Reversing the Destruction of Trust

Our society lives on trust. We do business by trust.
When we read that multi-million-dollar PR firms like Burson-Marstellar took their 30 pieces of silver from current Internet giant Facebook to wrongly bad-mouth rival giant Google, it rends the very fabric by which our society holds together.
Without trust, one ultimately has anarchy. A growing lack of trust means things cost more. Low trust leads to greed.
What is even more sad and disheartening is the fact that Burson is widely credited with the classic and highly praised trust-building strategy that saved Tylenol (and Johnson & Johnson) way back in 1982.
Apparently both Johnson & Johnson and Burson have both misplaced their moral compass.
The PR giant, one of the largest in the industry, makes matters worse by serving up weak blame, pointing the finger towards its client, Facebook: "
"[T]his was not at all standard operating procedure [for Burson] and is against our policies, and the assignment on those terms should have been declined."
What "nice" words, the phrase: "Should have been declined." Unfortunately, such a mea culpa doesn't work.
This is a classic "dirty tricks" campaign, and one in an unbroken line as long as recorded human history. However, that does not make it right. In fact, in this post Great Recession time of shaky trust, it comes at a very bad time. It's bad for the PR profession, it's bad for Burson (and Facebook) and it's bad for society.
When people start tossing around words like "integrity," they better be prepared to show that their motives are a little more pure than power-grabbing and profit-taking.
Fast Company magazine asserts that the Burson/Facebook dirty tricks tactic is simply the first round in "an epic, escalating war" between Facebook and Google. I sincerely and feverently hope that FC is totally wrong on that one.
The antidote to this collapse of trust is actually fairly simple. Paraphrasing the famous line from Robin Williams in the Disney movie Aladdin, all one really has to do to be successful here is "tell the truth." Further, when companies like Facebook and Burson are openly caught in such matters, justice is required. If no legal recourse is available, then people should make their displeasure known in the marketplace. If not, bad things happen. As one ancient source says: "Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed speedily, the heart of the children of man is fully set to do evil" (Ecclesiastes 8:11).

Let us reverse this. Among other bits, the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) needs to do its bit and condemn Burson for its breach of ethics. Facebook should be sanctioned by the marketplace. And we all need to agreed that going forward, the restoration of trust is critical. No lying. No cheating. No accepting 30 pieces of silver to wrongly bad-mouth anyone.

We need to change, and we don't need a presidential administration to do it for us. We need fundamental change inside of us -- accompanying by an open change in behavior -- to truly reverse the destruction of trust.

Irrational "cool" -- How are we wired to make decisions?

As social media continues to ramp up--whether we want it or not--efforts to determine just how consumers (or the general public for that matter) make decisions also continues apace. Are we more emotional? Or do we deploy rational logic?Related to this is the consideration that the elusive title of "Cool" is irrational from a number of dataviews -- how "cool" is defined, who possesses the authority to bestow the title of "cool" and the like. The mysteries of the Human Dynamic--what motivates and drives us--continue with little real illumination.

PR News offered up a recent piece on human emotions and drivers which was quite interesting and worth a read, especially as some marketers and PR pros will serve up high emotion (which may promote irrationality) to motivate decision-makers. Among other bits, the PR News account included the above motivational/emotive map of blackberry users vs. iPhone owners. Clearly the Blackberry types are a bit more achievement-oriented and practical than the iPhone people, who clearly view the objective of "having fun" as more of a driver.

As one lets this all roll around in one's head, then the progenitors and outcomes concerning any given "brand" begin to insert themselves. As humans indiscriminately assign value to an object or concept--thus producing the "brand"--how is this process truly influenced?

Perhaps some food for thought in this cluttered market- and mind-place.

Reality Strikes - 2010 Strategic Planning in Uncertain Times

INDIANAPOLIS – Incomprehensible Excel spreadsheets. New government regulations (real or potential). Sleepless nights.

For thousands of companies, August and September traditionally represent a critical time when conflict resolution skills come to fore. Business planning departments send out performance files with 2009 budgetary data and ask executives, directors and managers to come up with some kind of meaningful 2010 forecast and operational goals.

Given limited financial resources and a conservative outlook at best for 2010, interdepartmental quarrels can break into open corporate warfare.

For many – and particularly in a time where the Fed is making vague comments about how they think the economy is “stabilizing” – strategic planning and budgeting can be a nightmare. As one executive told me recently in an expression of dark humor: “Which would I prefer: planning for post-recession growth with no money or getting a root canal? That’s a tough choice.”

With a trimmed-down work force, weak customer demand and anxiety about new government regulation resulting in additional costs, strategists can’t just trot out their 2009 spreadsheets, overlay a 5 percent multiplier and send them back to the accounting department. What’s the new reality? Documented performance.

Read more here.

A New Style of PR dominates in Silicon Valley

Whoa, did I make that up? Here's the confirmation from the New York Times:
"This is the new world of promoting start-ups in Silicon Valley, where the lines between journalists and everyone else are blurring and the number of followers a pundit has on Twitter is sometimes viewed as more important than old metrics like the circulation of a newspaper.
"Gone are the days when snaring attention for start-ups in the Valley meant mentions in print and on television, or even spotlights on technology Web sites and blogs. Now P.R. gurus court influential voices on the social Web to endorse new companies, Web sites or gadgets — a transformation that analysts and practitioners say is likely to permanently change the role of P.R. in the business world, and particularly in Silicon Valley."