Communications should be functional, i.e. service a clear objective. In the private sector a key aim is selling your product and communications are build around this purpose.
In the non-profit sector this is different but the key questions is always 'What business am I in', 'What do I want to achive'. There will be various answers but it is important to ask the right questions first. And the right questions always start with the business challenge. How can I achive the goals of my organisation? What do I need to make it happen? Who do I need on board? What does he need to know?
Communications is always functional. If not it will not be genuine and may be a waste of resources.
To be continued and edited.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
The global financial crisis and the resulting opportunities
The global financial crisis has implications which go much beyond the financial and economic sectors. Below are a eight thoughts and an attempt to see the opportunities in what currently looks like a pretty grim picture.
Thought 1: The West is in trouble and has become a potential source of instability for the world. During the last 8 Bush years the West's political leadership has been gamble away. But now the economic fundament of the Western way of life is being gamble away too. This is serious. In the future the challenge is to manage a peaceful decline of the West while rescuing as many of our liberal political and economic values as possible. This will only work if we accept the multipolar world as a reality and as an opportunity for a new style of global cooperation and governance.
Thought 2: The trouble of the West is contagious. And this has repercussions, not only economically. Even in decline, the West will weather the financial crisis and a recession better than emerging and developing countries. Democracies should be better equipped to deal with economic instability, one should hope. But how will Russia and China behave in a recession? Despite our differences, we cannot feel good if Russia and China suffer economically as instability there will have huge political, but also economic repercussions for us.
Thought 3: Global issues have to come to the boil before global action is taken. But if they boil and a global interdependent system is close to standstill, global leaders can and do act. Who would have thought that trillions of Euros would be found within a matter of weeks to deal with the global financial crisis? This should be a lesson for other global issues such as climate change and poverty. What were the estimated costs of Nicholas Stern to fighting climate change? And how many G8 summits went by talking about 'Making poverty history'? The question is whether we will have to come to boiling (or drowning) point before such dramatic government action will be taken on climate change and poverty reduction. On climate change global leaders cannot afford to wait until the system comes to a hold, because it will then be too late to get it going again, even with all the money in the world. Even the option of migration to another planet, as suggested by Stephen Hawkins, will need some serious preparation.
Thought 4: Globalization is very tangible now. We are interdependent, no question. Naomi Klein’s ‘No Logo’ was fun; No Lehman Bros is the hard reality of globalization. On the opportunities side, the attempts of major countries to work together shows that hard core globalization can force global government action. Will history books mark the collapse of Lehman Brothers as the start of building 21st century global governance?
Thought 5: Global governance has a comeback. And it is the Economy, stupid, which creates this new opening for global governance in the 21st Century. We need New Global Governance which can both manage the assent of China, India, Russia, Brazil as well as the decline of the US and Europe. Europe and the US must concentrate on shaping this new global governance and enshrine its progressive values it, while we still have some power to do so.
Thought 6: The early European Union a model for 21st century global governance. The EU started as s steel and coal community, not as the value community of today. While the fathers of the EU had a value driven vision of Europe in mind, they started pragmatically with coal and steel. Can this be a lesson for global governance? Can we re-build global governance based on global financial governance and then move on in a similar way the EU has done? Could this be an example for building a global open society. This is for financial and economic experts to answer. However, the EU is already at the forefront of creating global standards on another global issues- climate change. And arguably this is currently the EU's most successful foreign policy.
Thought 7: Keynes to create a new energy revolution. While the financial crisis is not quite over yet politicians are already turning to the predicted, and in some places already real, recession in the real economy. After major bail out packages for the banks now major stimulation packages for the economy are in preparation. And this is good. But stimulation packages should be used to stimulate the new, renewable energy growth sector and help create an energy revolution which creates sustainable growth now and in the future. The trillions of Euros which will likely be spent on fighting the global recession should be spent on fighting climate change at the same time. It’s a question of efficiency and forward thinking. And it combines the Urgent with the Important.
Thought 8: Development money will be scarce, at the least in the short term. This will apply to government development aid but also private foundation money and NGOs. We may find a consolidation in this sector but also lots of broken promises. However, rather than competing for scarce resources, the development community should use the crunch in development aid to assess approaches and structures, to restructure and to let go of ineffective models. Competition for creativity should result in doing things better with less.
Undoubtedly there are many more and more sophisticated angles to the Global Financial Crisis. The importance is to understand the crisis as an opportunity which should not be wasted.
Thought 1: The West is in trouble and has become a potential source of instability for the world. During the last 8 Bush years the West's political leadership has been gamble away. But now the economic fundament of the Western way of life is being gamble away too. This is serious. In the future the challenge is to manage a peaceful decline of the West while rescuing as many of our liberal political and economic values as possible. This will only work if we accept the multipolar world as a reality and as an opportunity for a new style of global cooperation and governance.
Thought 2: The trouble of the West is contagious. And this has repercussions, not only economically. Even in decline, the West will weather the financial crisis and a recession better than emerging and developing countries. Democracies should be better equipped to deal with economic instability, one should hope. But how will Russia and China behave in a recession? Despite our differences, we cannot feel good if Russia and China suffer economically as instability there will have huge political, but also economic repercussions for us.
Thought 3: Global issues have to come to the boil before global action is taken. But if they boil and a global interdependent system is close to standstill, global leaders can and do act. Who would have thought that trillions of Euros would be found within a matter of weeks to deal with the global financial crisis? This should be a lesson for other global issues such as climate change and poverty. What were the estimated costs of Nicholas Stern to fighting climate change? And how many G8 summits went by talking about 'Making poverty history'? The question is whether we will have to come to boiling (or drowning) point before such dramatic government action will be taken on climate change and poverty reduction. On climate change global leaders cannot afford to wait until the system comes to a hold, because it will then be too late to get it going again, even with all the money in the world. Even the option of migration to another planet, as suggested by Stephen Hawkins, will need some serious preparation.
Thought 4: Globalization is very tangible now. We are interdependent, no question. Naomi Klein’s ‘No Logo’ was fun; No Lehman Bros is the hard reality of globalization. On the opportunities side, the attempts of major countries to work together shows that hard core globalization can force global government action. Will history books mark the collapse of Lehman Brothers as the start of building 21st century global governance?
Thought 5: Global governance has a comeback. And it is the Economy, stupid, which creates this new opening for global governance in the 21st Century. We need New Global Governance which can both manage the assent of China, India, Russia, Brazil as well as the decline of the US and Europe. Europe and the US must concentrate on shaping this new global governance and enshrine its progressive values it, while we still have some power to do so.
Thought 6: The early European Union a model for 21st century global governance. The EU started as s steel and coal community, not as the value community of today. While the fathers of the EU had a value driven vision of Europe in mind, they started pragmatically with coal and steel. Can this be a lesson for global governance? Can we re-build global governance based on global financial governance and then move on in a similar way the EU has done? Could this be an example for building a global open society. This is for financial and economic experts to answer. However, the EU is already at the forefront of creating global standards on another global issues- climate change. And arguably this is currently the EU's most successful foreign policy.
Thought 7: Keynes to create a new energy revolution. While the financial crisis is not quite over yet politicians are already turning to the predicted, and in some places already real, recession in the real economy. After major bail out packages for the banks now major stimulation packages for the economy are in preparation. And this is good. But stimulation packages should be used to stimulate the new, renewable energy growth sector and help create an energy revolution which creates sustainable growth now and in the future. The trillions of Euros which will likely be spent on fighting the global recession should be spent on fighting climate change at the same time. It’s a question of efficiency and forward thinking. And it combines the Urgent with the Important.
Thought 8: Development money will be scarce, at the least in the short term. This will apply to government development aid but also private foundation money and NGOs. We may find a consolidation in this sector but also lots of broken promises. However, rather than competing for scarce resources, the development community should use the crunch in development aid to assess approaches and structures, to restructure and to let go of ineffective models. Competition for creativity should result in doing things better with less.
Undoubtedly there are many more and more sophisticated angles to the Global Financial Crisis. The importance is to understand the crisis as an opportunity which should not be wasted.
Final article published in Open Democracy http://www.opendemocracy.net/article/the-global-financial-crisis-opportunities-for-change
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