Trust Top Trumps (April 27, 2011)

Who do you trust? If you're a parent, who would you entrust your children to for the afternoon or evening? And how does all this relate to social media and the Royal Wedding?

 

Bottom of the pile — The Establishment

The establishment category includes heads-of-state, politicians and the clergy. They move in a world of *the well connected* and enjoy VIP status due to who rather than what they know. The Establishment is not at all squeamish about having more than the commoner. They move in "high places" and almost seem to operate above the law.

Cases to consider: middle east, MP expenses and child abuse.

Observation: as trust and respect for The Establishment reduces, common people are less squeamish about calling it to account for greedy and inhumane actions.

Trust factor: untrusted by the majority, particularly Generations X and Y. Would you entrust your children to this category. No!

 

Next-up — Big Business

This category needs no introduction. It reluctantly plays by the rules and spends its huge resources to mitigate the effects of those rules on its liberty. Tax avoidance, sweat-shops and low pay are all more than nodding acquaintances of this category.

Cases to consider: HSBC Infrastructure Company Limited, minimum wage set at £6.08/hour

Observation: as trust and respect for Big Business reduces, common people quickly make their feelings of disgust known about inequality. Instruments such as off-shoring, futures and spread-betting are not understood, they are mysteries that generate huge profits and are seen as evil.

Trust factor: eroded to near zero. Would you entrust your children to this category? Don't be ridiculous!

 

Next — Celebrity

Celeb's gain wealth by being popular and for now commoners are happy to watch them rise to fame and enjoy the trappings that come with the territory. To the commoner the celebrity is a hero(in), someone that flies the flag of hope while sharing a common set of values and opinions. Gucci, cool cribbs and fake tans are all in. However celebs are given their ephemeral positions in a chart like manner, they come and go according to the whim Joe and Joanna commoner — they either sell copies of OK magazine or they don't!

Cases to consider: Katie Price, Julia Roberts.

Observation: trust in this case is an alignment of values and opinions. If the lifestyle choices of the celebrity resonate with that of the commoner and the celeb' hasn't out-stayed her or his A-list position, they're remain revered or atleast admired and trusted.

Trust factor: is a bit like share values which go down as well as up. Would you entrust your children to this category? Some might for an afternoon BBQ but not if there's an unattended pool.

 

Penultimate — Education

Education has transitioned from benevolent-giver seeking to improve man's lot in life to a culture of *bums on seats*. The prospectus has become less about appealing to academic research aspirations and more about a *sign here for a prestigious title* sales pitch.

Cases to consider: Pay £9,000 a year and join one of the above categories.

Observation: Education joins the ranks of Big Business by churning out degree qualified students that find themselves competing among the masses with a commodity qualification.

Trust factor: some predict the current degrees-for-jobs culture will implode and that Education is no longer trusted as the benevolent giver in society. Would you entrust your children to this category? We do, everyday, but we don't consider the education system to be entirely *safe*.

 

Top Trump — People Power

Common people are clumping together, joining voices of dissent and aiming their killer-blows at all the above. People trust their peers, especially relatives and people that live in the same vacinity; people with similar values and opinions to themselves.

Cases to consider: Lady Di. Who does your baby sitting?

Observation: like likes like. People power is now frequently brought to bear via social media where collective voices join to shout their collective likes and dislikes.

Trust factor: higher than all the above

 

One further thing to consider. Will Kate Middleton be more admired by remaining a so called commoner in attitudes, values and opinons? Or by becoming a Royal in both title and deed?

The fuel of change (Feb 6, 2011)

Technology has continued to improve the Internet and the Internet continues to change us; the millions of people connected to it. Over the past 10 years we've seen huge improvements in web technology and I'd suggest this has resulted in the rise of people power.

Internet reach

As an early adopter, I had access to the Internet at home long before the work place. Since then, its reach has extended from home, to work (or in some cases the reverse) and now to smartphones and iPads. You can carry the Internet in your pocket! And many do: there's an estimated 1.5 billion 3G handsets out there.

Websites have changed beyond recognition

Ubiquitous broadband, mega-pixel screens, improved browser technologies and sophisticated software developments have all combined to change today's web experience beyond recognition. Here's a couple of examples:

  1. Apple's homepage 10 years ago
  2. BBC's homepage 10 years ago

The Internet delivers a richer visual environment but it's not a passive broadcast space like TV. Many Internet users expect some degree of 2-way interaction, especially the generation that grew-up with it — Generation-Y. The Internet didn't replace TV in the sense that it gave more of the same, but it has equaled if not replaced the TV as the medium by which Values and Opinions are transmitted. And because it's a 2-way medium, the bigger voice is the audience not the broadcaster. And this simple numerical superiority has led to the rise of People Power.

What fuels People Power?

In a word: ideas. You might have thought I would say: social media! No, it's ideas that resonate and reach millions of readers in near real-time that has promoted People Power to king of the hill. Social Media is the meeting space where ideas are shaped and formed, where they gain inertia and are given momentum. Social media is the catalyst of change.

The new dynamic

Governments and organisations are aware of the power social media can exert upon them. Unlike advertising campaigns which were carefully constructed, impeccably timed and designed to travel in the top-down direction, *ideas* are expressed in the reverse, bottom-up direction. They arrive without notice and packaged in a transparent container labeled *brutally honest*.

Top-bottom

To play or not?

Some organisations worry about participating in social media. To not is no longer an option. It would be as absurd as not having a website or phone system but to play brings introduces its own issues. Direct and public feedback has a subtle way of enforcing quality of service and/or product — audiences trust the values and opinions of their peers. If your organisation is trustworthy, open and proudly stakes its reputation to all it says and does online it's likely to do well. If reputation is what you worry about and the idea of playing in the social media space keeps you up at night, your audiences will be talking about you anyway. Sooner or later, you'll have to join the party.

What is the fuel of change?

Ideas that resonate with people get carried on channels such as blogs, Facebook and Twitter. When there's a strong desire to change something, anything from a poor service that's affected thousands to an oppresive regime that's affected millions, these ideas gain momentum and are given velocity.

The fuel of change = problem + idea + social media + will

People Power Part 2 (February 1, 2011)

In August 2009 I wrote Power to the People. And the trend continues: thanks to the power of social media, global power bases continue to slide from top-down to bottom-up. Any government or organisation that hasn't kept pace with popular sentiment, wants and wishes will find themselves on the wrong end of 140 characters and that's proving a dangerous place to be!

The current uprising in Egypt is further evidence: the threat to Mubarak and government being so great that Internet access and mobile networks has been shutdown for days. Social media power houses Google and Twitter have fought back. Protesters can now call these numbers: +16504194196 , +390662207294, +97316199855 and their voice messages can be found here: http://www.twitter.com/#/speak2tweet. All those naysayers that doubted power is shifting to the people may need to reconsider their views.

  1. http://xjg.co/gR25Mk — the speak2tweet twitter feed
  2. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12332850
  3. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12331520
  4. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12341554

Power to the public (August 8, 2009)

Over the past few years there’s been a gentle shift from top-down to bottom-up power bases. So imperceptible you may not have noticed. The 1980’s ushered a new era of public ownership: British Gas, British Telecom, British Rail, British Steel and a slew of other manufacturers. We the public cherished our slice of BT, for many it was their first taste of owning a publicly traded morsel. And as shares climbed, the new public ownership culture proved popular. It was the new smart money.

Media_httpfarm5static_edyuk

[Shot: http://www.flickr.com/photos/silenus81/4307175681/]

The transition from state-owned company to the private sector saw the birth of a new animal: the pin-stripe adorned “fat-cat”. The french say of us Brits: “They love their maker. Britain is full of self-made men!” The fat-cats multiplied; pandemic fat-cat! They had special cars made for themselves with retractable steering wheels to accommodate their newly acquired fat-paunches. The fatter cats dispensed with their cars; in a single evolutionary step; they took to the air in their shiny new bisjets. I worked with a director in the late 90s; he was based in Manhattan but used to visit *England*. He was mildly miffed with his photograph in an annual report. And it had to go to print in the next 3 days. What would he do? He climbed aboard his Falcon, flew to Heathrow, was chauffeured to Hook, had his pic taken then went home; presumably with ego safely in tact. Shortly after, the dot-com bubble burst. Fat-cats were snapped into sobriety as they saw dividends slashed, bonuses cut and promising careers abruptly halted.

By 2002, the recovery was well underway. Banks had created shady businesses which, in hindsight, looked more at home in Vegas than high-street settings. Build societies demutualised, preferring to serve the greed of shareholders than the modest small time investors, they even went a step further by securing funding through markets rather than the more traditional route of good old fashioned savers. Inflation was the number one indicator and it indicated no problems whatsoever.

In early 2009, politicians embarked on public witch hunts, chasing-down errant bankers only to discover they knew nothing about banking at all! By mid 2009 politicians themselves became the target of much finger-wagging as their fiscal excesses were exposed to an angry public. Crowds gathered to demonstrate in London and other major cities and we were introduced to another new phenomena: kettling! A technique used by the Police to coral and trap protestors.

The past 30 years have been interesting. The past 5 years even more so because of two distinct and disconnected things which took place simultaneously and on a global scale.

1. Governments poured billions of public money into banks and big business in an effort to prop them up and secure jobs and homes, and in the process have in all but name nationalised many of these once powerful institutions. The free market will never be the same again.

2. Twitter happened; traditional news channels will give way to new ways of broadcasting breaking news. Iran elections trended for weeks signaling the global take-up of social media. The informed global general public start to pull the levers of government, businesses and public-sector services by means of Twitter. Issues are pounced upon and opinion pronounced with deliberate ease, ultimately power is being transferred to the twitterati with followers. [Read more here: Twitter Is a Player In Iran's Drama]

Fat-cats and free markets are all being chased out of town by pay-caps, pay-freezes and stricter regulation. It’s my speculation that power is sliding from the few to the many. Public ownership by default.

Oh sure, banks, royal colleges, government will all remain but the ground rules are changing. Accountability is the new kid on the block along with corporate social responsibility. How are public and private organisations responding? By means of digital engagement. A new dynamic that will see roles reversed. And one in which ordinary folk tell bosses, banks, manufacturers and governments what they want, how they want it and when they want it by.

This is the entitlement generation, it understands the power of social media and it’s not frightened to use it!