Lightburn

(Photo by Malone & Company)

A few days ago, Jordon and I made the 500+ mile trek from Milwaukee to Omaha, Nebraska.  No, we didn’t go to try and get a glimpse of Warren Buffet, nor did we go for the steaks (although we did have some great steaks).  We went to hear some of the greatest entrepreneurs and innovators on the web today speak about what drives them to do what they do so well.  Why would we go to Omaha of all places for this?  The second annual Big Omaha conference, of course.

So, what is Big Omaha?  Truthfully, leading up to the event, both Jordon and I had a hard time describing what this event was and why we were so excited to go to it.  I think that the Big Omaha website puts it best, so here it is, straight from the horse’s (or, I guess in this case, cow’s?) mouth:

This event brings together the region’s best and brightest to motivate, challenge, excite and connect with one another, and in turn raise the bar on the level of work we’re producing.

They gathered quite the group of speakers to excite and motivate.  Here’s a quick overview of my favorites:

The Big Omaha Lineup (Photo by Malone & Company)

Scott Belsky (Behance Network)

For me, Scott Belsky was the hidden jem of this conference.  I vaguely knew the existence of the Behance Network, and I use the action method (only because it looked good on the shelf at the bookstore), but I had no idea who he was, or what to expect.  He grabbed my attention when he lead this quote from Thomas Edison:

Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.

Scott’s talk dealt with how to make it through the “unsexy 99%”, and make your ideas come to fruition.  It’s a topic that hits close to home in any creative field.  We’re notorious for coming up with exciting ideas, only to have that excitement fade away once we realize what it takes to see it to completion.  I picked up his book, Making Ideas Happen, and would recommend it to anyone.  If it’s anything like his talk (I haven’t started it yet), you’ll be sure to get something out of it.

Scott Harrison (Charity: Water)

Charity: Water was another organization that I knew the existence of, but I had no details about.  Scott Harrison was a successful nightclub promoter in New York City, when he realized that he wasn’t happy with the direction that his life was headed.  He gave it all up and started Charity: Water, an organization with the mission to bring clean water to the nearly 1 billion people around the world without access to safe water.

He built it with the idea that the organization should be completely transparent, and that 100% of donations would go towards drilling wells.  So far, Charity: Water has supplied clean water to over 1 million people.  You can help by starting a My Charity: Water campaign, or by purchasing some swag.  Proceeds from the store go towards the cost of operating the charity.

As a side note, Big Omaha set a goal to raise $5000: enough to drill 1 well, and supply clean water to 250 people.  As of this writing, they’ve raised over twice that amount.

Jason Fried (37 Signals)

37 Signals is a company that we follow very closely at Lightburn.  We use a lot of their products internally, and we aim for the same level of quality and passion for our work that they have for their products.  Jason’s talk (complete with sketchnotes by local designer Mike Rohde) touched on 10 points to help you and your business become more productive.  Some of my favorite’s were:

• Useful > Innovative – Cool wears off but useful never does.  This is a topic that I love to rant about.  Too often I see websites that are the result of a designer going “oh man, it’d be cool if…” that are completely useless.  It’s one of the best arguments for my UX friends out there.
• Draw a Line in the Sand – Know what you and your company stand for, and know what to say no to.  If you start to say no, and start focusing more on the things you say yes to, you’ll be more focused and productive.
• Specs, Features & Tech Don’t drive Sales – More often than not, your customer doesn’t care about the latest and greatest trend, or what programming language it’s written in, or anything like that.  They care about the basics: that their website works for them and works well.  So, nail the basics, and the rest will come as needed.
• Less – The concept of doing less works directly with the “Draw a line in the sand” point from above.  If you do less stuff, you can concentrate on doing the things you do well.  Jason really hit it home when he said “if you want to get more stuff done, do less stuff.”

More essays (and much more details on the topics above) can be found in 37 Signals new book, Rework.

Wrap Up

There are three main overall concepts that I got from Big Omaha:

• Put Limits on yourself – Limits allow you to focus on making things work within the boundaries, and ultimately you’ll find a solution that works better than it would have if you didn’t have boundaries.  A younger version of myself would have cringed at this notion, but now I understand that this is a the way to keep focused on what matters to your client.
• Speak with, and to your audience – Knowing how to communicate to your audience, rather than just your peers, will get you a long way.  Having an open dialog with the people who will be using your product will lead to a better user experience.
• Be passionate – If you’re passionate and driven, more often than not, pieces will fall into place.  The trick to keep that passion through the 99%.

So, thanks, Silicon Prairie News for putting the event on, Malone & Company for the use of their awesome photos, and everyone else that helped with Big Omaha. It was a blast!