Do you complify instead of simplify?

At Palette we have a promise (to our clients and ourselves) that our relationships and work will be based on three pillars: simplicity, energy and integrity.

It's at the heart of everything we do.

But lately I've noticed that for some people and organizations simplicity has (simply) gone awry.

And instead of making life easier, we make things more complex: we complify.

Here's what I mean. In the course of a workday, you notice something you're doing is cumbersome and has too many pointless steps. You think, we should come up with a way to fix this.

But instead of cutting through the crap, egos get involved. And then an old process is replaced by a newer process, a few extra levels are added (in the spirit of collaboration, of course) and all of a sudden something that wasn't working very well to begin with (the devil you know) has been transformed into something that doesn't work at all.

Congratulations. You've just been complifed.

So how can we avoid getting into this trap?

Here are three (simple) steps:
1. Ask yourself if an improvement is truly needed and if so, will people buy in.
2. Strip down the activity to its base elements, assume nothing is sacred and cut, cut, cut. (Pretend CTL-V does not exist.)
3. If your solution involves more than a couple of moving parts...abort! Remember what you're goal is.

Sounds simple? Sure. But I can tell you in no time, it wouldn't be hard to add a few more steps to this plan and complify.

Poppy Day (revisited)

Every November 11, I think of my dad, a WWII veteran and a man with a supreme joy for life. He always shared his wisdom, ideals and opinions (often without being asked), but kept the horror of his war experience to himself. He passed away over nine years ago, and for me, Remembrance Day is like another Yahrzheit for him. So today, to celebrate his memory and everything he taught me, I'm going to republish part of a post I wrote in 2007:

November 11.

When I was growing up in Winnipeg we called Remembrance Day: Poppy Day. And every year when it came around, my Dad would return from work with a poppy on his lapel. Often, he’d bring some home for us and I felt it was both a thrill and an honour to wear one. It connected me with my Dad and by extension with history. It made me feel proud.

Back then my dad, a veteran who saw action as part of Montreal’s Blackwatch regiment in WWII, would have bought the poppy from someone more senior than he was (by that I mean someone who’d fought in WWI).

Later, the ‘torch’ was passed to the WWII vets, and now they’re mostly gone too. Today, you never know who’s going to sell you a poppy (and sometimes it’s just the honour system and a contribution you make at Tim Horton’s). Time marches on.

Every year, I continue to wear a poppy over my heart and feel nostalgic. I love the symbol, the visual reminder of Flanders Fields, where ‘poppies blow between the crosses row on row. That mark our place…’

Introducing my social media class

Well, the social media for PR course I'm teaching at McMaster University is half over (hard to believe) and the students are busy working on their blogs. I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce and welcome them to the online community.

Name	Blog title	Twitter
Devorah Abrams Farmer	Devorah’s Blog	@dvora24
Suad Abukamla	Suadabukamla’s Blog
Natalie Ardanaz	Natalie’s Blog	@prNatAttack
Lisa Atkinson	Lisa M. Atkinson blog	@weezie130
Christine Davis	My New Digs	@MzCrisy
Sonja Dowbiggin	Staying Alive in the 905	@sonjaferne
Donna Drake	Dawna’s Blog	@dawnadrake
Paul Jones	Collapse of the West	@jonespt
Giselle Kimos	HR and more...	@gisellekimos
Lesley Morris	It’s All About Relationships	@LesleyM100
Julia Oudeh	JuliaOudeh’s Blog	@JuliaOudeh
Jotsna Pervin	JBPV’s Blog	@aeyshapakhi
Helen Powers	Socially Responsible Thoughts	@HelenEPowers
Madeline Robins	You, Me and Poverty	@madelinerobins
Margaret Shkimba	In the Sisterhood	@inthesisterhood
Mark Skeffington	About Cities	@markskeffington
Allyson Wenzowski	Allyson’s Publicity Works School Works Blog	@allysonpw
Kaan Yucel	Kaan’s Dervish Lodge	@soulician

If you have a chance and visit their sites, you'll see an eclectic group; original voices writing about a wide variety subjects including living the unemployed life, corporate social responsibility, city politics, HR, women in society, being a new homeowner, a doctor's view of the mind, and many more.

And, if you do drop by, please share your comments and thoughts. I'm sure they'll appreciate it.

Special thanks to Joe Thornley for suggesting I do this.

Are Canadian media responsible for spreading viral news?

You can't pick up a Canadian newspaper, listen to radio or watch TV without hearing about H1N1, the vaccination process, supply issues, lineups...

But the story doesn't seem to have the same intensity in the U.S. It wasn't even mentioned in Conan O'Brien's monologue a couple of days ago (when it was the lead on CBC) - and talk show openings are often a good barometer of big news stories (as silly as that sounds).

I did a search of 'H1N1 vaccine' on Google this morning* and in the first 30 results, there were 25 Canadian stories; four U.S. stories; and one international story. That's over 80 per cent of today's coverage emanating from Canada.

Now, we all know a pandemic is a very serious situation. And I'm not saying we shouldn't do everything we can to prevent the spread of the virus. It's important to be informed and educated.

But I wonder if Canadian media are making H1N1 a bigger story than it needs to be right at the moment.

What do you think?

*Search results as of 9:30 a.m., November 4, 2009

Musings on meshmarketing

Last week, I attended meshmarketing - a one-day gathering in Toronto highlighting social media case studies and best practices.

The event took place at CiRCA, a Toronto nightclub. And I have to say, I wasn't ready for the stanchions, bouncer attitude and red carpet at 8 in the morning. In fact, it felt like I was entering a super-cool boutique hotel - dark and with plenty of attitude. I got the impression that many of the staff had not been on the job at that time of day in a long, long time.

However, my eyes (and attitude) adjusted before the sessions. Here are my Twitter-notes highlights:

Keynote Gaping Void/Hugh MacLeod:

- Human beings socialize around objects; we talk about them; share knowledge.
- Web 1.0 = search. Web 2.0 = share.
- Products don't go viral just b/c you throw a lot of money behind them.

Facebook's Elmer Sotto:

- Facebook thinks people want to interact with brands in much the same way as they connect with friends.
- Think about FB user experience, profile, compelling profile visual (doesn't have to be logo) & thumbnail image.
- On FB brands should pace their posts, establish an 'editorial' calendar and [not] overdo it.

Measurement guru Katie Delahaye Paine:

- Measuring eyeballs shifting to measuring engagement; numbers go down but quality of dialogue goes up.
- People measure; computers count. You need people to analyse the results.
- Improve reputation by changing conversation: listen first then respond, and stop doing stupid things.

With one exception, the sessions offered useful tips and practical approach - the same high calibre as Mesh but in a change-of-intensity setting. And I liked that the level of information was aimed at people with a working knowledge of social media and not at the beginner level.

I also had a chance to record a couple of 4Qs for a future Inside PR podcasts.

If you were there, do you have any other nuggets to add?

Fixing what's broken between journalism and PR

On Inside PR #173, my '-30-' comment, the short POV remarks we're using to end the show, dealt with a few of the things we need to do to start fixing the pretty much broken relationship between journalism and PR.

This is something that must be done. And I think it's up to our industry to take the lead and try improve the way we interact with each other; build trust, credibility and respect on both sides. I think the same applies to bloggers and other influencers, as well.

Part of the problem lies with the way our profession functions: trying to place stories, traditionally in MSM, for clients or organizations. We often feel under a lot of pressure to deliver results for which we have virtually no control.

Fine. That's our reality and no one forced us into it. I'm proud to be a PR practitioner and this uncertainty is one of the things we just accept.

There are many media with whom I feel I have a good professional relationship. I define that as being able to approach a journalist/blogger with an idea they might be interested in, showing them why/how it works in a quick, efficient manner and having them say either say yes or no (or sometimes saving it for a future story).

However, I think that over the years we have made many repeated mis-steps that hurt the industry and our collective reputation.

And now, with social media and two-way conversations being embraced by both sides, this seems like a perfect time to make the change.

Here are 10 steps the PR profession can take right now:

1. Always read a journalists or blogger's past stories (and not just from last week). We need to do our research and know who's covering or interested in which subjects.
2. Know the difference between hard and soft news and position a story accordingly. It may seem big to us (or our client), but we have to step back and realize where our news fits into the grand scheme of things. I mean really fits.
3. Be transparent and tell the truth.
4. Stop writing in corporate-speak
   
5. Strive to be helpful, not a pest.
   
6. Understand that while our clients are a top priority for us, the reporter has many other priorities and we need to empathize more with them.
7. Stop making media lists from databases. Go to the source: newspapers, broadcast outlets, blogs, online publications. See who's writing about what. If we're not passionate about media, why are we in PR?
   
8. Never blast out an email to a large (or small) bcc list. We've all done that in the past. And some are still doing it. Really, this was a bad idea from the start. It turned us into broadcasters, something we're not.
9. Leave our PR egos at the door. It's up to us to reach journalists. Stop griping if they don't always call back when we want them to.
   
10. Help journalists and bloggers understand the new FTC rules/principles so that we can continue to work together in a mutually beneficial way.

It sounds simple but we've got to make the first move.

What do you think?

CPRS Toronto gets connected

As many of you know, I'm the president of CPRS Toronto and, if you're in the city, I'd encourage you to attend our first fall professional development event.

It's a panel discussion on October 15 called 'Get Connected: Building Virtual Relationships to Expand Communications'.

It features three savvy social media strategists, Michael O'Connor Clarke, Eden Spodek and William Young, talking about how we can use social media tools to engage and connect with our communities online and in real life.

I'll be moderating the session.

If you're interested, here's some information on the event. Hope to see you there.