Looking for Leadership? Invest in Your Networks

by Michael Cayley & Jonathan Salem Baskin

Lincoln and Roosevelt are heralded as great American leaders in times of crisis, and their vision and fortitude are recognized as drivers of their historic accomplishments.

However, we think their greatness had far more to do with their abilities to be catalysts for network effects.

If we’re right, it reveals a very different interpretation of the calls we’re hearing for “leadership” to restore confidence in our economic system. In fact, there’s a good chance that no government policy gesture or announcement will mollify the worries of businesses and consumers, let alone stabilize the markets.

Confidence must emerge from the networks in which we all participate. We need to lead ourselves.

This raises intriguing issues and opportunities for corporate marketers looking to craft a way forward.

“In times of uncertainty consumers rely more on trusted relationships when making purchasing decisions,” says Dr. Brent Simpson, an expert at the University of South Carolina who specializes in understanding how social order is formed.

Stanford University’s Matt Jackson, a leading social network theorist, adds: ``People's friends and trusted social relationships are important in influencing their behavior, and people learn from and emulate their friends. Attitude certainly can play into that, especially in turbulent times.''

So what does this mean for businesses directly impacted by the financial crisis, like banks, brokerages, and insurance companies, as well as any consumer business facing the prospect of declining (or less profitable) sales?

First and foremost, you can’t brand your way out of it. You can’t rely spin doctors to declare your path through the crisis; your customers must see and verify it. While your hired guns are hatching ads and press releases to statically “position” the situation, your networks are trading information and defining it in real-time.

And that information, whether accurate or not, has absolutely nothing to do with how the brand has been envisioned, promised, or promoted. Every network is founded upon the tangible realities of action and reaction, just as the mechanism of their function is cause and effect.

How do you empower these networks to step up and lead?

• Know your networks. Invest in software to map connections between people and content.

• Move your enterprise closer to customers, employees, partners and investors. In the past we talked about flattening hierarchies; now it is time to integrate internal & external sources of value.

• Trust opportunities that emerge from the exchange (don’t just talk, and certainly don’t lecture).

• Make information a utility as ubiquitous as electrical light. If what you share isn’t affirmed and forwarded, don’t repeat it...instead, recast or reimagine it, and find new ways to prove it to your networks.

• Demand feedback and ideas.

• Stop looking for ‘home runs’ and play ‘singles and doubles’ by finding small wins, frequent trials. Make constant adjustments. Allocate resources to winners and abandon losers without blame.

The larger revelation of today’s various crises is that the era of symbolic branding is waning, if not over. The woes of the financial institutions have graphically illustrated to us why.

It was always untenable for lenders to ignore the details of weak/bad relationships and to expect instead that homes or property (i.e. commodities) would appreciate in value with no accord to the strength of home owners (i.e. the source of value that differentiated the commodity). Instead of accessing and fostering the relationship to make the loan a better product, the banker chooses to focus on the derivatives.

All businesses face similar risks. From toothpaste to software services, consumer brands invite significant downside threats when they focus on manufactured identify and perception, and not on the drivers of true business strength: connection, interaction, involvement, collaboration, consumption and the other aspects of human behavior.

There are no brands, or businesses, without the networks of people who make them real. It is in, and through, the behaviors of these networks that the Lincolns and Roosevelts for our business and social communities will ultimately arise.

Jonathan Salem Baskin and Michael Cayley met through the concurrent release of their manifestos in the 50th issue of ChangeThis.

Jonathan Salem Baskin recently released the book Branding Only Works on Cattle. This post also appears on Jonathan’s blog at http://dimbulb.typepad.com.

Michael Cayley recently released the ebook Introducing Social Capital Value Add: Value Based Management for the Networked Age. This post also appears on Michael’s blogs at www.socialcapitalvalueadd.com and www.memeticbrand.com.


If you are interested in being a contributing author to this blog, please leave a comment and we will be in touch!

MSVU Toronto, Women of Influence & Deloitte

Good things happen when you get connected, that is the moral of this story.

A few months ago, fellow Mount alum Andre Mazerolle (who I have still not met in person, sadly!) set me up to discuss my Social Capital Value Add idea with his friend Steven Rayson, Chartered Business Valuator & Certified Fraud Examiner at Deloitte Canada.

Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago and the Women of Influence Luncheon Series , sponsored by Deloitte, comes on to radar. Emails ensued and thanks to Steven, here we go with a win-win-win alignment of interests that is designed to bring two messages to MSVU Toronto Alumnae:

1. There is great potential in this group of more than 700 hundred in the GTA if we connect.
2. It is worth investing some time, money and effort into.

The October 22nd Women of Influence Event in Toronto is world class. It features a presentation by co-Chief Creative Officers of Olgivy Toronto, Janet Kestin & Nancy Vonk.

They are the creative directors behind the film "Evolution"part of the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty.



Steven has generously donated two tickets to the event to encourage MSVU Toronto Alumnae to connect with their peers. It is very simple, everyone who connects by adding their names to the MSVU Toronto Alumnae email list between now and October 20th has a chance to win the pair of tickets (value - $176.40).

It is very, very simple - put your email in this box (or the one at the bottom of this blog) and hit subscribe:

Subscribe to MSVU Toronto Alumnae

Email:

Visit this group

UPDATE: The contest may be over, but you can still reconnect with fellow alum by signing up via this box.
Thanks again Steve!

Stand Up for Ontario ... are you talkin' to me?

Generally we shall stay clear of politics here, but this is not partisan and given the local economy (in for many of us, our adopted home of Toronto) this is worth sharing:

http://actnowforontario.com/

As I write this, I smile wondering how many real Maritimers in this group can bring themselves to actually looking at Ontario like this :)

Have a good weekend!


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Last Chance to RSVP - President’s Reception in Toronto

From the Mount Alumnae Office:

The President’s Reception is fast approaching – we hope you can make it!*

Kathryn E. Laurin, President & Vice-Chancellor, invites you to mingle with old friends and new at the President’s Reception! Join us for refreshments and hear all the latest news from the Mount.

Date: Monday, September 22, 2008

Time: 5:30p.m. – 7:00p.m.

Location:
The University Club of Toronto
380 University Avenue
Toronto, ON
(Closest Subway Station: St. Patrick’s)

RSVP:
Telephone: 902.457.5546
Toll Free: 1.888.678.2586
Email: alumnae@msvu.ca

In accordance with club policy, please note that dress code is business attire or smart casual. For more information or directions, please visit www.universitycluboftoronto.com.

* For those who have already RSVP’d – thank you! We can’t wait to see you!!

If you are interested in being a contributing author to this blog, please leave a comment and we will be in touch!

ChangeThis 50th Issue includes Social Capital Value Add

Hey there – www.ChangeThis.com’s 50^th Issue went out to over 20,000 people yesterday. It included new ideas from Seth Godin, John Kotter, Jonathan Salem Baskin, Vince Procente and Andrew Abela (full details here). Thanks to many of you who voted to make Social Capital Value Add the 8^th most demanded proposal in ChangeThis history last spring, the release also included a piece by me.

Business leaders who trust you will likely appreciate it if you share these pieces with them. That is the idea behind ChangeThis.

Thanks,

Michael

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Job Opp: World Health Organisation

Re-post from MSVU PR dept blog:

http://msvupr.blogspot.com/2008/08/world-health-organization-needs-you.html

Hope you had a good summer!

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Invitation from MSVU President for Sept.22 Reception

President's Reception

Date: Monday, September 22, 2008

Time: 5:30p.m. - 7:00p.m.

Location: The University Club of Toronto, 380 University AvenueToronto, ON

Kathryn E. Laurin, President & Vice-Chancellor, invites you to mingle with old friends and new at the President's Reception. This invitation is extended to all MSV Alumnae in the Greater Toronto Area. Join us for refreshments and hear all of the latest news from the Mount.

Please RSVP by September 15, 2008.Telephone: 902.457.5546Toll Free: 1.888.678.2586Email: alumnae@msvu.ca

If you are interested in being a contributing author to this blog, please leave a comment and we will be in touch!