A cold and wet early morning train ride is brightened by the melodic voice of a happy Amtrak employee.

All aboard! The Amtrak train bound for Washington D.C. pulled into the station 20 minutes late Tuesday morning, as weary passengers, huddled under a rain-soaked overhang, tried to keep dry. Tired and frustrated, the human cargo – with luggage in tow, shuffled onto the train and found seats that hadn’t been visited by drips leaking from the roof of the train car.

As the train pulled away from the platform, you could almost feel a collective sigh of relief. We were on our way for the five-hour journey south. Most people quickly reclined their seats and closed their eyes. But soon, the gentle rocking and hypnotic rumble of the train was broken by the conductor calling out the first stop on our journey. Or should I say, singing it out?!

Marvin, a boomer-aged conductor, made his way down the aisle, informing us of the name of the quickly approaching station – put to a familiar tune. With an operatic voice, this happy employee made everyone perk up and smile. He continued this pattern of serenades all the way to D.C., each time filling the train car with grinning passengers.

At one stop just south of New York City, two young women boarded and announced to Marvin that this was their first time riding a train. Clearly not one to miss an opportunity to entertain, he gave the whistle around his neck a quick toot and broke into a self-written Amtrak jingle, welcoming them to their first ride on the rails as he punched their ticket.

Marvin is a man involved in his brand. It’s not often that we hear our employees singing our company’s praises – literally. What a refreshing experience in this Great Recession recovery phase: a happy, involved employee.

As I detrained, I learned a little secret about Marvin – he had just 93 days left until retirement. Maybe that fact was putting a little extra song in his voice – or maybe he’s been like that his whole career. That remains a mystery, but what is clear: Marvin loves his job and his passengers love the brand experience he creates.

Thanks for being involved today.

Tim

Kraft has planted the seeds of involvement in the minds of cracker snackers across the country.

Have you ever bitten into a juicy, vine-ripened tomato or munched on a crisp carrot – picked or plucked directly from your home garden? It’s an incomparable experience. But, it’s one that not everybody gets to have, especially if you’re a city dweller.

How, then, do you transcend the limitations of home gardening and stir people’s curiosity about fresh-from-the-garden food?

If you’re Kraft Foods, you drop a seed packet into every box of your Nabisco brand Triscuit snack crackers and wait to see what blooms. Guided by some simple directions on the back of the box, aspiring young farmers can test their green thumbs by sowing the biodegradable seed packet in a flower pot or small patch of ground.

Kraft has provided a simple way to get people – young and old – involved in the home farming movement. Involvement in a box. Now that’s an idea worth cultivating.

Thanks for being involved today.

Tim

Over 100 musicians from dozens of locations around the world collaborated on this unique album, without ever meeting.

Imagine over 100 musicians playing music together, and yet never meeting face-to-face. Sounds a bit far-fetched, doesn’t it?

“Far-reaching” is a more accurate depiction of the accomplishments of a small film crew that traveled around the world for four years in search of musical inspiration. They found it in the streets and subways, Native American reservations, African towns and villages, up the Himalayan Mountains and beyond. The result, a cross-cultural collaboration on 10 songs that were created by editing together unique vocal tonalities and diverse instrument sounds, as though the artists were all in the same studio, playing from the same sheet music. And yet, they never met. You have to listen to the album — and then listen again and again — to find the hidden riches of the sounds that make Playing for Change so unique.

This album is inspirational. It’s an example of what’s possible beyond the impossible. It demonstrates the power of bringing together diverse, cross-functional people and the event-changing effects that can be realized.

How can this musical accomplishment inspire you and your work? How might a cross-functional collaboration change the way your team/department/organization sees the challenges that lay ahead?

Give it a listen. See what comes of it.

Thanks for being involved today.

Tim

An example of a "Love Drawing" from the Starbucks Love Project site (love artist: Marcelo Henrique Valenzi A, Brazil) -- part of the worldwide effort to raise money to fight AIDS in Africa.

Something touching happened on December 7, 2009 at 1:30 p.m. GMT. A simple event that connected people in 156 countries. Something that demonstrates remarkably coordinated involvement and makes us wonder what else is possible.

On that day last month, regular people in countries all over this globe joined together to sing at exactly the same time to raise awareness of AIDS in Africa. Take a breath and take a listen. Now, watch the video again and look at the lower right corner of the screen. The diversity of country participants is astounding.

The Starbucks Love Project is just one part of the company’s effort to help fight AIDS in Africa. In one year, through their partnership with (RED)™, they have managed to generate enough money to provide more than a 7 million day supply of medicine to help people living with AIDS in Africa.

Singing a simple song, together. If 156 countries can come together to make this happen on the same day, at exactly the same time, imagine what else we can achieve — if we get involved.

Thanks for being involved today.

Tim

An Air New Zealand employee and her in-flight co-workers get the undivided attention of their passengers in this stripped down safety video.

How often have you boarded a plane and completely ignored the flight crew who are there, primarily, for your personal safety? We’ve all napped through the preflight instructions that they recite as soon as the main cabin door is closed and locked down tight. Maybe for good reason: they are being robotically repeated for the umpteenth time that day. I’m sure even the flight attendants get bored with the message.

Enter involvement. A select group of actual Air New Zealand employees were selected for their “professional attributes” to participate in a passenger safety video. But this is no ordinary video. Clad in nothing more than body paint that mimics their ground crew or flight crew uniforms, this cheery bunch give us a different view on airline safety. As one male purser explains in the opening of the reel, “…we’d like to give you what we call the ‘bare essentials of safety’ aboard this flight.” Followed by a rather perky female co-worker stating, “Even if you fly with us quite a lot, we’d appreciate it if you’d take — (with the rise of her eyebrows) — a second look.”

“It’s such a fantastic thing to do to involve your own employees, I think, in adverts,” said one svelte ground crew member, as a bright yellow safety vest was being applied to his torso, “’cause it gives a level of authenticity.”

Posted on YouTube, the video has been viewed almost 5 million times — and counting. Take a peek at the in-flight reel and the amusing, behind-the-scenes “making of” video. There’s also a clever 45-second TV ad which closes with a duo of mature women admiring a pair of male captains as they pass by in the airport.

Stripping it all away, there is no better way to capture the attention of both your audiences and your employees, than by using involvement.

Thanks for being involved today.

Tim