Andy Green's Creativity and Flexible Thinking blog

Ministry of Memes

2010-03-05T12:40:00.000Z

We need a new post of Minister of Memes to provide good regulation and sound government.

A meme is the heart of word of mouth communications – it is how a message can replicate itself well beyond its original missive.

The information that circulates in our society is not necessarily the definitive text of whoever first commissioned the text. Rather, it is the sticky messages most conducive to people’s ‘truthiness’ – the reality they want to hear and see – which get passed on, and become accepted as Gospel by the community.

So, the proposal for a Ministry of Memes is this: any time government wants to tackle a problem, put forward new measures, or has a view, it needs to take into account and consider the potential dimension of memes – how will the message be relayed, distorted, and live on beyond the original transmission.

The Ministry of Memes could spot potential memes that may inadvertently arise from even the most well intentioned of acts.

News of the Government’s new agency for dealing with child protection issues, the new Independent Safeguarding Authority prompted the idea.

The forthcoming arrival of the Authority was the subject of an investigation by ‘Panorama’ (‘Are You a Danger to Your Kids’, February 8^th). It is the latest move against tackling ‘the threat of paedophiles; before you can work with children you need to be checked to ensure you have no paedophile criminal record or allegations on your record.

As a proud parent of two daughters, and a big softie when it comes to any kids, I reckon I would be among the first to stand up against the evil of paedophilia.

Aside of issues about the agency just being the latest example of massive misdirection of community resources, the empowerment of an army of bureaucrats - and as Professor Sue Morris, featured in the programme, rightly points out, the Authority is more about protecting the agencies that work with children rather than actually protecting the kids themselves - a key part of its future failure will be having to deal with a confusing mess of messages created by legislation.

Essentially, it has failed to take into account the dynamic of memes.

(Another point by those who support this new venture is that the Authority was created as a measure resulting from a recommendation made by the Inquiry after the murder of two young girls by a nobody called Ian Huntley. My response to this would be that they need to consider that this was a noble idea in principle, but desperately unworkable in practice.)

Apparently, you don’t need to be checked if you work every other week with children.

You may not need to be checked if you are involved in theatre groups.

If you take other people’s children to school events, you will need to be checked if the arrangement was through the school, but not if it was arranged parent to parent.

In responding to specific criticisms the legislation will now affect 9 million people not 11 million as originally planned. Yet, in allaying the concerns of specific groups or instances, they have added a more extensive list of specific sub clauses, op-outs and extra detail to their story.

By creating a spaghetti-like morass of complex messages, the Authority will bedevil society with a series of simplistic memes – or urban myths. Messages will boiled down to a lowest common denominator for ease of passing on; ‘You can be fined if you have anything to do with children’ or ‘If you want to volunteer it’s a lot of hassle – so, it’s not worth bothering’.

As one friend who worked in child protection told me, paedophiles are extremely resourceful, full of guile and remorseless cunning to gain influence, and groom and gain the trust of children, and sometimes others around them. A series of formal steps devised by this Authority will not stop them.

In a survey of 12,000 cases of alleged paedophilia reported to the charity Childline only 13 were related to people working with the children – that is about 1 in a 1,000 cases. The comment in the ‘Panorama’ programme of ‘a sledgehammer to crack a nut’ seems apt.

Yes, the emotional message of ‘If it saves one child, it will be worthwhile’ is a powerful one. It can be neatly countered however, by a cost-benefit analysis of the resources being used to set up this Authority being directed instead, to tackling and preventing cases of paedophilia by other methods.

More fundamentally, this inappropriate agency could lead to significant damage to society at large. Large numbers of people will be influenced by the negative memes of the bureaucratic problems you have to overcome to work with children.

Ideals of volunteering, giving to the community, helping our young people, being genuinely good to each other, will be sapped by the dissonance and fear created by the bureaucratic work of the agency.

One personal experience here: My wife has worked as a teacher for 14 years. Moving to Wales she is now looking to start supply teaching.

She had to pay £60 for a CRB check to be considered for work by the Vale of Glamorgan Council. At the same time she has had to pay another £60 for a separate CRB check to be cleared for working with Cardiff Council. And she has had to pay another CRB check for registration with the General teaching Council for Wales.

The arrival at our house of the three separate CRB checks – all giving a clean bill of health - highlights the mindless bureaucratic thinking of those behind the scheme. (Can anyone explain why she cannot use just one check - a bit like a personal MOT – to the different organizations?)

Remember, communications is not what about what you say, but is about what will be said by others – the memes seeded by your words and actions and replicating onwards.

Until we get a Ministry of Memes that can advise rule makers on their actions, before Governments make any decisions, they need to take into account of the memes they are creating and their consequent impact, in the widest sense, on the good of our society.

Pass it on.

The Upturn: your part in its rise

2010-02-08T19:36:00.001Z

Camden Council - Creating Messages that Create Real Change 2.

2010-02-08T19:35:00.001Z

Dealing with a difficult situation

2010-02-08T18:42:00.000Z

The wayward husband, the lush wife, and defusing a potential media crisis through flexible, creative thinking

One of the best examples on dealing with a very difficult media situation was shown last week by Tzofit Grant, the wife of Portsmouth football manager Avram Grant.

Mr. Grant allegedly faces being questioned by vice squad officers after he was seen visiting a Thai ‘massage parlour’, described as a brothel in the ‘Sun’ newspaper.

When confronted about her husband’s alleged errant ways Tzofit, a TV presenter in Israel, said the revelation did not bother her: “He can get Thai massage any time and any how. I don’t understand all the fuss. He’s the manager of Portsmouth. Do you know how tough that is? He’s a great manager stuck in a crappy team. He works so hard he needs two massages a day, and from two women, not one.”

Unlike the media saga involving the England football captain John Terry, the media interest soon waned following the unexpected comments from Mrs. Grant.

Her response echoed the retort given by Franklin Roosevelt, when someone raised the issue of his wife Eleanor’s drinking habit – a habit which was well known in private circles, but could have made politically devastating media headlines.

When asked if his wife had a drink problem FDR replied along the lines of: “If you think she has got a problem you should see her mother!”

His flippancy again defused the situation, took the heat of a negative media situation.

The lessons here are not about always to be flippant in a negative media situation (in fact, it will often be the worse tactic to employ.). Rather it is to be flexible in the range of responses available to you.

What Tzofit Grant and FDR were employing is what I call ‘Bigger Box Thinking’ – putting an issue in a far bigger context, to diminish and dilute the significance and potency of any poison.

The tendency of most media specialist is to look within a situation – use Smaller Box Thinking – to analyze, establish ‘the facts’ and use these as the tools for managing the situation.

The limitations of this approach is in failing to put into a bigger context, being able to fully engage emotions and emotional responses – including humour, as well as metaphors (if used correctly, the most powerful tool available to a communicator.)

Last week was a good week for me; I delivered a beta version of a new creative communications course I am running called, ‘Create messages which create real change’.

One part of the course deals with overcoming negative barriers from people failing to trust you, or your message. I share five tactics for using in these situations including:

take your opponents negative belief to its logical conclusion.
give counter examples to demonstrate potential credibility
identify another belief which may have stronger potency for the situation.
explore a detail for building common ground
depict a wider bigger picture which can create a common denominator.

You can see how both Tzofit and FDR both used these tactics to positive effect.

If you disagree with what I say, take your argument through each of these five tactics.

Then ask yourself: ‘Do you still want to disagree?’

Stupid Aid Week Pt 2

2008-09-03T13:46:00.003+01:00

The Stupid Aid Week (Sept 1st -5th) tour is helping to spread the word about our efforts to promote creative thinking to overcome stupidity in the world.

On Tuesday was our visit to the Information Commissioner's Office in Wilmslow, Cheshire. They face the challenge of highlighting what can be called 'duck out data protection- - where people, partuicularly call centres, hide behind the excuse of: "It's data protection, and often it is just an excuse for inactivity.

We delivered a series of presentation'sto the Commission's staff and received great feedback.

Some interesting questions included: One delegate who had just come back from a trip to Yosemite national park in the USA, recalled how on the peak of one mountain there was a sign saying: 'Visitors beware they could be struck by lightning during a storm." The positive he drew from this was how he was left in control to decide what risks he should take, rather than being forbidden to do something.

Repeatedly, we are getting tales of woe with call centres beinga common theme.

On Wednesday saw another blive radio interview, this time with BBC Radio Leeds.

I listen to the Andrew Edwards and Georgie Spanswick breakfast show every morning when I am in Yorkshire, and told them it was just like visiting family. It made the 5.45am wake up well worthwhile!

Extended examples of stupiditysubmitted by listeners included, the children's toy Batman cape with the warning: 'This cape will not help you to fly' along with the packet of nuts that alerted consumers: 'This prodcut may contain nuts'.

A great session with West Yorkshire Police with food for thought. My talk includes the heading: 'Break the rules' which I obvioulsy qualified.

Already getting media coverage from as far apart as 'Computer Weekly' and the Norwich Evening News.

Watch this space as Stupid Aid Week continues...

Overcoming Stupidity- press release

2008-08-29T12:24:00.000+01:00

The full press release for the Stupid Aid tour next week is available here....

Click Here...

Welcome

2008-08-29T11:57:00.000+01:00

I am proud to announce the launch of the Stupid Aid tour 2008. I will shortly be posting some more items from my new book, 'Overcoming Stupidity' along with some articles on Creativity and Innovation.

The full document is available to download here.

Six examples of Stupid Thinking