Grand Central Review

I got turned on to Grand Central by Tim Ferris and his 4 Hour Work Week blog. He saw it as a good productivity tool and a nice way of screening calls- allowing you to only take calls that are important and urgent. I love trying new tech things, so I quickly signed up for the beta. It didn't hurt either that Google recently bought Grand Central. If Google thinks it's cool, I'll give it a try. Google does just about everything right.
I've now been using GC for the last couple months. Any time someone or "something" asks for my phone number, I give out my GC line. When someone calls in, they're greeted and asked to state their name while the Grand Central customer is contacted. Then, when I pick up the call, I first get a message from GC saying that so and so is calling and I get three options: answer the call, send it to voice mail, or and probably the coolest feature, I can send it to voice mail and listen in on the message- if it is urgent, I can interrupt the message and talk to them. It's kind of a shocker for some people the first time. One thing I would like to see, is the ability to customize the greeting when people call. Sometimes I think people don't know what to make of the initial greeting, as it doesn't mention my name at all- sometimes they don't know if they called the right number. It'd be great if I could have a nice sweet female voice to annouce my name and then ask for theirs while she attempts to reach me.
It also has some other interesting features. One unique feature that I've enjoyed is the ability to create personalized voice mail messages for each person in my contact list. ie. " Hey John, sorry I couldn't answer. I'll call you back shortly." I think it's a nice touch. As an entrepreneur, any time I can differentiate myself, it's a good thing. The custom voice message is neat.
GC also allows me to customize which phones ring when certain people call. ie, when my wife calls, I can have both my office phone and my cell phone ring. I can also load my client list in the contact manager and have VIP clients not just go to the office phone, but also ring my cell phone to make it easier for them to contact me.
There's a handful of other novel features, but overall, those are the ones I find most useful. Will I keep using GrandCentral? Absolutely. I'm a bit curious to find out what it's going to cost when it comes out of beta, but as long as it's reasonable, I'll probably stick with it. At least until the next cool beta comes along :)
http://www.grandcentral.com/

Life Insurance

I just got off the phone with a good friend. Right on the heals of hearing about Scott, my buddy tells me his dad was just diagnosed with a rare form of aggressive Leukemia. Apparently he had a persistent flu, finally went into the doctor, and after just a couple tests- bam, "you have leukemia". Apparently it was a big shocker. He really thought it was simply a virus. He's of a normal weight, has a good health history, doesn't drink or smoke, relatively low stress...
Being in the insurance business, I can't help but immediately think of his wife and whether or not they have life insurance, good health benefits and have their finances in order. Especially with life insurance, having a leukemia diagnosis makes it virtually impossible to secure any protection for his family now. Hopefully they did some planning before this happened.
The horrible thing is, people usually wait until it's too late to take care of their plan.
Don't get caught off guard- take care of your life insurance plan now.

Scott Zimbrick

I was sitting in class when the email from Joan Wessell hit my desktop. Immediately saddened, I had trouble focusing for the remainder of class. I kept reviewing in my mind all my interactions with Scott. In reality, I didn't know Scott well. However, the few interactions I had with him, left a great impression on me.
My very first interaction with Scott was when I owned Rapid Refill Ink. I had been really involved in the chamber of commerce, and regularly attended all the Greeters meetings. At one of our summer Greeters, Patty Mulder made an announcement that they were looking for people from the business community to run for City Council. After thinking about it for a while, I decided to give her a call.
A few days later, she and Scott Zimbrick took me to lunch at the Dream. This was when I met Scott. I thought it was really neat that the Chief Marketing Officer of a bank would take time out of his day to come talk to some wet-behind-the-ears 24 year old kid about being a city leader. He made me feel important and capable. He encouraged me to run, spent a good hour explaining some of the current politics, his thoughts on where Corvallis needed to go, and what kind of commitment it would be. At the end, he gave me his cell number and encouraged me to call any time with questions.
This was the first of a dozen or so interactions with Scott over the last 4 years. During that time he connected me with donors to raise money for two different campaigns, gave my campaign extra funds he didn't need, met with me over lunches to strategize and stayed late after a debate one night to help me debrief with constructive criticism and tips for the next one. He took the time to help me, when he no doubt had way more important things to do.
Scott had a real pensive quality to him. When Scott said something, it was worthwhile. He didn't seem to waste words very often. I really admired that. He was also a master of diplomacy, without sacrificing his own principles.
Corvallis will remember Scott Zimbrick for many years to come for the contributions he made to our community.
You'll be sorely missed, Scott.