comipidigest2012-3

International Public & Corporate Communications Quarterly Digest of Public Affairs News Issue # 3 - 2012

FOREWORD This newsletter is aimed at providing Public Affairs practitioners with a short selection of recently published stories, papers, etc. which may be useful to remain abreast of new trends or to stimulate a debate on the opinion expressed by the authors. External sources are linked and any copyright remains with the authors.

In this issue:

An Unlikely Convergence: Journalism & Public Relations? . p. 2 What Are The Symptoms of a Social Media Driven Crisis? p. 4

SOCIAL MEDIA While this issue is mainly devoted to Social Media, the first article is an interesting blog

by Prof. Van Dyke. He noted emerging convergence between PR and journalism.

Since I am the one who introduced him to Kimbo coffee, I take part of the credit for his positive approach…

DOD's new policy 'likes' social media, but with caveats

p. 5

Essential media tips: - 5 Tips for Blending PR & Social Media Effectively p. 9 - 4 Key Steps to PR Measurement Success p.11

During the past summer, PR/PA pages included an increasing number of discussions on Social Media. In selecting what to post here, I focused my attention on the related development of military policy and on how to measure effects.

Media tips also refer to social media.

Social Media in Command & Control p.13

I found also of interest – again for the military – an innovative but quite complex and preliminary approach about how social media can be applied in military Command & Control.

Can Charisma Be Taught? p.18

The closing article provides confirmation, from a psychologist point of view, of the basic advice we all provide when preparing someone to deliver a speech. I found this as good reassurance that – PR/PA not being a science – we are not too far from it.

The iVolution of man

These and other issues can be debated at our discussion page http://www.facebook.com/?ref=tn_tnmn#! /groups/197500116950819/ The editor

cartoon by Scott Hampson - Creative Commons

Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported Licence

edited by ComIPI http://www.comipi.it/indexEng.html

1

An Unlikely Convergence: Journalism and Public Relations?

September 9, 2012

By Mark Van Dyke http://markvandykenewsroom.blogspot.it/2012/09/anunlikely-convergence-journalism-and.html

I am sitting at my dining room table, enjoying my daily ritual: a post-lunch “digestivo.” I became partial to a good digestivo when I was a U.S. Navy public affairs officer, based at a NATO military headquarters in Naples, Italy, serving as a senior NATO spokesperson. After lunch, before going back to work, I would usually stop off at the coffee bar next to my office to have an espresso with my Italian friends. Now, my digestivo is a home-brewed double shot of authentic Italian espresso (Kimbo, an Italian roast that “represents the Neapolitan coffee culture”).

My Italian friends explained that a shot of espresso after lunch helped grease the digestive system. I knew better, though.

Decades of experience in the public relations profession had taught me to recognize a good “line” when I heard one. You see, Italians don’t swill down their coffee like many people in other coffee cultures. They actually use a cup of coffee as a reason to slow down, take a break from the fast pace of work, and enjoy the company of friends – a wonderful relationship management tool. (Strange, though. I find the espresso does have the added benefit moving the digestive system, in fact, like clockwork!)

Suddenly, while glancing through the main section of the Sunday edition of The New York Times, a column about the no-man’s land between newspaper readers and writers interrupts my reverie. I am reading and rereading “My Turn in Between the Readers and Writers” (September 9, 2012, p. 11) by Margaret Sullivan, The New York Times public editor, only five days into her new job.

As I read the column, I’m doing a double take.

Ms. Sullivan, a former editor, reporter,

Public Editor Margaret Sullivan, The New York Times and columnist for The Buffalo News, is explaining how she intends to operate in her job.

And the points she is making about operating as an editor and journalist nearly match the exact points that I teach my communication students at Marist College (Poughkeepsie, N.Y.) about operating as a public relations professional.

Given the long history of animosity between writers that were once known for “yellow journalism” and public relations “flaks” that could spin any story, I am wondering what is going on here. I left my full-time public relations career in 2000 to pursue my teaching career.

Have the journalism and public relations career fields converged that much since I took up residence in the “ivory tower” of higher education? Perhaps not, or at least let’s hope the two fields have not converged. Healthy skepticism among journalists and public relations professionals helps keep everyone honest, which benefits the audiences of our respective communication efforts. No, I believe the similarities between Ms. Sullivan’s profile of a good editor and my understanding of what makes up a good public relations professional have simply evolved.

Consider, for example, Ms. Sullivan’s first objective: “Put readers first.” Absolutely. Since Ben Franklin and other Revolutionary War writers, editors, and publishers, journalists have served their readers a literal “marketplace of ideas” in the United States. And in public 2

relations, the work of professionals like Ivy Ledbetter Lee in the early 1900s paved the way for recognizing the importance of publics.

Lee was among the first public relations counselors to urge respect for public interests as well as organizational interests. His counsel to powerful business leaders like John D. Rockefeller proved very effective in forming good relations between organizations and publics. Decades of research studies in public relations since the 1900s have proven Lee right. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, public relations scholars like Dr. Linda Childers Hon and Dr. James E. Grunig discovered that the value of good public relations does not come down to simply making money for an organization. Instead, the value of public relations can be defined in terms of the quality of relationships between an organization and its many publics (see Hon & Grunig, 1999, Guidelines for Measuring Relationships in Public Relations).

Also, long gone are the days when journalists “set the agenda” for readers and listeners.

Today, social media trends generated by readers and listeners drive what editors choose to lead the news. Now, publics set the agenda. And even the slickest public relations tactician can no longer rely on spin as a tactic, with so many audience-generated news sources standing by to check facts. We must remain centered on our audiences and their stakes (e.g., needs, interests, and concerns).

Second, Ms. Sullivan expressed her intent to “encourage conversation.” For many years, journalists and public relations professionals alike have competed with each other to get their respective points across to intended audiences. They often communicate these points with each other’s help; however, at times they go around each other to avoid having intended messages filtered or manipulated. In reality, the “story” always ends up being more accurate and newsworthy when journalists and public relations professionals cooperate. Journalists need a few news subsidies and well-placed sources to report news accurately. And any selfrespecting public relations practitioner will admit to needing reliable journalists to provide “third-party” credibility.

This competition between journalists and public relations professionals over controlling the story simply clouded the vision of what communication professionals should have been doing: having two-way conversations with audiences, or listening to what mattered to audiences as well as transmitting self-important messages. Yes, Ms. Sullivan is right. Journalists and public relations experts both should work to create “a village square for discussions” and “invited other voices in.”

That’s the way to communicate in this era of exploding social media: focus on listening and using what you hear to address audience needs as well as organizational needs. Cooperating, communicating collaboratively, and building mutually-beneficial, long-term relationships with audiences do lead to success. The public relations field is now moving in that direction, finally. Only recently, the Public Relations Society of America, the world’s largest organization of public relations professionals, updated its definition of public relations, based on suggestions by thousands of members. The new definition espouses the principles described above: “Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics” (see What is Public Relations?).

Third, Ms. Sullivan advocated in her column the need “to promote transparency and understanding.” Again, I couldn’t agree more.

Public relations practitioners now understand the value of providing strategic publics with information they need. Just before I retired from the Navy after nearly 30 years on active duty, I helped to lead the public information efforts behind NATO’s operations to implement provisions of the 1995 international peace agreement that ended nearly three years of war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Like Ms. Sullivan’s goals, the goal of our public information program was quite simple: “gaining and maintaining broad [public] understanding for the mission.” Also, very much like Ivy Lee’s efforts more than 80 years before, we based our public relations plan on three principles: “a proactive public information policy; a free and open media access policy; and complete, accurate, and 3

timely reporting” (see Siegel, 1998, Target Bosnia).

world that they support gay pride. But often it’s the tell-tale signs that hit you fast and hard. That’s why it’s so crucially important for you to both Perhaps the fields of journalism and public understand the symptoms of a social media driven relations are converging. Or maybe this is crisis, as well as to have your crisis communications simply the result of an evolution in the plan developed and ready to go at the first sign of communication field driven by consumer use these symptoms. of advanced technology and the effects of game-changing social media. In any case, I am So what are the symptoms? What should you be all for it; and I admire Margaret Sullivan’s looking for and how? approach to her new job with The New York Times. I hope she succeeds.

The easiest symptom to detect is: Now, back to my digestivo, which makes me Negativity + Virality wonder, “Could the Italians have it right after all?” Might the explosion of espresso bars If you notice a growing number of negative posts, around the world have some positive effect on comments and/or tweets circulating about your journalists and public relations professionals company or organization, whether on Twitter, who continue to meet over a cup of coffee, Facebook, your blog or elsewhere, then this is the and then find time to slow down and form first sure-fire sign that there’s an issue that needs good relationships? your immediate attention.

Mark A. Van Dyke is an associate professor in We’ve seen this countless times with tweets the the School of Communication and the Arts at likes of: #boycottChickFilA, #NBCfails, #tamu, and Marist College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. even more recently with: #legitimateRape, #ToddAkin and #Progressive.

There’s nothing faster than viral.

What Are The Symptoms of a Social Media Driven Crisis?

By Melissa Agnes

The speed at which a crisis can escalate on social media can be overwhelming. Within mere minutes of a simple mistake, you can watch your brand be scrutinized, criticized and attacked online. It’s for this reason that 24/7 social media monitoring is a must-do, no matter your organization’s size, reach or social media activity.

http://crisismanagementbook.com/crisiscommunication/what-are-the-symptoms-of-a-socialmedia-driven-crisis

But monitoring is only half the battle. Once a threat is detected by your monitors, engagement We’ve seen it countless times. Whether based and response are the only ways to begin to resolve on truth or falsehoods, the public picks up on it. The longer you wait to engage and respond, the harder it will be for your organization to regain a story, a situation, a statement and comments on it, tweets it, shares it and next control of the situation. thing you know, you’re in the midst of a social But how can you be sure which post, comment or media driven crisis that has you feeling tweet is severe enough to potentially go viral and overwhelmed, stressed and attacked. develop into a crisis? What are the red flags?

Sometimes you get lucky and have the opportunity to catch it coming and/or plan for it in advance. Oreo had this per-calculated opportunity when they decided to release their cookie image to Facebook, showing the

We’ve all experienced negative criticism on our social channels and blogs. Though it’s typical for people to complain and voice their opinions, not every single complaint results in a social media 4

attack or crisis situation. So how can your Once a threat is detected, your monitors need to monitors be sure to identify the real potential be able to assess the situation and determine crises, before they begin to go viral? which is a potential threat, and when your social media crisis communications plan needs to be put If we look at the recent Progressive crisis, all it into motion. took was one blog post to go viral and put some massive heat on Progressive Insurance, Bio: so much so that they were blogged about, tweeted about, scrutinized, judged and Melissa Agnes is a social media crisis manager and massively attacked online. Though this was consultant. She keeps a daily blog on the subject not the first time someone blogged or over at MelissaAgnes.com, is a co-host of The Crisis tweeted about their grievances with Show and the creator of The Social Media Crisis Progressive, it was the time that it resulted in Academy, an online training course aimed at a social media driven crisis. So what were the helping small to medium sized businesses and PR symptoms? professionals develop strategic social media crisis communications plans.

Matt Fisher’s post had both a huge emotional aspect and a moral factor that the world could identify with; not to mention an intriguing and share-able blog post title!

These were the red flags that Progressive should have instantly picked up on and properly and sympathetically addressed and responded to.

DOD's new policy 'likes' social media, but with caveats

By Amber Corrin

Aug 14, 2012

http://fcw.com/Articles/2012/08/15/FEAT-Inside-DOD-socialmediapolicy.aspx?goback=.gmp_816587.gde_816587_member_147 064264&Page=6

So as not every grievance, complaint or negative blog post will result in a full on crisis, there are specific red flags that your monitors For all its benefits and the enjoyment it brings to should be trained to identify and bring to your the people who use it, social media has a dark side. attention.

When it comes to military users, one slip — such as an inadvertent mention of a deployment timing or The following are some questions that will location — can endanger lives. But given its help identify these red flags: intrinsically open nature and constantly changing boundaries, how can the Defense Department >What is the emotional impact of the effectively manage social media? situation?

Pentagon officials at the highest levels recognize the importance of social media for communicating > What and whose morals and ethics may be with the public and collaborating within the on the wrong side of the fence, and how department, as well as providing troops access to might the public react to it? their loved ones even when they are stationed thousands of miles away. But leaders know they > What is the potential reach of the story? must weigh those advantages against the sensitive (Though this can sometimes be deceiving) security needs inherent to military operations.

To strike a balance, DOD officials are focusing on > How intriguing, catchy and share-able is the regulating, not restricting, social media use. post, video, image and/or tweet?

Currently, DOD’s social media policy is governed by a directive-type memorandum (DTM) from 2010 — > Can a quick and sympathetic response help a two-page document that superficially outlines calm the situation? the rules and responsibilities those under Pentagon jurisdiction must follow in their use of So, as I’ve said, monitoring is half the battle. social media. That policy will change in the coming 5

months as the department prepares to issue the lawyers look at the final version one more time more permanent and detailed DOD and determine what to address,” Carey said. “Right instructions that will expand the existing now there’s no date set. I can only say to stand guidance. by.”

“Because the DTM was the first ever, it was Clearing the fog of Facebook galvanizing for the department to work its way Social media has permeated the lives of most through the potential rules around social Americans, but for the military, it’s a relatively new media use at DOD,” said Rob Carey, DOD’s capability, and rules for its use haven’t always been deputy CIO. “As you can imagine, with a very well understood. structured, hierarchical organization such as One prominent misconception is that the use of ours, we were dealing with ‘How do I use this dot-mil e-mail addresses on social media is thing?’” forbidden. That simply isn’t true, Carey said. What The DTM was meant to be a quick set of matters is how a social media account associated guidelines governing activities in the social with a dot-mil address is used. The key designation media space. It was set to expire July 15 but is whether or not someone is officially conducting will remain in effect until the new policy job-related business. comes out. Even now, two years after its “The secretary of the Navy, the commander of release, the department is still determining European Command, the defense secretary — they just how to use the still-developing and use social media [for an official] purpose,” Carey sometimes unwieldy tool. With a rapidly said. “The account that is set up is an official evolving capability like social media, a hot new account, so dot-mil e-mail addresses are used to trend can catch fire and fizzle within a matter support official presences. If you’re using Facebook of weeks, so it’s difficult to issue hard-and-fast or any of the others for social purposes — and rules. there’s nothing wrong with that, consistent with all “The underlying effort of the DTM was to the other [operations security] guidelines we have work toward breaking down some of the silos in place — you should use some other e-mail of keeping information together, allowing a address.” broader perspective of options out there and No social network sites are universally banned seeing what we could gain,” said Jack Holt, from military use, but there are certain who helped write the DTM while serving as circumstances in which the use of one or another senior strategist for emerging media at DOD; might be temporarily suspended. For instance, he is now director of policy analysis at Blue after the tsunami struck Japan last year, access to Ridge Information Systems. “It was partly YouTube was shut down on some military about communicating with the American networks to free up the bandwidth needed to public and understanding what else we can do coordinate disaster response efforts. within the medium and how it can work The new policy will address those issues and some behind the firewall as well.” newer ones that have begun to crop up around the downloading of information, such as the growing Where the DTM laid the groundwork by and evolving use of advertising, endorsements, establishing definitions, responsibilities and image alteration and gaming, Carey said. the importance of information sharing, the new guidelines incorporate a more thorough The elephant in the room and detailed look at social media, at least as it Perhaps the biggest issue in the military’s use of exists today, Carey told FCW in a preview of social media is security. And one of the biggest the new policy. problems with security is that the traditional, Two areas will receive particular emphasis: bureaucratic approach isn’t flexible enough to making sure the rules are clear and making keep up with the rapidly changing social media sure security is adequately covered. Both landscape. areas will be clarified when DOD unveils the “The issue is not social media; it’s new software policy in the coming months, but according to techniques that need various degrees of Carey, the exact release date is still to be safeguards,” said Paul Strassmann, distinguished determined. professor of information sciences at George Mason “It’s currently at the legal sufficiency review; University’s Volgenau School of Engineering and 6

former director of defense information at applications.

DOD. “It’s a new set of applications…and “There are a lot of things we give lip service to that whether I’m in Kabul or Mogadishu or any before weren’t a big deal but today they are,” Holt other place, I need to be able to said. “Especially for DOD and social media, they communicate. [Existing systems can be] too need to be addressed in basic training and for new onerous, difficult, expensive and hard to civilian employees. But this is also something that execute. So what people do is work around needs to be addressed even in children. We should using social media. Social media is a big train kids to be on and off the Internet the same bootlegging operation. It breaks down the way we train [them] to cross the road — and structure.” probably at the same time.”

Carey believes that the new policy, combined Young or old, good cyber habits should include with existing training and education, are understanding the potential dangers of bogus enough to combat much of the threat that URLs, bad links and malicious attachments. Inside social media potentially poses. The two main the federal government, preparedness rises to concerns are cybersecurity and information another level. security, he said.

“It’s not just [operations security], it’s proper Although social media receives the same decorum,” Holt said. “After all, it is publishing. cybersecurity treatment as any other form of When you put something on the Internet, you’re DOD desktop activity — including perimeter still liable for defamation and things that, before defense, firewalls and other traditional ubiquitous publishing, only journalists, public measures — information security hinges on affairs people, and those producing products and the training and education that are mandatory content for mass distribution had to consider. It’s a for all defense personnel, both military and different story now.” civilian.

At the heart of information security is Filling in the gaps operations security, which in turn might be Although DOD has unique security requirements, the pinnacle of social media security concerns. the concept of operations security and the “A lot of social media policies try to address protection of internal information have the breadth [of concerns] not to scare people implications at other agencies, where officials are to death but to let them understand this is not also grappling with social media use. the same thing as having a conversation in Some agencies are collaborating on the best your living room or over a cup of coffee with a approaches to social media — for example, via friend,” said Laurie Schive, outreach director interagency working groups and by sharing at the Office of the National information through websites such as HowTo.gov.

Counterintelligence Executive in the Office of Despite the differences in their missions, most the Director of National Intelligence. organizations have a number of issues in common.

There are plenty of stories about military “We not only have to read tea leaves of where families inadvertently revealing too much technology is going to go in the next five to 10 information online about a service member’s years, it takes a lot to revise federal policies, so it location or a geotagged photo getting publicly has to be evergreen,” said one government official posted, for example. who is familiar with federal social media strategies “It’s just like someone saying it at a crowded and agreed to speak on background. “It also has to bus stop, just the media has changed,” Carey provide for a range of operations [because] there’s said. “The problem with the Internet is that not going to be one toolset that works for every it’s viral to those friends. It can be a social department or component.” media issue, but the first problem is that DOD’s goal for the new policy is that it will be information shouldn’t have gotten there.” broad and flexible enough to fill in the gaps that Are the current efforts in training and have emerged as social media has evolved and education enough to counter security governance has taken shape. worries? Although Carey expressed The task will be ongoing and it won’t be easy, but confidence in existing programs, most would social media has become too powerful as an agree that there’s always room for information and strategic messaging platform to improvement, even beyond military be dismissed, Carey said.

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“Some of the tools that we use to frame this discussion will not exist in a few years, and there will be new ones out there in their places,” Carey said. “We have to set a broad context. Implementation is targeted around the as-is, not the what’s-to-be, and that means you have to be careful about it.”

officials after he wrote that he would not take “unlawful orders from Obama,” among other remarks. The comments went against a military policy, dating back to the Civil War, that limits service members’ free speech, including criticism of the commander-in-chief. Stein is reportedly fighting the dismissal in court.

Social media missteps Geotagging slip backfires big time Defense Department officials hope their soon- Today’s high-tech smart phones and other mobile to-be-released social media policy can help devices include features that can come in handy service members avoid the kinds of incidents but also pose huge risks. Software that tracks detailed below. location is a big one, including the ability to geotag items such as photos uploaded to social networks.

The appropriation of Adm. Stavridis’ identity The dangers were exposed in 2007 when Army Adm. James Stavridis, commander of U.S. soldiers snapped and uploaded photos of a new European Command and NATO’s Supreme fleet of helicopters arriving at a base in Iraq.

Allied Commander Europe, is often held up as According to the Army, adversaries were able to a prime example of military social media done access the pictures and, more importantly, the well. Stavridis is famous for his use of geo-location information that was embedded in Facebook and Twitter to interact with the them. Using that data, they were able to international public, and he does it all himself. determine the exact location of the AH-64 Apache But his prominent social media use made helicopters and launch a mortar attack that headlines of a different sort earlier this year destroyed four of them. when hackers created a fake Facebook profile pretending to be Stavridis and reportedly Indian, British and Israeli service members leak managed to befriend other NATO officials and confidential data online glean some personal information. The U.K.’s Social media mistakes are not limited to the United Telegraph reported that Chinese hackers were States; a number of other countries have suffered behind the social engineering tactic, but like from similar blunders. most cyber incidents, attribution is difficult. The Times of India reported in January that a group DOD officials downplay the dangers of that of four Indian naval officers were caught leaking kind of ploy but note that it’s yet another confidential information, such as the location of reason for thorough and routine training and warships, via social networks. education. “The social engineering aspect of Back in 2010, 10 employees of the British Ministry social media is just another point of of Defense faced disciplinary action after they awareness that anyone, including senior were found to have leaked sensitive information leaders, need to manage and diligently via social media sites, including Twitter, 16 times in monitor,” said Rob Carey, DOD’s deputy CIO. the course of 18 months.

“Once an anomaly has been detected, we That same year, an Israel Defense Forces soldier contact the specific sites — Facebook, Twitter, posted information on Facebook that detailed the etc. — and they remove them.” time and place of an upcoming raid on the Palestinian territories, as well as the name of the Marine dismissed for Obama-bashing on combat unit involved. According to Israel’s Haaretz Facebook newspaper, the soldier’s friends reported the A fierce free-speech debate was sparked in status update to Facebook, leading to the soldier April when Marine Sgt. Gary Stein faced being relieved of combat duty and the raid being disciplinary action — and later, a less-thancalled off. honorable discharge — for posting remarks About the Author criticizing President Barack Obama and Amber Corrin is a staff writer covering defense and launching an Armed Forces Tea Party page on national security for Federal Computer Week.

Facebook.

Stein drew the attention of Marine Corps 8

required currency.

If all you do is “push” your own content – without ever retweeting, responding to, or commenting on other people’s thoughts and by dmcalister • September 12, 2012 http://blog.myprgenie.com/5-tips-for-blending-pr-social- content – you’ll quickly find that you don’t get the results you’d get if you were a more, media-effectively/ well, social participant.

One of the most examples of being too pushy arrive in those messages we all get when we follow or like someone, and immediately get an email that contains some variation of “Thanks for following. Visit my website for …. (promotional offer). And don’t forget to follow us on (another social media site), too!”

One of the lessons we all learn quickly in social media is that traditional forms of marketing don’t translate directly to social media. New communications channels and marketing tools require new rules, different tactics.

In her book, The Zen of Social Media Marketing, best-selling author and social Recently, MyPRGenie looked at the media guru Shama Kabani talks about the convergence between PR and social idea of generosity and sharing in social media. We find that the most successful media. She isn’t talking about online companies in both tend to follow a few fundraising and crowd-sourcing to raise simple guidelines. We put some of those money (although both those ideas work). into our recent white paper, Social Shama is talking about the basic fact that Media is the New PR, but this list of five social media communications is two-way tips for effectively combining PR and street. Sharing other people’s ideas, being social media covers the basics. friendly, approachable, and positive are Scott Hampson’s cartoon is funny, but among the traits that set a social media it’s not true. It’s true that social media master like Shama apart from other doesn’t (yet) have hard and fast rules. marketers online.

But there are definitely guidelines — they just change rapidly, sometimes in Deliver Content People Want surprising ways.

Sounds pretty basic, doesn’t it? But a lot of The truth is that what works today in marketers act as if they have no idea that social media may not work tomorrow – the power base has shifted from the days and it almost certainly won’t work next when Don Draper and the “Mad Men” year. Social media evolves and changes controlled the media. Back then, they told us quickly, so a marketer who wants to be all the wonderful things that their client’s effective needs to base strategy and products would do for us – and we listened, tactics on solid public relations lessons. because we had no choice. Today’s

5 Tips for Blending PR & Social Media Effectively

Don’t Be Pushy They call it “earned media” – and one of the first things you’ll learn in social media marketing is that you have to win the right to be heard. At its heart, social media engagement is a kind of conversation and participation is the

consumers have the power to block most marketing messages – and they aren’t going to give that power away.

So if you want to use social media and digital marketing to reach an audience, the most important thing is to deliver well-written, informative and entertaining content in all its forms. Blog posts, tweets, status updates, 9

videos, podcasts, photographs, infographics, webinars, white papers – and dozens of other kinds of information. New content matters – Google and Bing love frequently updated content, and nothing else has the power to move people like great content.

Content really is king. If you doubt me, take a look at actor and social activist George Takei’s Facebook page, or at the way content marketing masters like J.K. Rowling and Peter Jackson control the flow of information about their new “products”.

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importantly, it means avoiding treating others with disrespect.

One way to build mutual trust and respect is to use your photo as an avatar and your name as your handle. That’s not to say you shouldn’t have an identity tied to your brand. A number of the most effective social media marketers use their full name for their personal social media, and a short version with their brand name for company messages. For example, you might use @janedoe for personal tweets, but @WidgetMakerJane for marketing messages.

A side benefit of that strategy is that it makes it clear and easy to tell who owns Remember What Your Mother Said what. This is important as the number of Can anyone honest say that they didn’t lawsuits filed by employers against former hear at least one of these three behavior employees over social media continues to rules from their mother? increase.

“If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.”

Avoid Magpie Marketing “People don’t get upset because you lie New social media sites seem to crop up every to them. They get upset because they week or so, and even the best multi-channel can never trust you again.” scheduling applications can’t keep up with “It’s nice to be important, but it’s more them all. Some marketers are like magpies, important to be nice.” moving from one shiny new marketing tactic Mom was right, especially in the context to the next. of social media. Nothing will ruin your It’s nearly impossible to maintain an active reputation in social media faster than presence on every social network. Luckily, misrepresenting yourself, treating other most brands don’t need to try. For some people badly, or delivering false brands, Pinterest is vital – for others, it’s just information. Many, many companies another chore that probably won’t add to have learned the hard way that creating the bottom line. And that’s true for nearly a fake persona to post online reviews every social media site. may be easy – but it’s very, very costly The key is to be on the social media sites when you get caught. where your customers are. How do you know And even more have learned that that? Well, you could always ask. At mistreating your customers, employees, MyPRGenie, we survey our customers and or even competitors can destroy years of the media regularly. And there are a number painstaking and costly brand building. of services that will profile your target Need some reminders? How about audience for you – often for only a few cents United Breaks Guitars, Facebook’s Terms per name. These emerging tools deliver the of Service Changes, or Kenneth Cole’s kind of essential campaign intelligence that Twitter disaster during the Egyptian turn an ordinary social media marketer into a uprising? management’s latest superhero, capable of The most important thing to remember delivering measurable bottom-line results in in social media marketing is that if you record time. want people to trust you, you have to We can’t afford to forget that social media is treat them with respect – and that just one more communications channel — it includes responding to negative posts or can’t replace spending and activity in PR, customer inquiries instead of just advertising, web, SEO, email, or other forms deleting anything except your own of traditional marketing. Combining specials and promotions. More traditional communications tools with social 10

media is far more effective than using If you act on the information you gain from any communications channel by itself. your tests, your results will get better. Just Also, all of the basic rules of marketing keep testing, and keep tweaking your tactics. still apply. One basic rule of marketing Cartoon credit: The amazing Australian that’s easy to forget in the rapid-fire cartoonist Scott Hampson created this image, world of social media is that marketing which he made available under a Creative communications is a marathon — not a Commons license on his website. sprint.

Drive-by posters make the common mistake of pushing content…and then sprinting on to the next message, group, or communications channel, without stopping to engage with the people who 4 Key Steps to PR Measurement responded to their original message.

Success Test Messages, Channels & Tools July 23rd, 2012 What works in social media today may

by David Rockland not work tomorrow, and it’s nearly http://www.culpwrit.com/2012/07/23/4-key-steps-to-prcertain that it won’t work a year from measurement-success/ now. So test your messages, your communications channels, your press By now, many people in PR have heard of the release distribution lists, your Barcelona Principles adopted two years ago as the copywriting strategy, landing pages, link basic fundamental “truths” about PR shortener, writing style, and the tools measurement. While these set a foundation for you use to deliver your message. Run measurement, there have been a number of A/B tests frequently. events and activities since then that have Social media and PR are not free. Each progressed the Principles to make them more consumes the most irreplaceable actionable. One occurred June 13-15 in Dublin, resource of all: time. But the costs are where the 4th annual European Measurement reasonable, and the rapid response Summit took place with over 200 delegates from allows plenty of room for 30 countries. experimentation.

One trick make testing easy and quick is In Dublin, the delegates to the Summit agreed on to write the social media messages at the top priorities that anyone working in PR need the same time you create new press needs to know when it comes to demonstrating releases, web content, landing pages or the value of public relations. The purpose behind campaigns. Go ahead and write a series this is a global education program, based on the of tweets, social media bookmark site Barcelona Principles, but more specific in terms of abstracts (these are the forms you fill the skills, abilities and knowledge levels anybody out on LinkedIn, Facebook, Reddit, working in PR should have.

StumbleUpon and other sites to describe In many ways, it came down to basics. If you work the link you’re posting), a press release, in PR, the most important things you need to know and a blog post on the same topic. If you how to do in terms of measurement are: have a white paper, PDF, infographic or other piece of collateral on the same 1) Be able to connect what you do to the client’s topic, so much the better. Cross-link, and or organization’s business. If you can’t describe cross-promote. Don’t forget the how what you do drives business or organizational supporting marketing materials (emails, performance, you probably shouldn’t be doing it. newsletter article, landing page, etc.).

And, you need to be able to say it in the language Once the content is written, it’s simple of the business or organization you are working to schedule it, distribute it, and compare with. the results across multiple communications channels, different times and days, and different audiences.

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2) Know the difference among the three types of metrics used for the evaluation of PR performance – outputs (both traditional and social media results), outcomes (how audiences change as a result), and business results (sales, employee engagement, stock purchase, etc.).

3) If you can’t write proper communications goals for your work, find a new profession. A PR practitioner should be able to express who you are trying to reach, what about them you want to change, how much is the expected result, and by when you expect those results to occur.

Without those clear goals, you really can’t measure effectively.

4) Leave the measurement to the measurement pros. Things like research transparency, survey design, and the details of market mix modeling, should be left to the researcher. However, a PR practitioner should know what they are, and know how to ask for them. And, anyone who is still simply counting clips and impressions, versus how good they are, should probably have their PRSA membership revoked.

What was also interesting about the discussion in Dublin was a pretty clear sense that “if you can’t run with the big dogs, you should stay on the porch.” In other words, too often we meekly ask whether we can measure the results or demonstrate the value of what we do. Instead, the delegates said that we need to insist that measurement — both the results and what they mean going forward — should just naturally be part of any PR program. In a great presentation

by Booz/Allen/Hamilton on original research they’ve done on the PR field, it couldn’t be clearer that we need to either go big or go home. In other words, if you want to be thought of as PR professional and not a PR flack, you insist upon having measurement of communications and business results as part of anything you do.

The trouble in Dublin, however, was when it came to agreeing on what are the key next steps to roll out a global education program focused on the PR practitioner and measurement. There were some good ideas presented and voted on. In fact, PRSA’s Christina Darnowski talked about the need to add a measurement education

'Barcelona Principles': 1. importance of goal setting and measurement 2. measuring the effect of outcomes is preferred to measuring outputs 3. the effect on business results can and should be measured where possible 4. media measurement requires quality as well as quantity 5. Advertising Value Equivalents are not a value of public relations 6. social media can and should be measured 7. transparency and replicability are paramount to sound measurement.

component to every major PR conference rather than the measurement and the PR pros meet separately.

In fact, PRSA is adding an entire measurement symposium to its international conference this fall; a great first step in the right direction.

The dilemma for PR professionals is that we often feel undervalued. This was not solved in Dublin. But, I think we made some progress about how to make sure anybody getting a degree in PR, starting in the field, or leading a large PR function or company can express the value of what we do and take steps toward demonstrating it. And blogs like Culpwrit play a key role in helping educate our profession about making sure we can express the value of our work in ways that are meaningful and measurable.

This guest post by David Rockland, PhD., is adapted from his July 2012 column “Ask Doc Rock” in PRSA Tactics. David is Partner and CEO of Ketchum Pleon Change and he heads Ketchum’s global research network.

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Social Media in Command & Control: An extended framework

By Peter Jongejan, Tim Grant Netherlands Defence Academy http://www.iscramlive.org/ISCRAM2012/proceedings/27 5.pdf

ABSTRACT Our research is aimed at investigating whether social media has a role to play in military Command & Control. Since social media is peer-to-peer, it could facilitate NetworkEnabled Capabilities. A useful theoretical development is Reuter, Marx, and Pipek’s (2011) proposal of a two-by-two matrix for social software infrastructure. Their framework assumes one-way communication and monolithic organizations. However, to operate in a real-time, dynamic environment, crisis management organizations must close the decision-making loop. Moreover, they must be structured into an action part that handles the crisis on-site, and a control part that monitors and directs operations in real time. The purpose of this work-in-progress paper is to present our extension of Reuter et al’s framework. The paper outlines Reuter et al’s framework, summarises the basic theory of Command & Control, describes how we extended Reuter et al’s framework, and outlines further research.

INTRODUCTION Much of scientific research on social media has been empirical and descriptive, i.e. it is focused on studying how citizens use social media “in the field”. Around 2010, articles began to appear on the use of social media messages by commercial and public organizations, e.g. for marketing purposes or to broadcast a warning to the public in a defined area.

The initial reaction of many organizations has been to see social media as a threat. Early adopters, however, realized that positive gains could be made using social media proactively.

Marketeers, in particular, have taken to social media with enthusiasm, not only to monitor their target groups, but also to influence them. It is in this context that researchers,

such as Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) and Kietzmann et al (2011), are currently developing theory for the organizational use of social media. By contrast, theoretical concepts about the use of social media for emergency management are in their infancy.

As in the wider organizational community, some emergency management and military organizations (e.g. US Marines) immediately banned the use of social media. Studies have now tempered the initial fears about employees violating information security (Brand, 2010).

Military and emergency management organisations are starting to approach social media proactively. Clearly, it is the right moment to investigate the formal use of social media within emergency management processes. In this paper we report on the initial results of our research aimed at investigating the use of social media technology within the military Command & Control (C2) process. These results are likely to be applicable also to civil crisis and emergency management.

In military doctrine, the C2 process (supported by a C2 system) is defined as “the exercise of authority and direction by a properly designated commander over assigned and attached forces in the accomplishment of the mission” (US DoD, 2011).

Some researchers have concluded that the peer-to-peer nature of social media cannot be reconciled with the top-down, directive nature of C2 systems. For example, Palen & Liu (2007, p. 727) state that “command-and-control models do not easily adapt to the expanding data-generating and -seeking activities by the public”.

We believe that their conclusion was premature precisely because it applied just to members of the public. Recently, Reuter, Marx, and Pipek’s (2011) proposed a two-bytwo matrix for the social software infrastructure supporting communication between citizens and organizations. We contend that if this framework is extended with cybernetic ideas about control systems then social media can be applied to C2 13

systems.

The purpose of this paper is to present our extension of Reuter et al’s (2011) framework, incorporating basic ideas from C2 theory. This paper consists of five sections. After an introductory section, section 2 summarises Reuter et al’s framework, and section 3 outlines relevant basic ideas of C2 theory.

Section 4 combines Reuter et al’s framework with C2 theory, showing how the resulting extension could be applied to a hypothetical, but realistic humanitarian crisis. Finally, section 5 draws conclusions and identifies areas for further research.

REUTER ET AL’S (2011) FRAMEWORK Since Reuter et al’s (2011) theoretical contribution is central to the work reported here, we describe it in more detail. A review of the military C2 and equivalent emergency management literature (Jongejan & Grant, 2011) has not disclosed another framework specific to social media that could have been used as our starting point.

Reuter et al (2011) discuss how the professional actors involved in crisis management and the affected citizens can communicate and collaborate using social media. They define their term ‘social software’, identifying four types: wikis (e.g.

Figure 1. Communication matrix for social software infrastructure (Reuter et al, 2011, Fig 5).

Wikipedia), blogs / microblogs (e.g. Twitter),

social networks (e.g. Facebook), and social sharing / collaborative keywording systems

(e.g. Flickr and YouTube). Then they examine two case studies, identifying the strengths and weaknesses of social software in crisis management. Finally, they propose a concept for using citizens in crisis management with a social software infrastructure and a communication matrix. It is this last part of their paper that is relevant to our research.

The goal of Reuter et al’s (2011) research is to recommend the creation of an infrastructure that integrates information from the different online communities and helps the official crisis management by providing and receiving information.

Citizen-generated information could be integrated by monitoring social software with crisis tags, aggregating and validating the information against organization-generated information, and archiving relevant material for analysis and training.

New activities enabled by social software would be the broadcasting of information from organizations to citizens, recommending crisis tags, requesting information from citizens, and supporting information brokers.

Reuter et al propose the two-by-two matrix shown in Figure 1 as the basis for the social software infrastructure for communication between organizations and citizens.

In quadrant (a), citizen-generated content is integrated with and validated against the recipient organization’s own information, assisted where possible by the use of crisis tags previously provided to citizens by the organization. In quadrant (b), organizations broadcast information to inform, warn, and communicate with citizens, either as individuals or as groups. This would include the provision of crisis tags for citizens’ use. Quadrant (c) represents peer-to-peer communication between citizens, as employed in a crisis to provide self-help within (emergent) communities of interest. Communication in quadrant (d) supports information sharing between organizations for crisis management purposes.

BASIC C2 THEORY Reuter et al’s (2011) framework models an organization as an atomic entity. However, all organizations have significant internal structure.

Typically, three elements can be distinguished in 14

emergency management and military organizations.

A policy element – often closely linked to political decision making – sets the strategic goals.

A control element acts to achieve those goals by gathering and assessing information from and giving instructions to the organization’s action element., i.e. the element responsible for acting in the crisis area.

The organization is embedded in an environment containing the general public (and other objects). Citizens involved in the crisis interact directly with the organization’s action element.

We focus on the control and action elements, with policy being effectively fixed during a crisis.

In systems theory (van Bertalanffy, 1968) – of which control theory is a specialization – a process exhibits behaviour by continuously exchanging inputs and outputs with its environment. In control theory (Ashby, 1956), a goal-oriented process can be split into two subprocesses: a Controlling Process (CP) and a Process Under Control (PUC). For the purposes of this paper, we map the control element of emergency management and military organisations with the CP, i.e. the commander and control team, and the action element with the PUC, i.e. his/her assigned and attached forces. Objectives are the goals set by the policy element (not shown).

Control theory distinguishes open- and closedloop control and direct and supervisory control (Sheridan, 1992). Figure 2 depicts a closed-loop control system. Information flows from the environment, through the PUC where it is sensed and assessed, to the CP as observations, is compared with the objectives in the CP and transformed into commands to the PUC, which are then converted into output actions on the environment.

The environment responds to these outputs by changing its state, which can again be sensed by the PUC. The loop from Environment to PUC and back is the direct control loop, and from PUC to CP and back is the supervisory control loop. To date, social media have played no role in closing these control loops (Jongejan & Grant, 2011).

EXTENDING THE FRAMEWORK We refined Reuter et al’s (2011) framework by incorporating the C2 process, splitting organizations into two parts: CP and PUC. The result is the three-by-three matrix shown in Table 1 [at end of text].

Reuter et al’s quadrant (c) remains the same, because citizen-to-citizen communications are unaffected by splitting the organization.

We mark the citizens-to-CP and CP-to-citizens cells in Table 1 as “Not applicable” (“N/A”), because there is generally no direct communication from citizen to CP or vice versa1.

We can now add the remaining three quadrants.

On behalf of the organization, the PUC Integrates, Aggregates, and Validates Citizengenerated content – quadrant (a) – and also communicates to citizens – quadrant (b).

Figure 2. Relation between Controlling Process, Process Under Control, and Environment.

When multiple organizations form a coalition, they collaborate or deconflict at CP-to-CP level2: quadrant (d). On-site, there may be communication PUC-to-PUC, e.g. to ensure that ambulances do not drive over the firefighter’s water supply pipes. This on-site communication can be interpreted in several ways. It can be interpreted as inter-organizational coordination, regarding the medical and fire services as separate organizations.

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Alternatively, if the medical and fire services are regarded as two parts of the same organizational entity (i.e. the emergency services), then this can be viewed as selfsynchronization internal to that entity. We term this Intra-organizational coordination to reflect the parallels with Reuter et al’s Interorganizational coordination.

Applying social media to the three-by-three matrix (Table 1), the following picture emerges: Integration, Aggregation and Validation of Citizen-Generated Content represents the use of social media by citizens to provide inputs to the organization.

Such inputs should be received by a call centre (c.f. handling of 911 calls) which integrates the validated and aggregated information with the organization’s own information before it is passed to the CP. The call centre is part of the PUC.

does not indicate to which of the control loops – direct, supervisory, or both – social media should be applied. This could be dependent on the organizational boundaries. The nature of the environment may also make it impossible to employ social media.

For example, the supporting infrastructure (mobile phone reception or the availability of electrical power) might have been destroyed, or the citizens might be too poor to afford social media and the associated hardware devices. Secondly, the refined framework does not stipulate exactly what social media technology is suitable. One could envisage a design choice between one- or two-way communication (e.g. email versus chat), between broadcast or pointcast (e.g. webpage versus Facebook), and between synchronous or asynchronous communication (e.g. telephone versus voicemail).

CONCLUSIONS AND FURTHER RESEARCH  Citizen Communications represents the use of social media by the organization to inform citizens in the crisis area. By analogy with marketing, this should be done by a team specialized in communicating with the public, based on CP-generated commands. Such a team is part of the PUC.  Self-Help Communities represents the use of social media by citizens to communicate with other citizens in the environment. This is essentially unchanged by how the organization is structured.  Inter-Organizational Crisis Management is a more complex case. Where two organizations are regarded as separate, then this is inter-organizational communication. By contrast, if they are regarded as parts of a coalition, then communication is intraorganizational. Communication can be PUCto-PUC, as happens on-site, or CP-to-CP, as in cooperative planning. Moreover, it can range from collaboration to deconfliction (“if you keep to the east of the river, we’ll keep to the west”). This will be the subject of further research.

Observations and Instructions were not identified by Reuter et al (2011).

The refined framework leaves unanswered a number of implementation decisions. Firstly, it

Social media has become a serious element in disaster response and political uprisings.

The scientific research on the public use of social media in crisis situations has been largely empirical and descriptive. By contrast, theoretical insights are in their infancy. One theoretical development has been Reuter et al’s (2011) framework for a social software infrastructure that helps official crisis management by integrating information from different online communities.

Our research is aimed at investigating whether social media has a role to play in military Command & Control (C2). To operate in a real-time, dynamic environment, crisis management organizations must close the control loop.

Moreover, they must divide the organisation into an action part – the Process Under Control (PUC) – and a control part – the Controlling Process (CP). We have extended the Reuter et al’s (2011) framework by splitting the Organization into two parts – PUC and CP – so turning their two-by-two matrix into three-bythree.

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Table 1. Extended framework for social media infrastructure

(PUC=Process Under Control ; CP= Controlling Process )

In addition, we close the direct loop between citizens and PUC and the supervisory control loop between PUC and CP. We add Observations (PUC-to-CP), Instructions (CP-to-PUC), and On-site or Self-synchronisation (PUC-to-PUC) to Reuter et al’s four categories. On-site or Selfsynchronisation can be seen as an intraorganisational variant of Reuter et al’s Interorganisation category. In further research we intend to validate the extended framework by applying it to a realistic example of humanitarian crisis management, such as transporting food to Darfur. Compared with the state-of-the-art social media employed in responding to the 2010 Haiti earthquake, integrating social media into the supervisory control loop would make it possible to close the control loop, to monitor task execution, to generate alerts, to enable self-synchronisation, and to maintain an event log for After Action Review.

technology is suitable.

This paper’s contribution has been to show how social media could be applied in C2 to close the control loop. Its key limitations are that it is purely theoretical and gives no guidance on implementation. In particular, it does not indicate whether social media should be applied to the supervisory control loop, the direct control loop, or both. Nor does it stipulate exactly what social media

The extended framework has not yet been evaluated by expert practitioners nor tested by implementing it, let alone using it in training exercises or in the field. Further research is needed to overcome these limitations. We intend to start by prototyping the extended framework incollaboration with expert practitioners.

REFERENCES 1. Ashby, W.R. (1956) Introduction to Cybernetics. London: Methuen.

2. Bertalanffy, L. von. (1968) General Systems Theory: Foundations, development, applications. New York: George Braziller.

3. Brand, M. (2010) Eigen Vuur: Waarom het Pentagon user generated media van militairen wantrouwt en waarom de noodzaak voor dit wantrouwen ter discussie staat. [In Dutch: Own Fire: Why the Pentagon distrusted user generated media from military personnel and why the need for this distrust is being debated.]

Masters thesis, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

4. Jongejan, P.A. & Grant, T.J. (2011) A Refined Framework for Crisis Management Communication via Social Media. Netherlands Institute of Government (NIG 2011) working conference, December 2011, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

5. Kaplan, A.M. & Haenlein, M. (2010) Users of the World, Unite! The Challenges and

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Opportunities of Social Media. Business Horizons, 53, 59-68.

6. Kietzmann, J.H., Hermkens, K., McCarthy, I.P., & Silvestre, B.S. (2011) Social Media? Get Serious! Understanding the Functional Building Blocks of Social Media. Business Horizons, 54, 241-251.

7. Palen, L. & Liu, S.B. (2007) Citizen communications in crisis: anticipating a future of ICT-supported public participation. ComputerHuman Interaction (CHI 2007) conference, San Jose, California.

8. Reuter, C., Marx, A., & Pipek, V. (2011) Social Software as an Infrastructure for Crisis Management: A case study about current practice and potential usage. 8th international conference on Information Systems for Crisis Response And Management (ISCRAM 2011), May 2011, Lisbon, Portugal, paper 113.

9. Sheridan, T.B. (1992) Telerobotics, Automation, and Human Supervisory Control.

Cambridge: MIT Press.

10. US DoD. (2011) Dictionary of Military Terms and Abbreviations. Joint Publication 1-02, US Department of Defense, Washington DC.

Notes: 1 An exception, if the geography allows, could be where the CP can communicate directly to the public. For example, the control room of a railway station or an airport may have the facility to instruct passengers by loudspeaker to evacuate the building in case of fire. However, a danger is that the CP may not be sited so that controllers can observe that the instruction has been correctly understood and acted upon.

2 Intuitively, it seems desirable for interorganizational communications to run horizontally, e.g. from one element (policy, control, or action) of one organization to the corresponding element of the other. In practice, this intuitive principle is violated. For example, in a civil-military coalition a military organization with its top-down hierarchy may cooperate with a civil organization in which decisions are made primarily in the field.

Proceedings of the 9th International ISCRAM Conference – Vancouver, Canada, April 2012 L. Rothkrantz, J. Ristvej and Z. Franco, eds.

Can Charisma Be Taught?

by Mark van Vugt Top 10 tips to be a more effective leader.

Published on May 5, 2012 by Mark van Vugt, Ph.D. in Naturally Selected http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/naturallyselected/201205/can-charisma-be-taught

If you want to be effective as manager, politician, parent or coach it helps to have a little bit of that X-factor leadership quality, charisma. In a previous blog I suggested that charisma is the oldest and most effective form of leadership because it is based on an intimate, personalized interaction style.

Charismatic leaders appeared in our ancestral environment whenever there was a need to quickly mobilize the masses for some common cause like a war or natural disaster. Through signaling their ability to unite a large crowd and motivate them to go the proverbial extra mile for their group, they obtain charismatic powers. Think Winston Churchill, Martin Luther King, and Nelson Mandela.

This all seems a bit remote from the world of business and education but even there a little bit of charisma can go a long way. So do you have what it takes? If not don’t worry because you can train it. It seems there is nothing mysterious about charisma after all. Charismatic leadership can actually be taught. Recent research conducted by a team of scientists led by John Antonakis from the University Lausanne Business School, shows that training managers a specific set of charismatic leadership tactics improves their charisma, and thus, their effectiveness as leaders.

In a first study they randomly assigned a sample of managers from a large Swiss company to either a charismatic training course or no course. The training consisted of a lecture on the principles of charismatic leadership (including watching scenes from movies like Dead Poets Society), a presentation, and a feedback report. Both before the training and three months after, these managers were assessed by their co-workers (who did not know that their managers had received the 18

charisma training).Their charisma significantly improved after the course.

In a second study the researchers videotaped the speeches of a group of MBA students before and after the charisma training, and these speeches were rated on charismatic content by independent assessors.

Again, the training significantly improved the students’ charisma and perceived effectiveness as leaders.

So, what skills were being trained? The researchers came up with a long list of Charismatic Leadership Tactics (CLTs). In case you want to develop your personal charisma, here are the most important CLTs and what I regard to be their primary function.

(1) Use metaphors (e.g.,"We brought our competitors to their knees “, “We must change course”) Function: Metaphors are excellent in showing off how smart you are (2) Use stories and anecdotes Function: Personal stories are the best remembered parts of a speech

Function: This make you look bigger, better, and more important (9) Facial expressions (e.g., smiling, nodding, looking calm) Function: Audiences copy these facial expressions unconsciously (mimicry) and this makes them feel better (10) Keep an animated voice tone Function: To keep your audience captivated throughout your speech Before you go out there, you might want to practice these charismatic skills in the mirror or in front of your beloved ones.

How do you know you have improved your charisma?

If you can persuade your children to eat their vegetables or go to bed without complaining!

Antonakis, J., Fenley, M., & Liechti, S. (2011).

Can Charisma be Taught? Tests of Two Interventions. Academy of Management Learning and Education, 10, 374-396.

(3) Display moral conviction (e.g., “This is the right thing to do”) Function: To show your honesty and integrity as a leader (4) Stress collective sentiments ("We will be stronger") Function: This shows the audience that you are concerned about their welfare not your own (5) Set high expectations for yourself and your followers Function: It takes someone and something special to solve this crisis (6) Communicate confidence Function: Explain why they should follow you and not someone else (7) Use rhetorical questions like “Why should you hear about this from me” Function: Make your vision theirs (8) Body gestures like raising your arms, putting up your thumbs, or inflating your chest 19

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ComIPI is a no-profit study center aimed at developing and implementing advanced techniques to communicate with the public while respecting ethical principles. ComIPI uses its communications talent, skills and expertise also to help organizations to educate and to inform their target audiences; to develop communication strategies; to train their staff in communication skills; to monitor and analyze results of communication efforts; and, to assess media perceptions on matters of interest.

Communications activities are also assessed taking into specific consideration inter-cultural aspects.

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