A note from the Corporate Communicator's Conference

Well, the big Corporate Communicators Conference in Vegas is winding down. I'm about to head to the pool and lose myself in a sea of bloody marys before heading to the sports book to bet on the Cubs against the Red Sox. If I lived in Vegas, I'd be dead inside of two months.

I was going to post some conference coverage out here, but the hard truth is that I couldn't do it any better than my pal Charles Pizzo has done, on his conference blog.

Ragan hired Pizzo to create a conference blog, and he put together an unbelievable one—interviewing speakers, posting slides from presentation, linking to other relevant content.

My God. He has put hours into this thing. If Ragan hired me to blog about the conference, I would have posted about four half-assed items in between rounds at the bar. Pizzo puts me to shame, so check it out.

I did want to share a couple of good lines, though. First, the line from this morning's keynote session with 'The Wonkette,' who Newsweek has called the top political blogger in the b-sphere.

When asked which politician would win the 'Liar Liar Pants on Fire' award, the Wonkette said this:

'Oh, Jeez. I think it's a little bit like the Special Olympics . . . you'd have to give an award to everyone.'

That's good stuff. She later went on to call all journalists whores, which was also a nice touch.

And here's the other good line. I heard it from a guy from Toyota, in my four-hour pre-conference session. We were talking about how every company has malcontents, and every company has ass kissers.

And I said what I've always heard: That there are 10 percent of employees you don't worry about communicating to, because they are never going to be happy or like the company. So you can't worry about them.

And there is another 10 percent you don't have to worry about, because they love the company. They wear company t-shirts and drink the company Kool Aid.

Communicators, I said, need to focus on the 80 percent in the middle.

And the guy from Toyota said:

'We look at that a little differently. We always say we focus on the 80 percent in the middle, and the 10 percent who like the company . . . and let HR deal with the complainers.'

It seems to me that's an even better strategy.