When the going gets tough… (February 15, 2011)

As pay decreases, belt-tightening occurs and perhaps most unexpectedly good things happen. Drinking and smoking costs too much — that has to be a good thing, because some people quit. In the work place, tougher competition is faced head-on by people determined to keep their jobs. And this determination drives-up strategic intelligence.

I've often wondered why junior members of a team can often run rings around more experienced, better paid colleagues.

This video goes a long way to explaining why; when the going gets tough…you know the rest.

Local Authorities on Facebook (December 13, 2010)

Since my last post on this subject I thought it worth revisiting the data. Why today? Today (13 December 2010) was the day English Councils discovered just how much they had to save as the waves of cuts begin to hit. Local government is required to deliver services, some funded by central government, others through community initiatives. And it's the latter a.k.a, Big Society or pay-for-it-yourself that means these organisations need to engage with citizens to:

— sell ideas
— explain choices, cuts and options
— ask for input and help
— gain commitment

Today was the day some lost their jobs while others had budgets cut to such an extent it will make tomorrow's challenge a whole new ball game. An interesting side effect of hard times is that strategic intelligence is driven up as hardships increase. This is the age of austerity, the age of doing more with less. And it's the age where councils seem to be engaging with their citizens using with social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. Will it enable them to do more with less? Only time will tell…meantime, some have joined the race to be liked.

In this post I've refreshed the date and concentrated on PERCENTAGE INCREASE IN FACEBOOK LIKES since my last post. Coventry County Council is still the notable leader in terms of Facebook success with more that 16,000 Likes!

Local Authority
 Pos. FB Likes (orig.) FB Likes (current) Incr. %
Darlington BC
 1 427 2,977 597%
Belfast CC
 2 611 2,565 320%
Tameside Metropolitan BC
 3 114 316 177%
City of Edinburgh
 4 171 438 156%
Brighton and Hove CC
 5 220 560 155%
Stratford-on-Avon 6 94 240 155%
Manchester CC
 7 172 425 147%
Sunderland CC
 8 577 1392 141%
Carmarthenshire 9 171 391 129%
London Borough of Brent
 10 118 264 124%
Wrexham County BC
 11 156 344 121%
Torbay Council
 12 387 814 110%
Bracknell Forest Council
 13 294 602 105%
Cambridgeshire BC
 14 92 186 102%
London Borough of Lewisham
 15 139 271 95%
Stockport Metropolitan BC
 16 138 269 95%
Stevenage BC
 17 141 262 86%
London Borough of Barnet 18 351 647 84%
Wakefield City Metropolitan DC
 19 109 192 76%
London Borough of Southwark
 20 432 738 71%
Rotherham Metropolitan BC
 21 104 175 68%
Maidstone BC
 22 158 258 63%
Allerdale BC
 23 140 218 56%
Coventry CC
 24 10,896 16,589 52%
Hart DC
 25 89 129 45%