Well, once again I apologize for not posting for a while.

Regular readers might think that my reason for not posting has something to do with that fancy new picture of me up there at the top of the blog. You know, the one that switches expressions, making me look like a drunk, then a retard, and then someone who just did something nasty in his shorts on accident.

But no . . . I actually didn’t have anything to do with that. I have a crack team of web designers and IT folks at Ragan who handle the actual look of the blog. I didn’t even know it was being changed until I logged on today!

And I can’t figure out if I like the changing faces or not. It’s hard to tell, because I generally don’t like my own face to begin with . . . so seeing three different versions of it is like getting hit three times in a row with three different blunt instruments.

I’m open to any and all opinions on the new look. . . after all, you poor people are the ones who have to look at it whenever you come to the sight . . . and if the image of Uncle Fester soiling his adult diapers is going to turn you off the blog, please let me know, so we can change it.

Now, if you want to know the real reason I haven’t been posting, just let your eyes wander over to the top right corner of this page. See that ad for my Integrating Print and Online seminar? That’s what’s been keeping me too busy to post.

Not the ad . . . the seminar itself. I haven’t taken IPO on the road in three years, and so much has changed in employee communication in that time that I find myself having to recreate the seminar almost from scratch.

When I started IPO six years ago, there weren’t that many tools to juggle. We had print (some of us, anyway), we had e-mail, and we had intranets. So the seminar was about how to make those three things work together.

Now, six years later, we still have those three tools . . . but we also have blogs and wikis and chat rooms and RSS feeds and podcasts and vidcasts and tons of other stuff.

So I’ve been spending my time digging out real-life case studies on all those tools, and finding out how the best communicators are using them all together to reach and engage employees.

If you’re still reading this, I’d like to ask a favor. Actually, I’d like to ask two favors:

First, sign up for the seminar. It’s going to be a fun-filled two days, with free booze and tons of gourmet food.

No it’s not. There won’t be any free booze at all, but there will be booze that we can pay for in the hotel bar the second the seminar ends at 4:01 on Day One, and 3:59 on Day Two. And the only food will be bagels and coffee in the morning, and whatever treats I can steal from other corporate meetings that are happening in the hotel that afternoon.

But it will be worth the money. I’ve already got some unbelievable case studies on how people are using all the new tools without overwhelming employees with too much corporate crap.

Which leads me to the second favor:

Even though I have a lot of great stuff, I’m always looking for more. I happen to think that the smartest communicators in the field read this blog . . . and if you’re doing anything great with your print and/or online employee communication vehicles, I’d love to hear about it.

Is your online publication working? Are you getting people to read it and interact with it? Are you doing podcasts, or blogs? Have you figured out how to apply RSS feeds to internal communication? Is your print publication going strong, and steering people to the online tools, the way it should? Is it helping you communicate complicated or emotional information?

I'm actually including a component on face to face communication in IPO this time around, too, and I have some wonderful examples of how you can use online tools to help your managers and supervisors communicate with the front lines. So if you're doing anything great with face to face, I'd like to hear about that, too.

If you have something you want to share, I’d like to talk to you about a) featuring it in IPO (and probably one of the Ragan publications); and b) having you as a guest speaker in one of the cities, if you’re interested in that sort of thing.

My goal is to have one speaker in each of the cities—and that speaker and his or her colleagues can come to the entire two days for free.

I’ve already lined up the great and talented Kathy Felong from Erie Insurance for one of the cities. Kathy’s doing wonderful things with integrating her print publications with her online tools, and she’s going to share that case study.

So if you have anything, shoot me an e-mail, at steve@crescenzocommunications.com.

And if you don’t have anything . . . why aren't you signed up yet? Obviously if you have nothing you feel confident about sharing, you need to be at the seminar. I guarantee you that you’ll have stuff you'll want to share after we’re finished.

And again, sorry about the pictures up there.