Category Archives: Huh?

November 10, 2016 · 2:49 pm

Dead Wrong

There are a lot of lessons to be learned from the events of the last couple of days and not all of them pertain to our politics. One question I think I hear from people who fall all across the political spectrum is “how could almost every prediction be so wrong?” After all, putting aside the prognostications of loyalists on either side, none of the pollsters and data-based predictors got this right.

I’m not going to go into the politics but we can learn some valuable business lessons here. I’m not sure this was a case of garbage in, garbage out. That said, it’s clear that the legacy systems from which samples are drawn such as calling landline telephones are not accurate anymore. The real issue is one that I think we have in business, though, which is the inability to tell the difference between “good” data and noise. More importantly, we tend to rely on faulty data to the exclusion of both external factors and our own common sense. We like to tell stories that can be believed, and that happens when the stories echo popular beliefs. We focus on things that have happened already and in so doing we often miss subtle undertones that tell us what went before may not indicate what will come next.

We also suffer from the echo chamber in business. We talk to our coworkers and reinforce faulty information. We tell the tales that our tribe shares and miss those from the outside – the other tribes.

I was just as bad as many of you on Tuesday. I said more than once “unless every poll is dead wrong, it’s going to be a short night.” Well, they were and so was I. While the pollsters will have to wait 4 years to show they’ve learned how data can’t be the only thing we consider as we make decisions about the right path, you get that chance the next time some information crosses your desk. Take it!

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October 26, 2016 · 11:29 am

Not Your Best Behavior

I can’t wait for this damn election to be over. The back to back to back to back political ads in which one candidate demeans the character of another is just horrific. I’m not surprised though and something that’s manifesting itself in our politics has been creeping into our business lives for a while. A survey bears out my thinking and the results are incredibly disturbing. The Zogby Survey on Civility in U.S. Politics was commissioned by Allegheny College and reveals chilling trend lines for civility in America.

This isn’t the first time they’ve conducted this survey and the trends are bad. For example, in 2010, 89% of respondents said commenting on another’s race or ethnicity in a political engagement was not okay. Today that number has dropped to 69%, a full 20 points. Similarly, 81% said commenting on someone’s sexual orientation was not acceptable. Today that number is 65%. And the percentage of voters who believe elected officials should pursue personal friendships with members of other parties plummeted even more precipitously, from 85 percent to 56 percent. In other words, civil discourse and reasonable people disagreeing reasonably are dying. 80 percent of 2016 respondents said they believe civility in politics is important for a healthy democracy, compared to 95% in 2010. And 77% of 2016 respondents said it is possible for people to disagree respectfully, compared to 87% of 2010 respondents.

I think it’s impossible for people to exhibit a deviant behavioral pattern when it comes to political issues and not have that pattern carry over into business. In 2010, 77% of respondents thought is was not ok  to interrupt someone you disagree with in a public forum. You know – like a business meeting. Todat that number is just over half – 51%. 86% thought is was rude to shout over someone with whom you disagree during an argument. Today that number is only 65%. One need only turn on any cable news “discussion” to know the 65% might just be too high.

“When examining the state of civility among adults who were surveyed, based on the survey questions that were asked both in 2010 and 2016, there seems to be less emphasis on, and a decrease in, acts of civility among adults nationwide,” said Jonathon Zogby, CEO of Zogby Analytics. I see it in business, as I’m sure you do. People can’t finish stating their thoughts before someone jumps on their sentence. People don’t return phone calls or emails. People are late to appointments and meetings for no particular reason. Call it rude or call it dumb; it’s offensive no matter what you call it.

If this election results in nothing else, hopefully, once it’s over and we all take a deep breath, a return to civility in both our politics and our business behavior comes about. I have many friends with whom I disagree vehemently on political issues but we always hear one another out. I have been in meetings where I know that a speaker was dead wrong in their facts or their approach but I listen with an open, respectful mind in case I’ve missed something before I state my case. The trends found by this research are both sad and dangerous. Let’s change them. You in?

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October 18, 2016 · 9:30 am

Negative Campaigning

It’s that time of the year when it seems that the vast majority of the ads we see are for some politician. I don’t know anyone who isn’t quite tired of all of the political noise by election day and I suspect that has a lot to do with the content of the ads themselves as much as it has to do with the length of the campaign. There is a lesson for all of us who do marketing contained in our politics (OK, given the number of posts in which I draw learnings from politics, maybe more than “a” lesson). To understand it, let’s pretend we’re a candidate.

You have one opportunity every 2-4 years to sell your product. If you don’t close the sale by a date certain, your window to make the sale disappears for years. No pressure, right? Given that, would you spend the time badmouthing your competitors? I sure wouldn’t. I’d focus like a laser beam on my customers’ needs and how I was going to meet them. I’d be as specific as possible and explain all the facts I could compile about the customer’s situation and deliver a well-reasoned solution that solves their problem(s).

Compare that with what we’ll see in watching any evening’s worth of political ads. The consumer – the electorate – is hardly found in any of them. Instead, we hear about criminals, liars, or worse. The tone is generally negative but often veers into the threatening. “Facts” are things seemingly found on the internet (where we know everything is true). Have studies shown that we treat our politics differently from our products as we make purchase decisions? This is from Scientific American:

A comprehensive literature analysis published in 2007 in the Journal of Politics examined the effects of political ads. The authors reported that negative ads tended to be more memorable than positive ones but that they did not affect voter choice. People were no less likely to turn out to the polls or to decide against voting for a candidate who was attacked in an ad.

The lesson is pretty obvious in my mind. Saying negative things about a competitor doesn’t work to influence a sale although it does stick in the consumer’s mind. It’s funny how we prohibit the kind of unsubstantiated mudslinging we routinely see from campaigns in every form of comparative product advertising but politics. I think that if we are to be the world’s model for democracy we should do at least as good a job in marketing our leaders to “buyers” as we do in selling soap and cars, don’t you?

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