The Good, The Bad, The Spin

The world of scientific research holds a principle of conservatism that hasn’t yet entered the public consciousness–and likely never will. It is the idea that if something isn’t yet explainable by rigorous and established controls and procedures, researchers are cautious to draw broad conclusions about that phenomenon.

The reason for this is simple: In order to best understand phenomena, researchers are careful about offering conclusive statements because the process of research demands a constant challenging and updating of information, new and old. What makes science, science is the constant refining of knowledge.

Problems arise because the human tendency is to take familiar features of one’s situation and to reduce those features into a seemingly plausible and easily accepted conclusion. An example: The world works in mysterious ways and many ideas exist about how and why the world turns as it does. Commonly, an invisible force–an intelligent designer, a god—is deemed to be responsible.

Such a deduction goes against fundamental scientific principles. Evolutionary explanations are readily available and are accepted by scientists in spite of the fact that more than 80 percent of Americans believe in God. (more…)

Read part 1, part 2, part 3.

Q: I’ve attended a few of your seminars, and one thing that you’ve recommended is that people read Jack Welch’s book.

Jim Lukaszewski: Absolutely. In the book, I list 13 or 14 different management literature (sources) people should be reading. Welch’s book is important because it is the diary of someone, pretty much in current time, who is a business CEO. It is how he got the job, what he went through, what he thought about.

He spent the first 10 years firing 200,000 people. They called him Neutron Jack. In the last 10 years he rebuilt the company. There are marvelous management lessons in this book, which is why so much is still written about him. There’s a new book about him every year written by other people.

My point is, really the larger point is, if you want to advise leaders, you have to study leadership and you have to study leaders. I advise people to read about military leaders. Most of the biographies we have are in politics or of military leaders. There are wonderful lessons about how these people think, how they make decisions, what bothers them, where they fail and where they succeed. You have to become a student of leadership to be an effective coach for leadership. (more…)

If true, Target’s snubbing of “non-traditional media outlets” raises poignant questions about the emerging reality of how information gets disseminated–and how perceptions are formed.

It’s indisputable that bloggers not only break news, they are increasingly the shapers of opinion (especially if what Murphy’s Law says is true).

At my day job, I spend more and more time pitching stories to and sending releases to “non-traditional media outlets.” The traditional news media is no longer an emphasis–and some days, isn’t even an afterthought. It is instead another audience with which to bridge messages to constituents. And, it is often the case that “non-traditional” outlets are the only ones to run stories the news media ignore.

Target, though, makes a good point. There’s a call to be made about when and when not to respond to bloggers and incessant Internet idiots. In frequent cases, it’s simply another instance of a whiny consumer—and Target (as well as most organizations) is correct to ignore such commentary.

For Target to respond in the manner conveyed at Consumerist, however, smacks of arrogance, especially the lie that “we are unable to respond” and the unfitting corporate jargon in the term “core guest” That phrase alone is the understandable reason for Target to take a hit in this situation.