, millions of thousands of crazy people. We can create them. We can reinvigorate them. We will deliver them. Fans that stay for a lifetime of loyalty, with the spending and championing that comes with it.

Our biggest value as an advertising agency is not just getting fans in the door, but earning and sustaining their fanship over the long haul by entertaining them time and time again. As they hold you in their hearts and minds and on the tips of their tongues, we engage them in ways you can imagine and others you cannot. It’s pretty simple, really.

I love that Wexley knows exactly what they do, who they are, and why. For an agency that prides itself on branding organizations, they take the cake in honing in on their own brand (not always an easy feat; this often gets muddied in the details of agency work).  I guess you could say that I have a crush on Wexley School for Girls. They make me giddy, and smiley, and sometimes sweaty with excitement. (* I am NOT looking for employment with Wexley.)

Secondly, Cal mentioned the following tidbits of valuable information for people and orgs creating public content:

1. Ideas Need To Be Simple: Humans receive more than 500 unsolicited messages everyday – unsolicited means messages and visuals such as billboards, commercials, pop-ups, flashy shiny ads and dancing sign wavers: these are not the hundreds of thousands of messages that we actually subscribe to and process (think Facebook, Twitter, emails, and news). Keep messaging simple!
2. Messages Need To Be Repeatable: Cal offered the example of Paul Revere’s famous adage “One if by land, two if by sea” as how colonial’s learned that the Brit’s were coming. The message was targeted to a specific audience, and was something that was easy to repeat and travel – it was (and is) memorable.
3. Create Proud Fans: Audiences need to be proud to share the message – TOMS Shoes is a great example of a brand message that fans are proud to share: One for One. With Every Pair You Purchase, TOMS Will Give a Pair to a Child in Need.

The last thing Cal said, that really stuck with me, was “be the best part of someone’s day.” A philosophy that speaks volumes, both as a professional in an agency that communicates to publics and on behalf of clients, and a regular, everyday human being. Sometimes a simple “hello” and yielding at a crosswalk can be the action that makes the world that much brighter.

- Leigh Ann Dufurrena

Overcoming my writing challenge has been a goal of mine this year. To help me along that path, I attended Ragan’s Corporate Writers & Editors Conference, where I learned a variety of techniques, my favorite of which is mind mapping, as taught by writing coach, Daphne Gray-Grant. Gray-Grant said something that will stay with me forever – “Outlining kills the creativity in writing.” She suggested to the “lovers of outline” that we try to mind map. This stressed me out because I LOVE to outline. I outline everything. You name it and I will outline it. Gray-Grant advised that it’s a perfect tool to use when suffering from a “brain fart” with a deadline looming. I decided to give it a try, here’s how it works:

Mind Map

Mind mapping is a quick and easy way to get simple thoughts down on paper to help construct the outline of your article, strategic communication plan, monthly report, press release, etc.

Step 1. Take a sheet of paper, flip it horizontal, or as I like to call it “hotdog-style.”

Step 2. Write your central idea in the middle.

Step 3. Let your mind go free. Whatever pops into that little noggin of yours, write it down. Any word or affiliation that comes to mind, jot it down and link it to the central theme.

Step 4. Write about feelings and emotions, write a word down and move on, just keep writing. According to Gray-Grant, you should never judge what you are writing down. We are incredibly harsh critics, write something down on your map and move on.

Step 5. As you mind-map, you will begin to develop the story, pitch, plan in your head and will begin to dictate where your writing should go. Don’t feel like you need to finish your mind-map. Gray-Grant assured us she has multiple unfinished mind-maps strewn across her office.

This is a perfect example of what your mind map should look like – as created by Laurie Pawlik-Kienlen, referring to Gray-Grant’s technique. You can see the main idea is centrally located with thoughts, feelings and emotions connecting ideas throughout the map.

Mind mapping has helped me tremendously as a writer. I am now writing with more ease and without wasting precious time. I hope it’ll be just as helpful for you as it has been for me. Good luck and happy writing!

- Gloria Miller

Cause Marketing is rapidly becoming the public relations tool-of-choice in business. This is especially true due to today’s downtrodden economy and the increasing role businesses are playing in providing means to charities, communities and individuals in need.

Studies have consistently shown charitable donations and corporate sponsorships have a positive impact on the bottom line through increased sales, improved consumer loyalty, employee morale and enhanced brand awareness. Consumers, employees and community stakeholders are more likely to support companies associated with good causes, and many business are leveraging this opportunity. Doing well by doing good.

Our client Avery Dennison is no stranger to cause marketing and has adopted one particular area where they focus their support—education. Avery firmly believes that a solid education starts with access to quality school supplies and resources. They are well-known and praised for their participation in the Box Tops for Education program, and up until recently, were the only office products company to do so.  In the past two years, Avery has donated more than $2 million to schools all over the country through the Box Tops program.

Avery supports schools through other initiatives as well. Red Sky has had the honor of being involved with two of them recently, and I got to experience first-hand the personal excitement and reward of cause marketing campaigns. Through our role in the Avery Give Back to Schools™ promotion and Avery Sticky Notes Mark the Spot Sweepstakes, I was able to visit eight schools across the country in the last two months and provide them with much-needed and well-deserved means of support.

Avery Give Back to Schools™ just wrapped up its second annual promotion in which any K-8 school in the country is invited to participate in an online voting contest. This year, the top five vote-getting schools received $10,000 in Avery-brand school supplies, $1,000 in gift cards and 10,000 Box Tops for Education coupons (a $1,000 cash value).  The 25 runners up each received 5,000 Box Tops for Education coupons (a $500 cash value).

Avery Sticky Notes Mark the Spot Sweepstakes was a social media sweepstakes created in celebration of Avery’s new See-Through Sticky Notes line. People visited Avery’s Facebook page and entered the contest, with 20,000 randomly selected winners to receive a free package of Sticky Notes, as well as five randomly selected winners to receive 100,000 Box Tops for Education coupons (a $10,000 cash value) to donate to the school of their choice.

I traveled to five schools for Avery Give Back to Schools™ (AGBTS), and three schools for the Mark the Spot Sweepstakes. These schools were located across the U.S. (Elk Grove, California; two in Corona, California; Henry, Virginia; Springfield, Illinois; Cimarron, Kansas; Hamilton, New Jersey; and Jenera, Ohio).

Red Sky assisted in the strategic direction and implementation of these two campaigns. I attended the AGBTS events as the coordinator (setting up, photographing, etc), and the Mark the Spot events as the actual Avery representative.  This was a new role for me, but it was a great experience! Getting up in front of a crowd and delivering speeches is something I needed more experience in.

It was remarkable. Personally getting to see the excited faces of the staff, students, parents and community members of these schools was so enriching and rewarding. Some events even had emotional moments, with people giving tearful speeches. They were all so incredibly grateful for their rewards, and Avery and myself were thanked over and over for the contributions. I was amazed to not only see the PR value of what I had worked for come to life, but the personal significance as well. I knew those donations would go a long way in contributing to the success of the students at the schools, and it was a wonderful personal experience to get to witness such gratitude, happiness and excitement.

While cause-marketing may be a business strategy, I wonder how many businesses actually take the time and effort to really feel the impact of what they’ve done. To hear personal accounts of how they have helped someone. To open the thank you cards or read the thank you posters. It really helps you realize that you’re not just gaining the trust of your consumers—but you’re doing something that can make a real difference in people’s lives. I encourage  businesses to take the time to understand the impact they have had on people, rather than just focusing on the sales revenue of their campaign.

Both of these events were wildly successfully from a PR standpoint. Media covered them, and people were more aware of Avery and the products they offer, but their consumers also received a great sense of what Avery stands for. This is because Avery is consistent with the type of causes they support. By reinforcing their belief in education and taking on a cause that shares their need for taking action, Avery has made a huge impact. They went beyond writing checks—they demonstrate that they’re in it for the long haul.

- Danae Castellaw

Other than the obvious benefits of laughter and camaraderie in the workplace, learning to tell jokes can also help with presentation skills and in the reputation-heavy industry of PR, those skills are an absolute must. As mentioned in the article, “If you’re a good comedian, you’re probably a good presenter.” Not that I’ve ever done stand-up comedy, but it doesn’t take a Jim Gaffigan or Chris Rock type to recognize the relationship there. After all, everyone has had the same piece of advice: “Just start out with a joke.”

Red Sky recently had a presentation skills coach (the fantastic Mike Leary of Leary Communications) come in to elevate our team’s skills in the art of presenting. While reading the aforementioned article, I couldn’t help but refer back to his workshops. One of the biggest tasks in presenting in front of an audience is learning when and how to pause – the way our coach paused after every thought seemed awkward at first, but we quickly caught on to the reasoning for it. Let what you said sink in; don’t move on to quick or you will “step on your laughs,” as they noted in the stand-up comedy article.

Obviously, not every presentation you have will be as informal and light as stand-up, but the need to establish a relationship with your audience will always be there. Whether it’s telling a semi-appropriate icebreaker joke or providing a personal anecdote, you have to be willing to create some type of emotional rapport. Whether the audience is made up of critics or those who worship the ground you step on, they are human too – they realize what you’re doing is brave and they want you to succeed.

And the nerves, as both the article and Red Sky’s speaking coach would agree, are good. “Things that make you nervous are generally things you care about,” as noted in the article. If you can find a way to channel them correctly, nerves can be a valuable addition to any performance. During our speaking skills workshops at Red Sky, we also covered the issue of “flop sweat” – the fear of bombing a public speaking event (symptoms often include sweaty palms, becoming as red as a tomato, and a stutter as bad as Billy Bob Thornton in Sling Blade). Although the article did not approach this subject, I took the opportunity to find out what one can do about this embarrassing problem. For one, wear layers. Yes, you may be hot as hell, but chances are, people won’t notice the massive pit stains on your sweater (as our coach told us, wool is a great material to mask sweat because of it’s wicking powers). Another option is to rock a headband like Richard Simmons…too bold? Well, there will always be Botox injections.

For those of us who would rather not drastically alter our wardrobe or spend thousands for a needle wound, one could also practice. As we all learned in our workshops, practice makes perfect

- Kalyn Neils

This is not the way customer service practice should work. I set out this blog with the goal to write about one organization and a minor internal communication error that led to a month-long annoyance, which was eventually resolved and turned out to be a non-issue. I intended to moralize the story with internal communication translating to external communication and how companies can better develop an execute plans to arm their staff with internal communication practices to relay into their customer-facing jobs.

Then, something far more interesting fell in my lap.

My sister messaged me to ask about my reaction to the recent PayPal debacle with snarky humor blog Regretsy as I was fumbling through a less-interesting customer service entry. The PayPal/Regretsy war was beginning to unfold on all the major media sites, but if you haven’t already heard, the humor blog decided to raise some money for toy donations to be sent to 200 families who would be unable to afford them this holiday season. When the donations far outnumbered the sufficient number of toys, Regretsy began taking monetary donations for the families using a PayPal account. Read the discourse between April Winchill from Regretsy and PayPal on Regretsy’s blog here.

Excerpts from the conversations as told by Regretsy are below:

PAYPAL: Only a nonprofit can use the Donate button.

REGRETSY: That’s false. It says right in the PDF of instructions for the Donate button that it can be used for “worthy causes.”

PAYPAL: I haven’t seen that PDF. And what you’re doing is not a worthy cause,it’s charity.

REGRETSY: What’s the difference?

PAYPAL: You can use the donate button to raise money for a sick cat, but not poor people.

REGRETSY: The problem is I’ve already bought all of these toys, so now I’m really in a position like any other merchant – which is to say, I have inventory I need to sell. Why can’t I sell them as gifts, like any other retailer?

PAYPAL: Don’t you think it would look suspicious if the same people bought them again?

REGRETSY: Why? These are my customers!

PAYPAL: If you wanted to do that, you’d have to start a new website.

REGRETSY: What? Why would I start a new website?

PAYPAL: I’m not going to argue with you.

—————————————————————————————————-

PAYPAL: The only way you’d be allowed to sell these as gifts is if you sent them directly to the person who bought them. And we will track your shipments and make sure it goes to the buyer.

REGRETSY: That’s discriminatory! You don’t make other retailers send purchases to the buyer only, especially not at Christmas.

PAYPAL: No one but a nonprofit would send gifts to someone else on buyer’s behalf.

REGRETSY: What about Amazon?

PAYPAL: We know what you’re doing and we’re through playing games with you.

—————————————————————————————————-

PAYPAL: You say you’re selling these as gifts, but there is no information as to what the gift is.

REGRETSY: People sell mystery gifts and grab bags all the time. What about sites where they say, let us choose for you?”

PAYPAL: It doesn’t say that on your site.

REGRETSY: Is that the problem? If I say it’s a mystery gift would that be sufficient?

PAYPAL: You aren’t going to be able to get around this. It’s too late, we know what you’re trying to do and we’re not going to let you do it.

REGRETSY: But there are hundreds of toys! Do you think it’s reasonable to create a drop down menu for hundreds of gifts, all of them different, and create an inventory for each as “one?” So that every time one sells, it’s sold out, and the customer has to keep choosing options and going through check out to see if they can find a gift that’s still available?

PAYPAL: Yes, I think it’s reasonable.

This is all hinging on the fact that what April Winchill reported is factual and truly what happened. (Here’s another blog post on the whole kit-n-kaboodle) Regardless, it all comes back to the same thing.

Poor internal communication = poor customer service

= poor external communication

The other compelling component of this particular story is the power of social media. It is a great message to business.

One could say the first PR mistake made by PayPal was nabbing Regretsy on what seems to be a technicality and putting a stopper in a project that was clearly meant for charity (from which PayPal makes a profit.) Another error they made was when they seemed to forget they were corresponding with a popular blog in front of an online and very captive audience. With that being said, businesses can learn a great deal about this situation because even if every customer interaction is not to the scale of this, there certainly is power behind the online consumer voice.  A best PR practice for businesses is to treat every situation as if their actions could result in being accosted by blogs, social media, and news media if they do not react with dignity and professionalism to any situation.

All this being said, there are many challenging interactions that can exist on the opposite side with challenging customers. I can admit that I have often found myself to be that challenging customer, as I have high expectations of customer service. Consumer complaints may be invalid, unsubstantiated, and even odd. My personal advice is: it is the business’s job to be professional and respond as such.

Because this became such a public-facing issue, thousands of angry PayPal account holders posted comments and tweeted about the issue, and PayPal was forced to issue a public apology to Regretsy. I feel excited and intimidated, as well as impressed by the power consumers have in their ability to virtually rock the boat in cases like these, and I am looking forward to seeing how PayPal’s now-public apology sits with Regretsy and the public.

- Amanda Watson

Now more than ever, the need for good corporate citizenship is paramount. When the economy is sound, the needs of the community are often less, or less visible. When times are tough, and those tough times last for years, the community leans on its assets, its thought-leaders and influencers, to provide that leg up and inspire similar behavior.

It is a time when companies of every size and industry need to live their core values out loud and consider the interconnected nature of our communities. Isolated and insulated we falter. Collaboratively we survive and thrive.

As Charles Moore, executive director of the International Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy noted, “Over the past year, every sector of society has experienced challenges of nearly unprecedented dimensions, causing us all to rethink the ways we engage with the world and its problems. We have entered an age of solution-oriented collaboration, in which each party coming to the table must leverage its unique resources for maximum effect.”

The essence of corporate philanthropy is quite simple. You contribute to a community because you are part of it. The lifecycles of both business and community are inherently intertwined.

Red Sky PR has embraced involvement since its inception in 2008.  Philanthropic-minded founders set a culture of giving back early on – through contributions of dollars, time and support to causes in the areas of health and wellness, arts and culture and community development. Community involvement enabled a young company to establish its name, build a reputable brand and enhance ties in the community that enabled it to grow, thrive and provide for its dozen employees.

As the company evolved and instituted structure and a refined vision, culture became an integral part of the agency identity. By crowd-sourcing the development of agency values among the team, Red Sky identified the ‘Community Involvement’ as core to what the company is about, stating, “We are renaissance people. Our work is better and our minds are sharper because of the experiences we have, connections we make and community opportunities we embrace outside the office.”

Philanthropic efforts can, and should, go beyond the checkbook. Red Sky has sought sponsorship opportunities that enable active involvement from our staff  – from embracing wellness challenges with Activate Treasure Valley and Go Red for Women, to rolling up our sleeves at the local Humane Society or with Food Bank drives. Staff retreats and holiday giving decisions are collaboratively decided on by the entire team, and often incorporate activities to drive home the community need and contribution.

Doing well by doing good means getting out of the office for the ‘doing’.

For those that argue philanthropic efforts cannot be tied to bottom lines, consider the impact that an engaged, empowered and enthusiastic workforce has on your internal culture and the dividends culture provides to promote satisfaction, loyalty and productivity from customers and employees alike.

Solution-oriented collaboration through corporate philanthropy across the spectrum of business will ensure our community thrives.

“Everybody can be great because everybody can serve.” —Martin Luther King, Jr.

- Jess Flynn & Tracy Bresina

P.S.: A fantastic example of local small businesses putting solution-oriented collaboration into action is the Care2Share program. It’s the 2nd year for this initiative that meets community needs through social media driven crowdsourcing campaigns. Find out how you can be involved via the Care2Share blog, Facebook or Twitter!

As a college student, I was constantly searching for summer internship opportunities that might give me an upper hand entering into a tough job market upon graduation. I even worked for several weeks doing PR out of some guy’s house to try and get traction for his homemade floppy disk notebooks just so I could have some “experience” in the field, no matter how small-scale.

My most career-applicable internship was one I had working for the University of Idaho and the celebration of Constitution Day.  My classmate and I worked from May to September to generate campus awareness, increase community involvement, pull off the event, and get our first taste of media relations. For novices, I think we did all right. We even got news coverage and I had my first on-air cameo.

My point is this: the experience I had on the Constitution Day account was one that prepared me for what would eventually become my career. I saw an account through from beginning to end and performed many of the same tasks and tactics I implement here at Red Sky.  In essence, my experience as an intern was invaluable.

Many college students work part-time along with carrying a full academic load. Others are involved in collegiate athletics. Even more have extra curricular obligations. These responsibilities can make seeking out an applicable internship an unnecessary, additional time commitment. That is, until students are facing graduation and a grim job market.

With thousands of Communication, Public Relations, and Marketing majors graduating from American colleges every year, and not nearly that same number of jobs available, it is important to ask yourself what you are doing to set yourself apart.  If you take nothing else away from this soapbox, take this: get an internship, and cling to it for dear life.

Here are a few tips to keep in mind while pondering if you should or shouldn’t pursue an internship:

1. Make sure you allot the time required to do a good job. If you truly don’t have the time, and can’t make the time, don’t apply.
2. As much as you want your resume to look good, an employer needs a job done. Many companies want to help college students, but they also need a job completed. Be mindful of the work that needs done, and realistic to if you have the skills to accomplish those tasks.
3. If you are lucky enough to land an internship, and it’s not for you or your circumstance changes and you are unable to fulfill the tasks, be professional. This is not an entry-level college class you can drop and take another semester without consequences.

According to College Magazine, 70 percent of interns who graduated from college in 2008 were hired at a company where they had previously interned, compared to 57 percent in 2001. This is also true here at Red Sky, where college intern, Gloria Miller, was hired on full-time after her graduation and now works as an Account Executive and leads her own accounts.

Especially if you are working in the communications industry, it is safe to assume the people you are working with and for have access to and use numerous channels to sing your praises, or otherwise. After landing that internship, whether you’re promoting floppy disc notebooks or working for a full-service agency, see it through and be professional. No matter what, these are the people who may eventually give you or get you your next job.

-Amanda Watson

We here at Red Sky have focused our attentions towards the Go Red For Women Campaign this month. A large component of this campaign is to evaluate what each of us are doing to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Many, like me, struggle with the fact that there aren’t enough hours in the day or if we can’t be the best at whatever activity we are doing, maybe it’s just not worth doing, right?

Please tell me I am not the only one here.

I have to admit there are days [and years like this one] where I am a bit of a cluster. One of my best friends who is a nurse just shakes his head in good-natured ribbing towards me every time we run together or race. You see, I have arthritis. Oh yeah, and asthma. And spinal alignment issues and have either IT band issues or bursas in my knees. Yes, when I say I can be a bit of a cluster, it’s true and I have accepted this. Well, mostly.

I tend to be a bit of perfectionist and I become slightly neurotic when I feel I can’t give my best in any way. Almost to the point of not being able to function. This carries over into running in a big way.

I have always been athletically inclined and active.  I began running in high school and more seriously in graduate school. I was a pretty decent runner [7:13-miles consistently] and life was good. I was then diagnosed with asthma after a pretty horrible respiratory illness and I never seemed to get back to where I was, however; I was still running 8:00-minute miles. Then three years ago while training for the notorious Robie Creek Half Marathon, I began to be in quite a bit of pain and generally was not recovering well from my runs. Not understanding why, and after numerous and stressful exams, it was found that I have arthritis. Let the humbling experience begin and believe me it has.

The reason I give this backstory is because I just completed a writing assignment entitled “What do I Run For?” I have had every reason to give up over the years if not only because of my own mental roadblocks that tell me if I cannot run at least x-pace then I should not run at all. Again that inner voice dictating what success looks like.

What I have come to realize is that I have come to run mostly for different reasons that when I began. These to this day continue to evolve as I get older however after dealing with a pretty awful case of pneumonia this year which has affected my lungs and breathing in major ways even 6-months later; it has affected my times and ability just that much more and it has caused me to look deep within me as to why running is so important to me as honestly, it would be so much easier just to get on the elliptical machine.

I run because:

• It keeps me sane despite its frustrations;
• This is when I mentally talk to my mom who passed away 6-years ago due to cancer and tell her all the things I wish I could pick up the phone and tell her;
• It challenges me, but on my own terms;
• I may not always be able to do due to the arthritis so I am grateful that I still can;
• The pain is a reminder that I cannot always push everything to the limit and it teaches me patience which I really have little of;
• I make large decisions while running…my mind is clearer and focus is sharper;
• If I have a bad run, the next one is usually much better;
• A very good friend of mine that passed away much too early in life was an avid runner…I run for them;
• The women on both sides of my extended family tend to have a lot of breast and ovarian cancer which makes me high risk especially given my mom and maternal grandma’s deaths due to the disease. Running is part of a lifestyle choice and I would like to live long enough to see my future grandchildren and perhaps even great grandchildren;
• It is just for me…I tend to give myself away to everyone else emotionally. This is to replenish what I need to be able to give of myself to those I adore;
• I ran my first half marathon last year 20+ minutes faster than I ever did in my training runs. This inspired me.

I have a race coming up two weeks from today. I am not prepared mentally or physically for it due to a number of reasons that really don’t matter. What does matter as I keep learning through what I have termed “Ashley’s Year of Patience” is that I will still show up on race day, be seriously nervous, and will just find a way to get through the race. And at the end I will congratulate my friends who have competed as well and start working towards the next goal. While I desperately want to compete and to beat my time from last year, it really is all about finishing the race and to keep in mind the very reasons above as to why I am really out there running.

I would challenge each one of you to really evaluate, determine and address what may be keeping you from a healthier lifestyle and face it head on. We all have our challenges but as I have said…it is all about the finish line. Hopefully you will cross it on your own terms.

- Ashley Ford

(Please join Red Sky and all of the other community and national sponsors in Going Red for Women on November 3 at the Boise Centre)