Archive for February, 2009
Posted on February 27, 2009 by Miller
I read an article today about how a 16 year old office worker from Essex was fired after she described her office job as ‘boring’ on her Facebook page.
Details were passed to her employers after she allowed colleagues access to her page, Miss Swann said, adding that she was not given the chance to explain.
Her mother, Janette, 41, said: “I think she’s been treated totally unfairly. She didn’t mention the company’s name.
“This is a 16-year-old child we’re talking about. She says Clacton is boring but we’re not going to throw her out of the house for it.”
Mr Ivell said: “Ivell Marketing is a small, close-knit family company and it is very important that all the staff work together in harmony.
“Had Miss Swann put up a poster on the staff notice board making the same comments and invited other staff to read it there would have been the same result.”
This got me thinking and it folded in nicely with a chat I had with @KristinNeher about employee access to Social Media tools. I’m wondering if employers have any right to influence or police what you say off premises, and off hours using social media networks. Personal networks. I get the argument that your facebook status is shared with a lot of people. But, its not completely public unless you have it set up that way. Additionally, why should your boss have anything to do with what you can say on your own time and who you can say it to?
I get the argument that its akin to putting up a sign somewhere. Trust me I get it. I wouldn’t want my staff talking negatively about me or my business online either. But is there a difference between frowning upon it, and taking away someone livelihood because they didn’t drink the Kool-Aid?
I’m honestly on the fence with this. On the one hand, I don’t think anyone has the right to tell me what I can and cannot say or do in my off time. But putting the shoe on the other foot – if I was a small business owner I think I would take issue if my employees were constantly talking negatively about what they do for a living. I just don’t know if its my obligation to find new employees, or to try and make the work experience better for our existing staff.
Is the answer to have ask people to keep their profiles semi-private or to talk about work problems first with a supervisor before taking it to the net? Is it something that can be solved with a ‘policy’ Tough stuff.
Krista said that she knows a person who is not allowed to even post where he works online and is obligated to delete comments that reference it. That seems a bit extreme to me. One of the greatest things about being involved in social media is being able to share ideas and opinions, and in general be yourself.
So where is the line? Is there a line? And how should companies address the fact that employees as well as customers are plugged in to the social web, and that they will share their feelings as well as ideas. More importantly, how can companies turn employees activities on social media networks from liabilities into assets?
Posted on February 24, 2009 by Miller
With all the craziness in the economy and (justified) outrage at CEO and financial sector compensation packages, I’ve been thinking about income distribution and the wage gap – and how it relates to younger professionals who are used to working in a faster leaner environment.
Most people look at CEO and higher up executive compensation packages see an amazing gap between what they make and what a lower manager or line worker makes. Even at a salary of say $400,000 (which is under what the government is proposing capping bailed out CEO salaray at) breaks down to a hearty $7,692 per week. Not a bad gig.
Listen, I’m not saying the government has a right to tell people what they have the ability to earn in business. That’s crazy. BUT I think if you’re taking tax payer dollars to bail out a company that YOU helped run into the ground, a wage ceiling is not out of the question. More importantly, do shareholders think about the ‘value’ of their CEO vs. their compensation in their investment decisions?
But let me get back to the big What IF. Do we as a society (not a corporate board) think that upper management and CEOs are worth hundreds (or thousands) of times the wage of a lower level worker? Are they doing that much more difficult work? Do they have hundreds of times more expertise? Certainly, I would hope that its much more, but does the wage gap match the skillset?
The argument is that large paychecks attract the best qualified candidates. I think that may be valid. What I want to know is if you get more bang for your buck by getting a kick ass CEO and upper management block that is super expensive but have to pay your front line workers less than they’re worth – OR if you settled for a middle of the road upper management block and paid lower line workers more? I don’t have the answer to that question but I am curious about it.
I also wonder if a corporation could change its structure to the latter, where transparency reigns, and the income gap between the highest paid employee and lowest is much smaller, what would that do for your business? Would it attract the best lower and middle management talent? How much would your upper management talant pool be affected? Would it attract the best front line talent? Would it give people more of a sense of ‘team’ or ownership? And would it be a great story that you can market? I think that altruism is an incredibly marketable thing, so long as its genuine.
Anyone know of any companies that are currently doing this or that have narrowed this gap? Has it hurt them or helped them? And as workers value things like time and flexibility more than wage, how will this change the talent pool and corporate structure of companies in the future?
Posted on February 23, 2009 by Miller
I was reading Seth Godin’s post today about whether ‘marketing is evil’ or not. His answer was that while marketing itself isn’t usually evil, market-ers sometimes are, and that can lead to bad things.
While I’d agree, I’d also take a step back and try to look at the business or marketing and advertising. One of the quotes that stood out to me from the post was:
I’ve got a lot of nerve telling you that what you do might be immoral. It’s immoral to rob someone’s house and burn it to the ground, but is it immoral to market them into foreclosure? Well, if marketing works, if it’s worth the time and money, then I don’t think it matters a bit if you’re doing your job. It’s still wrong.
and
Just because you can market something doesn’t mean you should. You’ve got the power, so you’re responsible, regardless of what your boss tells you to do.
Remember Chris Rock’s bit about gun control? If you want to cut down on gun violence, make each bullet cost $5,000. My original thought was that maybe ‘unethical’ advertising should just be more expensive… Charge more for marketing products that are more dubious like ‘Advertorials,’ ‘Infomercials,’ and paid blog reviews – things that seem to blur the line between advertising and content. The problem then becomes who is the judge of what’s on either side of the advertising line?
What about a sort of hypocratic oath for marketers – a kind of Do No Evil creed? If there was some kind of high ethical standard that people were trained in from the get go would that change which products and services are marketed or the way that they are presented? Or at the end of the day, are we all chasing ad dollars without regard for what we’re helping to market?
If you’re part of an agency or media outlet, how do you balance the need for business with the implications that consuming your clients’ product or service come with?
Posted on February 20, 2009 by Miller
With all the discussion of the changing (and subsequent resetting) of the Terms of Service on Facebook I’ve been thinking about our digital lives and who owns all this content. And what are the implications of that?
Let’s face it – if you have a Facebook or MySpace or Flickr or any social network account, there are huge swaths of your life that are online and public. Remember that angst ridden blog your wrote as a college student? You may have ‘deleted’ it, but its been crawled, indexed, and I promise you its out there somewhere. Think about what that means when you get into photos and videos. As @garyvee puts it – its your legacy. Your grandkids will be able to access all this stuff someday.
Where I’m going with this is that in about 10 years (maybe less) we’ll be dealing with the first generation of world leaders and policitians that have participated heavily in social media. And there’s bound to be tons of digital material that WILL be uncovered related to drug use, drinking, embarrasing photos, videos, and the like. If people can find Bush’s military records from the 60′s, they WILL find that picture of you streaking across the quad or taking a hit from that pipe (looking at YOU Phelps).
But the other side of that coin is…..will it matter? Will I care about my future Senator doing keg stands and smoking pot in college? Probably not. Will I want to see the YouTube clip? Maybe. I think this whole era of social networking has huge implications for future leaders and the way that we perceive and interact with them. Is it an opportunity for us to humanize people? To focus on policy positions rather than past digital skeletons (since so many people will have them themselves)? Or will we enter a new age of digital mud slinging and holier-than-thou judgement?
What implications does this have for social networks? Things are pretty open now, and the whole notion of who ‘owns’ the content that is posted on these services is still a bit gray. I’d also argue that the uproar by Facebook’s new terms of service had a lot to do with the bandwagon effect – I mean, how many people actually knew or understood the ORIGINAL TOS? My guess is not many – but it sure is easy to join a Facebook group that’s against the change. Get on the bandwagon people, before it stops being cool! Will we see a higher tolerance for societal transparancy, or will people demand control of their content and increased privacy settings on social networks?
There’s a couple good articles I’ve read about the Facebook TOS scandal by Robert Scoble and Alex Wilhelm, so check them out if you get a moment.
What do you guys think? VERY curious….
Posted on February 18, 2009 by Miller
When was the last time you received bad service? Whether its customer service or a long wait on hold to speak to a live person or having to go through 5 people via phone until you reach someone who can help you with your issue? When’s the last time you had that happen? It probably happens all the time. The company doesn’t have to be big or small, local or national.
What I’m arguing is that when you experience any of these things, or when someone ‘isn’t authorized’ to help you, you’re not getting BAD Service, you’re getting NO Service. We’d take BAD service in a heartbeat these days.
When I used to service networks and computers full time as a freelancer, I would get compliments after a call just thanking me for returning their call or for showing up when I said I would….even if I couldn’t fix their problem. People just want a response. They want to be heard. They want an answer, even if its not what they are looking for. They want someone to CARE.
I am no where near the most knowledgeable technician, and you could argue that I provided so-so service (no good invoicing system, no business cards, not super efficient) at the time. But that was more than enough. It was better than NO service, which is what they were used to getting.
And hearing all of these stories about how much caring matters, how response matters, I’m taking that advice to heart and trying to care way more. I dont’ have to be the best in the world, but if I care more than the next person, I feel that I will be successful. Because anyone has the ability to talk about their experience online with your company, the ones that care, are the ones that will win. And I do believe you can monetize caring.
So look at your business, at your freelance gig. Is Bad service still better than what everyone else is doing? But more importantly, how soon will it STOP being enough? And how much do you think you can grow your business if you inject a little caring into it?
I wonder though, if to truly care about your customers, do you have to cater to everyone or is a consequence of caring, that you’re not able to take on every project?
Would love to hear your thoughts…
Posted on February 16, 2009 by Miller
Another Brilliant post by Seth Godin. Can’t wait to see him at The 99% Conference in April. Here’s the first two, full 5 at his site (don’t want to rob his traffic).
- Every question you ask is expensive. (Expensive in terms of loyalty and goodwill). Don’t ask a question unless you truly care about the answer. This means that a vague question with vague answers (extremely satisfied…acceptable…extremely dissatisfied and no scale to compare them to) is a total waste of time. What action will you take based on that? It’s smarter to ask, “how much would you say lunch was worth?”
- Every question you ask changes the way your users think. If you ask, “which did you hate more…” then you’ve planted a seed.
Read the Full post here.
Posted on February 16, 2009 by Miller
This morning I got an email from Rach which was an automated message through Kiva.org talking about its services and mission. For those of that don’t know (including me up until a few hours ago), Kiva is a micro-lending site that specializes in raising loan funds (read: not donations) for entrepreneurs in developing countries on a micro level, to help them develop businesses, get an education, etc.
Kiva works with existing micro lending institutions to get the funds to the individual, tracks their progress (which you can see via the website) and ultimately handles the repayment of your loan. When I say MICRO lending, its exactly what the name entails. You can lend as little as $25 to a project of your choice and see that cash make a difference.
My first Kiva loan was to the Annet Nakaweesa Group in Uganda, which is a food market. My $25 was only a small part of the $4,975 total loan that will be used to purchase goods for a local food shop. This group has track record of successful repayment of other micro loans and I should expect to see my investment repaid in 3 months.
On their page, I can also see other Kiva lenders who have lent to this group, and although I haven’t had a chance to really get into the guts of the site, I’m pretty impressed so far. I think there’s probably a huge opportunity for community building.
I’ve read a bit about micro lending before through different articles in Wired or even hearing about it at TED, but had yet to participate. Its such a brilliant use of the web to organize and provide opportunities to people a half a world away. Its community, its trust, and its an opportunity to help influence good things. I’ll keep you all posted on the progress of the repayment but I’m looking forward to checking out some other amazing opportunities through micro lending…
With the hot mess that’s Wal St. and our banking system, its funny how other opportunities present themselves that remind me that people can be cool. My confindence in anything relating to this ‘bailout’ has long since expired, as I generally don’t know if there is enough collective wisdom in our business and elected leaders to address whatever financial calamity we’re looking at. And then I see how regular people can come together to create opportunities where there were none, or where it was ‘unprofitable,’ and see if as a collective of individuals can help change happen even in small doses.
Posted on February 11, 2009 by Miller
Read a great post from Krista Neher today about a tool called ‘Twitterhawk‘ (read full post here). This is a tool that crawls Twitter looking for tweets about a topic of your choice then will automatically sent an @reply out from your account to that poster. Krista lays out some great points with regard to the medium itself and authenticity, so I won’t even try to compete with that.
In terms of what Twitterhawk actually does, Krista used the example of someone posting about how much they love coffee… Twitterhawk may see that post then automatically end a reply that contains: ‘like coffee? Maybe you should check my new coffeeshop located at…’ You get the idea.
I tend to come down on the side of saying that its SPAM. The whole purpose of twitter is to make people quickly accessible and to enable us to have quick conversation. Once you inject automated response tools and crawlers into the mix, I think it only has a negative impact.
At the crux of it, what so many of these automation tools are trying to provide are SHORTCUTS to growing your followers, or marketing your business / blog. Twitter has become a tool that rewards autheticity, participation, and good ideas.
Its like when TIDE Detergent wants to ‘Friend’ you on Myspace. No you don’t. You want to sell me Tide, not participate in my space. Its this influx of shortcuts that have made a lot of people jump ship on the platform and move to something else. Hope that doesn’t happen with Twitter.
The good folks who make Twitterhawk actually responded to her blog post:
Cheers for the comments and feedback, as you’re all aware we’re trying to be pretty hard on spammers and have already canceled a few such accounts to reflect this, but are aware this is something that is a touchy and ongoing topic.
We are currently looking into a few ways to improve the product and will soon be announcing it’s future plans which will include a few matters to make it a lot more personal and (as the keyword repeated here) authentic.
I have my doubts, but maybe that’s just me being behind the curve. What do YOU guys think. Can you see a way that tools like this can be useful, or will they be more likely used by people who want to take shortcuts and spam? Would love to hear your thoughts!
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I read an article today about how a 16 year old office worker from Essex was fired after she described her office job as ‘boring’ on her Facebook page.
