Introducing Atlanta Stacks!

A good buddy of mine started a new kind of curated newsletter, Atlanta Stacks, and I wanted to a) figure out why he created it and b) spread the word, because I think it’s terrific. So I thought, sure, let’s do that at the same time! 

Disclaimer: I’m just a fan of Atlanta Stacks and Raleigh. I’ve asked the readers of this blog recently about possibly having some paid sponsor posts in order to raise dollars for charity. I still have not decided if I’m going to do that, but this is DEFINITELY not one of those times. You should all sign up for Atlanta Stacks simply because it’s rad ;) Oh and if I ever do anything with a sponsored post, it will be incredibly clear.

Who are you and what do you do?

My name is Raleigh Gresham. Currently, I’m the Global Director of Business Traveler Insights and Experience at Intercontinental Hotels Group where I’m working to turn data into innovative hospitality by blending advanced analytics with service and experience design to create tailored moments of hospitality for IHG’s business travelers.

Wow, better you than me ;) So what is Atlanta Stacks and why did you create it?

When you take on the responsibility of putting “new” into the world – when you’re innovating – you bump into a unique set of challenges with very few prescriptive and repeatable solutions. Selling the new “thing” to decision makers. Proving concepts. Bootstrapping because of competing priorities and limited resources. Repeating success and communicating failure. Collaborating with the “I didn’t think of it, so it’s a bad idea” crowd. 

I spend my time asking big companies to evolve their traditionally reporting-centric approaches to data use and expand them to see data & analytics in the context of the differentiating experiences and products they make possible – it’s a big ask and I’m constantly trying to solve for these unique challenges.

One of the most helpful things for me in coming up with ways around and through these obstacle has been comparing notes with other innovator here in Atlanta. I came up with the idea for Atlanta Stacks because I (selfishly) wanted a patterned way to share and have access to other innovators’ “notes” and inspirations on innovating and I felt like others might benefit from it too. 

Right now, it’s an email periodical that goes out every other Friday with a curated selection of the URLs, book titles, podcasts, Instagram feeds, etc. that Atlanta innovators are consuming – an aggregation of the things that have got the community thinking.

I’m obsessed with figuring out how I can help ensure innovators in Atlanta have a healthy community to rely on and contribute to. Not just a network, but a true, real world community – check out this post (in a less than academic source) for a pretty good read on what I mean. My hope is Atlanta Stacks will continue to evolve into one of the platforms this unique community can use to learn from, be held accountable by, contribute to and find support in.

Great, love the vision. So you’ve essentially started something here, one could call it an MVP of a startup actually. Have you started things like this before? 

That’s exactly it. The bigger vision is creating a platform that innovators in Atlanta can rely on. Whether that’s a periodical or some other format, I want to help bring that to life. The first few editions are going to be about gauging interest and usefulness. If either aren’t there, figure out a “pivot”. 

This will be the first “project” I’ve put out there like this, but I’ve been using a “modified” version of the MVP approach for how we deliver work for a few years now. We’re basically tasked with producing something new every 6-8 weeks which means we had to come up with an approach to not only identify the most important accomplishment that new thing would be held accountable for, but also be able to learn from it and iterate it into the next thing. 

This type of constraint makes some variant of the MVP approach a no-brainer. Come to think of it, I probably run almost every project-like thing I do now through an MVP approach just because it’s so second nature.

You’ve executed the first version of Atlanta Stacks brilliantly, which is impressive since you have a very demanding job and a family. What’s your process for “getting things done”?

Appreciate that! It’s the curators man. They’ve made it easy so far.

So you know me well enough now to know I can hit a sad level of nerdiness when it comes to how “into” processes for staying on top of ideas, projects and general things in life I am. You may get a longer winded answer that you hoped for. 

For me, it’s really about info management. I record most of the pieces of info I encounter during the day with little scrutiny. I carry a [Field Notes] notebook with me everywhere and there’s no system for how things make it in there – every line is just an “intake”. Could be a meeting note, could be a random thought, could be a book title, could be something I overheard. Doesn’t matter. Digital stuff (blog posts, web pages, images, documents, videos, podcasts, etc.) all get clipped immediately into Evernote and are automatically assigned a “triage” tag. My email comes into Evernote now too so it can be part of the intake too. All of this is just to make sure I pull off that GTD goal of keeping stuff out of my head so it’s free to “think”.

From here, everything goes through an obsessive and relentless triaging and culling – once a morning with a deeper dive on Fridays. This system has meant I’ve had to learn to be ruthless with my triage process since so much gets recorded. Only what really matters should live past the initial “recording”. Honestly, this was probably the thing that took the longest to learn because I think we naturally conclude EVERYTHING is important and prioritizing is hard mental work. Getting good a triaging through the lenses of importance, urgency and action-ability is so important and a skill I’ll be working on for the rest of my life probably.

Self imposed “friction” is a big deal for me too. Every morning I chug through my intake from the day before. Anything that makes the cut lands (or stays) in Evernote (thanks to you and [Dave P.] for getting me on the wagon) with all the tags required for finding at the right time and right place. That extra step of looking at everything again for a few minutes each day (especially after it’s had time to marinate) is really important. It keeps Evernote free of cruff so I can trust that it’s in Evernote, it matters.

See, told you. Geeked out. I guess the full circle here is you’re right: Atlanta Stacks comes after family and my pay-check related work. But it’s still possible. Mostly because of how ridiculous I am about managing info and time. I think a lot of people would be shocked at how much time they’d get back in the day and how much they could accomplish if they started “taking better care of their time”. I geek out on this stuff so much because I’m pretty obsessed with being the best custodian of my time that I can.

Sidebar: Being vulnerable is hard – like Brad White’s curation in the first edition of Atlanta Stacks told us (see what I did there?). Most of us are pretty scared when time gets freed up. Suddenly we have to do meaningful work which happens to be the scariest because it’s usually the stuff that makes us vulnerable. Maybe we pack our days full of meetings to avoid the harder, riskier but more meaningful work?

Awesome. Friends, I suggest you sign up to start receiving (and contributing to) Atlanta Stacks immediately!