A Ragan Communications blog a few weeks ago by Jeremy Probert (Visit Ragan.com for more.) raises some good points about businesses, their employees, and social media. I agree with him, but I want to make sure the world isn't passing me by. Please let me know if you agree with Jeremy and me or if there's a point of view I'm missing.
He begins his post with two examples from a Wall Street Journal article:
“Some companies are training staffers to broaden their social-media efforts. At Ford, Mr. Monty plans to soon begin teaching employees how to use sites like Twitter to represent the company and interact with consumers.
"Coca-Cola Co. is preparing a similar effort, which initially will be limited to marketing, public affairs and legal staffers. Participants will be authorized to post to social media on Coke’s behalf without checking with the company’s PR staff, says Adam Brown, named Coke’s first head of social media in March.”
Probert goes on to write:
"...this is about the wisdom of letting your employees have free and uncontrolled access to the media which, in effect, is what the good people at Ford and Coke are thinking of doing.
"Are they completely insane? As we all know, your people are your greatest asset and your greatest liability. As ambassadors for your brand and product, there is nothing more powerful than a vociferous and loyal employee—and here’s the important bit—who has been well briefed and is on message.
"This is why internal communications departments exist—to generate that loyalty, to bring the workforce onboard, to maintain motivation and momentum—to ensure the messages that are going out are consistent and in line with company strategy and policy....
"In no company or organization that I know do employees get to comment publicly to an external audience without being carefully briefed and monitored. In many companies and organizations, it is more than their jobs are worth for them to do so....
"You simply do not allow employees free rein. You don’t; that’s accepted.
"Then along come the social media strategists. 'It’s all about content, it’s all about dialogue, it’s all about the quality of the conversation'—free spirits in the digital age. Not for them the rules of the old guard—no, the rise of the Internet and Facebook and Twitter has changed the world, and we must move on or wither and die.
"It appears that their lobbying ... has convinced even the most conservative of organizations that they should be allowed to let employees post directly to the social media sites, without passing the sense/health check that is the PR department.
"I know that I’ll be accused, as a PR professional, of being miffed that I’ve been edged out of the frame and that stuff is going on without me.
"Maybe. But I think this is a disaster waiting to happen. Time will tell. Personally, I hope there’s someone in both organizations (Ford and Coke) who remembers what the real role of a corporate communicator is and who is powerful enough to perform it.
"The real role of a corporate communicator is to look at stuff like this and say, “no way”—and put a stop to the stupidity immediately."
Let me hear from you. Are Probert and I dinosaurs who need put out to pasture? Or is the communications department still a vital function of every Fortune 500 company plus hundreds of other organizations?
Friday, September 25, 2009
Parents View Seasonal Flu to be More Dangerous to Kids Than Swine Flu
We've been puzzled here at the Institute for Crisis Management about why organizations aren't beating down our doors to help them with pandemic planning. We've had a number of companies seek our help, but not enough to jam the phone lines. We believe that most businesses aren't taking the pandemic and their preparations seriously. Now a poll reveals that parents don't even take H1N1 seriously when it comes to their own children.
A C.S. Mott Children's Hospital national poll conducted in late August finds only 40 percent of parents indicate they will get their children vaccinated against H1N1 flu, but 54 percent say they will get their children vaccinated against seasonal flu. Among parents who do not plan to get their children vaccinated against H1N1 flu, 46 percent say they are not worried about their children getting H1N1 flu. Twenty percent believe H1N1 flu is not even serious. (http://www.bio-medicine.org/medicine-news-1/H1N1-Flu-3A-Are-Parents-Underestimating-Risk-to-Kids-3F-58298-1/)
"This information about parents' plans to vaccinate their kids against H1N1 flu suggests that parents are much less concerned about H1N1 flu than seasonal flu for their kids. That perception may not match the actual risks," according to Matthew Davis, M.D., of the University of Michigan Medical School.
You think this isn't serious? As of September 20, 3,917 deaths in 191 countries and territories have been reported to the World Health Organization, most in North America. The Centers for disease control this week posted a map that shows how widespread swine flu has become in the U.S..
If your organization isn't ready, start today. And get those young ones vaccinated for H1N1 as well as seasonal flu, please? I do some tutoring, and I sure don't want your kids giving me swine flu.
Oldham County School Closes Due to Flu Absences
I shouldn't chuckle about sick children. Therefore, I will chuckle about the inane approach to the flu pandemic by Oldham County Schools in Kentucky. This is the district, as I've written about twice below, that decided not to release which school had a swine flu case last month because "We don't want students to have a false sense of security just because it's not their school," according to Anne Coorssen, the school board's attorney.
Well, that seems to be working well. The district's Liberty Elementary School is closed today and Monday because 40% of its students have been absent with flu-like symptoms (http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009909240338). The problem must be that "false sense of security" Liberty students developed. Watch for other district schools to take long weekends, as the younger kids take the flu home to older siblings. An Oldham County high school student commented on my post below that they have three minutes between classes and can't use the restroom during class time, even though they are required to wash their hands between classes. It sounds like that wise practice isn't happening.
These are unusual times, and unusual times call for unusual measures. It appears as if school officials aren't taking all the prudent precautions available to them. As a communicator, I am most offended by the phony excuse about the "false sense of security" and wish the district had told the truth: We don't want parents to panic and keep their kids home from school because our district would lose state money for each kid not in school. Being honest may not have prevented a single case of flu. But it would have prevented virtually all cases of mistrust.
Well, that seems to be working well. The district's Liberty Elementary School is closed today and Monday because 40% of its students have been absent with flu-like symptoms (http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009909240338). The problem must be that "false sense of security" Liberty students developed. Watch for other district schools to take long weekends, as the younger kids take the flu home to older siblings. An Oldham County high school student commented on my post below that they have three minutes between classes and can't use the restroom during class time, even though they are required to wash their hands between classes. It sounds like that wise practice isn't happening.
These are unusual times, and unusual times call for unusual measures. It appears as if school officials aren't taking all the prudent precautions available to them. As a communicator, I am most offended by the phony excuse about the "false sense of security" and wish the district had told the truth: We don't want parents to panic and keep their kids home from school because our district would lose state money for each kid not in school. Being honest may not have prevented a single case of flu. But it would have prevented virtually all cases of mistrust.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Soap Opera Tragedy Mirrors Real Crisis -- to a Point
My wife is off work today. She likes to surf through a bunch of soap operas. Drives me crazy, but she doesn't understand why I watch sports pretty much every night, so we're even. She had one soap on today that involved a driver who suffered a heart attack and crashed into a carnival site. I don't know the name of the soap. What caught my attention was how chaotic the carnival and emergency room were. They did a good job of showing how so many people were frantically looking for loved ones at the scene and asking questions at the hospital. For a long time, there weren't many answers (They probably won't come until an episode late next week). Rescuers were digging through the rubble of twisted steel hoping to find survivors, fearing to find victims. Hospital employees were doing their best to tend to injuries and fight off frantic family members.
What wasn't realistic: Not a single reporter was anywhere to be found. Reporters have a different motive than loved ones, but they want information just as much and just as quickly, adding to the confusion. If they aren't getting a story, they'll seek someone to speculate about what happened.
That's what I wrote about earlier this summer after a train derailed at the Louisville zoo. Reporters talked to zoo visitors who didn't even see the accident but who felt qualified to offer, "I heard it was the breaks" and "I think it was going too fast." I wrote that the zoo did a good job that first day, but even good wasn't quite fast enough.
You need to be prepared for whatever fate can throw at you. Be sure your crisis plan has a chapter to deal with each vulnerability of your business. Incorporate legally blessed comments that give no real information, but that may buy you a little time. And get ready for reporters whose job it is to get the story. They'll get some story one way or another, but it might not be the one you want told. Life is not a soap opera. It may feel like one sometimes, but we can't -- nor do we want to -- write reporters out of our scripts.
What wasn't realistic: Not a single reporter was anywhere to be found. Reporters have a different motive than loved ones, but they want information just as much and just as quickly, adding to the confusion. If they aren't getting a story, they'll seek someone to speculate about what happened.
That's what I wrote about earlier this summer after a train derailed at the Louisville zoo. Reporters talked to zoo visitors who didn't even see the accident but who felt qualified to offer, "I heard it was the breaks" and "I think it was going too fast." I wrote that the zoo did a good job that first day, but even good wasn't quite fast enough.
You need to be prepared for whatever fate can throw at you. Be sure your crisis plan has a chapter to deal with each vulnerability of your business. Incorporate legally blessed comments that give no real information, but that may buy you a little time. And get ready for reporters whose job it is to get the story. They'll get some story one way or another, but it might not be the one you want told. Life is not a soap opera. It may feel like one sometimes, but we can't -- nor do we want to -- write reporters out of our scripts.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Lessons We Should Have Learned in1957
George Santayana is often misquoted. But he is the one who wrote, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." When it comes to the flu pandemic, we clearly are repeating it.
By the way, I am writing this from home, ill for several days. I'm not sure it's the flu, and it's not like any cold I ever had. My self diagnosis: the swine flold.
Nevertheless, I was captivated in my sick bed by the reporting of Donald Brown of the Washington Post. His description of response to the Asian flu pandemic in 1957-1958 was remarkably similar to reaction to the swine flu of 2009. The Asian flu, like the swine flu, started in the spring, smoldered through the summer, and ignited in the fall, largely in the schools. During the summer, most cases were reported from children's camps and a national women's conference in Iowa. A cruise ship from Rotterdam to the U.S. had 250 people become ill with flu.
Three to six weeks after schools opened in 1957, flu was running rampant. Just before that, people were questioning whether health warnings were exaggerated. "Did New York City jump the gun on Asian influenza?" wondered the New York Times on October 10. A week after that article appeared, 29% of students in New York were absent from school. A study two years later reported "clinical illnesses" among 69% of school children across the country that fall.
The Bell System, then a national telephone monopoly, is a good measure of how the flu hit the workplace. Peak absenteeism in 36 cities tracked by Bell reached 8-10% and lagged school absentee rates by two to three weeks. Businesses were hit hard, but mostly recovered in a few weeks. Brown's article reports that news coverage was light, focusing more on the flu's disruption to high school football games than to disruptions to business and academia.
Vaccine wasn't available until after the peak had passed in most places. By Thanksgiving, health officials were having a hard time warning the public to remain vigilant. Sure enough, a third wave of Asian flu hit in the spring.
Seasonal flu kills about 36,000 Americans every year, mostly the very young and the very old. The Asian flu in 1957-1958 killed an additional 60,000 people, mostly school kids and working-age people under 65. Did we not learn anything from the Asian flu? In these times of lean and mean employment figures, can you lose 10% of your workforce for two weeks? If you can, then why do you have 10% too many employees? What plan do you have to replace all those people temporarily? What human resource policies pose problems for those people as they return to work?
School is back in session. What can we learn from the fall of 1957? Keep in mind that flu pandemic was much milder than the Spanish flu in 1918. Are you prepared for the worst? Are you heeding Santayana's admonishment? I dread a business setback in this current economy, and you should too. Make sure your pandemic crisis plans are all that they should be!
By the way, I am writing this from home, ill for several days. I'm not sure it's the flu, and it's not like any cold I ever had. My self diagnosis: the swine flold.
Nevertheless, I was captivated in my sick bed by the reporting of Donald Brown of the Washington Post. His description of response to the Asian flu pandemic in 1957-1958 was remarkably similar to reaction to the swine flu of 2009. The Asian flu, like the swine flu, started in the spring, smoldered through the summer, and ignited in the fall, largely in the schools. During the summer, most cases were reported from children's camps and a national women's conference in Iowa. A cruise ship from Rotterdam to the U.S. had 250 people become ill with flu.
Three to six weeks after schools opened in 1957, flu was running rampant. Just before that, people were questioning whether health warnings were exaggerated. "Did New York City jump the gun on Asian influenza?" wondered the New York Times on October 10. A week after that article appeared, 29% of students in New York were absent from school. A study two years later reported "clinical illnesses" among 69% of school children across the country that fall.
The Bell System, then a national telephone monopoly, is a good measure of how the flu hit the workplace. Peak absenteeism in 36 cities tracked by Bell reached 8-10% and lagged school absentee rates by two to three weeks. Businesses were hit hard, but mostly recovered in a few weeks. Brown's article reports that news coverage was light, focusing more on the flu's disruption to high school football games than to disruptions to business and academia.
Vaccine wasn't available until after the peak had passed in most places. By Thanksgiving, health officials were having a hard time warning the public to remain vigilant. Sure enough, a third wave of Asian flu hit in the spring.
Seasonal flu kills about 36,000 Americans every year, mostly the very young and the very old. The Asian flu in 1957-1958 killed an additional 60,000 people, mostly school kids and working-age people under 65. Did we not learn anything from the Asian flu? In these times of lean and mean employment figures, can you lose 10% of your workforce for two weeks? If you can, then why do you have 10% too many employees? What plan do you have to replace all those people temporarily? What human resource policies pose problems for those people as they return to work?
School is back in session. What can we learn from the fall of 1957? Keep in mind that flu pandemic was much milder than the Spanish flu in 1918. Are you prepared for the worst? Are you heeding Santayana's admonishment? I dread a business setback in this current economy, and you should too. Make sure your pandemic crisis plans are all that they should be!
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Admiral Is Clear on the Relationship Between Honest Communications and Credibility
Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is by definition an expert on foreign policy, including the country's relationship with Muslim nations. But the man also knows communications, credibility, and meeting commitments.
He criticised the U.S in an essay last week for "squandering good will by failing to live up to its promises," according to an AP story by Anne Gearan. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090828/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_mullen_muslims) What Adm. Mullen has to say has implications for all organizational communicators.
"We hurt ourselves and the message we are trying to send when it appears we are doing something merely for the credit," he wrote. I can identify with that. In my chemical industry days, I sometimes felt like I was walking a fine line in our community relations efforts between talking about what great guys and gals we were and telling plant neighbors what they needed to know. I made sure those great guys and gals got out to meet people to show how great we were, not just tell. An employee speakers' bureau and displays at dozens of community events helped accomplish this.
"Most strategic communication problems are not communications problems at all. They are policy and execution problems." How many times are we tasked with smoothing things over with communications? This happens a lot in a crisis and is otherwise known as passing the buck or fixing the blame. Early in my career, I worked for what I thought was a poorly run company sadly behind the times. The problems were cultural and couldn't be fixed with communications alone. I moved on in just seven months. I couldn't communicate away poor decisions.
"Our messages lack credibility because we haven't invested enough in building trust and relationships, and we haven't always delivered on promises." Here's another example from my 16 years working with fenceline neighbors who were concerned with my plant's ongoing emissions, occasional fires, and rare releases. People remember those upsets for a long time. (Ask the old-timers about the DuPont explosions in 1962.) It takes time and effort to build credibility so that, if I said the situation was safe, I was believed. I attended neighborhood meetings, walked the streets with fliers, volunteered in the schools, ran a Kids' Club for a nearby impoverished neighborhood, and so on. People knew I cared about them and their neighborhoods. It's these effective relationships that built trust and credibility.
Adm. Mullen has it right. We can all learn a lesson from his chastisement of U.S./Muslim relationships. I hope someone has the sense to listen and make changes.
He criticised the U.S in an essay last week for "squandering good will by failing to live up to its promises," according to an AP story by Anne Gearan. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090828/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_mullen_muslims) What Adm. Mullen has to say has implications for all organizational communicators.
"We hurt ourselves and the message we are trying to send when it appears we are doing something merely for the credit," he wrote. I can identify with that. In my chemical industry days, I sometimes felt like I was walking a fine line in our community relations efforts between talking about what great guys and gals we were and telling plant neighbors what they needed to know. I made sure those great guys and gals got out to meet people to show how great we were, not just tell. An employee speakers' bureau and displays at dozens of community events helped accomplish this.
"Most strategic communication problems are not communications problems at all. They are policy and execution problems." How many times are we tasked with smoothing things over with communications? This happens a lot in a crisis and is otherwise known as passing the buck or fixing the blame. Early in my career, I worked for what I thought was a poorly run company sadly behind the times. The problems were cultural and couldn't be fixed with communications alone. I moved on in just seven months. I couldn't communicate away poor decisions.
"Our messages lack credibility because we haven't invested enough in building trust and relationships, and we haven't always delivered on promises." Here's another example from my 16 years working with fenceline neighbors who were concerned with my plant's ongoing emissions, occasional fires, and rare releases. People remember those upsets for a long time. (Ask the old-timers about the DuPont explosions in 1962.) It takes time and effort to build credibility so that, if I said the situation was safe, I was believed. I attended neighborhood meetings, walked the streets with fliers, volunteered in the schools, ran a Kids' Club for a nearby impoverished neighborhood, and so on. People knew I cared about them and their neighborhoods. It's these effective relationships that built trust and credibility.
Adm. Mullen has it right. We can all learn a lesson from his chastisement of U.S./Muslim relationships. I hope someone has the sense to listen and make changes.
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