BELGRAVIA — It’s sometimes worth pushing your chair back and having a moment to think.

What do you make of this picture (above)? 

It’s from this week’s media and is a photo of the Argentina football team coming home.

I love it for all that is obvious about it.  And also all that is incredibly weird about it.  [...]]]>

BELGRAVIA — It’s sometimes worth pushing your chair back and having a moment to think.

What do you make of this picture (above)? 

It’s from this week’s media and is a photo of the Argentina football team coming home.

I love it for all that is obvious about it.  And also all that is incredibly weird about it.  If you left this planet even 10 years ago you would have no idea what all the little blue lights are.

But to us, it seems quite normal.

Why is that?

Could it be that the future has arrived?

Monday there was a great hoax for anoraks like us.  It was said (and shown) that Monday was the day that Doc programmed into the clock in the car for in Back to the Future.

It’s a shame it’s not true.  Like most good hoaxes it seems credible. 

Maybe the future is here when have more toys than we know what to do with.  And we’ve stopped waiting for the rocket cars.

/df

PARSONS GREEN — There’s a lady in a business suit sitting reading The Guardian.  The Media Guardian is tossed on the bench beside her.  Untouched.

It’s maybe symptomatic of a larger issue. And then again maybe I am just getting old. [Cue rant.] Why do the media need sections dedicated to… the media? 

I find myself hanging [...]]]>

PARSONS GREEN — There’s a lady in a business suit sitting reading The Guardian.  The Media Guardian is tossed on the bench beside her.  Untouched.

It’s maybe symptomatic of a larger issue. And then again maybe I am just getting old. [Cue rant.] Why do the media need sections dedicated to… the media? 

I find myself hanging around late in cinemas just to stare in awe at the screen. Why do we need to have “credits” for the caterers assistant?

Why do the arts and the softer sciences need to be so self-congratulatory?

It does none of us any good.

Can you imagine a great big banner being pulled behind an aircraft: “And the guy who polished the wing was called Gus…”?

/df

HOME — I used to have a Klingon cookbook.  No, it was Lt. Uhura’s Cookbook.  But there was Klingon it it.  That was in university.  More than 20 years ago.

I never cooked anything from it.

Are you kidding?

But I moved it from dorm to dorm and house to house.  I thought its simple existence was funny [...]]]>

HOME — I used to have a Klingon cookbook.  No, it was Lt. Uhura’s Cookbook.  But there was Klingon it it.  That was in university.  More than 20 years ago.

I never cooked anything from it.

Are you kidding?

But I moved it from dorm to dorm and house to house.  I thought its simple existence was funny enough.  (Yes, not everyone shared my sense of humour then either.)

However, my daughter has just brought the world of Fan Fiction to my attention.  It seems that Star Trek was even a pivotal modern outburst of it.  Followed by Star Wars… And today people like Stephenie Meyer and JK Rowling, for the Twilight and Harry Potter series, even actively encourage it, saying they read it.

It’s a really interesting phenomenon.  And not one without it’s legal and copyright implications.

So my question today is: Why don’t brands do it more?

People write Star Trek cookbooks because they are obsessed with the show.  And one assumes they buy other people’s Star Trek cookbooks.  But what about great brands and companies? 

Imagine some of the great BP fiction that could come out of the Deepwater Horizon situations?!

Okay, maybe that’s not the best example.

But what about other, more day-to-day examples?

I think it’s a heck of an idea.

I think I’ll talk to some clients about it this week.

/df

CHELSEA — I realised yesterday that I have not lived in North America for more than a decade. So it’s hard for me to fully understand what companies like Verizon and Comcast are all about.  But even from this distance it’s clear they’re having trouble with service delivery.

A few years ago I found this brilliant [...]]]>

CHELSEA — I realised yesterday that I have not lived in North America for more than a decade. So it’s hard for me to fully understand what companies like Verizon and Comcast are all about.  But even from this distance it’s clear they’re having trouble with service delivery.

A few years ago I found this brilliant series of YouTube videos called “the Comcast guy is asleep on my sofa.” They still hold a special place in my heart.

Today I read about M.I.A.’s new song “I’m Down Like Your Internet Connection”. Written based on the singer’s experience with Verizon.  Apparently she even gets some employees to sing the chorus.

What failures of technology and service make this kind of thing possible?

Unfortunately you can’t say that they are one-off situations, because they ring true with so many people.

Customer experience — particularly in the telecoms businesses — is so important. Here in the UK, companies like T-Mobile, Orange, O2 and Vodafone will do almost anything to keep people.

There are some fairly straight-forward technology, change and communication issues that can be ironed out quite easily in most businesses.

Get on it.

/df

“Galloway has been identified as one of the darkest places on the planet.” – The Independent, 05 January 2009

GREEN PARK — There’s plenty to be joyous about at the start of a new year.  And it’s not just the FTSE rising to a 16 month high, the pending snowstorm in London, or [...]]]>

“Galloway has been identified as one of the darkest places on the planet.”
– The Independent, 05 January 2009

GREEN PARK — There’s plenty to be joyous about at the start of a new year.  And it’s not just the FTSE rising to a 16 month high, the pending snowstorm in London, or the ongoing chocolate fight for Cadburys.

There is South African President Zuma dancing with joy at his 5th marriage.  What a brilliant picture.  Putting aside the poor choice of running shoes, who is to complain about this?  Really.  What a great image of joy.  Don’t you just know that Phil “The Power” Taylor would love to be in this position.

We all would.

Then there’s Albert Camus.  The author still toted around by earnest, and slightly musty students everywhere.  French President Nicolas Sarkozy was a musty youth once himself and now wants Camus’ remains put in the Pantheon in Paris along with other great national treasures like Napoleon (who is all there, except his bits).

Clearly Camus would have hated the idea.  Or fallen over in pure shock.  But since when have public perceptions of people needed to connect to their actual person?  Ask John Lennon, Elvis or Ashley Cole.

For Camus, immortality is a fair an fitting goal.  The fact that we’re still talking and arguing about him today is a fitting tribute.

Finally, I am heartily encouraged by the mounting rivalry between Google and Apple.  It’s all over the news.  Techies are whispering about it in corridors and everyone seems to be very excited about what it all means.

I don’t really care that much about it, I must admit. I’ll wait until the dust settles and go with the winner.  But what a fantastic luxury to have?!  The biggest business story around is about two companies that make things that no one really needs.  Smart phones and internet technology is unlikely to start a war, or poison a river, or any of the other horrors that commerce occasionally inflicts on the world.

What a world.

/df

MARBLE ARCH — I was visited by a charming man from Brussels yesterday called Hugh.  We had a nice chat about PR, communications and change management.  We talked about schools in Kenya and wine in Kuwait and real estate in Cirencester.

When it came to the subject at hand — work — Hugh blushed a bit [...]]]>

MARBLE ARCH — I was visited by a charming man from Brussels yesterday called Hugh.  We had a nice chat about PR, communications and change management.  We talked about schools in Kenya and wine in Kuwait and real estate in Cirencester.

When it came to the subject at hand — work — Hugh blushed a bit and said “I am here because, I am afraid to say, I googled ‘change management’ and your company came up.”

And I think that was the best thing I have heard so far in 2009.  (Granted it’s not been a such a great year.)

There was a day when businesses like ours would try to find the biggest shingle they could and hang it above the front door.  Or you might offer the “best deals” or some kind of AMAZING results or solutions.  I know companies that have gone to great lengths to get in the papers or appear on TV.  But today there’s one business directory that counts ahead of all others, and that’s Google.

When we started this business in September 2008 we had a lovely website that no one could see.  But we didn’t figure that out until earlier this year.  When we did, and our South African SEO (look it up!) guru tweeked a few things, everything changed.  We climbed the ratings literally over-night.

Part of this is about technology, but part is also about noise and focus.  We have tried hard to make our business offering both broad and specific.  We found some words that we wanted to own, and we set about owning them.

At the same time we made as much noise online as we could.  Blogging, Twitter, LinkedIn… We appeared at conferences and made sure the name was spelled right.

Has it been the making of us?  So far, not really.  But it can’t hurt.  And it’s better than trying to lift that big shingle.

/df

LONDON — There seems to be quite a bit of excitement out there about Google Wave.  Here’s a blog I was sent to earlier today.  Look how many comments there are in a few hours.

There’s a lovely short video here too that will show you what Google Wave is all about.

To me it looks quite [...]]]>

LONDON — There seems to be quite a bit of excitement out there about Google Wave.  Here’s a blog I was sent to earlier today.  Look how many comments there are in a few hours.

There’s a lovely short video here too that will show you what Google Wave is all about.

To me it looks quite similar to the demo I saw in August of Microsoft’s OneNote.  A lovely guy from Pfizer explained to a group of us how it’s should change their project processes.  And I find both quite compelling.  Here’s a video about it too.

In many respects I am dying to try both out. 

In many other ways I suspect that I won’t and I can’t.  My brain is already programmed to using email and other software.  I recognise that this is better.  I even suspect that in a few years or month I will be using it.  But I can’t get excited now.

The Google Wave video says “email was invented more than 40 years ago, Google Wave is what we would do if we invented it now.”  Well, I was invented 40 years ago and I don’t think I have out-stayed my welcome yet. 

In fact, I am still quite keen on writing letters.  You know, start at the top and work down from left to right on a piece of nice paper?  I like that too and people are still doing it (although not in Britain with a Royal Mail strike).

/df

LONDON — I am delighted to see that people are still talking about last month’s CommsFlashMob.

Liam and his buddy Paul have both written about it recently. 

It seems like maybe the CommsFlashMob should keep on rolling.

Ideas?

/df

LONDON — A few of us got together in one place today and made an effort to quickly update the “Internal Communications” page on Wikipedia.

We learned a lot in the process.

All tolled there were 28 amendments made to the page, and more are still being made now.  Some people watched.  Some emailed, texted and tweeted [...]]]>

LONDON — A few of us got together in one place today and made an effort to quickly update the “Internal Communications” page on Wikipedia.

We learned a lot in the process.

All tolled there were 28 amendments made to the page, and more are still being made now.  Some people watched.  Some emailed, texted and tweeted us to say “you missed X”… and some just went on and did stuff themselves.  It’s still a long, long way from perfect.  But it is better than it was.

Hopefully improvements will continue.  Why not have a look and make a change now?

What an interesting experience.  At the same time we noticed that the Corporate Communications page is even worse.  Should that be next?

/df

LONDON — It started as an idle comment on Twitter.  Either Rach or Lee started it.  Well, actually Wedge started it…  Maybe I should start again.

Anyone interested in social media and communications will know that Wikipedia, while fantastic on the marriage of Britney Spears, is not so great on topics like Internal Communications.

In fact, the [...]]]>

LONDON — It started as an idle comment on Twitter.  Either Rach or Lee started it.  Well, actually Wedge started it…  Maybe I should start again.

Anyone interested in social media and communications will know that Wikipedia, while fantastic on the marriage of Britney Spears, is not so great on topics like Internal Communications.

In fact, the patchwork of an Internal Comms page was started by Wedge many years ago, but he takes no responsibility now.  Acknowledging that it’s a mess.

Earlier this summer we fell into some idle conversation about fixing it.  Social Media superstar Rachel Allen, former CIPR head Lee Smith, communications dean Liam Fitzpatrick, tech-god Wedge and I.  Soon Twitter’s only permanent resident, and Virgin Media Internal Communications head, Abi Signorelli was also involved.

We pledged to get together in one afternoon and “fix it”.

Tomorrow afternoon (Thursday 20 August) from 3 pm to 5 pm BST (10 to 12 EST) etc. we will gather and try to take a crack at it.  We hope that others will join in online.

A few people have had to drop out for reasons ranging from travel to ‘real work’, but we will persist.  Some others have already written their sections and all that remains is to post them.

You know, it may not work.  Wikipedia works in mysterious way.  They may dump us out entirely.  But we will soon see.

I hope you’ll come by and have a look.  Write a bit… Or even simply follow us on Twitter at CommsFlashMob.

/df