Entre blog roll
June 30, 2008
Entrecard is a very popular bog indexing and blog marketing site. I like Entrecard and have found some very good blogs via my participation there. Something that has bothered me since I began participating there though is the value and ethics of the raised traffic (including some traffic from alleged child abusers). There is no doubt that Entrecard is a traffic builder…but if I want just traffic then I would build a dodgy site that focuses on making money from hits.
Imaginif Child Protection became Serious Business is about consciousness raising and making a difference, celebrating the child protection that most parents already do and helping those who are not sure what to do. Traffic is nice, certainly helps in keeping me high on the elite top 50 lists, but not mandatory: my means must justify my ends. I like comments because I value conversation, change and transparency.
Entrecard is attempting to encourage comments and ethical drops - droppers that do more than click for credit and leave. Entrecard has started a “Comment Rush” where they choose a post to become the recipient of one hundred dropper comments. I love it. That is smart marketing and very nice flipping of a product that was becoming unruly and undisciplined. The first chosen post is Irish Ken Armstrong’s Music and Driving. Have you commented yet?
The blogosphere is abuzz with speculation over Entrecard and Alexa. It seems that those who have been promoting Entrecard fast drops are to have their accounts suspended, and that, Alexa is going to ignore traffic obtained via entrecard. Ummm, obviously I am not the only one to question the ethics of a blog marketing network that has turned into a drop and run scheme.
In the event that Alexa does fail to count entrecard traffic, I have started a contingency: an entrecard blogroll of those blogs that I do read prior to dropping my entrecard (it is a work in progress as I visit sites). I will enter those blogs from my blog roll rather than from the entrecard site. This then allows my traffic to those sites to be counted by alexa. I do not want the blogs, I like, to be penalised because of how I entered them.
To those entrecard users who have commented on my posts and added me to their blog rolls, thanks. I really appreciate your help in preventing child abuse and you can be assured that I will continue to both entrecard drop and advertise on your sites. Comments breed blog karma and help keep kids safe.
Water safety
June 29, 2008
Kids alive do the five:
1. Fence the pool
2. Shut the gate
3. Teach your kids to swim - it’s great
4. Supervise - watch your mate and
5. Learn how to resuscitate
….and ensure the water safety patrol is on duty!
Privacy verses secrecy
June 28, 2008
Secrets are bad. They are banned in the Imaginif house and business. Secrets make people all scrambled up in the head. Why would anybody want to hold knowledge that they are not allowed to tell anybody else, ever? Sex predators, paedophiles, child abusers and those in the process of grooming for silence LOVE secrets and LOVE to find people willing to keep secrets. Secrets are bad.
Privacy is good. Privacy has boundaries around it - protectors of information that says that this information is for a limited set of ears only thank you. We have privacy conversations in our home. Master 12 knows that there are some things that are private - information for our family only. One of those privacy rules is his name. Online we refer to him as Boy or Master 12. Privacy is good.
While I am open, I am also fiercely defensive of our family privacy. Therapists lead a life that others like to know about…but, we deserve privacy and a respect of that privacy - we have a work life and a private life where we do things that other people do - boring things. If all we ever did was live our private life by the therapists rule book that says you do no harm and use high level skills, we might just go crazy!
Even though I am a staunch child protection and child rights advocate, it does not mean I am a perfect mother. I have yelled at my children before. I have even smacked Boy with a newspaper before (omg, I nearly died when I did that…sorry Boy…it was a very, very wrong thing for me to do and I am responsible for throwing a tantrum). I have said things to him that I would never say to another person: I have even sworn at him. While I understand the context around all of this stressed parenting syndrome, many of my clients would not. They live still in a black and white world where risk management, shades of grey and human behaviour becomes too confusing and threatening. Therefore, I keep my personal life outside of the counselling room so as not to confuse those struggling to reach their own self determination and understanding. And, my personal life is my personal noise - there’s no room in counselling for my own psychological noise.
Some people are horrified to discover that I am most comfortable, at home, in few clothes (T-shirt and swimmers) and that I often undress in front of Boy (not totally you understand). Boy himself is drama queen horrified and he covers his eyes as though shrinking from me and pretend whinges, as he holds up a finger made Christian cross, “Mum, I thought you were working against child abuse.” Boy knows that my state of undress is a private family thing and that I would just die if ever I was caught like that. Boy also knows that it is not a secret and he takes ample opportunity to make jokes to his friends about it - “…make sure you always ring before coming over so that you don’t have to see Mum in her swimming togs! Urrggghhhhhhhh, vomit.”
Privacy is now gone! Our back garden was very private and none of our neighbours could see in. Preparing for our move, our back garden was yesterday severely cut back for maximum regrowth. Far out….I had forgotten that there were houses, with people who live in them, right next door to us! Today I’ll be wearing a full set of clothes as I potter around the back yard. Why, because my privacy is paramount and I do not want to traumatise anybody outside of my family by having them view me in my swimming togs!!!.
Imaginif moving to 30 James St, North Cairns
If you are interested in renting a magnificent 4 bedroom, en suite, fully self contained granny flat and very deep swimming pool home at 206 Jensen St, Edge Hill (Cairns), I suggest you contact L.J.Hooker Edge Hill immediately.
$500.00 per week.
Great location and great neighbours.
What? Psychological Noise at Imaginif
June 27, 2008
Counsellors and therapists need to be fully aware of their own noise: their values, their politics, their ideas, their personal issues, their preferences - anything that may alter the way they interact with another person is known as psychological noise. Knowing yourself and being able to put yourself aside makes for an objective and effective listener: the elements of active listening.
The psychological noise of the helper can constipate a therapeutic relationship and create further harm to a client. It is unprofessional and unacceptable if the counsellors noise rises during the therapeutic session. Much better to recognise it prior to a client entering into the relationship with the counsellor and to do something about it (refer to another therapist or ensure personal strategies to keep individual noise controlled).
My psychological noise is around sexual deviance and exploitation. I am unable to work with perpetrators of sexual assault - sex predators. My psychological noise about them is louder than my professional duty to care. I recognise this and I immediately refer on when a sexual perpetrator is referred to me. I do not deny them help but I do deny them my help because I know I cannot, will not, be effective.
At Imaginif today there is enormous noise going on: psychological and physical. It is so noisy in fact that I cannot even hear the phone ring! Four workmen are seducing the back garden into submission. No easy feat on a garden that has been hardly explored for the last five years.
Should you today ring Imaginif and the phone fails to answer, it is not because we are nursing psychological noise and having a mental health day, it is because we can’t hear the phone ringing! My goodness, I am today aware of my noisy counselling garden….how could I not be.
If you are interested in clear communication and how it works in a counselling situation have a look at The Anger Volcano.
Knowledge Solutions. A message to the Social Services
June 26, 2008
The social and non government sectors have long been known for not readily sharing helpful information with each other. Competitive funding rounds frequently create competition, secrecy and suspicion among agencies and workers. We are all just so precious at times. Licensing, accreditation, low wages and high case loads, lead to high staff turnover, burn out and in house bickering. Is it any wonder I now work in the private sector!
Case management is supposedly about knowledge solutions and resource sharing. In rhetoric it works well. In reality, I am appalled at the lack of professionalism and client focus across the human services. We are quick to judge, point fingers and blame others for an overall unruly sector that continues to dance to the under funded drum.
Some years ago I chose to stop dancing to Government funding and set outcomes and to instead work in a collaborative way with a focus on client need. I treat my clients as the boss and offer them the respect they deserve. I work to best practice, even though the budget often reflects not being able to work that way. In the private sector, I make that choice because I decide what is most worthy.
Despite my move away from Government control and my firm belief that child protection is everybody’s responsibility, I still operate across a social service sector that is not terribly skilled in sharing resources. Stop it! Stop trying to protect your own ego, position or skill level. Pay it forward: share your knowledge and skill with an expectation of making the world a better place for everybody. Stop maintaining the staus quo. Instead do something differently.
I have recently entered a collaborative partnership with Knowledge Solutions. A small group of professionals, all with expertise in different areas and a passion to do business differently, we are set to share some communication resources designed to improve individual life, business life and community life. I’ll be blogging to Knowledge Solutions weekly and I would love to hear business feedback and reflective comments from you in the community sector.
Knowledge Solutions: Placing the future in your hands and supporting collaborative business infrastructure
Why? Because child protection is serious business!
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