28 August 2009

Greenwashing, Social Media, and The New Opinion Leaders

This week I had the chance to record a conversation with Maria Surma Manka, an expert in environmental communications and policy. Maria is one of my favorite green bloggers and she's also in public relations - I think she serves as a role model for people who want to succeed in the workplace and make a difference on important policy issues.

Our conversation focuses on "greenwashing" and how to avoid it, but we also got into how the media covers environmental issues and how the opinion leaders in environmentalism are all moving online.

The audio clip is 23 minutes, 51 seconds and I think the audio quality is the best I've been able to manage so far.

27 August 2009

Where in the world?

I'm in Nashville for a little while before the family heads to Durham.

Long story.

26 August 2009

Senator Kennedy

The news of Senator Kennedy's passing is not unexpected but still sad. Right now I suspect the Kennedy family is doing what it always does at times like these - coming together, relying on each other for support, and remembering all the good times while resolving to carry on.

Those of us who worked for Senator Kennedy are reaching out to current and former colleagues, thinking of our proudest or funniest moments with him. I was a mid-level policy wonk at best; but I was there long enough to see how hard Senator Kennedy worked, how much he truly cared for the issues, and how he could be larger than life and profoundly personal at the same time.

I'm sure an avalanche of eulogies for Senator Kennedy will come today and tomorrow; I'm sure people will have plenty of good things and bad things to say about him. I was by no means his closest confidant or his most trusted staffer, but I'm completely certain about one thing.

Right now, Senator Kennedy wouldn't want us to be talking about him.

Right now, Senator Kennedy would want us to be talking about health care reform.

19 August 2009

Goodbye Bluegrass

It seems our house sold sooner than we thought it would, so I'm saying goodbye to Central Kentucky. My wife will be starting a new job at Duke University soon, so we're off to Durham, NC.

The past five years in Kentucky have been personally and professionally rewarding. I had my most surreal professional experience here - coordinating a conference call about a plane crash from the site of a derailed and burning freight train. I also saw my own name in the papers here a lot more than I wanted. However, I also got to see life from a different perspective - slower, more rural, more conservative - and as a result I hope I've learned more about appreciating and respecting other points of view. From my home office in Lexington I helped my company build a social media practice that accounts for seven figures in revenue and assemble a young, talented and dynamic global team. It's a humbling experience, and I'm grateful to Evan Kraus for having confidence in me and tolerance of my wacky ideas.

I can't begin to thank Tom Martin, Chuck Creacy and Chris Eddie at Business Lexington enough for the opportunities to contribute to Business Lexington's success. My sporadic column there gave me the chance to both explore national and global issues while learning more about Kentucky. Tom is a good friend and an accomplished journalist, and I'm looking forward to continuing to collaborate with him on some interesting ideas, albeit from a distance.

There are a couple of local business people I have to specifically mention here. Nancy Victor of All Creatures Inn and Scott Nieves of Beaumont Veterinary Center have consistently gone above and beyond all expectations when it comes to customer service. If dogs are part of your family, and you live in the Lexington area, I'd recommend each of them in a heartbeat.

The transition to Durham will take some time, and things might be a bit spotty here for a few weeks, but I'll try to update as much as I can.

13 August 2009

Transitions...

A lot has been happening in the work and personal life that I don't typically share here - all good stuff, but not necessarily for public consumption just yet. Suffice it to say that things may slow down a bit here for a little while, but I'll try to keep this updated as much as possible, and I'll eventually provide more details to the 2 or 3 people who may actually be interested.

Locally, the online chatter is basically the same as the offline talk. All I'll say is in Kentucky, people are willing to overlook a lot in a basketball coach if you're winning.

11 August 2009

Protest and Social Media in Iran

While the United States media focuses the bulk of its attention on screaming people at "town hall" meetings (presumably about health care) and the fact that Michael Jackson is STILL dead, I thought it was important to take a look at what real journalism looks like today and at how high the stakes really are for free speech in some places in the world.

Earlier this week, I was very fortunate to speak briefly with Hamid Tehrani, Iran Editor for Global Voices Online. He's been covering Iran's presidential election and its aftermath. In my opinion no one has provided better coverage than GVO, because they are able to curate the primary source material, translate it in many languages, and present it in its proper context. Hamid has written extensively on the protests and the use of social media to facilitate and report on them.

So much of the "social media coverage" of these protests has been about the tools, and they're no doubt important. But I still think this story is still about the people, the messages, the stories, and what's at stake. Hamid made some excellent points about how social classes have come together in protests, something you wouldn't expect to see in Iran. And for all the talk about Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter, I loved his point about history. In 1978 the Ayahtolla distributed audio cassettes to spread his message and people climbed to their rooftops to yell "God is great" in protest. Today, they're using social media tools, but the protesters are still going to the rooftops and they're still chanting "God is great."

The audio quality is so-so, I'm still getting the hang of it. But this is well worth a listen - just under 20 minutes. Here's a link to the page on the Internet Archive. It's also embedded here.

07 August 2009

Health Care Reform, Democracy and Ethics

I'm trying very hard to hold my tongue on the health care "debate." I have friends - and clients - on all sides of the "debate." But this isn't a debate. This is a freak show that will have a violent end.

Today a friend told me his office received a death threat. It won't be the last. I've seen the videos of people storming these "town hall meetings" and just shouting to make sure no one else speaks. I've seen videos of fist fights, of members of Congress hung in effigy. I'm not going to link to any of it because it's seen enough activity online and it doesn't need any more help.

There can be no doubt that people in my profession are organizing this sort of thing, stirring up fear and hatred and dehumanizing an enemy, in the name of "freedom," going on television and telling outright lies. They are actively trying to suppress discussion and debate. They are telling unstable people some unstable things, then they're pointing at someone and calling them "Hitler." And they're hiding their true identities (and their funding) by setting up "non-profit" groups that have names with words like "freedom" in them.

They are undoubtedly aware that the more they do this, the more likely someone is going to commit even greater acts of violence. They know this and they do it anyway.

The blood will be on their hands. And on the hands of the people that pay them.

What they are doing is a disgrace to our profession, and more importantly, a disgrace to our democracy. We are supposed to be communicators - our livelihoods depend on freedom of speech.

I worked on Capitol Hill for one of the most passionate advocates for health care reform in our history. I don't hide my politics. But this isn't politics. This is just a fight.

There are people in politics and in our profession that want it this way. They want to appeal to the most base nature of the least stable among us.

I want nothing to do with them.

05 August 2009

#sexistsvsrolemodels

The video I embedded yesterday was funny. I'd give it a solid B. But there's a bigger point.

When insecure guys take gratuitous potshots at ambitious or successful women - potshots you know they'd never take at men - it doesn't just insult that woman. I think there's a subconscious message they send young women and girls - try to succeed and you'll be harassed for it.

Many women shrug it off or use it to motivate them, but some don't. The bottom line to me is they shouldn't have to deal with it, but the reality is they do and they probably will forever.

That's why I thought of the "female role models" posts - I thought maybe it would be a way to show people that there are tons of success stories out there who may not be Senators or Cabinet Secretaries, but are doing amazing things every day.

But I'm not exactly an authority on female role models. So I reached out to some women bloggers I know who are also active on Twitter. They're going to stand up to the sexism and introduce us all to women who deserve our praise, not our mocking.

The next time we see another example of a sexist potshot from an insecure goober, we will send a tweet that says something like "ignore sexism from [insert insecure goober name here], @username is a role model for MY kid." Or something like that. Then we'll add the hashtag #sexistsvsrolemodels at the end.

So anyone who wants a list of female role models on twitter will only have to search that hashtag. I say let's create something good out of this. And maybe this is a start.

04 August 2009

03 August 2009

Female Role Models, Part II

So I've figured out when to publish another installment of my informal series highlighting female role models - women who are using social media effectively to both further their careers and set an example for others.

It's whenever someone prominent takes a pathetic cheap shot at an ambitious and successful woman - more specifically, when she's described as having an "abrasive" or "cold" personality, or whenever someone trots out the b-word. You know, just as a joke or something.

So thank you, Dana Milbank of the Washington Post, for our most recent edition. Here's how I defined the criteria I'm using in my first post on the topic:
Someone an online mom can show her daughter and say, "See her? See what she's doing? See how she's living in the same world you are, with the same challenges you have, and see how she succeeds? THAT is how you do this. THAT is what I stand for. I want you to be like HER."
So here goes:

Alanna Shaikh. She's a public health professional currently in Tajikistan, managing the ZdravPlus tuberculosis infection control project for Abt Associates. She's already had a very impressive career in public service, non-profit advocacy, and in global health, having worked for the Dept of State, the UN Population Fund, and Project HOPE. She has a masters degree in public health from Boston University, in addition to a bachelors from Georgetown. She writes a kickass blog on international development, and isn't afraid to criticize bad behavior in the development sector when she sees it. She also contributes to Change.org. She even writes a recipe blog she calls - and I love this - Food You Can Cook Anywhere.


Maria Surma Manka. Yes, PR folks can be role models too. But unlike most of the social media PR women I know who spend most of their time in the mom-o-sphere, Maria is a committed environmentalist. I've mentioned her before, and you can read her stuff at Maria Energia or her company's green blog, Ecologic. Maria is a role model because she stays true to herself in her public communication. Let's face it: companies don't hire PR firms because they just need help selling sunshine and puppies and spreading the love. Companies hire PR firms because they have PR challenges, and they don't always want people in those firms to share their own opinions on issues relevant to them. Maria shares her thoughts while remaining focused on the positive - the latest innovation, the newest information, things like that. It's a difficult balance but she pulls it off.

Kelly Wickham. She's an assistant principal in a Chicago-area high school, but she's known in social media as Mocha Momma. She's also leading a very important discussion about marketing to people of color in the blogosphere. I met her at BlogHer in 2007 where this issue came up briefly in the "State of the Mom-O-Sphere" panel discussion, and I wrote about it as well. But Kelly kept at it, and what was a side discussion became a panel of its own at BlogHer 2009, and got people talking more directly about the issue - and NOT just the semi-regular collection of the usual suspects in the PR and marketing industry, paying lip service to the topic at a pre-scheduled event. This was one of those rare times where the consumers led the discussion, and Kelly (along with some noteworthy others) was leading the leaders. That's a role model in my book.

OK, that's it for now. So stay classy and keep dropping the b-word, fellas. You're saying a lot more about yourselves than anyone else.