Tag Archives: Tom Peters

Re-Imagining Rotary

16 Thursday Dec 2010

Posted by in Club Leadership, Membership Recruitment, Membership Retention, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Rotary@105, Tom Peters, Website

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by Paul Kiser
USA PDT  [Twitter: ] [Facebook] [LinkedIn] [Skype:kiserrotary or 775.624.5679]

Paul Kiser

In 2003, Tom Peters wrote Re-Imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age. In that book, Mr. Peters takes a visionary look at business and our culture that confronts the traditional…and remarkably stupid concepts of the modern working world. His words have foretold many of the new realities we see unfolding around us.

Recently I have had to face up to some hard realities about Rotary. Rotary is a great organization, but the organization is being held back by an old skin that needs to be shed. Rotary’s membership issues cannot be solved unless RI’s President Ray Klinginsmith’s suggestion of ‘keep what works and drop what doesn’t,’ is absorbed into the organization’s DNA. It’s time we Re-Imagined Rotary, so I will offer up my view of what I would change about Rotary to re-vitalize the organization from bottom to top.

Rotary International (RI)
Club Members should be RI members. Currently Clubs are members of RI, but the Rotarians in the clubs are not. I’m sure there is a rational legal reason for the wall of separation and I know the history, but there is a negative symbol created by the divide between Rotarians and the parent organization.

Council on Legislation (CoL) should be abolished and organizational changes taken directly to Clubs. Currently the Council on Legislation meets once every three years. In a world of rapid change and flattening of hierarchical structure, the CoL is a dinosaur. A significant problem with the CoL is that to be a representative you must be a Past District Governor, and while we have some very smart and forward-thinking Past District Governors, we also have some Past District Governors who see themselves as Cardinal’s in the Church of Traditional Thinking. Change needs to come from the Clubs and a handful of amendments could be presented to the clubs on a monthly basis for voting via the Internet. Discussions for and against the amendments could be made via linked blogs.

Decentralize most of RI. Face-to-face contact is valuable, but often an organization’s headquarters develops a ‘bunker mentality’ which does not serve in the best interest of the whole. VoIP phones, the Internet and webinars can bring people around the world together as well as people in cubicles, in fact, often the Internet tools do a better job in creating an environment of sharing ideas.

Every RI employee has to be a Club member. I don’t know if this is currently required or not, but my feeling is that the paid staff of RI can serve the organization of better if they see Rotary from the viewpoint of being a Club member.

Zone and District
Eliminate the PDG monopoly. Rotary has a wealth of knowledgeable people but all the significant discussions and decisions are made behind doors labeled, “Past District Governors ONLY.” It is not a system of decision-making that brings all the talent to the table.  Some of my best friends are PDG’s and I have great admiration for what all of them have contributed to the organization; however, when tackling a problem such as years of declining membership, the people who have dedicated themselves to Rotary and have been rewarded with significant prestige of office, may not be the best people to address why others don’t ‘get’ Rotary.

All Zone and District Leaders must write blogs. Rotary is great in sending out emails and finding people to speak at meetings, but the organization is still in the dark ages when it comes to communicating. Emails just fill up the Inbox and get buried among all the other emails. The concept of ‘just-in-time’ information is not well understood in Rotary. Blogs put information that is Google searchable and readily available when someone needs it. Blogs can offer information, ask questions, or begin a discussion. Blogs allow each club to absorb the information at their own pace.

Zone and District Leaders are consultants, not Lords. This really isn’t a problem for most Zone and District Leaders because most of them approach their position as a consultant for the organization; however, we still have a few leaders who are insulted when some insolent Rotarian suggests a different concept or idea from their own. I have a list of them in our District, and I know I’m on their list.

District Conference and Assembly to be held on the same weekend. It is such a basic idea to increase participation, give respect to the member’s time, and improve the value of both functions that it shouldn’t be an issue, yet it is vehemently opposed by some Past District Governors.

Clubs
No Club to be chartered without a website. Today, no business or non-profit is taken seriously as a legitimate organization unless they have a website. Any club that wishes to be chartered should start with a website for the provisional club to answer questions, inform, and create methods of contact with the organizers of the club. Once a club is formed the website becomes the 24/7/365 presence for the club. It is so basic to survival it has to be mandatory.

Club member immersion in Social Media. Rotary has always been about creating connections between people and Social Media is the greatest tool ever invented to do exactly that. It is not about one Social Media savvy member creating a Facebook page, but about all members logging in and using the page. All committee meetings, announcements, social events, and projects should be posted on a Facebook page by the person in charge of that activity. The fear that many of our members have about Social Media is a telling indicator of how quickly Rotary is falling out of the real world.

Absolute adherence to the no religion and no politics policy established in the Constitution. Rotary is an organization of business professionals and that should be our public image. Unfortunately, some clubs have a public image of being a sub-organization of a certain religion or a certain political view. If people want to join a church or a political party they can and will, but Rotary is not a place for members to further their personal religious or political beliefs.

A greater focus on Vocational development. Rotary should be a place where smart business people get smarter. Incorporating business seminars into to Club meetings and District Conferences should be standard practice. Rotarians can and should be experts in the latest technology, management and business practices. Some clubs do this, many do not.

Clubs must have a significant focus on the inclusion of family members. Our organization tends to ignore business professionals with children because we have so many members without children. Many Club social activities don’t involve ‘kid and/or teen-friendly’ activities. The status quo is a great way to keep Rotary’s membership in decline.

Club members must be interconnected with other Area clubs. In any community all Rotary clubs should offer a united and coordinated front. I think Rotary is getting better about creating connections between clubs, but this connection should go deeper than just the Club Presidents. Every club member should recognize that they are part of a larger force in their community that includes all Rotary clubs. Good natured competition is great, but petty rivalries between local clubs should be dealt with immediately by District and Area Leadership.

Do or Die Time
I am absolutely convinced that Rotary driving towards a cliff. We either have to make a major change in direction or we will go off the cliff. We are being eaten alive by a monster that is consuming our will to change. We either confront the monster or we die.

Rotary played a major role in my life for the last 9 1/2 years and I have come to appreciate the beauty that arose out of a simple concept of business professionals joining forces for good. I have a profound respect for what Paul Harris created with this simple concept but I fear that he would be very anxious about the fact that Rotary has failed to attract young professionals in most clubs. For Paul Harris and the good of all Rotarians, Rotary must change. It is time to Re-Imagine Rotary and shed the old skin that encumbers the organization.

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Starbucks is Re-Imagining the business…again

22 Friday Oct 2010

Posted by in Branding, Business, Communication, Customer Relations, Customer Service, Information Technology, Internet, Management Practices, Passionate People, Print Media, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Relationships, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, Tom Peters, Traditional Media, Travel, Website, Women

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by Paul Kiser
USA PDT  [Twitter: ] [Facebook] [LinkedIn] [Skype:kiserrotary or 775.624.5679]

Paul Kiser

This week Starbucks continued to add value to its stores and more Re-Imagining seems to be in the forecast. A few months ago Starbucks did the smart move of offering free WiFi for everyone (see article below) and on Wednesday they took it one step farther with a Digital Starbucks that features free web content if you sign on to their WiFi service while you’re in the store.

(Free WiFi at Starbucks)

Now when you use the free WiFi service in any Starbucks you can also read a digital version of the day’s Wall Street Journal, New York Times, or the USA Today. The New York Times requires software download of a reader, but the USA Today loads up its own reader and retains the exact look of the paper copy. The site also includes Yahoo! news and GOOD content.


In addition to news, the Digital Starbucks offers access to a selection of entertainment, wellness, business/career, and local online resources. There is also a page to access most of the functions found on the Starbucks website. It seems apparent that Starbucks has teamed with AT&T, the WSJ, NYT, USA Today, and several others to offer this value-added service. Recently all Starbucks stores received new labeled newspaper stands with the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today in the top three shelves with the local paper given the bottom shelf. In my October tour of stores in Houston, Boston, Denver, and Reno I have seen more papers sold out than I have ever seen at a Starbucks store. Obviously the collaboration is a win-win.

A screen shot of the DG Wellness page

While some information has been sent out regarding the new online features most people have not caught on to the major remake of the log-in page and the new free media resources. That will change over time and I expect Starbucks will see a positive increase in store traffic as customers become aware of what they can access for free at their local store. I have already noticed high occupancy of the key ‘power’ tables (tables next to a power outlet) in almost every store I’ve visited since the free WiFi service started on July 1st.

Starbucks After Hours
The value-added virtual Starbucks is small change compared to what may be coming to some Starbucks locations. As reported in this Monday’s USA Today, the company has been testing wine and beer service at a Seattle location. The three-month remodel of a standard store resulted in a cafe-type look and feel, moving away from the glorified fast food feel of most coffee houses. The move is designed to generate more late day revenue when coffee sales die down. There is little doubt that local bars may find a Starbucks too much to compete with as it creates a middle ground for those like getting out in the evening, but seek a relaxed atmosphere free of loud music and single men on the hunt.

While I remained concerned that Starbucks is allowing accountants have too much say in store operations, I have to congratulate them on bringing value-added service and innovative ideas into the forefront. The winner is the customer … the only person that matters.

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Social Media 3Q 2010 Update: Who Uses Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, & MySpace:

08 Friday Oct 2010

Posted by in Branding, Business, Communication, Consulting, Customer Relations, Customer Service, Ethics, Information Technology, Internet, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Relationships, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, The Tipping Point, Tom Peters, Traditional Media

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by Paul Kiser
USA PDT  [Twitter: ] [Facebook] [LinkedIn] [Skype:kiserrotary or 775.624.5679]

Paul Kiser

The third quarter 2010 demographics of Social Media users according to Google’s Adplanner services has a few surprises. Facebook actually dropped from 550 to 540 million users in the third quarter, and Facebook users over age 54 dropped from 16% to 10% in the last six months. Based on the data from the 2nd and 3rd quarters there is a significant slowing in the growth of the major Social Media tools.

Among the numbers are the interesting age group distributions of each of the networking sites. The data gives important clues of what each site is being used for in addition to who is using it.

Facebook’s Fire Cools
No one can dispute Facebook’s impact on the world. It is BIG, and with millions of posts and interactions each day, the influence of its users is the envy of every marketing professional. Traditional media professional and other old people will be tempted to look at the 3rd quarter data and declare that the Social Media ‘fad’ is over and on the decline. That would be a statement of ignorance.

Facebook 3rdQ 2010 DAILY visits

Facebook’s growth could not continue indefinitely and its amazing growth in users from 2008 to the start of 2010 was being fueled by a viral exploration of a new media that allowed people to connect in a way they never had before. Now that exploration has calmed and I believe we are seeing the coming of age of Social Media.

The drop of 10 million users during the third quarter is only significant in that it shows a leveling off of the growth. The average time on the site is over 23 minutes, which is much longer than the other three major U.S. Social Media tools (MySpace 14:40 mins., Twitter 13:10 mins., LinkedIn 9:50 mins.) That is important as more time spent means more interaction and more influence by users and advertisers.

Facebook reaches almost 57% of the people in the United States (35% worldwide) which is a staggering statistic. If USA Today could reach 57% of Americans (without giving the newspaper away to every hotel guest) and know that the readers were spending over 23 minutes looking at their paper they would probably be the only newspaper in the United States… and mega rich. As of March 2010, USA Today has a circulation of only 1.8 million compared to Facebook’s over 65 million visitors (based on cookies.)

3rdQ Facebook Users by Age

1stQ Facebook Users by Age

One statistic that keeps bouncing around in the Social Media world is that “women over 55 is the fastest growing group of Facebook users.” That it is old data. While the over 55 group had climbed to 16% at the end of March 2010, it is now the fastest shrinking age group and Facebook users under 18 years old have been the fastest growing group during the last six months.

Finally, 57% of the Facebook users are women, which is about the same as six months ago. That seems to confirm that Facebook is about ‘social’ networking and making personal connections. Facebook continues to be the place where buying decisions are influenced through small group interactions. Business and Marketing people will find that if they try to manipulate these discussions it will eventually backfire on them. Facebook is where business should LISTEN, not talk.

Twitter 3rdQ 2010 DAILY visits

Twitter Continues to Pause
The biggest surprise in the 3rd Quarter with Twitter was that it did not break the 100 million user mark. At the end of the 2nd Quarter it was at 96 million users, which was up by 16 million from the 1st Quarter. However, Twitter only grew by 2 million and now stands at 98 million users.

Twitter’s daily visits have leveled off for the last six months, and some might see this as an ominous sign for the hyper-fast post Social Media tool; however, this is deceiving as many Twitter users, (like myself,) don’t go to the Twitter site to use the tool, but rather use an application, like TweetDeck, to interact on the site. Thus the visit count would not be recorded as a site visit.

Twitter’s lack of significant growth in the number of users may be do to a continued lack of understanding of the value of the Tweet world and a period of constant ‘Fail Whales’ in the 2nd Quarter and early 3rd Quarter. The service has seemed to address the major problems in system overloads, but lately has had a return of a few service interruptions in the past few weeks. Obviously, if Twitter continues to have problems it won’t be able to survive in an environment where reliability is oxygen to users.

As for the lack of understanding of the value of Twitter, the service will struggle to grow until people can learn that the impact of Twitter is not in the posts, but the conversations and the URL links to other blogs and webpages. Twitter is like Headline News for new ideas and concepts. Often posts reveal a new approach or cutting-edge information that won’t be in the traditional public arena for months. That is why I still see Twitter growing if they can rid themselves of service interruptions.

3rdQ 2010 Twitter users by Age

1stQ 2010 Twitter users by Age

One interesting development in the latest data is the shift in the age demographics. Twitter seems to have made a shift to younger adults. The 18-34 age group is up by 16%, while the 35-64 age group is down by 9% from six months ago. Also, teenagers (under 18) have dropped by 6% since the 1st quarter and now make up only 4% of all Twitter users. The apparent dislike for Twitter among teenagers is a clear age defining characteristic. I have had two separate teenagers say to me “You’re not on Twitter, are you!?”

Apparently Twitter gives you cooties. Who knew?

MySpace Back From the Brink?
I have predicted the end of MySpace for sometime, but in the 3rd quarter it did something bizarre … it gained users. It had dropped 14 million users from the 1st to the 2nd quarter and then it gained one million users back in the 3rd quarter. MySpace now stands at 67 million users. Not earth-shaking, but certainly noteworthy. LinkedIn would sacrifice several interns to have that many users. MySpace also has more women. Female users consist of 64% of the MySpace population.

MySpace 3rdQ 2010 DAILY visits

The reason? Well, no other major Social Media tool lets you search by gender … and age … and height … and race … and body type … and sexual orientation … are you getting the picture? MySpace is a social dating site as much as anything else and lonely people make up a lot of our world’s population. So maybe MySpace has found its niche as a romance network and that will stop the freefall of the past two quarters.

3Q 2010 MySpace users by Age

3rdQ 2010 MySpace users by Age

Yes, there are more teenagers on this site than most (14%), but 63% of the users are between 18 and 44 years old. One caveat. MySpace has limited the ‘find-a-friend’ search function to give the results of people age 18 and over. That is a smart move to protect minors; however, some teenagers have simply listed themselves as an age of 18 or older to circumvent the limitation. I caught a few teenagers that list themselves as 19, but on their main page description they indicate their real age. This is likely why the number of ‘under 18’ users have dropped from 34% to 14% in six months.

LinkedIn Drifting in Niche
The 3rd quarter statistics show that despite millions of people looking work, the business person to business person website of LinkedIn is not growing. It is at 41 million, which is actually higher than the end of 2nd quarter, but the same as the end of the 1st quarter.

LinkedIn 3rdQ DAILY visits

Like MySpace, LinkedIn has found its niche. Essentially, LinkedIn is a business-oriented website that provides a job exchange service. Most users are using the networking website as their digital résumé in order to attract job offers. In the Tom Peters ‘Re-Imagine’ business world where branding is a key element of survival, LinkedIn is Mecca for self-promotion.

Unfortunately, LinkedIn is not as successful as Facebook and Twitter in two-way interaction. Both of those Social Media tools do not have as much as of an ‘agenda’ by individual users as LinkedIn. Users of the business-oriented network seem to spend more time professing what they know and don’t spend as much time listening to others. This is the traditional media model of one-way communication, which is the style of communication that Social Media has displaced. For some, the self-promotion run amuck style of some LinkedIn users is a turn off that may hurt the site in the long run.

3Q 2010 LinkedIn user by Age

1stQ 2010 LinkedIn users by Age

It will be interesting to see how LinkedIn will fare as the business-caused Recession of 2007-09 eases and people are employed again. LinkedIn could be a key to a sudden labor shortage in 2012 as those companies with the best opportunities will be able to target and recruit candidates through LinkedIn, leaving other employers to either compete or settle for what’s left over.

Age and gender on LinkedIn reinforce the business-world orientation as more males (57%) are users and the distribution of the age groups reflects the working world. Interestingly, while LinkedIn still has more users over 54 years old (15%), this is 7% drop from the 1st quarter. That is offset by an 8% jump of the 24-34 year old users in the last six months.

4th Quarter Predictions?
I believe we are seeing a refinement of each of the big four Social Media tools. Facebook has become the social sharing network, Twitter is the thought-provoking, learning network, MySpace is the social relationship network, and LinkedIn the branding and résumé network. The demographics are settling in to reinforce the existing nature of each of the networks. Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn will likely end 2010 about where they are now unless something viral either cause a rush of new users, or sends people running away. Twitter still has potential significant growth, but I don’t see that happening in the 4th quarter.

The volatility of the Social Media networks have made it difficult to understand what they will eventually represent in our world; however, now that there seems to be a calming of the major networks, the value and purpose is becoming clearer. That will allow the big four to lock in their market; however, it will also open the door for other networks to identify areas of opportunities and weakness. My prediction is that 2011 will be the entrenchment of the Social Media, followed by more competition by other networks seeking to improve or offer alternatives to the established services.

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Millennium Hotel: Go away, spend your money elsewhere

27 Friday Aug 2010

Posted by in Branding, Business, Communication, Customer Relations, Customer Service, Information Technology, Internet, Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, The Tipping Point, Tom Peters, Travel

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by Paul Kiser
USA PDT  [Twitter] [Facebook] [LinkedIn] [Skype:kiserrotary or 775.624.5679]

Paul Kiser

This week I spent a couple of nights in the Millennium Hotel in downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. Now this is a good hotel and it has everything you would expect for the business traveler. The rooms are clean and reasonably updated. The staff is pleasant. It has a restaurant and a bar (although it struck me that maybe both were afterthoughts in the lobby design.) It has a pool on a fitness room (I didn’t go to hunt for them, but I’m assured that they exist.) It has a television with a selection of stations and optional pay-for-movies.

They have everything you might expect, save one item. Free WiFi/Internet. To access the Internet in the Millennium Hotel in Minneapolis you must add $10 (okay, $9.95) to the daily room rate.

Some business practices reflect old ideas.

This means one of two things. Either they decided to contract out their Internet service and they are getting some kind of kickback, or they have a bean-counter in their organization that has said to management, “Hey, we can boost our room rate by $10 if we charge for the Internet!”

It doesn’t matter why they charge for Internet service because what it says to me is simply, “We would prefer that you go elsewhere for Internet service.” In my case, I go to Starbucks where I can get online for free…and buy my tea with my extra $10…and then, rather than go back to the hotel to eat I find a place near Starbucks. Is that what they want their guests to do? Apparently.

A better place to spend $10/day

Next month I will be going back to Minneapolis and I will find my hotel on Priceline.com. That may land me back in the Millennium Hotel and once more I will go outside the hotel to connect to the world…and spend my money. I wonder if they have a clue? I seriously doubt it.

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Is it time to fire yourself?

27 Friday Aug 2010

Posted by in Business, Communication, Consulting, Customer Relations, Customer Service, Employee Retention, Government Regulation, Higher Education, Human Resources, Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Relationships, Rotary, Tom Peters, Universities

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by Paul Kiser
USA PDT  [Twitter: ] [Facebook] [LinkedIn] [Skype:kiserrotary or 775.624.5679]

Paul Kiser

One thing I have observed in government, hospitals, universities, and small business management is that all of those fields tend to be people collectors. What I mean is those particular fields have a high incidence of people who have passed their expiration date.

Why?

Government, hospitals, and universities tend to: 1) pay their employees well, 2) offer good to great benefits, 3) offer prestigious positions, and 4) have incompetent human resource professionals. A person who lands in any of these three fields may be an excellent performer for several years; however, every human being needs new challenges and after five to seven years they lose the excitement of the job. The problem is that because they have moved up to the top of the pay scale (pay scale: an example of HR incompetence) the person discovers that if they were ever to leave that job they would have to: 1) take a pay cut, 2) risk losing their excellent benefits, and 3) not find as prestigious position as what they have in their comfy current job.

Now that excellent performer is trapped like a caged animal in a job that has no challenges for them. The result is what we have in America today. Government services, hospitals, and universities that are operated by uninspired people who’s most important priority is to go home at the end of the day. And where is the human resources professional? Standing there preaching that all those systems they created that cause employee burnout are absolutely vital for retaining employees.  People collectors.

Show me an organization that prides itself on long-term employees and I’ll show you a group of people who shoved innovation and creativity into a file drawer decades before.

So why did I include small business owners in with this unhappy, unproductive group of people?

For small business owners the trap of mediocrity is different, but it has the same result.  Initially, a new business owner is excited by the challenge of creating a business from nothing. If they are successful they find the satisfaction of beating the odds, which is like a drug to a business owner. Then comes the fear of losing everything they built. That fear always, always, always leads to becoming conservative. Don’t take chances and don’t risk failure. But it doesn’t stop there.

Eventually, the intelligent business owner realized that his/her business has become stagnant. He/she then tries a series of half measures that stirs the pot but doesn’t make anything new happen. They shake up their sales team, join a peer group (they serve the same function as HR), purchase clever productivity software, or…God forbid, hire a consultant. The result is a temporary change in activity that fails to address the real problem. Fear of failure. Thus, the small business owner becomes a people collector, and they are the one collected. Stuck in a place they can’t get out of and yet, don’t want to be.

My best advice I can give to a small business owner who is stuck in this trap? Fire yourself. Put someone in charge of your company, expect that they will drive it into the ground, and go out and build a new business. At the very least you will no longer live in fear, but you will more alive than you have been in years.

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How Rotary can…must…will plug into Social Media

28 Wednesday Jul 2010

Posted by in Branding, Club Leadership, Communication, Customer Relations, Customer Service, Information Technology, Internet, Management Practices, Membership Recruitment, Membership Retention, Passionate People, Print Media, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Rotary@105, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, Tom Peters, Traditional Media, Website

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by Paul Kiser
USA PDT  [Twitter: ] [Facebook] [LinkedIn] [Skype:kiserrotary or 775.624.5679]

Social Media (sO-shul  mE-dE-ah) – 1) any Internet function that allows user comment or input, 2) interconnected Internet tools that promote participation in the sharing of ideas, concepts, and information between users or members, 3) a type of interactive communication on the Internet that bypasses the non-interactive, one-way, broadcast-type communication of traditional media (e.g.; newspaper, magazine, radio, television, books, etc.) 4) an evil plot devised by mostly young people who seek to destroy traditional media, end all privacy, and rule the world by talking to each other.

Paul Kiser

Rotary is not an organization that reacts quickly to change. The parent organization meets only once every three years to discuss and propose major policy changes and even then the meeting consists of senior representatives (Past District Governors) from each Rotary District. Rotary clubs themselves often consist of members that disproportionately represents males over 50, (of which I am one,) and that group is not normally known for its adaptation skills in changing environments. In many ways, Rotary is the poster child for rigidity, rules, and tradition.

The problem is that we don’t live in a world that rewards the slow or unadaptive. We have moved into a period of rapid change that is similar to the Crusades ‘convert or die’ philosophy and nowhere is this more obvious than in the world of Social Media. Never before have we seen a key function of our world, namely communication, advance in such a short time period. We now live in the Peter Drucker and Tom Peters world of Ready, Fire, Aim!

Consider the revolution of computers. From the introduction of personal computers from 1975 to 1985, the personal computer at home and in the office was a novelty. It was an interesting device, but limited in its usefulness. By 1985, the personal computer was starting to become a staple in business and by 1995, the computer was firmly entrenched into our everyday lives. It took approximately 20 years for computers to go from ‘a toy’ to staple of life.

Compare the computer revolution to the Social Media revolution. Just over six years ago Facebook didn’t exist. Just over four years ago Twitter didn’t exist. In the past three years the way we communicate has so drastically changed that email is considered on par with snail mail by most people under 30 years old.

Social Media Revolution

(What’s changed? See the Social Media Revolution Video)

So what does this mean for a world-wide service organization like Rotary? Change. Change like our organization has never experienced in its 105 years. But it will be good change…for most of us.

Open Discussion of Issues
The Social Media revolution is characterized by open discussion of ideas and concepts. Over the next 18 months we should expect to see more members who are passionate about Rotary writing personal blogs. These individual blogs will not be sanitized messages approved by Rotary International, but personal viewpoints (like this one) discussing current issues at the Club, District, and RI levels. Sometimes the ideas and opinions expressed will be uplifting, sometimes awkward and/or uncomfortable, and sometimes they will just be wrong. The point is that there will be discussion of Rotary…good…bad…or both, and we should expect it.

The leadership of Rotary, from Club Presidents to the RI President, can either pretend it is not happening and hope it will go away, or they can decide to participate. My vote is participation. A District Governor may serve her or his District for a year and speak once at every club, but a blog is forever and is accessible to everyone in the world. Wise input from knowledgeable leaders can help promote positive discussions, and discourage inappropriate discussions. The worst thing to do is to allow a single Rotarian to create misguided impressions of Rotary by not correcting or responding to incorrect statements.

This must be done with care, as we are all aware that in the 1980’s Rotary International (RI) took a stand against a California club that allowed women to join, thus beginning a fight that ended up in the U.S. Supreme Court where RI ended up on the wrong end of the law.

Still, we do have key principles that must be protected as was the case in 2006-07. A California club began promoting a project to buy special ammo clips for U.S. soldiers at war in Iraq and Afghanistan and was pedaling this program to other clubs. Clearly, this was a violation of Rotary’s peaceful mission to serve and of RI’s Constitution. Such violations of our principles must be addressed and corrected by the leadership of Rotary.

Rotary leadership must take care in participating, but they should not only comment, they should write their own blogs. A more open discussion of Rotary related issues will serve to make our organization stronger and will help guide the leadership to address true member issues, not just what filters up through the Chain of Command.

Better Communications – Smaller Chunks, Targeted Audience
In the 1960’s a newsletter was vital information that couldn’t be accessed anywhere else. As copy machines in the 1970’s and 80’s got better the quality of the newsletters got better. The spread of color inkjet printers (HP made a killing on color ink) of the 1990’s brought newsletters to the height of their glory and anybody and everybody put out newsletters about anything. Today, a newsletter is only slightly higher on the value scale than junk mail. The problem is that few people have time to spend 15 minutes reading it and much of the information is not of interest to the reader. In addition, the quality of the editing and design of a weekly club newsletter goes from professional grade to…well, not so much. Often the editor is a volunteer who is passionate about the club, but may or may not agree with the current priorities of the club leadership.

Enter Facebook and Twitter. Most clubs I’ve been involved in regarding incorporating Facebook or Twitter into club communications have included this statement, “But most of our club members don’t use Facebook.” If there is a defining remark about the state of a club’s recruitment situation, that is it. Over 500 million people use Facebook and Rotary clubs don’t think it is relevant because their current members don’t use it. If your membership is not using the most current methods of communication, that should tell you why people in the real world see Rotary and your club as out-of-date and out of touch.

Facebook and Twitter provide information in small readable chunks. No one has to read all 10,000 words in the newsletter to get the information they need, they just read what is of interest to them and they read it in a format that gives it to them when they are ready to read it. Those that don’t use Facebook or Twitter will find that they know less and less about what is going on in the world around them and ignorance is not a Rotary value. The club that doesn’t have an active website and Facebook Fan Page within 12 months will most likely be the club that is consistently struggling to maintain membership. It that simple.

Fortunately, I know that Rotary clubs will adapt to the new Social Media whether anyone wants it or not. They will adapt because those clubs that don’t will waste away, while those that embrace Social Media will begin to see new, younger, smarter members fill in the ranks. It’s the way change works according to Darwin.

Paul Harris began Rotary to make connections with other people. Paul Harris would have loved Social Media.

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How Social Interactive Media Could Transform Higher Education

06 Thursday May 2010

Posted by in College, Consulting, Customer Relations, Customer Service, Higher Education, Independent Studies, Information Technology, Management Practices, parenting, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, Tom Peters, Universities

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by Paul Kiser

Mom!

A Future Phone Conversation Between Mom and her Son
Mom! I just got a flash from Dr. Ramjan..HE ACCEPTED ME!!!!…Yes!…I start his program right away….for crepe’s sake Mom, it’s not like when you went to college. I don’t have to go sit in a classroom and listen to some no-name drone on about stuff nobody cares about!….No, I’m not slamming your education, but honestly Mom why did you put up with it? Going to classes, paying for parking, student fees, and being told what professors you had to learn from, etc., etc….

Paul Kiser - CEO 2020 Enterprise Technologies

Tomorrow’s College to Be Professor Based, Not University Based?
Brick and mortar universities have created elaborate rules and policies (and fees) that tell a student what classes they must complete (some required, a few elective) to obtain a degree. Many of the classes will have facts based on outdated research that must be memorized for tests. In the end the student has a degree that includes course work that had little to do with what is going in today’s working world, but was forced on him or her by a system of Higher Education that is designed for the education of a group, not of an individual.

Social Interactive Media (SIM) tools create new options for Higher Education that could overcome many of the shortcomings of the current University environment. Here are a few issues with the status quo and how Social Interactive Media offers solutions to these issues:

Less Education at a Higher Cost – Universities are slashing budgets as they are being given less money with which to operate.  This means larger classes, fewer professors, and older facilities and equipment.

SIM Solution: Eliminate the major costs of massive campuses and administrative overhead using Social Media as a student’s access to the professor. The classroom can be anywhere in the world, including in the field or in the student’s home. This is not a new idea and the use of the Internet for teaching is becoming widely accepted.

Lack of Choice – In the University environment the student has little say in what classes they will take and even less choice in the professor. The professor might be a graduate student with little or no teaching experience, or a tenured professor that has years of teaching experience, but has not performed any research in his or her field for a decade or more.

SIM Solution – Allow the student to choose the seminars and the instructors based on the information and reputation of the professors through blogs and references online. This may create a new classification of the Education Coach who advises and recommends professors and course work. Perhaps Education Coaches will be individually accredited and specialize in certain fields, or perhaps they will be accredited to help a student define a general studies (liberal arts) type program.

Inflexible Scheduling – University classes are based on the concept of group teaching, which requires all students conform their lives to the schedule determined by administrators.

SIM Solution – Individualized studies where the professor works with the student schedules programs that are mutually beneficial.

For decades there have been versions of independent study programs and in the past decade, many legitimate Internet-based colleges programs; however, the negatives of the existing University environment, exacerbated by funding shortfalls open the door to Re-Imagining higher education as a Student/Professor centered system that is relevant, rather than an administrator/bureaucratic centered system that is insensitive to the individual.

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United and Continental Airlines: Merger with the Devil

03 Monday May 2010

Posted by in Customer Relations, Customer Service, Human Resources, Management Practices, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Social Media Relations, Tom Peters

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by Paul Kiser

Paul Kiser – CEO of Enterprise Technologies, inc.

They are not too big to fail and personally that is the only viable option I see for United Airlines. I apologize for my tone, but United Airlines is the worst of the worst and I’m not alone in my opinion.

Today it was announced that United Airlines and Continental Airlines are officially merging. What a dumb move on Continental’s part.  Here are some of the comments I picked up about this merger:

“United is nothing but a mediocre airline, I don’t think I want to be combined with that work force. Continental has better customer service, it has a better product.” (1)

A Continental Airlines pilot that didn’t want to be identified

This is a sad day…united sucks…continental is an awesome airline. Some asshole will get a HUGE bonus for this and we travelers will get sh*t for service and surly b**ches at check in from united. I really hate American business nowadays. (2)

Comment to a Blog (I masked the worst of the vulgarity)

The worst kept secret in the airline industry is that United is a dysfunctional, uncaring, arrogant, and consistently bad air carrier. It has the public image of GM when Congress was considering bailing the car maker out in 2009. Songs have been written about United’s poor customer service.

(Listen to United Breaks Guitars by David Carroll)

United Airline service can best be summarized by this slogan: “We don’t care, we don’t have to.”

United is destined for failure and this merger seems to confirm that UAL continues to take action for all the wrong reasons. This merger is done for one purpose and one purpose only:  a desperate attempt to show the investors that it is doing something, anything, to avoid certain death.

United demise has been a slow, painful process of false promises, betrayals, and really, really bad management. United employees have been jerked around so many times that they no longer care about customer service. I have interacted with them enough to see that UAL has institutionalized poor customer service.

One example happened to me last year at Denver International Airport. I was flying with my four year-old boy and we were checking in for a flight from Denver to Reno on United. As we approached the ticketing area we walked past 80 or more ticket kiosks that were wide open. They were all reserved for the handful of passengers with no baggage or for international travelers, while passengers with baggage were only offered ten or so kiosks and a 30 minute wait in a long line. They had more people directing traffic for the long line than they had assisting passengers. That is not poor customer service, that’s customer loathing. United employees have heard it all, seen it all, and they see no reason to care.

My guess is that new employees at United are trained by people who are so cynical about their management and customers that they drive out any spark of hope in the rookies. That level of institutionalized hate for your job can’t be fixed without massive changes in staff. It would take a complete wipe of all levels of management and dismissal of almost all rank and file employees to excise the environment of customer hate that exists at United. A merger may make investors happy but it changes nothing in the poisonous environment that will spread to Continental after the merger.

Is there any hope? Not likely. The company name will stay United, so people will associate Continental employees with the sour employees at United. That’s not good. Jeffery A. Smisek, the CEO of Continental, will be the CEO of the new company, but United’s headquarters in Chicago will be the HQ for the new organization, which means the United ongoing leadership attitudes and problems will be retained.

Regarding the merger, Smisek said, “This combination brings together the best of both organizations and cultures to create a world-class airline with tremendous and enduring strengths.”  and  added, “Together, we will have the financial strength necessary to make critical investments to continue to improve our products and services and to achieve and sustain profitability.”(3)

Note that Smisek says nothing, not a word, about the 800-pound gorilla in United’s Operations, which is bad, really bad, customer service. United Airlines wouldn’t be out looking for a merger if it wasn’t a house of cards ready to collapse, but the new CEO seems blissfully ignorant that most flyers would fly anything but United.

All this is good for the customer because it will probably lead to the demise of a mega airline within 36 months after the completion of the merger and the equipment will be sold off to smaller carriers.

However, I can see a small opportunity for a turnaround, but it would be a miracle. First, it is that Public Relations professionals dream because they can go no where but up. Second, all public image is local, so it would take massive retraining of the staff to do a Tom Peters’ Re-Imagine! of the company. The extreme makeover would have to happen at the rank and file level. If they don’t buy into a 10.0 seismic shift in customer service the makeover is doomed. Investors be damned, everything would have to be done to make the passenger a VIP. No baggage fees, no accountants counting nickels and dimes.

Realistically the dynamics at United make the task impossible. Labor unions, cynical employees, authoritarian managers, accountant infestation and investor worship, all would work against the goal of excellent customer service, so that leaves the obvious option: let United die. It is unfortunate that United will take Continental down with them, but I guess they asked for it. Dumb move.

(1) Top News Article: http://topnews.us/content/218898-continental-airlines-worried-about-merging-united-airlines

(2)  Joe.My.God Blog:  http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2010/05/united-and-continental-airlines-to.html

(3)  American Headline News:  http://abh-news.com/united-and-continental-airlines-merge-2738.html

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Car Dealership Re-Imagines Customer Service

30 Friday Apr 2010

Posted by in Branding, Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Random, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Tom Peters

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by Paul Kiser

Car Dealerships: A Scorpion on the Fox’s Back

The world revolves around certain truths and we hold these truths to be self-evident. One absolute truth is that interactions with a car dealership will leave the customer feeling soiled, dirty…robbed. It’s bad enough to buy a car from a dealership, but then to have to go back for regular servicing is rubbing metal shavings in the wound.  Bad customer service at a car dealership is a fact, like the sun rising in the morning, or traffic lights always being red when you’re late for a critical appointment.

Paul Kiser - CEO of Enterprise Technologies, inc.

Last year we bought a car and admittedly the experience was not what I expected.  I attributed the unusually positive experience to the fact that we had our loan pre-approved through USAA and to already completing an Internet search for the car we wanted.  The dealership we finally did business with was located in Carson City, Nevada and they were willing to close the deal over the phone (and fax)…with no haggling. I gave them the results of my search through USAA and they found a car with most of the features, gave me a price that was close to what I expected and we were done. It was a freak situation.

However, regular servicing on the car would still force us to go back to the dealership, so despite our positive experience, I set my expectations appropriately low for return visits. I should note that our car is a Toyota Camry and yes, part of the service I had done this week was the accelerator assembly recall work.  I didn’t get upset about the recall. Cars are incredibly sophisticated systems and I’m amazed that we don’t have more problems.  I know other people are outraged, but honestly, if this had been a problem with GM cars we would have all said, “GM cars still suck.” But because is was Toyota, we all had higher expectations.

I am confident that our Camry is a quality product, but experience has trained me to expect the dealerships to behave like the scorpion who stings the fox.  The story is about a scorpion hitching a ride on the fox so that both of them can cross a river, but partway across the scorpion stings the fox, dooming both of them. In one version of the story, when the fox asks why the scorpion stung him he answers that it is in his nature. Likewise, bad customer service is in a car dealership’s nature.

Carson City Toyota: Do They Not Understand?  Their Supposed to be Bad!

On Monday I called to make an appointment. They asked me when I wanted to bring it in.  “Thursday,” I said, expecting a response that this week was booked, maybe next week.  Instead he responded, “What time do you want to bring it in?” This guy had to be new, because he didn’t understand how the game works in the auto service world.  He apparently didn’t know that the customer doesn’t schedule the appointment time.  The dealership always schedules the time and they always manage to find the most inconvenient time of the day to drop the car off. But I wasn’t going to tell him his job so I said, “10 AM?”  He said, “That will work fine.”  Now I knew this guy was not only new, this was probably his first day.

My plan was to go in and drop off the car and go to a Starbucks for the rest of the day.  They said it would take three to four hours, which is car dealership speak for six to eight hours. I hoped to drop it off and get out of there as quickly as possible. Most car dealerships can be scary places and the Service Waiting Area is usually a modified storage room with an old TV that is tuned to Fox News or a Soap Opera.

Carson City Toyota just prior to opening the new location.

I knew that Carson City Toyota had just moved into a new facility and I expected to be a new version of the same old thing.

My first shock was that instead of parking the car outside and turning over the keys to some overworked and poorly paid clerk at a counter, this dealership has a huge, fully enclosed car drop off area.  I pulled my car inside and the service person immediately met me, introduced himself (Greg), asked all the questions, looked over the car, and then took me to his office to enter in all the information needed to pass to the service staff.  I decided that he must be the new guy I talked to on the phone because he was entirely too attentive and efficient for a seasoned car service professional. He confirmed it would be three to four hours for all the work to be done.

I told him I was going to walk to the nearby Starbucks and he said that would be fine, or if I needed a shuttle somewhere he could have me dropped off.  He showed me how to go through the new building to get to the front but as he walked me into the heart of the dealership we came to the ‘Waiting Area’.

A Waiting Area for VIP’s…the Customer?

I looked over the room and thought, “Mother of God!”   This was not what a Waiting Area in a car dealership is supposed to be!  The waiting area was the size of two or three Starbucks. There was a floor to ceiling stone wall with a fireplace and a large flat screen TV.  In front of the wall were 12 or so sofa-type chairs with a desk-like arm on the side, all facing the fireplace/TV wall. To one side was a cafeteria-style refreshment area with a variety of coffee/tea offerings and free small pastries. I was impressed!

I walked through this beautiful tiled lounge area only to discover that I had only observed half of the waiting area.  On the other side was the mirror image with another 12 or so sofa-type chairs.  The only difference was that instead of a refreshment station along the wall they had installed a laptop computer counter with power outlets and bar stools. They even had free WiFi!

Carson City Toyota is a car dealership that obviously values their customers and treats the customer with kindness! What is wrong with them!

I was committed to my Starbucks Chai Tea, so I walked the block to the store and settled into my normal routine.  At three hours on-the-dot Greg called and said, “I’m sorry Mr. Kiser, but they do not have the car ready yet.” Yep, he’s new.  Rule No. 1 in the world of auto service is that you don’t keep the customer informed because if you do it once, the customer will expect it all the time. I told Greg that I was settled in and it was not a problem. He told me he would call me when it was ready.

A little over an hour later Greg called me again and said that the car was almost ready. I wrapped up what I was doing and walked back to the dealership. When I got there I learned that my car was being washed…at no charge. I settled the bill and a few minutes later my car was ready for me…parked as close as possible without driving it into the waiting area.

It’s been 24 hours and I’m in still in awe.  One thing I know is that the experience we had last year when we bought the car was not a fluke. Customer Service is not an accident at Carson City Toyota.

For decades Tom Peters has been preaching about things like ‘taking care of the customer’, ‘creating a new paradigm’, and rising above the customer’s expectations.  Peters wrote the book on Re-Imagining the business.  It appears to me that Carson City Toyota has read the book and is writing their own chapter.

(This blog was not paid for, nor solicited, nor approved by Carson City Toyota.)

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Social Media 2020: Keep it Personal

19 Monday Apr 2010

Posted by in Branding, Human Resources, Information Technology, Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, Tom Peters

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by Paul Kiser

Part of the challenge in learning new things is getting enough information until you can hit that magic ‘A-HA!’ moment when the information starts falling into place.  Most of my ‘A-HA!’ moments occur when listening to someone who has insight on the topic AND they can frame the information in such a way that it makes everything else I’ve learned fall into place.

For over 20 years many of my A-HA! moments have come after reading Tom Peters, but recently my A-HA! moments on Social Media have come from listening to people like Dr. Bret Simmons.

(www.bretlsimmons.com)

Dr. Bret Simmons www.bretlsimmons.com

He is well ahead of me on the learning curve of Social Media, but I am finding my course in the digital jungle easier by the path he is blazing for the rest of us common fools.  He has a unique perspective that I appreciate, and it doesn’t hurt that we both share a mutual distaste for archaic human and public relations management practices.

A few months ago I listened to him talk to a group of young professionals. During the talk he caused an A-HA moment for me.  He said, “use your name” in the Social Media arena. That seems terribly simple, but it is a foreign concept to many.  He went on to say that the message that a person conveys to him by not using their real name is that they don’t value him enough to share his or her identity.

(Listen to Dr. Bret Simmons talk about Personal Branding)

I go farther than Dr. Bret, because when someone doesn’t use their own name..full name..I wonder what they are hiding.  I can certainly understand situations where using a full first and last name may be a personal security issue; however, if you’re in the business world and you want to build your individual brand then you must use your real name.

My father’s generation expected to work for one or two employers during their career. In the past 40 years that concept has died.  What has replaced it is an attitude by employers of a one-way contract.  They want the employee to pledge complete loyalty, but in return they have no obligation of offering the employee job security. Building your personal brand is the only job security you have in today’s market.

In today’s environment your name should be the address for your website, the title of your blog, and identify you on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Your resume is not what you have on paper, it is what you have out on the Internet and the quicker you accept that fact, the faster you can start working on developing your public image and engage in the today’s market.

Does that mean you risk embarrassing yourself?  YES!  Get over it.  With each embarrassment you will become a little better at self-monitoring, both online and face to face.  We are human beings and if you don’t get a job because of something you said two years ago then you have dodged a bullet.  Any employer who is looking for the perfect employee is going to be staffed with people who don’t risk failure and that is not the company to be associated with in today’s world.

You owe it to yourself and the rest of the world to create your own personal brand. If you don’t then expect your tag line to be, “would you like fries with that, sir?”

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Social Media 2020: Did Women Legitimize the Social Media?

14 Wednesday Apr 2010

Posted by in Information Technology, Lessons of Life, Random, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, Women

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Here’s a question for you to ponder.

Would Social Interactive Media (SIM) be where it is today if women hadn’t put their stamp of approval by becoming active users?

Did Women make Social Media acceptable to the World?

I’m not talking about numbers, because 60% of Facebook users are women, so it’s obvious that they have had an important impact in the volume of users, but I’m talking about legitimizing it for everyone else. I don’t want to get into stereotyping, but as George Clooney’s character in Up In the Air said, “It’s faster.”

Consider that, with the exception of having sex, most men need a reason for becoming involved in an activity.  Men don’t shopping; they go to a store to purchase.  A man may say that he plays golf just for the enjoyment of the game, but don’t let anyone kid you, a man’s golf score can make or break his day.

Women, by contrast, don’t need to have a reason to go to the store or play golf.  They can find pleasure in just doing the activity.  For a woman, life doesn’t need justification to be enjoyed.

Now look at the Social Media arena.  I often find that men are the most phobic when it comes to participating in Social Media.  They mistrust and fear it.  Often the comment is, “I just don’t understand what the purpose is!”  And there lies the stereotyped gender difference.  Men need a reason (and they tend to leave their participles dangling.)

Women don’t need a reason.  The format of sharing information and ideas is in their comfort zone and that’s all they need.  Women are accustomed to be judged by others, so they don’t fear being judged online.  Women are also better self-monitors, so they know how to control their emotions when they post and tweet.

I believe that it was the acceptance of Social Media by women that pushed it into the mainstream.  Now, men are just trying to keep up…and trying to find a justification, a ‘reason’, to explain why participation in Social Media is important….hmmm…how’s that working out for us, guys?

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Social Media 2020: Public Relations 2001 vs Social Media Relations 2010

13 Tuesday Apr 2010

Posted by in Human Resources, Information Technology, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Social Media Relations, Tom Peters

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A lot has changed in the last nine years in regard to the world of Public Relations.  In Part One I compare the fable presented in the Late 1990’s book, Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson to the reaction towards today’s new world of Social Media.  In Part Two of this series I compare how we looked at Public Relations in 2001 versus how we look at it today.

Paul Kiser

(Read Part One of this series – Social Media 2020: Who Moved My Public Relations?)

Public Relations 2001:  The Power of Third-Party Media

In 2001, Public Relations was more distinct.  A person could easily identify the roles and responsibilities. Publicity was defined as earning the attention of third-party media of an organization through free media channels. Promotion described the use of paid third-party media advertising (newspaper, radio, TV, phone book, mail, etc.) to gain public attention.  It was easier to define Public Relations in 2001 because it consisted of three distinct roles:  1) The organization seeking publicity/promotion, 2) the third-party media, and 3) the target audience.

Of the three roles, the third-party media was considered a deity.  The goal of PR professionals (and non-professionals) was to gain favorable attention of those key people in the third-party media so that they would talk about you to their audience.  You could buy your way into the hearts and minds of the media, but the goal was to seduce the media and gain their favor.  Journalists, newspaper editors, television news directors, and other media professionals had the power to make or break the public image of company and/or influence customers purchasing habits.  The people in the media were the gatekeepers to the public.

In 2001, the Internet was not new, but it was still primarily a place of email and websites.  PR professionals were promoting websites as another tool in their arsenal to reach the public, but many organizations still had their doubts about the importance of how a website could increase their business.  A few could see beyond the existing uses of the Internet.  Some of those gifted few might have imagined a world where junk mail and the yellow pages would become obsolete, but the idea of masses of people in continuous connection to each other was hard to fathom by almost everyone, especially PR professionals.

The New Cheese: The Individual

Tom Peters - author of Re-Imagine! New Business Excellence in a Disruptive World

One person who saw something brewing in the early part of the new millennium was Tom Peters.  In his 2003 book, Re-Imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age, he devoted a chapter to Individual Branding.  He suggested a future where the skills and experience of the individual would be key to ‘New Business’.  A world where a person isn’t swallowed up as a commodity in the belly of a corporation, but rather as an independent professional that companies would compete to have on their team.

(Go to Tom Peters Re-Imagine! website)

In 2003, it seemed hard to imagine how an individual could become relevant in a business world that often captured employees and then made them sign non-disclosure, non-compete, we-own-you agreements.  The ability for someone to market themselves was severely restricted, if not, banned outright by the corporation that made no promises of job security, but demanded total loyalty.

Perhaps Peters could see that the blogging sites of 2001-03 were signaling a new age of individualism; perhaps there were trends in place that Peters could project in the future; or perhaps (and this is my theory) that Peters has the ability to travel in time; but with the development and massive growth of Social Interactive Media in the last five years, Peters accurately predicted a new world of branding of the individual that is now a reality.

The Individual Trumps False Corporate and Media Gods

The rapid growth of Facebook and Twitter are two of the significant factors that changed the world of Public Relations.  Facebook made Social Media acceptable to millions.  Social Media allowed an individual to connect with hundreds of other people without the approval or denial of a third-party media deity.  Ideas, opinions, and knowledge were now being shared and it all bypassed the traditional gatekeepers.  It is hard to say what was the critical mass flash point that pushed Social Media into the mainstream, but once Facebook exceeded 100 million users there was no doubt that the Age of the Individual had dawned.

Twitter’s contribution to the age of the individual was two-fold.  The 140 character limitation for Twitter messages created a need to link to blogs, articles, and websites to fully convey new information and ideas; therefore, the practice of embedding links into a Tweet became commonplace.  That spurred a new connectivity of an individual’s ideas and opinions to the rest of the world.  Prior to Twitter, a blog was primarily found via a Google search, but a Tweet brought more attention to the general public without relying on a deliberate search, AND, the Tweet put new information out to an audience that was already interested in the topic.

The second impact of Twitter was a continuous flow of connectivity.  As a Social Media tool it put people in touch with each other 24/7/365.  While other Social Media tools could make a similar claim, Twitter encouraged users to stay connected and placed a priority on real-time interaction.  This was a pace of communication that corporations, with layers of control and approval, were not equipped to handle.  The corporate practice of running every statement or concept by a Public Relations professional before it goes public was not possible in the world of real-time information.  Twitter was designed for communication of individuals, not corporations, which is exactly the way users wanted it.

A Different Flavor of Cheese

Nobody will deny that Public Relations is still not a viable function in today’s world, but the old concept of the worship of third-party media like newspapers has been lost.  Discussing the Internet and Social Media when a newspaper professional is in the room is like discussing a new girlfriend in front of someone who used to date her and got dumped.  Public Relations is no longer an effort to make the best possible impression with the public as it is about being genuine.  Users of Social Media can spot a fake PR effort and anything that smacks of a corporate sell job is rejected…permanently.

To survive in a world of ‘Social Media Relations,’ corporations no longer can hide behind the perfect façade of Public Relations.  A business will be judged by the sum of its individuals and that means less control and manipulation of its employees.  The successful company will unshackle its people to dazzle its customers with their expertise of the business, and their competitors will tremble in fear.  It’s a new world, but not for those who don’t adapt and adopt.

Tom Peters world of New Business is here and Public Relations can no longer hide behind the curtain in New Oz.

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Best Practices: Become a Target!

24 Wednesday Mar 2010

Posted by in Human Resources, Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Tom Peters

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by Paul Kiser

Paul Kiser - CEO 2020 Enterprise Technologies

I just read Dr. Bret Simmons blog post, Give Yourself Permission to Be Excellent.  Excellence is a topic I fell in love with back in the 1980’s when Tom Peters and Robert Waterman wrote the iconic book, In Search of Excellence.   In that book I finally found someone who confirmed that business as usual is not good enough.

In Search of Excellence by Tom Peters and Robert Waterman

Fortunately, the President of the hospital I worked at then had also read the same book and for two years I experienced what business could be when unleashed from the confines of the unimaginative and uncaring.   All the ‘can’t-be-done’ stupidity had to face the light of day and it didn’t fare well when the control was removed from those who saw themselves as the ‘protectors’ of traditions.   The hospital (run by a strict religious-based organization) grew and flourished under the new leadership.  The facility kept it’s core values while eliminating most of the dysfunctional ideas that held it back.

But there was a price for those who pioneered the concept of excellence over authority.   Those people came under scrutiny.   Any mistake or failure was seized as proof positive that the people involved in effort of change were flawed….not that their ideas were flawed, but that the people were.

In Dr. Bret Simmons’s Blog he talks about the risk in striving for excellence and helps us understand why ‘risk’ happens.

(Click here to read Dr. Simmons Blog)

Dr. Bret Simmons www.bretlsimmons.com

Dr. Bret states that mediocrity abides by the current rules and to strive for excellence means defining new rules.  Most people wait for someone in authority to define the new rules and in most cases those in authority fear risking his or her position by breaking new ground.   Thus it takes a ‘champion’, as Tom Peters liked to call them, to step forward and make the new rules for everyone else.

However, once a person steps forward to lead the way they make themselves a target. Their peers ask, “Who are you to do this!!!” and they wait for the person to be struck down by someone in authority.  The person in authority is embarrassed that they weren’t the one who took the bold action and so is predisposed to ‘put the person in their place.’   The result is that the person who leads the way is disliked…personally…by others in the organization.

The organization that lacks great leadership destroys champions, and make no mistake it takes GREAT leadership to love a champion. Good leadership toys with champions like a cat toying with a mouse. Good leaders are entertained by champions, but once they make an error the champion is lunch.

So why take the risk?  Why not play it safe and color within the lines?   George Carlin said, “Life is what we do while we are waiting to die.” It’s a matter of choice, but one can find purpose by being a champion and that can be a great feeling!   So go ahead…put those red circles on your back and move out in front of everyone else.  They can see the target easier when you’re in front…but then they have to live with the fact that they are always behind you.

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Fear of Public Relations

21 Sunday Mar 2010

Posted by in Crisis Management, Human Resources, Information Technology, Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Social Interactive Media (SIM), Tom Peters

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The fog of Social Interactive Media is burning off

There are two approaches to Public Relations. The first is to live in fear of it and tremble at the prospect of screwing up. Take only measured steps that are carefully calculated and planned.

The other approach is to dive in. Risk mistakes and live and breathe being real and human.

The old school of Public Relations is the former. It is controlled by the Chain of Command. No one is authorized to speak unless cleared by multiple levels of authority and even then, to say or do anything that is nothing less than perfect is to fail. It is that Public Relations of which the world has become accustomed. Anyone who mars the perfect image risks banishment from the corporate world. Nightmare situations such as the current Toyota recalls reinforce the fear that Public Relations is a beast that must be closely guarded and heavily controlled.

This is why the new world of social media terrifies the old school. The unprecedented access to expressing our individuality on Facebook, Twitter, or even our own blog is the worst possible situation for those who believe that control of the message is the alpha and omega of Public Relations. Many companies are establishing strict policies for their employees on using Facebook, blogging, and all other avenues of professional or personal expression. Most of this comes from the management attitude that employees are a necessary evil and potentially a major embarrassment to the company.

What the old school of Public Relations doesn’t understand is that social interactive media (SIM) is creating a new model of business that is being driven by a desire of the consumer to do business with real people, not corporations. In today’s interactive world the branding of the individual is now becoming a driving force to he branding of the corporation. This is 180 degrees from the mission of most Public Relation professionals in major companies and it gives indigestion to old school managers that live in fear of employee self-expression.

Re-Imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age

In 2003, Tom Peters came out with a book called Re-Imagine!: Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age. If you understand that the book was published before Twitter and Facebook were available to the public, you have to wonder if Tom Peters can travel into the future and back again. Today everyone throws around the term ‘Branding’ but few know that today’s usage of the term originated from Peter’s 2003 book. On page 232 of Re-Imagine! Peters explains a new world of people who develop her or his individual brand separate from the corporate world. Now, in 2010, social interactive media has provided the vehicle for individuals to show off who they are and what they know and Peters has become the Moses of the new business world.

Like all business, the winner will always be the one who can embrace change before others. Companies that can adapt and use social interactive media to promote and showcase the quality and expertise of the individual within their ranks will have the advantage over the competition. In those companies the new role for the Public Relations professional is to help employees brand themselves instead of trying to muzzle them.

Still, the old school will loudly point out every slight misstep or mistake made by an employee that may reflect poorly on a company’s reputation. What they don’t understand is that errors make us human and that can deepen the bond between the company and the customer. An error is the opportunity to make things right and that is the key to all long-term relationships.

Passionate People Can Save a City

16 Tuesday Mar 2010

Posted by in Lessons of Life, Management Practices, Passionate People, Public Relations, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Tom Peters

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Rick Parr: A Force of Nature

Last night I sat in a back room of a restaurant in downtown Reno (that shall remain nameless) at the Rotary Club of Reno New Generations meeting.  The restaurant had decided to pack the back room with patrons who were not part of the meeting and who seemed to be oblivious that someone was trying to speak to the group. Despite all of this distraction the club members were focused on the man standing up.  To everyone it was apparent that this man was passionate about his job and all the noise around him didn’t keep him from making it clear that he loves what he does.

The man is Rick Parr and he is Passionate about his ball club. Rick is the General Manager of the Reno Aces and last year the new Triple A team came to Reno and erased all doubt of whether this town could support the Arizona Diamondbacks ‘farm’ team.

Rick Parr - General Manager of the Reno Aces

The Reno Aces exceeded all expectations for a first year club with a season attendance approaching 500,000 fans.  But that achievement was nothing compared to what happened during the first four months of 2009.

On February 1st of last year the ballpark looked more like the first phase of a major construction project rather than a state-of-the-art baseball stadium only 10 weeks away from the first pitch of the first home game.  But on April 17th all, and I mean all, were amazed.  For anyone who was paying attention it was a miracle.

www.renoaces.com

Rick doesn’t look like he has 30 years in baseball management.  When you talk to him about the Reno Aces he sounds like the person who was just hired to take a job that he has dreamed of all his life.  He loves baseball and he loves his team.  You get the sense that the miracle of last year’s opening day was due in large part to the force a nature known as Rick Parr.

But Rick’s passion doesn’t stop with baseball.  He is passionate about redeveloping downtown.  Like Denver’s Coors Field, the new Reno Aces Stadium is located in an area that has had little economic benefit to the city in recent history and like the Colorado Rockies, the Reno Aces are bringing in people and new development to revitalize the downtown area.

Rick has only been in Reno for 18 months, but as the designated hitter for the Front Office he taking the vision of the team owners, Jerry and Stuart Katzoff, and bringing home a Re-Imagined* downtown that offers more attractions than just a baseball team.  This year the Aces will open up the next phase of new dining and shopping with the Freight House District’s first retail offerings.  There is no doubt that this area will become a ‘Mecca’ for tourists and local citizens, bringing new jobs and revenue for local businesses and to the City of Reno.

Even before the completion of the full Freight House District retail project it is obvious that the Reno Aces have changed Reno for good.  Rick would probably be the first to credit the work of many others for the success, but there is one common factor in all that is happening in the downtown area and that is the passion of Rick Parr.

Rick is a great example of how one person can change a city by having passion and vision.  Peter Drucker wrote, “Wherever you find something getting done, you find a monomaniac with a mission.”  Rick Parr is Reno’s newest monomaniac.  Just in time!

(*Re-Imagine! is a 2003 book by Tom Peters about rethinking business in a new world.)

Reno Aces website is at www.renoaces.com.

Playing the Whole Game

15 Monday Mar 2010

Posted by in Human Resources, Information Technology, Management Practices, Public Relations, Social Interactive Media (SIM)

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I’m not a big sports fan.  I tend to skim through games and watch for a few minutes, but I don’t live for sports.  Still, I watch enough to qualify for my chromosomes and I do understand the strategies used in most sports.

On Saturday I caught bits of the Ohio State vs. Illinois basketball game.  It was a close game toward the end and Ohio St. did something that I really like…they played the whole game.  Twice Ohio State was behind by two points and they had several seconds left.  If they scored too soon it would give Illinois the opportunity bring the ball back down court and win the game.

The strategy many teams have in this situation is to stall and go for the last shot.  But Ohio State didn’t follow the traditional strategy.  They shot quickly and gave Illinois the opportunity to win.  The irony is that Illinois did play for the last shot and in both situations they failed.  In the end Ohio State won.

I was happy for two reasons.  First, I was happy to see Illinois lose because the Illini (players and fans) are known for their trash talk. They think it is part of the game.  The second reason is Ohio State won by playing the entire game.  They didn’t stall and try to win in a last second shot for victory.  They tied the game and then played defense.

Go Ohio State!

I’ve never understood the logic of the stall tactic.  I know the only thing that counts is the score when the clock reads 00:00, but the measure of a team is what they can do for the whole game, not just up to the final 40 seconds and then stop playing until the last three seconds.  What type of message does that send?

The Whole Game in Business
I see this attitude creep over into the business world.  I was once told about a manager for a major package delivery company.  He had a budget for labor and equipment.  The manager would get a significant bonus if he was under budget on his labor and equipment, so he deliberately over worked his salaried supervisors, worked understaffed with his hourly employees, and didn’t purchase the needed equipment for the staff to do their jobs.  He ‘won the game’ and got his bonus, but everyone hated working for him.

Some might think that this misuse of people and resources will eventually be discovered.  It is not.  Employees don’t like ratting on their boss because management often fails to act in situations where the manager is a success on paper and sometimes it is the employee that suffers for speaking out.  To my knowledge this manager is still in his position and nothing has changed in five years or more. He might have even been promoted by now.

This is one of the reasons why I don’t like most performance evaluation tools. They may be based on ‘quantifiable’ measurements, but quantifying doesn’t equate to fairness.  I don’t oppose goal setting, but business is and should be a dynamic process.  Goals and performance measures make bean counters happy, but the can often be manipulated to work contrary to the needs of the employees and/or customers.

The focus of any business should be to play the whole game and not work for the score at the end of the ‘quarter’.  This involves Management By Walking Around (MBWA) and letting small groups in the company experiment with new ideas (Skunk Works).  If this sounds like old Tom Peters stuff, it is, but it’s GOOD old Tom Peters stuff.

Tom Peters

I read Tom Peters first book, In Search of Excellence, soon after it was published in 1982, and I have been a disciple of his rants for over 25 years. Of course, you don’t win many corporate popularity contests when you’re guiding principles are reflected by a rejection of the status quo, but I’ve yet to be proven wrong….just fired or let go. I’ve been dusting off some of his books and scanning them again. I believe that almost everything a business person needs to be successful can be found in Tom Peters writings.

We’re facing a new business environment and it’s time we rejected the habits we fell into during the last 10 years.  We can start by going back to the basic question:  What does the customer need and how can we provide what they want, before they want it, and better than they expect?  Get that question right and everything else is easy.

Go Ohio State!

Management by Coup 1: Eliminate Employee Evaluations

11 Thursday Mar 2010

Posted by in Human Resources, Management Practices, Re-Imagine!, Rotary, Tom Peters

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by Paul Kiser

Paul Kiser - CEO of Enterprise Technologies, inc.

I have worked many years in Human Resources and at one time my job was to help managers write employee job standards and performance evaluation tools. I would like to now publicly apologize for playing a role in the dark side of management.

HR people can give you dozens of reasons why employee evaluations are absolutely necessary. You need to give the employee feedback, you need to let the employee know your expectations, evaluations are documentation of the employee performance, documentation is needed for disciplinary actions, blah, blah, blah, blah…it’s all BS. Here are four myths about employee evaluations:

Myth #1: Employees need periodic feedback
WRONG! Employees need constant feedback. Respectable HR people will tell you that there should be nothing discussed during the employee evaluation that they were not already aware of; however, in actual practice the employee evaluation is the moment many managers use the GOTCHA Management Technique by dredging up hearsay and listing new expectations that the employee has never heard before the evaluation.

Tom Peters discussed a technique known as MBWA or Management by Walking Around. The basic idea is the manager stops wasting time sitting in an office and spends it by interacting with his or her employees and customers. This brilliant 21st Century management technique was first discussed in the book, In Search of Excellence by Tom Peters and Robert H. Waterman in 1982! For over 25 years managers have been told to get out of her or his office to manage and yet some people still don’t get it.

Myth #2:  Evaluations are needed to support disciplinary action
While some managers use the evaluation as a GOTCHA moment, others will minimize a negative performance issue in order to maintain a positive working relationship; therefore, an employee’s evaluation often fails to support disciplinary action taken against them.  Time after time an employee’s lawyer seizes on a lack of evidence in the employee’s evaluation to justify disciplinary action by the employer.  A manager is better off having written documentation of a problem at the time of the incident rather than trying to use the evaluation to document an issue regarding the employee’s performance.

Myth #3:  Evaluations are needed to determine pay increases.
Pay increases need to be fair and equitable, but many organizations find that withholding a pay increase based on performance causes more potential legal problems than is solves, and punishment destroys employee morale rather than improves an individual’s performance.  Pay for performance was a novel idea that never delivered on the promises of improved productivity by the HR department.

Myth #4:  If a manager is not required to do periodic employee evaluations they will never give the employee the information they need to excel at their job.
An evaluation does not a good manager make!  If a manager is not giving constant feedback to their team, then what good are they?

Life Without Evaluations
I know it seems unthinkable for some, but evaluations are an HR imposed control system that is completely unnecessary.  In fact, evaluations do more harm to teamwork because they create a formal “Us vs Them” situation between the manager and the worker.  Evaluations can make a manager feel superior and that is not a good foundations for positive employee relations.

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Not so Greats are Killing American Business

10 Wednesday Mar 2010

Posted by in Human Resources, Management Practices, Public Relations, Rotary

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by Paul Kiser

Tom Peters is one of the most annoying people in the world.  I say this because people are usually annoyed by a person who is always right and Tom Peters is almost always right.  For decades he has been scolding business, mocking those who excel at mediocrity, pointing out companies that are doing it better, and generally being relentless at not accepting the status quo in the corporate world.  Sure he gets paid big bucks to chastise organizations and industries to their face, but that doesn’t mean they like him.

Tom Peters book, Re-Imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age

After almost 30 years of spelling it out for executives and business leaders that they are doing it wrong, he still makes a great living from ranting at the corporate world.  The reason is simple.  It’s not because it is difficult to take his advice.  It’s not because Peters asks the impossible.  It’s not because the corporate world consists of stupid people (well, maybe a few).  The reason Tom Peters is able to continue his assault on business is because he offers the perfect commodity:  Common sense in a nonsensical world.

The problem is a fear of Greatness.  Most people seem to be comfortable doing good work and live in terror of risking failure by going for greatness.  Case in point:  Government.  Right now most State, County and Municipal governments are operating under the assumption that they have failed and the only thing they can do is plan for more failure.  You can’t do great things when you have decided you’ve already failed.

Jim Collins book, Good to Great, talks about how great companies have a realistic view of the challenges they face AND at the same time those companies are absolutely certain that they will succeed.  Taking the lessons learned from Collins research, greatness involves; 1) great AND humble leadership, 2) getting the right people in the right positions AND getting the wrong people out, and 3) confronting the facts, no matter how stark, AND believing that success is possible.

Tom Peters has shown repeatedly that we fall into traps of mediocrity and that’s the alpha and omega to squandering a great opportunity.  I am constantly amazed at how many people have never read Peters and can’t figure out why business seems so hard to understand.  I am more amazed at those that have read Peters and still don’t get that ‘good’ is never going to be ‘good enough’.

The Coming Employment Perfect Storm

03 Wednesday Mar 2010

Posted by in Human Resources, Management Practices

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Storm Clouds on the Horizon
While some may fear a disaster coming in 2012, employers may want to worry less about the world ending and more about a new world emerging.

When the pendulum swings one direction it will always swing back the other direction.  In 2009-10, employment has swung to one extreme (labor surplus) and it’s not difficult to foresee it will eventually swing back the other direction.  The question for employers is what factors will influence the return because that will determine if we are moving toward equilibrium between labor and jobs or if we are moving into a new labor shortage.  Unfortunately for employers needing quality workers, a perfect storm seems to be brewing that may bring about the worst labor shortage since World War II.

A Symbiotic Relationship
The engine that drives employment is a symbiotic relationship between the employee and the employer.  In this relationship the employer provides; 1) wages and/or benefits, 2) job security, and 3) a source of pride and well-being from gainful employment.  In return the employee basically submits themselves to abide by the demands put upon them by the employer.

A One-Way Street
Unfortunately for the employee, employers have often exploited their workers by not providing one or more of the unwritten agreements of that symbiotic relationship.  Companies have been able to do this because a person’s need to survive has been largely dependent on gainful employment and though self-employment has been an option, it has been an option only if you wish to sacrifice your sense of security.  For a period of time labor unions helped the worker by leveling the employment playing field; however, with most unions devolving to some level of corruption, the employee sometimes is dealing with the lesser of two evils.

A New World
For decades we have observed that job security has been on the decline; however, the current recession has crushed the last vestiges of job security in the workplace.  Government and university employees were among the sectors of employment that still retained some job security, but this economic crisis has undercut the government revenue bases of property, sales, income, and many business taxes, leaving city, county, and state governments drastically cutting jobs.  No longer can an employee be deluded with the myth of job security and that removes the corner stone of the symbiotic relationship that employers have used to maintain some control on the labor market.  It is understood that for an experienced, educated worker there is no more risk in being self-employed than being under the thumb of a corporate manager.

The new reality is bad news for an employer that needs an experienced and/or educated workforce.  These workers are now seeking to earn their living outside of a corporate environment and organizations can no longer expect any leverage of a better opportunity within the corporate structure.  In fact, many people will discover greater opportunities and more control in the entrepreneurial world than behind the company desk.

The length of this recession is also contributing to dispelling the mystic of needing a job for a sense of well being.  With so many unemployed it no longer is a mantle of shame to be one of millions out of work.  Many unemployed workers are going back to school, re-imagining1 their careers, starting their own companies, working for volunteer organizations, or a combination of all the above.  Like a snow drift in Spring, the current labor surplus is gradually melting away and when employers return to the labor market they may find the labor surplus is a suddenly a shortage.

Damn Tom Peters!
In 2003, Tom Peters published his latest treatise on the future of business.  His book titled, Re-Imagine!  Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age, described the demise of the corporate employee.  His description of self-branded people who floated from project to project foretold an entrepreneurial environment where individuals reigned supreme and corporations fought for the best talent.  Whether Peters has a crystal ball or just exceptional perception, the impact of the current recession has made his predictions of the new workplace become our reality.

What to Do?
For the employer, the days of employment as usual are over.  Some human resource professionals may be smirking at the current power balance based on today’s labor surplus, but that smile will soon be wiped off his or her face.  The best strategy for an organization is to reevaluate the workplace and address any issues of people management that devalues the employee.  The guiding principal of treating the employee as an equal will help an employer to meet the new reality, but most organizations cannot fathom what that means.  Eliminating job standards, employee evaluations, and all other human resource and management tools designed to send the clear message that “we own you” will have to be sacrificed.  That is contrary to everything companies have been told in the past sixty years, but that is the only part of the extreme workplace makeover that will be necessary to revamp an organization for what is coming in the next storm front.  Many organizations that survive the new economy will emerge only to be swept away by the new workplace.

1Tom Peters term of rethinking the future of business.