What good is a Bloody Mary at 5 in the afternoon?

Likewise, what good is an excellent intranet if nobody uses it?

I had an interesting conversation with a former client about an hour ago.

She works for a company that has decided to commit major funds to the intranet. They are pouring money into their internal web . . . which is a good thing, of course. I think.

See, here's the problem: It's the kind of company where nobody really uses the intranet all that much. The organization has a heavy percentage (something like 60 percent of the workforce) of employees who don't use computers at all; and another big chunk of people, like sales folks, who have computers but are on the run so much they rarely sit still long enough to spend any time online.

And most of the executives are old-school guys who don't even have a computer on their desks. You know those guys . . . if they have e-mail, they print out messages, write the reply right on it and then have their admin send it back to the person.

So, while the intranet will no doubt be wonderful, there's a good chance nobody will take advantage of it.

The whole thing reminds me of a bar in my neighborhood (so many things remind me of bars in my neighborhood . . . I wonder why that is). This place is called Jakes, and it's about a block away.

Jakes makes what I consider to be the best Bloody Mary in the entire city of Chicago. Just the right amount of spice and heat, good vodka, the right garnishes . . . the damn thing is like mother's milk to me.

But here's the problem. Jakes doesn't open until 3 p.m. on the weekends, and 5 p.m. during the week.

Who the hell wants a Bloody Mary at five in the afternoon? The time for Bloody Marys is 11 a.m., right? Sometimes earlier, depending on activities of the night before. Five p.m. is martini time! It's happy hour! It's time to cleanse the pallet and prepare the appetite for dinner! You don't want to drink a sludgy, thick, heavy tomato drink, no matter how good it is.

So they have these wonderful Bloody Marys . . . but nobody is drinking them, because they're not open at the right time. What a waste, right?

Well, can't you say the same thing about my former client's intranet? It's going to be wonderful if they pour money into it, but it's not the kind of company that is going to take advantage of it.

Wouldn't it be better to pour that money into something else . . . like establishing a great face to face program for the folks on the factory floor, or a good bulletin boards system, or an excellent print publication, or even closed circuit TV . . . or anything that people will use?

Far be it from me to discourage anyone from spending money on the intranet . . . but sometimes, shouldn't the culture of the place dictate how you spend your money?

When did Snow White become a hooker?

What was the most offensive trampling of tradition in the name of political correctness that you witnessed over the holidays?

I'm not talking about the old standbys, like turning 'Christmas Trees' into 'Holiday Trees.' That is to be expected these days. But did you see anything that made you want to gag on a roasted chestnut? I did.

In Chicago, one of the big Christmas traditions is to go look at the windows of the department store Marshall Fields. They always have some kind of holiday theme, and it's usually pretty elaborate and cool.

This year, the theme was 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.' Only no, it wasn't. In order not to offend anyone, the entire exhibit was renamed. So when holiday revelers made their way downtown to look at the windows, they were treated to . . .

'Snow White and the Seven Men.'

Good God, has it come to this? First of all, that title sounds like a pornographic movie, doesn't it? What's the subtitle? 'Join us as Snow experiences her first gang bang in the magical forest!'

Secondly, whom exactly are we trying not to offend here? Can we really not say 'dwarf' anymore? Even dwarves say dwarf, don't they? Dwarf is okay, isn't it? I think midget is bad . . . but we're still good on dwarf, I think.

And if you really are hell bent on avoiding 'dwarf,' wouldn't anything be better than 'Snow White and the Seven Men?' What about 'Snow White and the Seven Short Dudes?' Or, 'Snow White and the Seven Hobbits?' After Lord of the Rings, everybody loves Hobbits, right? Hell, 'Snow White and the Seven Little People' would be better than what they came up with.

In fact, anything would be better than 'Snow White and the Seven Men,' . . . . except, of course, 'Snow White and the Seven Vertically Challenged Male Persons,' which is probably next year's theme.

Well, I finally did it. I broke down and got one of those iPod thingies that stores 17 million songs even though it's only the size of a credit card. I bought it because I fly so much, and I'm afraid of flying, and I can't stand to hear the creaks and grinding noises that planes make.

And the iPod helps with that. Actually, with the iPod, I have finally found the perfect formula for flying. I suggest you try it. Here it is:

2 martinis + 1 Xanax + 1 iPod = 1 very happy airplane passenger.

But now that I've popped for an iPod, I have one question:

Where the hell is all my free Internet music?

Last year, I visited a friend of mine in Washington, DC. He's an amateur classical guitarist, so he's really into guys like Leo Kotke and other people I've never heard of.

Well, he couldn't wait to show me how much music he had downloaded.

'Anything I want, I get on the Internet!' he gushed. Thousands of hard-to-find songs, entire albums, symphonies . . .everything was on his computer.

'I spend a couple of hours a day just downloading music,' he told me. 'Then I can either burn CDs or put it on my MP3 player.'

All right, I remember thinking. If I ever figure out what an MP3 player is, I might do that, too. Then the iPods came out, and made the technology seem so simple and cool, that I ran out and got one. And then rushed to the computer for my free music.

But guess what? There is no free music on the Internet! I typed in 'The Night Chicago Died,' . . . and nothing! I typed in 'Dire Straits Twistin' by the Pool,' . . .and nothing! It turns out there is no free music anymore. What the hell happened?

Now, I know all about the Napster lawsuit and how they went after individuals and all that . . . but are you telling me that's all it really took to end this 'crisis'? I mean, this whole file sharing thing was supposed to rock the foundation of the entire music industry! Remember all that hype? It was going to send thousands of recording artists to the poor house! Hundreds of record labels were going to go out of business!

And now it's over? Just like that? We're all going to survive—albeit without free music? Or am I missing something? I'd hate to think I spent all this money on an iPod and now I'm going to have to pay for music, too.

Payola exposed

You have to check this story out, if you haven't already. It has to be up there as one of the biggest PR blunders of all time, I would think.

You can read the long version here.

Here's the short version:
It seems the Department of Education, working through Ketchum Public Relations, paid $240,000 of YOUR money (if you pay taxes) to a prominent black pundit to promote Bush's 'No Child Left Behind' act on his show, and to encourage other black journalists to do the same thing.

Part of the agreement was that the pundit, Armstrong Williams, would interview Education Secretary Rod Paige on a regular basis.

The despicable Williams said last week that he 'understands' that critics could find the arrangement unethical, but 'I wanted to do it because it's something I believe in.' I think Hitler once said the same thing about invading Poland. What a jerk.

What's odd about this entire thing is that the silence out of the Ketchum camp has been deafening. As far as I can tell, they have put their organizational head firmly in the sand, and are running from the situation. As you'll see if you read the full story, Ketchum is referring all calls to the Department of Education.

Yes, that's right. The media relations specialists are referring all calls to the client.

Oh, and as if PR agencies needed more of a black eye, here's another quote from the USA Today story:

'Williams' contract was part of a $1 million deal with Ketchum that produced 'video news releases' designed to look like news reports.'

Boy, that doesn't make the profession look too slimy, does it?

Who's the bigger idiot?

My, my. It seems to me that there have been more Public Relations blunders in the past week or so than normal. So for this week's 'Question of the Week' feature, I wanted to do a multiple choice-type thing, and let you pick which person is guilty of the dumbest PR move of the week.

The problem I had was, how to narrow it down, in a world filled with stupid people, it seems?

Well, the first thing I did was take out all the celebrities, like What's-Her-Face Hilton. She is so stupid that picking on her would be like pushing a disabled person out of a wheelchair.

I decided to only list people who should know better. And here are the three I came up with:

Wenner Media Executive Kent Brownridge. When asked about the breakup of Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt (otherwise known as J-Pitt, or Pitt-Jen, or something like that, I think), Brownridge—publisher of US Weekly—had this to say: 'For a celebrity weekly, this is our tsunami.' Good move, Kent. Compare a Hollywood divorce to a once-in-a-millennium natural tragedy that took hundreds of thousands of lives, and destroyed the lives of millions more. Very sharp, dude. One can only hope that one day, Brownridge has family that dies in a hurricane.

Prince Harry from England. I'm sure you've seen this one. The little bloke dressed up as a Nazi for a costume party, was subsequently photographed by one of those English newspaper rags, and given the cover headline, 'Harry the Nazi.' Oh, Harry. Surely even coddled little English sissy boys know better than that, what?

Ketchum Public Relations. As reported in my previous blog item, which you can read, Ketchum brokered the deal between the Department of Education and pundit Armstrong Williams in which the DOE paid Williams $240,000 to promote the 'No Child Left Behind' act. Not as a public spokesperson, you understand. But as part of his show, with no acknowledgement of the money or the sleazy relationship. And, since the news broke, Ketchum has been unavailable for comment. That's right . . . a PR firm, unavailable for comment.

So, who's it going to be? Which is the biggest PR blunder? I'll tabulate the votes and let you know in a couple of days.

Don't let the inmates run the asylum!

I have a new column in IABC's member publication, Communication World. It's going to be devoted to employee publications, which is my absolute, number-one favorite topic in the world . . . other than my son, food, wine, live music, martinis, travel, the Cubs, boating, and some stuff I can't talk about on a family blog.

The first column, which just hit the stands (figuratively speaking, I mean; last I checked Communication World hasn't carved out any real estate at my local newsstand) is about readership surveys.

I'm not a big fan of them . . . at least the way most people carry them out. I see too many surveys each year that ask readers to weigh in on things like format, frequency, length of stories, design, etc.

I just don't believe that editors should be asking their audience for advice on those matters? Why not? For the same reason the IT folks don't come to us for advice on how to increase the bandwidth on their Local Area Network . . . or whatever it is that IT people do when they're not playing computer games on company time.

In fact, no other profession in the entire organization asks employees to tell them how to do their job. Except for us. The communicators. And we wonder why we don't get any respect.

Think about it. When you ask engineers, accountants, shop stewards, bank tellers, IT people, and other employees questions about format and frequency and design, you are taking them out of their area of expertise . . . and sending the subtle message that you really don't know what the hell you're doing.

Do you really want an accountant telling you how to design your print publication? Have you ever met an accountant who knew a lick about design? (Have you ever met an accountant who knew anything about anything other than how to pick apart your expense report while drooling on his shirt?)

Do you really want a union shop steward telling you how often your e-mail newsletter should come out? Or how often you should update the intranet news page?

Do you want someone in HR (which in many organizations stands for 'Horrible Riting') rating the quality of the writing in your publications?

Bottom line: Those folks don't ask us for advice on how to do their jobs. We shouldn't ask them for help doing ours.

Are you someone I should network with?

I spoke at IABC Chicago this past Wednesday. It was a great crowd . . . more than 80 communicators showed up to hear me talk about 'Trends in Communication.'

As with all local IABC events, there was a 'networking period' before the speaker starts. I was kind of milling around the room, talking to people I know, when a middle-aged woman came right up to me.

'Are you a good person to network with?' she asked.

I was a little taken aback by the question. I mean, in some ways, I really admired her. Do you know how many countless hours I've wasted networking with worthless people? I mean, maybe they weren't worthless as people, per se, but they were certainly worthless from a networking standpoint.

What a neat idea, I thought! Do some pre-qualifying when you network. Ask people straight out: 'Are you going to be worth my time?' Imagine the hours you would save!

Then I started seriously pondering the question: Am I, in fact, a good person to network with? Would it be worth this woman's time to network with me, or would she be better served bouncing around the room some more?

On the surface, I guess, I'm a fairly safe bet for someone looking to network. Because of the seminars I teach and the articles I write and the consulting I do, I've gotten to know a LOT of people. And I think I'm fairly in tune with the big trends in the industry. And I sometimes even know about jobs that nobody else knows about.

So in that regard, I guess I would be an excellent person to network with.

But . . . there's a downside, too. I don't return calls sometimes. I am swamped with e-mail and can't keep up. I can't keep track of everyone I network with. I am irresponsible. I am driven by life, not my career. While other Type A personalities use travel time to do work and get caught up with stuff, I drink and listen to James Taylor.

In the great phone tag game of life, I am always IT.

So in that regard, I am a lousy, rotten-ass person to network with, because I may not follow through on anything we talk about.

This was a defining moment for me. And maybe it would be for you, too.

Ask yourself: Are you a good person to network with?

And the survey says . . . absolutely nothing

As a senior editor at both Ragan Report and Corporate Writer & Editor, I get bombarded with a lot of stupid 'surveys' and 'studies.' And I'm constantly amazed how shameless these companies are at sponsoring 'research' that benefits their organization.

I recently got a whole slew of 'surveys' from Robert Half International, an outfit that calls itself 'the world's first and largest specialized staffing firm.'

The organization is so large, in fact, that they had to break up into different companies to handle each of the specialized fields they provide staffing for. So you have Robert Half Finance and Accounting, Robert Half Management Resources, Robert Half Technology, and so on.

I recently received two studies from this group. The first one came from Robert Half Legal (isn't that a wonderfully appropriate name for a legal group: 'Hi, I'm Steve, an attorney with Half Legal . . .'. )

Here's how the news release announcing the survey starts out:

'When you think of words to describe a law firm's culture, what comes to mind? Formal? Competitive? Not so, say attorneys. When surveyed recently about their work environments, the top adjectives used were 'team oriented,' 'family friendly,' and 'casual.'

In related news, a recent survey of sharks revealed that the top adjectives they use to describe themselves are 'cuddly,' 'adorable,' and 'cute!'

I mean, does anyone really believe that a law firm is casual? Or team oriented? I've read a couple of John Grisham books. I know more than a couple lawyers. Everybody knows it's the most cutthroat game in town.

But do you think lawyers are going to say that in a survey conducted by a legal staffing firm? I can only imagine the conversation:

'Hi there, I represent Robert Half Legal. We place highly qualified attorneys and paralegals in good jobs within law firms. How would you describe the culture at your law firm?'

What do you think a bunch of people who lie for a living are going to say?

'Well, I'll tell you, honey. It's kill or be killed around here. I'd just as soon cut someone's throat while he sleeps than see him make partner before me. When I got hired they told me if I didn't bill 85 hours a week, minimum, they'd take a blow torch to my testicles. No sirree, you don't want to send any of your people over to this shit hole.'

I mean, I know people do these stupid surveys to get some publicity for their company, but shouldn't they at least have some legitimacy to them? Tomorrow I'll tell you about the other Robert Half survey that came in the same mail. It may be even dumber than this one.

Groundbreaking survey says accountants worry about money!

Yesterday, I talked a little bit about self-serving, stupid surveys that companies sponsor just so they can get some publicity.

In yesterday's rant, which you can read below, Robert Half International told us that, according to their 'research,' most lawyers say the culture at their law firms is not competitive. Rather, it's all about kindness and team building. Okay, sure.

The same day I got that piece of nonsense, I received another survey from the same outfit. This time, Robert Half International's crack research team surveyed a bunch of Chief Financial Officers and asked them what their biggest concerns were for 2005.

And the answer? You're not going to believe this. This is crack investigative research at its best. I don't know how the researchers got them to admit this, but the number one concern of CFOs in 2005 is . . . a drum roll please . . .you'll never guess . . . here it comes . . . growing revenue! Yes! Stop the presses!! Has the Wall Street Journal heard about this yet? I can see the headline now:

'CFOs Care About Money!'

This is a startling turnaround from 2004, where the CFOs surveyed said their top three concerns were 'employee engagement,' 'diversity,' and 'work/life balance.'

Just kidding.