Worth Reading: Jock Talk: 5 Communication Principles for Leaders as Exemplified by Legends of the Sports World by Beth Noymer Levine.

 

jock-talk-book-0302

I am honored to have written the Foreword to Jock Talk by my friend Beth Noymer Levine, the head of SmartMouth Communications.

It is an inspiring book that will help any reader enhance his or her leadership communication skill.   Well worth reading, digesting, and applying.

Beth Noymer Levine, Author of Jock Talk

Beth Noymer Levine, Author of Jock Talk

 

The following is adapted from the Foreword:

Thirty years ago I made one of the best business decisions of my career. I hired Beth Noymer Levine.

I had just started work in the world’s largest PR firm, one of 25 people devoted full-time to a single Wall Street client. I was a mid-level member of the group, tasked with assembling a small team to promote our client’s nascent investment banking business. Beth became part of our five-person investment banking communication team. It was 1985, the go-go years on Wall Street — just a few years before actor Charlie Sheen captured the pace and possibilities, as well as the consequences of overdoing it, in the film Wall Street. We spent our days at our client’s Wall Street offices and trading floor, grazing for news by morning and early afternoon, and speaking with the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and other media by late afternoon, all to earn our client a disproportionate share of voice in the papers.

611px-Bronzefigur_Charging_Bull

We were young and brash and somewhat fearless. We began not knowing a thing about Wall Street — in my job interview I had to point out that I didn’t know the difference between a stock and a bond. My future boss reassured me, “you will.” And indeed we learned. And Beth was a star, earning not only our trust but also that of our (sometimes difficult) client and the news media. She was very, very good at it.

After a few years I left for another firm, and Beth also left for yet another. We reconnected at the end of the decade, when I became head of communication for a large investment bank. I retained Beth’s firm. Beth became my advisor, and I discovered that she had assembled her own team of young, brash, and talented investment banking communicators.

A couple of years later I had begun teaching investor relations and financial communication at New York University’s Marketing & Management Institute. They asked me to teach another course, so I needed to hand off Investor Relations. I could think of only one person to take over the course: Beth. She joined the NYU faculty and taught brilliantly for the next several years. Then her career led her to Atlanta, where she became head of corporate communications for a large bank – one that eventually would become part of Bank of America.

And then we went our separate ways. Beth started her own consulting practice and got involved in the world of Olympic and professional sports in addition to the corporate world. I spent the next 20 years building a crisis and leadership coaching practice, with a heavy emphasis on Wall Street, healthcare, and the military.

 

Rings

We reconnected over coffee in New York when she came to meet with people about her book idea – what became Jock Talk. And we discovered that we were each working on similar books – books on how to lead, build trust, and inspire loyalty through effective communication. Only I was doing it through the metaphor of military strategy, she through sports. We didn’t really compare notes. But we agreed to stay in touch.

My book, The Power of Communication: Skills to Build Trust, Inspire Loyalty, and Lead Effectively, came out in mid-2012; Beth read it only after she had finished writing hers. But – perhaps not surprisingly – the two books are completely aligned. We come at things from different directions and use different vocabulary. But we’re fellow travelers, applying and interpreting the same principles in ways we have found to work for our clients. And why not? We came of age together, discovering the hard way what works and what doesn’t. One small example: Beth’s First Principle is audience-centricity. My book’s Second Principle is that you can’t move people unless you meet them where they are. Same idea. But hers also embodies her Fourth Principle: Brevity.

I was honored and humbled when Beth asked me to write the Foreword. I devoured her book. It is brilliant. It is witty. And it works. I know that after you’ve read the book, and taken to heart Beth’s principles and techniques, you will become a more effective communicator, and therefore a more effective leader.

Beth and I agree on this: If you cannot communicate effectively you will not lead. Whether you’re an athlete, a candidate for political office, a business executive, or just someone trying to build a career, you will benefit mightily from Jock Talk’s approach.

Onward…

 

JockTalk

by Helio Fred Garcia

I’ve been in China for just over a month, the last two weeks of which were spent on book tour in connection with the publication of the Chinese edition of The Power of Communication: Skills to Build Trust, Inspire Loyalty, and Lead Effectively.

Book Tour

 

Publications - PC China Cover - 2014 Jun 12
The concepts from the book and the best practices and principles applied by Logos Institute for Crisis Management and Executive Leadership have been very well received by both academic and business audiences here.  I have spoken so far in three cities: Shanghai, Nanjing, and Tianjin.  I’m now in Beijing, and all the remaining work will be here.

By the time we’re done, I will have spoken at fifteen universities, including most of the top-10-ranked Chinese universities.  And also will have spoken at a half-dozen corporate events.

From business school deans and graduate students to newspaper editors to business executives, there has been an appetite for the best practices in crisis management and crisis communication, and also in executive leadership skills.  As China goes through extraordinary change, there is also a recognition that a management approach that promotes a culture of compliance but not of innovation may not be sustainable.  The tough migration to leadership that inspires, and to timely decision-making that maintains trust, has produced meaningful desire to get the principles right.  It is part of a larger change taking place across all elements of Chinese society.

Announcement at Nanjing University

Announcement at Nanjing University

Three universities so far have asked to discuss formalizing long-term relationships with Logos Institute, but no commitments in either direction have yet been made.

Shanghai

The tour started in Shanghai, in friendly territory: NYU Shanghai, where NYU Shanghai student and Logos colleague Evan Chethik made introductions.   The school, only in its second year, is housed in an ultra-modern building with smart classrooms, up-to-date labs, and even iPads in public areas for student use.  Their art lab has two 3-D printers.  I gave two classes, one on The Power of Communication and Leadership for the Global Liberal Studies course, and a public lecture focusing more on Power of Communication and barriers to effective audience engagement.  The students were smart, engaged, and engaging.  About half of my group were Americans visiting for a year; some were from NYU’s Abu Dhabi campus; the rest were Chinese, part of the first two classes of Chinese students to get an NYU Degree completely from NYU’s Shanghai college.

With my Logos colleague and NYU Shanghai student Evan Chethik

With my Logos colleague and NYU Shanghai student Evan Chethik

Our NYU Shanghai contact, Professor Ray Ro, is also on the faculty at Sino-British College, a consortium of University of Shanghai for Science and Technology and nine British universities.  We went there the next day.  Most of the students were Chinese, majoring in either engineering or business.  They too were quite engaged and engaging.

Teaching MBA students at Shanghai International Studies University

Teaching MBA students at Shanghai International Studies University

The same day we visited Shanghai Jiaotong University’s School of Media and Design, teaching graduate students on effective interpersonal communication.  Great students.

With Dr. Zhen Fan, Dean of the School of Business, Shanghai International Studies University

With Dr. Zhen Fan, Dean of the School of Business, Shanghai International Studies University

The next day we visited Shanghai International Studies University School of Business.  This was the first of two visits to the university, and three classes.  Here the students were getting their MBAs, some with a concentration in communication.  Most were Chinese, but there were some Americans and several Europeans.  The discussion was lively and vivid.

Teaching undergraduate business students at Shanghai International Studies University

Teaching undergraduate business students at Shanghai International Studies University

We returned to Shanghai International Studies University, to teach School of English Studies and in the undergraduate business school.

NYU MS in PR/CC Student Reunion

2014 grads of the NYU MS in PR/CC. L to R, Iris Wenting Xue, Ci Song, Judy Zhu, and Ada Yang. (I was thesis advisor to Iris and Judy)

2014 grads of the NYU MS in PR/CC. L to R, Iris Wenting Xue, Ci Song, Judy Zhu, and Ada Yang. (I was thesis advisor to Iris and Judy)

One of the highlights of the Shanghai visit was a reunion of several of my NYU MS in Public Relations and Corporate Communication students who now live and work in Shanghai.  All are working in good public relations jobs.  (A similar reunion is planned for Beijing.)

Corporate Presentations

While in Shanghai we had the opportunity to speak at three corporate events.

Shanghai Daily, the English language newspaper of Shanghai, invited me to give a luncheon workshop on crisis management to the heads of communication of about 25 multinational corporations.

Shanghai Daily StoryThe event was also attended by a number of editors and reporters from the newspaper, and officials of the Shanghai city government.

With Joyce Wu, Editor-in-Chief of Shanghai Daily, the English language newspaper of Shanghai

With Joyce Wu, Editor-in-Chief of Shanghai Daily, the English language newspaper of Shanghai

That evening we went to the headquarters office of Vanke, a the largest residential real estate developer in China.  Our evening was jointly sponsored by Vanke and Ivy League English, which hosted us several times.  The session was on strategy, leadership, and the power of communication.

The main room at Vanke, 250 people, plus 40 offices participating remotely via video hookup

The main room at Vanke, 250 people, plus 40 offices participating remotely via video hookup

In addition to the 240 people in the headquarters office, forty of Vanke’s offices throughout China also participated via video hookup.  This was the first session we held where we needed simultaneous translation into Chinese (although at all sessions, our slides were in both English and Chinese).  Ivy League English will also sponsor a similar session in Beijing.

Vanke employees at one of 40 remote locations participating in the workshop

Vanke employees at one of 40 remote locations participating in the workshop

Several days later we met at Ivy League English’s Shanghai headquarters offices for a meeting of Shanghai CSR We Can, a group of 25 heads of corporate social responsibility for major Chinese companies and for the Chinese offices of multinationals.  We spent the afternoon covering the overlap between corporate responsibility and crisis management; especially the need in each instance to take seriously stakeholder expectations and concerns.  We had lively discussion and debate.

Nanjing

We then took the bullet train to Nanjing, and spent a whirlwind 36 hours there.

That night we gave a public lecture at the Johns Hopkins University Nanjing Center, a campus of the School of Advanced International Studies.   The topic was the use of power in all forms, but especially communication as soft power, and therefore more sustainable than hard power.  The students were getting their MAs or graduate certificates in international relations and foreign policy.

The announcement at the Johns Hopkins University Nanjing Center

The announcement at the Johns Hopkins University Nanjing Center

These students, generally older and more experienced internationally than the business students I had met at other universities, had a sophisticated understanding of foreign policy, economics, and military force.  We had lively discussions of American foreign policy, framing (ISIS or ISIL?), and the limits of soft power.

Student interaction at Johns Hopkins University Nanjing Center

Student interaction at Johns Hopkins University Nanjing Center

Another unexpected delight on the trip was a surprise visit to the Johns Hopkins lecture by my former NYU PR/CC student Tao Feng.  He graduated in 2014, and now works for Burson-Marsteller in Guangzhou, China.  He happened to be in Nanjing for a client meeting, and saw the notice of the lecture on Weibo (Chinese equivalent of Twitter) and was able to get to the lecture, his boss in tow.  We shared a taxi afterward.

With Tao Feng, 2014 graduate of the NYU MS in PR/CC

With Tao Feng, 2014 graduate of the NYU MS in PR/CC

The next day we returned to downtown Nanjing to speak at a public workshop at Nanjing University on maintaining trust in a crisis.  It was a small but focused group of undergraduate, graduate, and post-doctorate students.

We spent the afternoon at a distant campus of Communication University of China, Nanjing.  The public lecture on effective leadership communication was held in the library auditorium to a standing-room only crowd.  The discussion was lively and toward the end got a bit raucous.  Or, as Dr. Shirley Tse, our host, said, the students were vivid.

Teaching at Communication University of China Nanjing

Teaching at Communication University of China Nanjing

Tianjin

After class we took the bullet train from Nanjing to Beijing, and seven hours later took the bullet commuter train the half hour (90 miles) to Tianjin, a city of 13 million known for its technology and manufacturing base.  (Logos has several large industrial clients with facilities here.)

The announcement at Tianjin University College of Management and Economics

The announcement at Tianjin University College of Management and Economics

That day we spoke at Tianjin University’s College of Management and Economics.  Tianjin University, founded in 1895, is the oldest university in China.

With Dr. Zhang Wei, Dean, College of Management and Economics, Tianjin University

With Dr. Zhang Wei, Dean, College of Management and Economics, Tianjin University

We spoke to the MBAs, Executive MBAs, and other business students on leadership and the power of communication.  The next day we were back in Tianjin to speak at Nankai University’s business school.

Teaching business students at Nankai University Business School

Teaching business students at Nankai University Business School

And then we rested.

My wife, Laurel Garcia Colvin, returned to New York Saturday, after four and a half weeks in China.  I got a three-day weekend, just ending now.

The trip has been ably assembled and managed by Logos Institute Research and China Business Development Associate Iris Wenting Xue (who also did most of the simultaneous translation, when needed). She has worked closely Beryl Young,  a manager with the book’s publisher, Publishing House of Electronics Industry.

Tomorrow the Beijing portion of the trip begins, and will last nine days.  Stay tuned…

Fred

Watchtower on the Northwest Corner of the Forbidden City, Beijing, from across the moat

Watchtower on the Northwest Corner of the Forbidden City, Beijing, from across the moat

 

 

Helio Fred GarciaHelio Fred Garcia | Bio | Posts
31 Dec 2014

Every year I look for great moments in leadership and leadership communication. This year offered many candidates for the greatest leadership moment. The usual suspects come from the world of politics, sports, or business. But there was one unlikely moment in 2014 that in my view shows leadership in an unexpected light, one that offers both teachable moments and hope for leaders in any field.

Great Leaders Transcend the Either/Or

Ever since the murder of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri in August, there has been a growing movement calling attention to the disproportionate number of black youths who are killed by police officers. In the months following the Ferguson shooting, other police-involved shootings led to national protests, including the “Hands Up/Don’t Shoot” rallies and the Black Lives Matter movement.

Black Lives Matter

The media has framed the conflict as police v. black communities, and New York City police have played into that dynamic by showing disrespect to New York Mayor Bill De Blasio after he noted that he has spoken with his own son, who is black, about his personal risk when interacting with police.

But however convenient for the media to paint the conflict as either/or; as pro-police or pro-community, it doesn’t have to be this way. And great leaders can transcend the bifurcation and find ways to unite and move forward.

My pick for the best leadership and leadership communication moment in 2014 is Missouri Highway Patrol Captain Ron Johnson. I’ve taught his case in several graduate business and communication courses in the five months since, and each time it brings tears to the students’ eyes. I share it here.

Ferguson

 Michael Brown was killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri on Saturday, August 9. The police mishandled the investigation and aftermath, and by midweek the St. Louis county and other local police forces mishandled the protests that erupted. The US and national media descended on the scene, broadcasting live from the streets.

Ferguson_Day_6,_Picture_44The police over-reaction included paramilitary police in military gear riding on an armored vehicle, with a sniper aiming his rifle at protesters. It included tear-gassing of the crowds and of journalists, and intimidating journalists and other observers. The scene was reminiscent of a war zone, and covered that way in the national and international press.

watching the crowd with rifles

By late week, Missouri governor Jay Nixon took control of the situation, and named the Missouri Highway Patrol as the agency responsible for crowd control. He appointed State Patrol Captain Ron Johnson the commander on the scene.

Johnson, who is black and who grew up and still lives in the Ferguson area, immediately reframed his role: it was not to protect Ferguson from the protestors, but to protect the protestors’ right to peaceably assemble.

 The Transforming Moment

But the great moment in leadership came the Sunday eight days after Michael Brown’s shooting, and four days after the tear-gassing in the streets.   It was at a church, at a rally in support of the Brown family. Capt. Johnson arrived wearing his state trooper uniform. There was palpable tension in the large crowd as he took the pulpit. UntitledBut he began in an unexpected way:

 “I want to start off by talking to Mike Brown’s family. And I want you to know my heart goes out to you. And I say that I’m sorry. I wear this uniform. And I should stand up here and say that I’m sorry.”

It was a remarkable moment. And the crowd was not expecting it. There was initial silence, then applause, which lasted for more than thirty seconds; the final fifteen of which included cheers.

In that moment Johnson transformed the situation.  He connected with the community; he opened a valve that allowed pent-up emotions to be released, in a positive and constructive way.  He spoke first to the people most directly affected, the Brown family. He expressed sympathy for their loss, and then said he’s sorry. He repeated it in the frame of his uniform. Their experience of the police, from the shooting of their son to the mishandling of the crime scene to the bungling of the protests, was one of indifference and of confrontation. Here was a police leader moving past those experiences and connecting at a human level.

And there was significance in his phrase: “I wear this uniform. And I should stand up here and say that I’m sorry.” He was the first law enforcement officer to say so.

Having established an institutional leadership role, he then connected more personally, and made a personal commitment.

 “This is my neighborhood. You are my family. You are my friends. And I am you. And I will stand and protect you. I will protect your right to protest.” (More cheers.)   I’m telling you right now I’m full right now. I came in here today and I saw people cheering and people clapping, and this is what people need to put on TV.” (More cheers and applause.)

He then told his own story.

“When this is over, I’m going to in my son’s room. My black son. Who wears his pants sagging; wears his hat cocked to his side; has tattoos on his arms. But that’s my baby.”

Then he moved from the personal to the public:

“Let’s continue to show this nation who we are; continue to show this country who we are; for when these days are over Mike Brown’s family is still weeping, and they’re still praying…

He closed by connecting, promising, and rallying:

 “I love you. I stand tall with you. And I’ll see you out there.”

A police officer told the community that he loves them.  Remarkable.

Watch the six minute talk here:

Leadership Best Practices

Capt. Johnson’s six minute talk met many of Logos Institute’s best practices. One is that you can’t move people unless you meet them where they are. Capt. Johnson did that, connecting in his first sentence with the Brown family and throughout with the community, both black and white. He understood the power of framing: “I wear this uniform. And I should stand up here and tell you I’m sorry.”

Our friend and fellow crisis counselor James E. Lukaszewski describes a pattern in crises he calls the Victim Cycle.  Early intervention can pre-empt or shorten the victim cycle.  In the early phases the victims (both those directly affected and those who empathize) need assistance with their own grief; to hear an expression of regret; to see involvement from the institution in queston; to receive information; and to have their plight recognized. In later phases they also need to receive validation of their suffering; get honest communication from the organization; to hear an apology from the top of the organization; to experience direct communication; and receive compassion. Capt. Johnson delivered all of those in his remarks.

And the Logos Institute best practices decision criteria were also met. The defining question in determining what to do or say is:

What would reasonable members of the stakeholder group appropriately expect

a responsible organization or leader to do when facing a situation like this?

And in the case of the Ferguson community, when Capt. Johnson addressed them, the reasonable expectations of a responsible leader would be to connect, express sympathy and regret, and to honestly declare his values, commitments, and next steps. Capt. Johnson did.

In many ways he was the leader best suited to do so.

Time magazine quotes St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson, who knows Captain Johnson from working on large events such as a presidential motorcade:

“He’s a quiet guy, but he is professional. When he speaks, people listen. When he acts, people respond to it. He’s familiar with the area, he comes from the area, and he connects with the community.”

Time quotes his former boss, Patrol Superintendent Colonel Roger Stottlemyer, who promoted Johnson to captain in 2012:

“I think he’s a calming influence on people.  I think he knows the people there, he knows what their concerns are, he can relate to them having come from that community.” …Stottlemyer said that at the time Johnson was rising in the ranks, there were fewer than 100 officers of color in a force of 1,200 officers. “He was a star, and it was obvious from the beginning.”  Stottlemyer said he promoted Johnson to Captain partly because he was impressed with his leadership style. “I observed when he was a corporal and a sergeant, the way he handled his men and the way he handled issues that comes up,” he said. “He communicates well with his people. He was an officer that you didn’t have complaints about.”

 Unfinished Business

The national debate set off by the Ferguson killing and aftermath is bigger than any one local community and any one law enforcement officer.  And however effective a leader Captain Johnson may be, the national controversy is large and getting larger, and many other players are now involved.  The media continues to portray the issue as either/or; as police v. community/community v. police.

But in all the controversy, it is reassuring to see real leadership in action, even in a small community, that transforms a situation and brings people together.  For his courage, his compassion, his authenticity, and his effective leadership, I am pleased to pick Capt. Johnson’s remarks on August 17 as the leadership and leadership communication moment of the year.

Your thoughts welcomed.

Fred

Book Review and Commentary

Helio Fred Garcia Helio Fred Garcia | Bio | Posts
28 Dec 2014

James G. Stavridis tried to leave the Navy in 1981, after his five-year commitment was up, to attend law school.  But he got a call from his Annapolis mentor, then Lieutenant Commander Mike Mullen (later to become Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff).  Mullen said, “You want law school. OK. Let me try and get the Navy to send you to a law school.”  The next day he called and offered to have the Navy send Stavridis to the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.  Stavridis pointed out that Fletcher is not a law school, but school of international relations.

Mullen’s reply: “It has ‘law’ in the name. And it is hard to get orders to it. So you better take it now.”  Stavridis did.  He received a PhD in international relations and was named the outstanding student in his class, setting in motion a career that propelled him to be one of only two 1976 graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy to receive four stars.  (The other, Marine General John Allen, served as head of NATO and U.S. operations in Afghanistan.)

The nation owes a debt to  Adms. Mullen and Stavridis, both for their service and for the decision-making thirty-three years ago that kept Stavridis in the Navy.

navyadm4wtstar

In 2009 Adm. Stavridis was finishing a three-year tour as the four-star head of U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) when he was appointed by President Obama to become simultaneously Supreme Allied Commander of NATO (a position known as SACEUR) and also commander of the U.S. European Command (EUCOM). He was the first Navy officer to so serve.  In those two roles he was simultaneously in charge of both all NATO operations around the globe (including the International Security Assistance Force Afghanistan (ISAF)) and all U.S. operations on the continent of Europe.  In those capacities he presided over the 2011 campaign in Libya that ultimately removed Muammar Gaddafi from power.

Adm. Stavridis, who retired from the Navy in 2013 to become the Dean of his Alma Mater, the Fletcher School, has written a memoir of his time in uniform, The Accidental Admiral: A Sailor Takes Command at NATO. (Naval Institute Press, 2014)

Accidental Admiral Book Cover

Worth Reading

The Accidental Admiral is my pick for the best leadership and leadership communication book of 2014.

It is worth reading, not just because it is elegantly written and shows in clear language the challenge of leading such complex organizations.  And not just as a good window into both diplomacy and military strategy over the last five years.  But also for three other reasons:

  1. Because Adm. Stavridis is an inspired and inspiring leader, and The Accidental Admiral is also a handbook on effective leadership, with application well beyond the military.
  2. Because Adm. Stavridis is a proponent of effective strategic communication, again with application well beyond the military.
  3. Because Adm. Stavridis is one of the big thinkers about national security, who will be shaping the views of the next generation of national security leaders.  His views on smart power and open-source security (see below) are particularly worth noting.

Adm. Stavridis lays out the theme of his book early:

“The big lesson that I learned along the way, and which is the underpinning of this book, is in one sense very basic: the world is a diverse and complex place, and single-point ‘silver bullet’ solutions for its problems will almost always fail. Unilateral action is usually a disappointment; alliances, partnerships, and friendships are everything. We must apply international, inter-agency, and public-private connections in creating security in the twenty-first century.”

In many ways Adm. Stavridis echos the philosophy of his mentor, retired Joint Chiefs Chair Mike Mullen.  In his 2009 article in Joint Force Quarterly,  Adm. Mullen decried both the foreign policy and the strategic communication failures of the prior decade.  He chided the nation’s leaders for the arrogance; for assuming that our good intentions by themselves would have us prevail.

“To put it simply, we need to worry a lot less about how to communicate our actions and much more about what our actions communicate…. I also hope we learn to be more humble, to listen more. Because what we are after in the end—or should be after—are actions that speak for themselves, that speak for us. What we need more than anything is credibility. And we can’t get that in a talking point.”

Decision Criteria: When to Use Force?

One of the challenges Adm. Stavridis faced as SACEUR was achieving agreement and commitment for NATO operations, both in Afghanistan and in Europe, from Nato’s 28 member nations.  His investment in relationships and diplomacy came to fruition during the campaign to protect Libyan civilians between March and November, 2011.  That campaign led to the ouster of Muammar Gaddafi, who was later killed by his own people.  In addition to recounting the run-up to and the implementation of that campaign, Adm. Stavridis offers lessons learned from the Libya campaign that can help inform decisions on the use of force in other conflicts, such as in Syria or against ISIL.

what-is-the-levant-why-obama-says-isil-instead-of-isis-islamic-state

“I do think we can draw some quick lessons from Libya that might inform the decision to engage elsewhere…

  1. There must be a pressing need in a humanitarian sense. This is the somewhat controversial legal doctrine of “responsibility to protect,” or R2P, as it is sometimes called. When large numbers of innocent civilians are being killed or threatened by disaster (man-made or natural), intervention must be considered.
  2. Allies and coalitions are crucial. The age of unilateral action is rapidly passing. Despite all frustrations, working with a coalition is vastly better than going it alone.
  3. Regional support is vital. The presence of Arab coalition partners in Libya was key.
  4. You must understand the language, culture, history, and hierarchy of any nation or region into which an intervention is considered.
  5. Bring lots of capability: intelligence, surveillance, targeting, ordnance, ships, aircraft, and – if necessary (and hope that they are not necessary) – troops on the ground.
  6. Try to minimize casualties. Interventions in today’s world are about relieving human suffering, not increasing it. That means working with humanitarian organizations, energizing public-private connections, using only precision-guided munitions, and paying attention to refugees at sea and on the ground.
  7. It will be expensive. More than you expect. Much more.
  8. Bring lawyers, strategic communicators, and public affairs experts, and engage the media early, often, and continuously.
  9. Do it under the auspices of the UN if at all possible. There may be times when it is not possible, but it is vastly better to intervene under legal norms provided by the UN.
  10. Probably most important, good luck. You will need it. In Libya, we had more than our normal share. It won’t always be so.”

Good advice.  And note that President Obama seemed to follow many of these principles in formulating a response to ISIL in Iraq and Syria.

Lessons for Leaders

But the real value of The Accidental Admiral for civilian readers comes from Adm. Stavridis’ leadership principles.  He summarizes his leadership approach:

“Any leader worth his or her salt understands that leaders must work hard to get to know the people on the team as individuals and demonstrate sincere concern for their families. In addition, they must master the skills and technology of any job; encourage teamwork and demand determination and dedication to task and mission; build innovation as a core competency; and insist on civility. In essence, leaders do best when they approach their position with an attitude of ‘leader as servant,’ always treating their teams with dignity, honor, and respect. No mystery there – except, perhaps, why so few leaders actually put those tenets to use…

People will almost always become what you expect and tell them to be: if you are suspicious and certain that they are going to malinger and procrastinate and do anything they can to get out of work, they usually will; if you tell them that they are going to get things done in record time and give them the resources and goals to do it, they usually will… But the key is always ‘leader as servant.’”

Adm. James G. Stavridis

Adm. James G. Stavridis

Adm. Stavridis outlines what he calls “tricks of the trade: important ways in which a good leader can put broad philosophical ideas into operation, make sure the goals of everyone in the organization are aligned, and maintain grace under pressure.”  They include:

  • “Speak and write with simplicity and precision, and don’t accept imprecision from those around you. Casualness in speech and writing can lead to huge disconnects. This is particularly true with e-mail, which – when you hit Send – becomes etched in stone…
  • Prepare thoroughly for key events. Make sure you understand which events truly matter.   Don’t let the chaff floating around in the wind distract you from what is really important to your job…Leaders need to look ahead several months or even a year or two at a time; pick out the events that really matter; and spend an enormous amount of time, energy, and resources ensuring that they are fully prepared.
  •  Be your own spokesperson. When things go wrong, it is much easier to find reasons why you should say nothing than to step up to your responsibilities…. But that gives the impression that the senior leadership is uncaring or unaware…After a sexual assault took place recently in the Australian Army, the Army’s commander, General David Morrison, posted a hard-hitting video and made repeated personal appearances condemning such attacks in the strongest terms and telling the offenders in direct terms: ‘Get out of our Army.’  Similar assaults have plagued the U.S. military, but many senior commanders have held back, fearing that they will ‘prejudice potential juries’ and ‘exert command influence.’ That is the wrong approach in my view – being your own spokesperson means stepping up and calling it like you see it in public.  The Aussies have it right.
  • Carve out time to think. Write down your thoughts. Share them with others whose opinions you respect.
  • Don’t lunge at the ball. Too many decisions are made in haste, under pressure, based on emotional reaction, or with incomplete facts. Take the time to gather the information you need. Don’t be driven by anyone else’s timeline unless absolutely required (i.e., by law).
  • Details matter, but think big thoughts. Balance the time spent on absorbing and understanding details and that spent sitting back from the thicket of the day to day and trying to think through new ideas, concepts, and necessities for your family, your organization, and the nation.
  • Look at the new law or regulation for yourself. Don’t rely on summaries or a staff member’s or lawyer’s opinion as to what the law says. Get it and read it yourself.
  • Organize yourself.  Don’t turn over personal organization to assistants, no matter how good they are. Much of the value of getting organized… is that it forces you to think holistically about events. The essential material thus gets into your head.
  • Carve out time to read. Take a balanced approach: fiction, nonfiction, professional journals, and so on.
  • Make mentorship a priority. Listen, learn, educate, and lead… Walk around and listen to your team. And show up early for meetings.”

Leadership. Churchill

Taking Strategic Communication Seriously

A second reason to read The Accidental Admiral is Adm. Stavridis’ view on strategic communication, which he sees as the glue that holds together all other strategic initiatives.   His recommendations are completely consistent with best practices and with the approach I advocate in my book The Power of Communication: Skills to Build Trust, Inspire Loyalty, and Lead Effectively (FT Press, 2012).  He knows that you can’t move audiences unless you meet them where they are.  In particular, he understands the power of human connection; of taking audiences seriously and engaging them effectively, not as an afterthought but as an essential element of leadership.  As I often say, communication is the continuation of policy, by yet other means.

His philosophy of strategic communication is summarized as follows:

“Effective communication is the key skill a senior leader needs in today’s world… Winston Churchill is said to have observed that the principal difference between management and leadership is communication. Effective communication requires leaders of an organization to take an early and persistent role in deciding how ideas and decisions are shaped and delivered.

Simply stated, the objective of strategic communication is to provide audiences with truthful and timely information that will influence them to support the objectives of the communicator. In addition to truthfulness and timeliness, the information must be delivered to the target audience in a precise way. This generalized approach can be applied to essentially any organization. It may sound easy, but in practice it is as hard as hell. The U.S. Department of Defense and NATO are damn good at launching Tomahawk missiles but can’t launch an idea to save their lives, figuratively (and occasionally literally) speaking.”

Save their lives

He notes that strategic communication is vastly more art than science, but also offers the following insights.

“Here are some things that I have seen work, although none of them is foolproof.

  • Remember that the postman never rings twice. You get only one chance to make a first impression on any story. Pick your spot and start talking carefully, thinking about the setting and the context, getting expert advice, and get out in front – intelligently.
  • You can’t un-ring a bell. Something once said can never be pulled back, especially in the media echo chamber, which demands constant content to fill the 24/7 news cycle. Ill-advised short-, punchy, cute phrases can kill you. Before you speak, make sure you know exactly what you want to say. And remember, there are times when silence is golden.
  • Tell the truth. The most important principle is the simplest: Always provide the truth to your audience. Nothing will more quickly doom strategic communication to failure than a falsehood. A strategic communication team can have a superb message, excellent messengers, and a carefully crafted plan – yet a single lie can bring the entire effort crashing down… Tell the truth and emphasize that you do tell the truth.  Over the long run, it is unquestionably the best approach.
  • Have a good message. The most brilliant strategic communication in the world will not sell a bad message… Again, this seems self-evident, but there are many in the world of strategic communication who believe that a bad message can be sold effectively. It cannot. The strategic message must resonate with the audience because it shares appropriate human values such as liberty, justice, honest, economic improvement, security, and fair treatment.
  • Understand the audience. Can there be two more different countries in the world than enormous Portuguese-speaking Brazil and tiny English-speaking St. Kitts? Or Spanish-speaking, economically strong Chile and poverty-stricken French-Creole-speaking Haiti? The audience is different in each country or territory and each group of people, during each particular season. Therefore, the messages must be evaluated and tailored with the diverse qualities of the receiver in mind.
  • Pull the trigger promptly… Do not let the ‘perfect’ become the enemy of the ‘very good.’ Develop a reasonably good plan fast and execute it right away. Otherwise you are likely to end up back on your heels in the world of the perpetual news cycle. Leaders tend to want to wait until they have all the facts before acting, but they often won’t have the time. Especially in this modern electronic media-driven world you will literally and figuratively be buried before all the facts come in.
  • Think at the strategic level… A strategic communicator must stay at the strategic level and not dip down into the tactical level represented by public affairs…. Indeed, strategic communication consists of a wide variety of tools and processes within a command… Each has a role to play in effective strategic communication at the tactical or operational level, but none of them is a substitute for a strategic plan operating at the level of the entire theater across time, space, language, and culture. At the strategic level, the intellectual firepower of the command must be brought most distinctly to bear.
  • Measure results. Many strategic communication plans flounder because the implementers, thrilled with having developed and ‘sold’ the plan, are completely consumed with its execution and fail to take the most important single step: measuring its results.  The absolute key to effective communication is rolling out a plan, organizing it widely, executing it energetically, and then measuring its results. ‘Organizing it widely’ means making sure that all of the key stakeholders are in on the formulation of the plan – essentially, ‘in on the takeoff, in on the landing.’ Too often strategic communication plans are cooked up by brilliant public affairs professionals, vetted swiftly with the top leadership, and then promulgated. Without wide support on the buildup, though, it is unlikely there will be much ground-level support when the plan comes out.
  • Adjust fire. No strategic communication plan is perfect at conception. All must be adjusted as time goes by. You may go to war armed with the ideas you have, but you will not win unless you are willing and able to modify those ideas along the way – discarding those that fail and welding on new approaches as needed.   One way to approach measurement is to adopt short-, medium-, and long-term views. The short term is immediate reactions – say, twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Medium-term measurement is done after thirty to forty-five days. Long-term measurement takes place at the one-year point. After each of these measurement windows, the plan should be evaluated and recast according to what is working and what is not.
  • Add spice. Strategic communication should not be boring.
  • Maintain steady pressure. Very seldom do strategic communication plans succeed overnight…. All good strategic communication plans take time, sometimes generations, to fulfill.
  • Bursts of energy. The analog of steady pressure, of course, is bursts of energy. In any strategic communication plan there will be moments when it is opportune to hit with bursts of energy…. A creative strategic planner is constantly looking for the right moment to come in high and hard with an energy burst.
  • Accepting defeat and moving on. Some strategic communication battles are un-winnable. Sometimes the message is not going to have any effect no matter how effective the plan.
  • Knowing when you win. Sometimes the hardest thing for any strategic planner is not accepting defeat but rather recognizing victory. As a general rule, ‘winning’ in the world of strategic communication is never clean and seldom obvious.”

These principles make sense, but like Adm. Stavridis I am often shocked by how many individuals and organizations that use the phrase “strategic communication” seem to be neither strategic nor focused on effective communication.  Rather, they tend to blend the strategic and the tactical, or assume that only one set of tools (media, social media, lobbying) matters, rather than seeing the big picture and aligning all the forms of influence.  The discipline of thinking first at the strategic level, what I call being habitually strategic, is difficult, but the key to effective communication.  Flawless execution at the operational and tactical levels also matters.  But if the strategic part isn’t right, flawless execution can have counter-productive consequences.

Adm. Stavridis offers four recommendations worth considering for strategic communication in the twenty-first century.

“First, strategic communication is a team sport. It must be part of a joint inter-agency, and commercial system. It does no good whatsoever to have a perfect strategic communication plan that is ultimately contradicted by other U.S. government agencies, as – unfortunately – is often the case.

Second, at least for strategic communication that goes beyond the shores of the United States, … the international community must be considered and then consulted often.

Third, as we develop and execute our strategic communication plans, we should ask the simple question: who are the thinkers, the idea makers?… Recognize that the ‘strategic communication director’ is more like the conductor of a band than an expert on any given instrument. Moreover, give the director of strategic communication unfettered access to the commander.

Fourth, and finally, anyone who is trying to move a message must work with all the participants to arrive at a shared understanding of what constitutes strategic communication in an international sense.

These insights by themselves would make paying attention to Adm. Stavridis a good investment of time and energy.  And it is gratifying to see this generation of military leaders — Adm. Stavridis, Adm. Mullen, Gen. Allen, understand the need to be effective both in leading complex coalitions and in aligning all actions with effective communication.

But there’s a final reason to follow Adm. Stavridis: He is helping the nation and its leaders re-think the use of power.

Rethinking Power

In many ways he is following in the footsteps of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government professor Joseph Nye, whose 2002 book, The Paradox of American Power: Why the World’s Only Superpower Can’t Go It Alone described the distinction between hard power — military might and economic clout — and soft power — diplomacy, academic and cultural exchange, and other forms of attraction.   The paradox, according to Nye, is that the more the US would use hard power the more it would squander its reservoir of soft power.  But the converse didn’t apply: the US could use its soft power effectively without diminishing its hard power reserves.  And in his 2011 book, The Future of Power, Nye describes how power is now diffusing and how many threats to national security now come from non-state players.

The-Future-of-Power-Nye-Joseph-S-JR-9781586488918

Open-Source Security

While still in uniform Adm. Stavridis took this approach and introduced the notion of Open-Source Security.  In a TED Talk while still serving as SACEUR/EUCOM, he outlined the concepts of Open Source Security as follows:

“Instead of building walls to create security, we need to build bridges.  Open-source security is about connecting the international, the inter-agency, the private-public, and lashing it together with strategic communication, largely in social networks.  Why do we need to do that? Because our global commons is under attack in a variety of ways, and none of the sources of threat to the global commons will be solved by building walls.”

Among the threats to the global commons — the infrastructure we all share — he includes piracy on the seas, cyber crime, and trafficking — the movement of narcotics, weapons, and humans.  These are done primarily by non-state players, but they create instability and flash-points that can lead to shooting wars.  But there is no single state player solution to these global threats.

Says Adm. Stavridis,

“So here we are, twenty-first century. We know our twentieth century tools will not work. We will not deliver security solely from the barrel of a gun.”

Silouhette of sniper.Stavridis

While some military might may be necessary, and while it must always be available to policymakers, the challenges are much more complicated.  He gives the example of the Afghan security forces.  One of the key challenges they face is that the Taliban restricted education.  So most men and women who serve in the Afghan forces join without the ability to read or write in their own language.  So through a combination of security services, many government agencies of many nations, and private contractors, the Afghan security forces learn to read.  This creates lasting benefits and stability for Afghanistan, and helps fulfill the national security interests of the United States, NATO, and our coalition allies.  But it requires resources of the fifty nations in the mission, plus public-private collaboration.

 

Hard-soft power reastat

He argues,

“Life is not an on-and-off switch. You do not need to have a military that is either in hard combat or is in the barracks. I would argue life is a rheostat. You have to dial it in. And as I think about how we create security in the twenty-first century, there will be times when we will apply hard power in true war and crisis. But there will be many instances… where our militaries can be part of creating twenty-first century security: international, inter-agency, private-public, connected with competent communication.”

 

His TED Talk is worth watching to the end.  It’s just under 17 minutes long.

His conclusion:

“No one of us is as smart as all of us thinking together. No one person, no one alliance, no one of us… My thesis for you is that by combining international, inter-agency, private-public, and strategic communication together in this twenty-first century, we can create the sum of all security.”

I believe that open-source security will be a key organizing principle of much security discussion in the years ahead.  Reading The Accidental Admiral to see the practice in action, and watching the Ted Talk to see the current conceptual framework, will give you a pretty good head start.

Your thoughts welcomed…

Fred

 

 

Helio Fred Garcia Helio Fred Garcia | Bio | Posts
5 Nov 2014 | 3:07PM

This is my third in a series of guest blogs featuring my recently-graduated capstone (thesis) advisees in New York University’s Master’s in Public Relations and Corporate Communication.

(See my earlier posts: On Wall Street, Reputation, and Recovery: Guest Blog by Julia Sahin here; A Model Apology by Iris Wenting Xue here.)

Today I share the post with Claudia Espinel, whose thesis focused on a challenging topic: ways to reduce violence in regions with conflict caused by the extraction of oil.  Her full capstone, A Discourse Analysis of Major Players in Regions with Oil Conflict: The Case of the Niger Delta, can be found here.

 

Claudia Espinel

Claudia Espinel

During the last five years, Claudia has worked for both national and international NGOs, using communication to promote social change.

By using the Niger Delta conflict as case study, Claudia analyzes the written documents of oil companies, the government, and the community involved in the conflict. Even though violence in this region has its roots in ethnic issues, the arrival of the oil industry enhanced the existing violence. Political, economic, environmental, and social factors have created an environment in which there is friction between the oil companies, the government, and the community. They have built a relationship characterized by lack of trust, respect, and tolerance.

niger_delta(1)

Claudia argues that communication practitioners can help build sustainable peace by creating initiatives to change the dynamic of the relation of players of the Niger Delta conflict. Although it is difficult to create a common communication strategy for different cultures, regions dealing with oil conflicts share characteristics that make this capstone useful for similar conflicts across the world.

Changing Narratives in Regions Dealing with Oil Conflict

 by Claudia Espinel

When the oil industry drilled the first oil well in 1958 in the Niger Delta, Nigeria became one of the strongest economies in Africa while the Niger Delta remained as one of the poorest regions in Nigeria.

Nigeria Flag

Nigeria Flag

Even though underdevelopment in this region is rooted in ethnic conflict since before Nigeria’s independence from England in 1960, the arrival of the oil industry worsened the already fragile situation of the Niger Delta. Since then, oil companies, host communities, and the government have built a narrative of blame, hate, accusations, and stereotypes that sustain a culture in which violence is understood as the only way to survive.

This long-standing violent conflict is a classic example of the “the oil curse”—the theory that oil wealth engenders violence and slow economic growth in countries with weak governments, under-developed oil regions, and petroleum dependent economies. Key players in oil conflicts­­—such as oil companies, the government, and communities—use narratives that support the use of violence as a protective tool, increasingly making it impossible for people to see others as anything different than enemies.

In order to transform oil conflicts, it is necessary to create a disruption in the dominant narrative people create to understand and frame them. Communication plans should focus on changing the relationship between the parties on each side of the conflict by promoting a narrative of respect, trust, and tolerance. In order for this to happen the following strategies should be put in place:

  1. Build a unified community voice: If the local community wants to have a seat at the table where decisions are made, they need to have a clear agenda and someone to lead it. Elders, community leaders, and grassroots organizations need to build a leadership structure that facilitates the process of decision-making within the community and develop skills to transform conflicts using non-violent means.
  2. Promote reconciliation: Rebuilding the relationship among players of oil conflicts requires an environment in which justice is possible and people have the opportunity to heal past injustices. In this way, they can focus on building a future instead of focusing on the past grievances.
  3. Address the root of the conflict instead of focusing on interventions to tackle the symptoms: Addressing only the symptoms of the conflict such as oil looting and militant groups has not brought peace to the Niger Delta. It has only momentarily decreased violence. As people begin to demand jobs, better healthcare systems, and prevention of environmental degradation, they also begin to feel betrayed by the government and the oil companies, which seem to bring palliative solutions, instead of action to promote the long-term survival of the local community.
  4. Place accountability and transparency at the heart of every communication: Ensure congruence between discourse and actions. In order to build constructive relationships in which cooperation is possible, it is necessary to promote trust among oil companies, the government, and the local community. It requires fighting against corruption and a strict policy of accountability and transparency in every project that operates in the region. For instance, oil spills may happen, however, if the community knows what the oil companies are doing to prevent them and mitigate the subsequent impact of them, communities will be more likely to engage in campaigns to stop oil theft and inform the authorities about oil spill.
  5. Establish a mechanism to promote two-way communication with host communities: The government and the oil companies need to be aware of local traditions, use communication channels that are familiar to the host community, work with community leaders, and respect traditional political structures. Communities need to be informed in a timely manner to any major development and must have the opportunity to present their opinions.
  6. Build partnerships: Blaming and emphasizing the other party’s responsibilities does not help to reduce violence. Nor does prioritizing the relationship between oil companies, the government, and elites while disregarding the importance of building partnership with the local community. Rather, it is vital to create projects and promote dialogue in which those involved in the conflict cooperate towards a common goal.

These recommendations are aimed at achieving peaceful relations in regions facing oil conflict.

However, there is more that needs to be done to promote a narrative of non-violence in countries dealing with this issue. Please share your thoughts on how to use communication to build a culture of peace in those places where oil or other natural resources have become a source of violence.

Claudia’s continues to investigate and develop communication strategies that build peace, and to create initiatives to motivate people to use non-violent means of transforming conflicts.

You can follow Claudia on Twitter at @claudiaespinel.  You can reach her directly at [email protected].

In future posts I’ll share the work of other recent NYU MS in Public Relations and Corporate Communication graduates.  Stay tuned…

You can subscribe to receive Logos’ blog posts automatically by registering here.

Helio Fred Garcia Helio Fred Garcia | Bio | Posts
2 Sep 2014 | 11:55AM

What’s on your business card? Twenty years ago this month I was staffing a client investor meeting when an analyst handed me a business card that baffled me. I took it to my client, a very experienced and sophisticated investor relations head of a major bank.  She stared at it and said, “How strange.  Why would anyone want to put their email address on a business card?”

1994: What is the Internet, Anyway?

That same year, the cast of the Today show, in an unscripted moment, tried to make sense of email address protocols.

Bryant Gumbel and Katie Couric couldn’t figure out what “@” meant.  Gumbel called it “that little mark, the a with a ring around it.”  Couric thought it meant About.  They asked their producer, off camera, what the Internet was, anyway.  His answer is worth watching.

In the 20 years since, email has gone from being a quaint curiosity to a basic reality of work.

But it wasn’t easy.  Fifteen years ago my firm started working with a major financial services company.  But one of our key client contacts, responsible for internal communication, wasn’t allowed to email outside the company.  Or to access the Internet.

2004: What is a Blog?

And on Meet the Press just 10 years ago the then host, the late Tim Russert, asked the now incoming host, Chuck Todd,  then the top editor at the political newsletter The Hotline, “What is a blog?”

Todd answered by referring to then presidential candidate Howard Dean’s blog as “essentially a digital bulletin board.”  Russert then recast the definition for the audience’s benefit: a “Cyber Bulletin Board.”

2014: Business Cards

Over this Labor Day weekend I’ve been thinking about that pioneering analyst with email on her business card.  That’s because my firm is now ordering new business cards, and grappling with the questions of what to put on the card:

  • Cell phone number?
  • Skype handle?
  • Twitter handle?
  • Blog site?
  • Website?
  • Fax number?! (Overheard at the office: “Does anyone use faxes anymore?”)
  • Titles? Do work titles matter?

And in my case, since I’ll be heading to China soon, and have already planned to have a Chinese translation of my business card, the questions include: Do I put my Twitter handle?   My Weibo handle?  Both?  Neither?

Fulfilling and Managing Expectations

In the case of my business card, the criteria I’m trying to use are these:  What would those who receive my card expect to find there?  And beyond that, what do I want them to find?

HFG Business Card

These criteria track the decision-making criteria we at Logos teach our clients and students on how to make choices in a crisis: What would reasonable people appropriately expect?  And how do we shape those expectations?

Those criteria seem to work quite well here:  Twenty years ago, most people did not expect to find an email address on a business card.  Now it’s completely expected.  The jury seems still to be out on blogs and Twitter; it’s more of a personal choice, or a set of expectations of the individual business card owner.

But the question of business cards is a relatively trivial microcosm of a much larger phenomenon.   A recent surge in connectivity has changed expectations of when one is on the job and how to connect with colleagues.

“…and then the Internet happened and everything changed.”

It seems almost trite these days to note that the Internet changed everything.  It did.

But I believe along the way there was one other event that took that change and supercharged it.  Until just a few years ago, most Internet developments were self-contained:  Search engines (Google), online video (YouTube), news, finance, entertainment, email, phones, Skype, etc.  And we experienced them one at a time.

Then in June, 2007, Apple introduced the iPhone.

Apple Reinvents the Phone

CEO Steve Jobs said that  Apple had reinvented the phone.  And they had.

But they also, eventually, reinvented our sense of connectivity. On one device we now had a phone, our music, and the Internet.  And with the introduction of apps, within a few years suddenly our phones were capable of just about anything.  (I once transferred money to my college-student daughter in Boston from the back seat of a taxi in Beijing, using just my phone and two apps — texting and banking.  The whole transaction — request to me, transfer, notification to my daughter, took less than 30 seconds.  My Chinese colleague was astounded that such a thing was even possible.  Come to think of it, so was I.)

Jobs

Perhaps as significant, Apple provided the ability to link the apps, so that we could seamlessly move from one to another — email to phone to text to calendar etc.) without having to stop and start, or even to understand how it all works.

Smart:Easy

That made it easy for someone like me — who knows nothing about computers — to use the device as if it’s an organically integrated whole.  I don’t know how it works.  And I don’t really care.  I just care that it works.

If you can spare an hour, it’s worth watching Jobs’ complete introduction to the iPhone, if only to hear the audience reaction to his demonstration of how everything is connected.  And to see how only seven years later, we take so much of it for granted.

So suddenly, whether with Apple’s iPhone or their competitors’ recent offerings, we can now access just about the entire Internet on our phone.  We carry more computing power in our pockets than the Apollo astronauts took to the moon. And all of this has now changed our sense of what it means to be on the job.

Work is No Longer a Place You Go

And the integration of everything onto devices makes possible a new way of understanding work.  Work is no longer a place you go.  It’s what you do, wherever you happen to be.  (So it’s valid to ask, should I put my street address on my business card?  Or will just my email address do? My office land-line phone?  Or just my mobile?)

This raises all kinds of work/life balance questions.  But it can also be empowering.  And the possibilities, just a few years into the future, are exciting.

Which leads back to the question I started musing about this Labor Day weekend.  Why would anyone want their email address on their business card?

And I can imagine 20 years from now someone asking this question: Business card?  Why would anyone want a business card?

Helio Fred Garcia Helio Fred Garcia | Bio | Posts
5 Aug 2014 | 2:56PM

I started working in public relations in 1980 and started teaching it to graduate students at New York University in 1988.  In all that time, the perennial question I’ve heard from clients and students is, What is PR, really…   And the emphasis is always on the really.

And as I listened to their proposed answers, and read the books purporting to provide an answer, I came to the conclusion that people’s definitions of PR were like the parable of the blind men and the elephant.


There were six men of Hindustan,

to learning much inclined,
Who went to see an elephant,
though all of them were blind,
That each by observation
might satisfy his mind.

Each grasps just a part of the elephant and assumes the whole animal is like the part.  So the man who grabs the tusk thinks the elephant is a spear; the one who grabs the tail thinks it’s a rope; the one who hugs the leg thinks it’s a tree, and so on.  And then they argue – each holding to his firm conviction that the elephant is solely what he experienced.

We have this argument even to this very day.

We had it when I started in the field, when high technology meant upgrading from a manual to electric typewriter and from a rotary dial to touch-tone phone.  We have it today among faculty members and graduate students in NYU’s M.S. in PR/CorpComm program.  And we’ll keep having it well into the future: long after social networking is considered as quaint as my old IBM Selectric.

And now there’s a forum where this discussion can take place, conceived and curated by, among others, my friend and colleague Andy Green.   Andy, who is based in Britain, was voted Outstanding PR Practitioner of the Year by members of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations in 2013.  He is the author of seven books translated into eight languages.

And he is part of a team of six senior PR pros from Britain and South Africa who have started an initiative called #PRredefined.  It includes a discussion forum that creates a community around this debate.  And it starts with a Kindle e-book that is available to students free of charge and to others at a nominal fee.

And I’m delighted to invite my colleagues on this side of the pond — including my graduate students, who themselves come from the all ends of the earth — to engage in this debate.

From the book #PRredefined:

“As public relations practice continues in the 21st century there is a growing sense that it needs better theory to provide a foundation and sustenance for public relations practice. Theory is not something abstract, remote from real-world — dare we say it — ‘academic’.

Having good theoretical underpinnings to what you do provides firm foundations for your day-to-day activity. It enables you to say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ quicker to whatever challenge you face. Good theory provides clarity and purpose to your mission.

This ebook is seeking to create new ways forward, new ideas to take the profession forward, to overcome its potential dangers as well as grow with any new opportunities.

Practitioners and academics with concerns and fears for the future of their profession are sharing their thoughts on the challenge of #PRredefined

They seek to act as a catalyst, a touch paper lit to create new momentum for inspiration, insights and ideas.

#PRredefined is not an end product. It is not claiming to provide a definitive answer – although it likes to feel it is proffering an intelligent way forward with some credible concepts to consider as possible solutions. Rather, it is seeking to start a symbiotic debate that can grow and create new thoughts, ideas and ultimately effective PR theory for 21st century practice.”

#PRredefined consists of three elements:

  • a collection of Forethoughts and Post thoughts articles containing commentaries about the need to redefine public relations and for a new theoretical framework for professional practice
  • submissions for redefining public relations or adding to its theoretical framework
  • a call to action inviting you to contribute to a subsequent debate to contribute to the goal of redefining public relations and creating a new theoretical framework

I’m honored to be one of the Forethoughts authors, and to be in the company of my friend and fellow Forethoughts author Christophe Ginisty, 2013 president of the International Public Relations Association.

What is the Essence?

So here’s my contribution to the argument.  What I struggle to find is the essence of it all: What is it that all the competing definitions have in common?

The first people to make a living practicing what we would recognize as PR were two Greeks in the fifth Century BC, Corax and Tisias.  The man who would eventually be called St. Augustine was a PR person before he found religion; he then brought those skills to his ministry.  The person who was the first in the modern era to call himself a “public relations counselor” was Edward L. Bernays.  He also became a thought leader, writing the first modern book on PR, Crystalizing Public Opinion, and teaching the first modern course on it, at New York University, both in 1923.   What do they all have in common, with each other and with PR as it’s practiced in the second decade of the 21st Century?

Crystallizing

Bernays noted in 1923 that it’s hard for PR people to define what they do:

“Indeed, it is probably true that the very [people] who are themselves engaged in the profession are as little ready or able to define their work as the general public itself. Undoubtedly, this is due, in some measure, to the fact that the profession is a new one.  Much more important than that, however, is the fact that most human activities are based on experience rather than on analysis.”[i]

Redefining PR

This is a discussion worth having.  And every generation needs to have it, if for no other reason than to move past the particulars of their own experience and into the higher vantage point of analysis.  And to understand both the relevance and the power of the profession.  That is the point of #PRredefined.  It is an important contribution to the discussion.  (And, as co-author Andy Green notes, in implicit agreement with Bernays, the discussion has to be outside of the bubble of the day-to-day practice of PR.)

I agree with the #PRredefined authors that PR needs to be redefined, or it will die.  Actually, it isn’t that PR needs a new definition.  Rather, we need a new understanding.  I believe the definition has been here all along.  But we have lost sight of it as we’ve become infatuated with new technologies and with the quickening pace of change.

We need to move from the particular (tusk, tail, leg) to the elephant as a whole.  Yes, we need to understand the particulars. But we need also to understand that the whole is more than the individual parts, or even the sum of the parts.  Not all elephants have tusks.  That doesn’t make them less of an elephant.  Not all images of elephants show the tail.  But we still recognize the elephant when we see it.

Solo walking right

The Essence

So what I grapple with is this: what is the essence of PR?  What do our clients most value?  What description is as valid in an oral society and in the age of social networking?  What definition applies equally to those who work with tree-based media (paper) and those who work with electron-based media?

I believe the answer is also found in Bernays’ 1923 book:

 “The public relations counsel is the pleader to the public of a point of view.  He acts in this capacity as a consultant both in interpreting the public to his client and in helping to interpret his client to the public.  He helps to mold the action of his client as well as to mold public opinion.”[ii]

Applied Anthropology

For more than 25 years, to my clients, with my students, and in my books, I’ve described it this way: When we do our best work we function as an applied anthropologist.  Like an anthropologist, we do active fieldwork to understand a group’s social and power structure, values, predispositions, and behavioral triggers. These days we can figure this out to a very granular level. We then make predictions based on these insights, helping clients understand how any given group is likely to react to any given stimulus.  The applied part is then to organize activity to provoke the reaction we want, and then to be in active relationship with our stakeholders, in continuous and mutual adaptation with each other.

And when we do it well, we do it by connecting with people, authentically, honestly, but effectively.  We can’t move people unless we meet them where they are.  And then we invite them to move with us.  This raises a host of ethical questions.

And again we find answers in Bernays:

“The advocacy of what we believe in is education.  The advocacy of what we don’t believe in is propaganda.  Each of these nouns carries with it social and moral implications. Education is valuable, commendable, enlightening, instructive.  Propaganda is insidious, dishonest, underhanded, misleading.”[iii]

I welcome being part of the discussion here prompted by Andy and his coauthors.

Paradoxically, I believe we find the future of PR by returning to our core, as articulated 90 years ago (but so often forgotten in the day-to-day bump and grind of our work).

Everything old is new again.

Your contributions to the debate are welcomed.

Onward…

…….

The authors of #PRredefined are:

Andy Green was voted ‘Outstanding PR Practitioner of the Year’ by CIPR members in 2013. He enjoys a portfolio career as a PR consultant, university lecturer, brand story-teller and creative thinking skills trainer. His published work is translated into eight languages includes ‘Creativity in Public Relations’ (4th edition Kogan Page 2010) and ‘Tubespiration! (Tangent Books 2013)

Professor Anne Gregory is Director of the Centre for Public Relations Studies at Leeds Business School and Chair of the Global Alliance, the worldwide confederation of public relations professional associations. Anne has written and edited over 70 books, book chapters and articles and holds the CIPR Sir Stephen Tallents Medal for her Outstanding Contribution to the Profession.

Philip Sheldrake is Managing Partner, Euler Partners. He is the author of The Business of Influence: Reframing Marketing and PR for the Digital Age (Wiley, 2011), and Attenzi – a social business story (2013).

Chris Skinner, APR and Fellow of the Public Relations Institute of Southern Africa (PRISA) is a research associate at the Durban University of Technology and a senior consultant with the East and Southern African Management Institute (ESAMI). He is a leading researcher and writer in the public relations field in Africa and[…]”

Stephen Waddington is European Digital & Social Media Director, Ketchum and President-Elect 2014 of the CIPR. His published work includes Brand Anarchy (Bloomsbury, 2012), Share This (Wiley 2013), Share This Too (Wiley 2013) and Brand Vandals (Bloomsbury, 2013).

Paul Willis is Director of the Centre for Public Relations Studies at Leeds Business School. He is the co-author of Strategic Public Relations Leadership (Routledge, 2013) and a contributing author to Exploring Public Relations (3rd edition, Prentice Hall). His research can also found in the PR field’s leading academic journals.”

Excerpt From: Andy Green. “#PRredefined.” iBooks.

 

 

 

 


[i] Edward L. Bernays, Crystalizing Public Opinion, Boni & Liveright, 1923, p. 13.

[ii] Bernays, ibid., p. 59.

[iii] Bernays, ibid, p. 212.

by Helio Fred Garcia

Imagine that you’re an executive at a large company.

You learn that one of your products – a good revenue generator but not a franchise-defining product – has a customer convenience issue. It sometimes does things that annoy customers. In particular, it doesn’t do what it’s supposed to do 100 percent of the time. Several dozen customers have complained.

Given all you have on your plate, how urgent do you consider this problem? What kinds of resources do you devote to it?

Now consider a different scenario: You learn that this product has a significant safety defect. That safety defect, in turn, risk loss of life – in fact, it may already have cost some lives.

Given all you have on your plate, how urgent do you consider this problem? What kinds of resources do you devote to it?

Finally, what if the problems are one and the same? Is there a difference in your reaction to something described as a customer inconvenience compared to the same thing that’s described as a serious safety defect?

Customer Convenience v. Safety Defect

Herein lies what may finally be an explanation for the otherwise incomprehensible behavior at General Motors (GM)

images

The Power of Communication

Communication has power. But as with any powerful tool, if communication is not used effectively it can dissipate or cause self-inflicted harm.

That’s one of the lessons of the tragic events at GM that have just come to light this year.

I have taught elements of the GM Cobalt ignition switch crisis since it first became public back in the Spring.  And in all the discussions, my students and I keep coming back to the same questions: Why did GM not fix the problem when they had a chance?  Why did it take more than ten years?  Did they simply not care?  Did their cost/benefit analysis lead them to conclude that it was OK to keep an unsafe car on the road?  We’ve been baffled.

So I’ve waited with anticipation for the formal report conducted by GM’s independent law firm. That report is now out, and it is stunning. Not just for its tale of incompetence and neglect. But also for providing an intriguing clue about how this baffling series of mis-steps could have happened in the first place.

I am indebted to author and Forbes columnist Carmine Gallo for first calling attention to what I cover below. Gallo’s June 9 post focused on how two words explain the massive failures at GM and how two different words could have prevented the fiasco in the first place. It’s worth reading.

The Valukas Report

The report, prepared by former US Attorney Anton R. Valukas, the chairman of the law firm Jenner & Block, was released on May 29. In the course of 315 pages it lays out the causes and tragic consequences of GM’s failures.

Anton Valukas

Anton Valukas

Three in particular caught my eye.

  1. GM engineers failed to name the problem accurately.
  2. That’s because the engineers didn’t understand how the cars worked (!?)
  3. The engineers mis-framed the crisis and therefore it wasn’t taken seriously for more than 11 years.

Let’s take these one at a time.

1. GM engineers failed to name the problem accurately.

When the Cobalt’s ignition system switched from Run to Off or Accessory, it also turned off the electrical system.

But the engineers described it as a “moving stall” and didn’t seem to understand that the lack of electrical power meant that airbags wouldn’t deploy, with potentially catastrophic effects. So they told the media and others that a moving stall did not create a safety hazard.

From the Report:

“[T]hose individuals tasked with fixing the problem – sophisticated engineers with responsibility to provide consumers with safe and reliable automobiles – did not understand one of the most fundamental consequences of the switch failing and the car stalling: the airbags would not deploy. The failure of the switch meant that drivers were without airbag protection at the time they needed it most. This failure, combined with others documented below, led to devastating consequences: GM has identified at least 54 frontal-impact crashes, involving the deaths of more than a dozen individuals, in which the airbags did not deploy as a possible result of the faulty ignition switch.”

Chevrolet Cobalt

Chevrolet Cobalt

2. That’s because the engineers didn’t understand how the cars worked (!?)

From the Report:

“A critical factor in GM personnel’s initial delay in fixing the switch was their failure to understand, quite simply, how the car was built. GM had specifically designed the airbag system not to deploy, in most circumstances, in the event that the ignition switch was turned to Off or Accessory, a deliberate and sensible decision made to prevent passengers from being injured by airbags in parked cars.

In 2004, however, GM engineers, faced with a multitude of reports of moving stalls caused by the ignition switch, concluded that moving stalls were not safety issues because drivers could still maneuver the cars; they completely failed to understand that the movement of the switch out of the Run position meant the driver and passengers would no longer have the protection of the airbags.”

3. The engineers mis-framed the crisis and therefore it wasn’t taken seriously for more than 11 years. To me this is the most interesting.

From the Report:

“GM personnel viewed the switch problem as a “customer convenience” issue – something annoying but not particularly problematic – as opposed to the safety defect it was.

Once so defined, the switch problem received less attention, and efforts to fix it were impacted by cost considerations that would have been in immaterial had the problem been properly categorized in the first instance.”

It isn’t that GM didn’t care about safety. It did. The Report makes clear that when presented with safety problems GM acted responsibly.

From the Report:

“Indeed, in this same decade, GM issued hundreds of recalls at great expense (including at times when its financial condition was precarious) because in the great majority of instances, it correctly determined or agreed that the issues that came to its attention implicated safety and demanded prompt action. But in the case of the Cobalt, it did not do so.”

Why not? According to the Report, in 2005 a number of committees recommended a range of solutions, but they were rejected because they would be too costly. The report makes clear that such cost considerations would not have been in play if they had understood the connection between the stalls and the disabling of airbags – in other words, if they had understood the safety hazard.

Cobalt Ignition and Switch Assembly

Cobalt Ignition and Switch Assembly

 

Why didn’t GM recall Cobalt? The initial framing of the problem as a “customer convenience” problem meant it wasn’t seen as a safety concern, and therefore got a back burner.

From the Report:

“From 2004 to 2006, not one of the committees considering a fix for the switch – filled with engineers and business people whose job was to understand how GM’s cars were built and how different systems of the car interact – ever reclassified the problem from one of customer convenience to one of safety or demonstrated any sense of urgency in their efforts to fix the switch. GM’s Product Investigations group, charged with identifying and remedying safety issues, made the same mistake; it opened and closed an investigation in 2005 in the span of a month, finding no safety issue to be remedied.”

The tragedy is that the signs of a serious safety issue were there to be seen. But in the “customer convenience” frame GM engineers didn’t see it. It took people outside of GM who had not been influenced by the “customer convenience” frame to grasp the real problem.

From the Report:

“As the early committees failed to fix the problem, accidents and fatalities in which airbags did not deploy began coming to GM personnel’s attention, including GM’s in-house counsel and the engineers who worked with them. Those outside GM, including, in 2007, a trooper from the Wisconsin Safety Patrol and a research team from Indiana University, figured out the connection between the switch and the airbag non-deployment. Yet, GM personnel did not.”

The Power of Framing

According to the Berkeley cognitive linguist George Lakoff, frames are mental structures triggered by language.

George Lakoff, Cognitive Linguist, UCal Berkeley

George Lakoff, Cognitive Linguist, UCal Berkeley

When a frame is triggered, an entire worldview is triggered, and that determines the meaning of what comes next. When the frame is triggered, we tend to focus what’s within the frame, and to ignore what’s outside the frame.

And when we say something “makes sense,” we mean that something is consistent with the frame.

So when the GM engineers referred initially to a “moving stall” and called it a “customer convenience” problem, that frame determined the meaning of what followed. As a result there was no sense of urgency, so cost and other tasks took priority.

But what if the original engineers had framed the problem differently: if they had called the ignition switch problem a “safety defect”?  The reaction could have been completely different.

Urgency makes sense when grappling with a safety defect, but not necessarily when facing a customer convenience issue. Conversely, cost becomes a challenge for a customer convenience issue, but not at all when grappling with a safety defect.

Of course, there were many other challenges at GM besides this basic failure of understanding. There was compartmentalization, turf, and a culture that included the “GM Nod,” defined in the Report as “when everyone nods in agreement to a proposed plan of action, but then leaves the room and does nothing.”  There was plenty of incompetence and indifference.

Lessons for Leaders and Communicators

But at one level the Report serves as a teachable moment:

1.  How you name the problem goes a long way toward how you fix the problem.

2. Framing matters.  The frame defines what makes sense and what is possible.

3. Situational awareness isn’t just about facts; it’s about understanding significance — and that comes from frames.

 

Your comments welcome,

Fred

 

by Helio Fred Garcia

Communication has power.  But as with any powerful tool, if misused it can easily be dissipated or cause self-inflicted harm.

The Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor, and former Dean of the Kennedy School of Government, Joseph Nye, defines power as the ability to get what you want.  In his 2001 book The Paradox of American Power, Nye distinguishes between hard power – military force and economic might – and soft power – attraction.  He says that the paradox is this: the more a nation uses hard power, the more it dissipates soft power.  But it can use soft power all it wants without in any way diminishing its hard power.

The-Future-of-Power-Nye-Joseph-S-JR-9781586488918

Power Shifts

In his 2011 book, The Future of Power, professor Nye describes a power shift from state players to ordinary people.  This power shift changes the game for all concerned: for corporations, for NGOs, for governments, and for all others.  The power shift is this: what used to be the exclusive domain of governments, militaries, and corporations, are now the domain of regular people.

In a TED Talk at Oxford University he put it this way:

“Computing and communication costs have fallen a thousand-fold between 1970 and the beginning of this century… If the price of an automobile had fallen as rapidly as computing power you could buy a car today for five dollars.  …In 1970 if you wanted to communicate from Oxford to Johannesburg to New Delhi to Brasilia to anywhere, you could to it.  The technology was there.  But to do it, you had to be very rich.  A government.  A multi-national.  A corporation…. But you had to be pretty wealthy.   Now, anybody has that capacity… So capabilities that were once restricted, are now available to everyone.  And what that means is not that the age of the State is over, the State still matters, but the stage is crowded.”

We saw that power shift in 2011 when the Chinese government initially lied about a high-speed train crash and its victims.  But Chinese citizens took to the Chinese versions of social media, Sina Weibo and Renren, and embarrassed the Chinese premier into coming clean.

 Information as an Instrument of Power

 A new contribution to this discussion comes from Dr. Amy Zalman, in a recent policy piece in Perspectives.  Dr. Zalman, who is currently the Department of Defense Information Integration Chair at the National War College, grapples with a paradox about information as an instrument of power.

In “Getting the Information Albatross Off Our Back: Notes Toward an Information-Savvy National Security Community, Dr. Zalman notes, “while the effects of the information revolution on national security deepen, the American ability to act powerfully in these new circumstances remains shallow.”

Zalman cover

She says,

“We are virtually drowning in information —the words, images, and sounds through which humans communicate meaning to each other via various technologies, from the human voice to remote sensors. Yet, the United States wields ‘the information instrument of national power’ — as national security parlance would have it — poorly.”

Dr. Amy Zalman

Dr. Amy Zalman

 

She observes that rapid advances in communication technology have fundamentally changed society – not only relations between citizens and governments, but for all forms of institutions among themselves, and among those who matter to them.  She says,

“These changes are so profound as to have chipped away at the bedrock of the international system, the sovereign state. Once considered inviolable, the autonomous boundaries of states are now transgressed daily by people, news, and ideas set in motion by new technologies.

Yet no such revolution has occurred concerning the United States’ priorities when it comes to using informational power. Both in normative documents, such as the National Security Strategy, and in actual practice, the United States appears to think little of informational power as a strategic instrument.”

We Need a Mindshift to Accompany the Power Shift

Zalman argues that incremental reforms will not resolve the basic problem: The United States organizes information activities on the basis of a Cold War mindset.

“During the Cold War, it made good sense to think of the informational ‘instrument’ of power as the capacity to inject American values into populations whose governments and/or technological advancement limited their access to outside ideas.”

Hence the overwhelming success then of Voice of America and Radio Free Europe.   They projected American voices to where they could not otherwise be heard.

But Dr. Zalman admonishes that we are no longer in the Cold War.

“Soon, almost everyone in the world will be able to receive as well as disseminate informational content. There are few populations that are unknowingly isolated from others’ media. The ideological landscape is variegated and complex, not bipolar.”

Zalman Callout

Consider the failure of US public diplomacy in the aftermath of 9/11:

“The failure of the Cold War/Industrial Age model should be clear from the informational debacles of 
the ‘global war on terror.’ In the decade following the 9/11 attacks, just as in the Cold War, the United States sought to “tell its story” to Muslim publics that we imagined not only as isolated from information about the United States, but as geographically secluded in Muslim majority countries.

The effort backfired among not only satellite TV- saturated cosmopolitans in Arab and Western capitals, but also provincial Afghans who in some areas had not heard of the 9/11 attacks. In both cases, the mistake was the same: the United States failed to note that people everywhere already have their own narratives, their own histories, and their own ways of articulating even the values we universally share.”

Prescriptions for Effective Use of Information as an Instrument of Power

Dr. Zalman calls for a new conceptual framework and a new alignment of resources to mobilize power within that framework.  It consists of the following:

  1. Retire the Cold War/Industrial Age Information Model.
  2. Instill a New Framework of Information Power. Using information powerfully today requires the ability to
    • “Act in accordance with the fact that actions, as well as intended communications, relay meaning to others
    • Use different kinds of communicative media to distribute and collect information
    • Develop and sustain networks required to tackle multi-disciplinary issues
    • Engage other stakeholders by aligning goals and interests on an issue-by-issue basis
    • Navigate the symbolic territory of adversaries, friends, and key stakeholders. By ‘symbolic territory,’ I mean that landscape of historical memory, stories, images, figures of speech, and metaphors through which people understand and relate their experiences.”

3. The education of professional senior leaders should reflect and promote a new framework of thinking.

4. The United States Government should organize informational activities to generate informational power.

“Today, we need a new model that reflects the fact that all government actions and activities are potentially communicative, and that this situation poses both risks and opportunities. Every agency should house an office of informational power to develop proactive communications risk strategies, to exploit opportunities for mutual engagement— whether military exercises or agricultural exchanges— and to coordinate with other USG agencies.”

Lessons for Leaders and Communicators in Business and Other Realms

Whether at the national level or at the level of individual business enterprises, NGOs, not-for-profits, and other organizations, we need to think differently about telling our story.

It’s not about telling our story.  It’s about connecting with our stakeholders, and having them share in our story.  We need to be as good at listening as at sending messages.  We can’t direct until we connect.  Or as I say in The Power of Communication, we can’t move people until we meet them where they are.  But that means knowing where they are; caring about where they are; and mobilizing resources to actually connect.

Garcia-book_NYU-SCPS-219x300-1

Your feeback welcome.

Fred

DINFOS Logo

by Helio Fred Garcia

About two years ago, just before the publication of The Power of Communication: Skills to Build Trust, Inspire Loyalty, and Lead Effectively, I began teaching as a guest speaker in the Public Affairs Leadership Department at US Defense Information School (DINFOS) at Fort George G. Meade, Maryland.  I am usually the first speaker on the first day of a weeks-long Joint Senior Public Affairs Officer Course,  Joint Senior Non-Commissioned Public Affairs Officer Course, and occasionally also the  Joint Intermediate Public Affairs Officer  Course.  I teach five to six times a year, and I’m honored that both The Power of Communication and my US Marine Corps Gazette Schulze Essay are required readings.

Helio Fred Garcia at US Defense Information School

Helio Fred Garcia at US Defense Information School

Each course is different based on the rank of the students, but my role is the same: on Day One, even before they get formal instruction from senior military and national security officials, to help students understand decision criteria and how to push back on senior officers or civilian leaders who might be making questionable decisions.   My session, Ethical Decision-Making for Public Affairs Officers, works them through decision criteria for maintaining trust and confidence, complete with case studies, and closes with the Abu Ghraib case study.  In each of the sessions I have come away impressed with the students’ sophistication, aptitude, and integrity.  And also at the frustration they sometimes feel when they can see things about to go awry but are unable to intervene.

Helio Fred Garcia teaching Ethical Decision-making for Public Affairs Officers at DINFOS, April 28, 2014

Helio Fred Garcia teaching Ethical Decision-Making for Public Affairs Officers at DINFOS, April 28, 2014

Meeting My Mentor

On my last visit, by sheer coincidence, DINFOS was hosting a VIP guest: my dear friend and mentor, the crisis guru Jim Lukaszewski.  No single practitioner has had a more meaningful impact on my work than Jim.  He became my mentor more that 25 years ago.  We have worked together, taught together, published together, and I have been much the better for all of it.  It was Jim who initially got me involved with the Marines 24 years ago.  And Jim who first encouraged me to publish, 26 years ago.  And when I decided to start my own firm 12 years ago, Jim very generously helped me understand how to do it with a minimum of mistakes.  He has encouraged me and challenged me and helped me for more than a quarter century.

Double Whammy

So although we happened to be at DINFOS on the same day by chance, and completely unrelated to my class, we decided to make the best of it.   I invited Jim to speak to my students during my session.

Helio Fred Garcia with Crisis Guru Jim Lukaszewski at the Joint Senior Public Affairs Officer Course at DINFOS April 28, 2014

Helio Fred Garcia with Crisis Guru Jim Lukaszewski at the Joint Senior Public Affairs Officer Course at DINFOS April 28, 2014

Jim helped the students better understand the ways their bosses make choices and how to influence those choices.  And I was able throughout my remarks to point to where I had gotten those ideas in the first place — the other fellow in civilian clothes in the classroom.

And I was delighted to see that DINFOS also assigned two of Jim’s books, which I also teach in my NYU courses and recommend to clients: Why Should The Boss Listen to You: Seven Disciplines of Trusted Strategic Advisor, and Lukaszewski on Crisis Communication: What Your CEO Needs to Know About Reputation Risk and Crisis Management.  I am gratified that my students have the chance to read Lukaszewski (the Three-Minute Drill from Why Should the Boss Listen to You is worth the price of admission!).

What Awaits Students on Their Arrival at DINFOS Joint Senior Public Affairs Officer Course

What Awaits Students on Their Arrival at DINFOS Joint Senior Public Affairs Officer Course

 

Paying it Forward

I have been extremely fortunate — I sometimes think blessed — that in the course of my career people have gone out of their way to help me.

This began during my first year in PR at Edelman when Jody Quinn and Mel Ehrlich each took this awkward classics geek under their wing and taught me to be a business communicator and consultant.  And six years later when Jim took me on.  And there have been countless other teachers (Fraser Seitel taught me speechwriting in 1983!), bosses, and colleagues who have taken me aside and made me a better professional.  None of us is an island.  It really does take a village.

And I take joy in paying it forward to the next generation — whether in my own firm, with my clients, with my students at NYU and other institutions.

But usually when a boss, colleague, or mentor is done, we rarely see them again.  So it was a particular joy to find myself serendipidously working again with Jim, at DINFOS.

My students were certainly the better for it.  And it serves as a good reminder that our success is not ours alone: However far we see it is because we stand on the shoulders of others.  And that every teacher is simultaneously also a student…

Thanks, Jim…

Helio Fred Garcia (L) and James E. Lukaszewski at US Defense Information School

Helio Fred Garcia (L) and James E. Lukaszewski at US Defense Information School