Tony skinner 00:01
Hi, and welcome to the podcast, podcast, my business with www.podcastmybusiness.com.au. And today we have Janie from www.Janejordan.com.au. And Jane handles our reputation or risk management and crisis communication and so on. All that wonderful stuff. How you doing?
Janie 00:26
I’m doing fabulous. Thank you, Tony really well. 
Tony skinner 00:31
Right? We’re doing better than what we were earlier in the week when we tried this. And yeah, it’s technology, if only technology was held to account for when it failed and had a poor reputation.
Janie 00:46
Oh, indeed, no. And that’s what we do when you come to reputation risk. It’s all about accountability and holding people to high standards. You know, when we talk about reputation risk today, we’re often Talking about the social licence quote unquote, to operate. And what that really means is communities standards change over time. And for example, I never thought it was appropriate but clearly mining resources companies thought it was appropriate to blow up beautiful sacred indigenous sites of you know, the hundred thousands and thousands of years old, Rio Tinto, and today being we have heard about the chief executive who has been held to account for those actions and he and some directors have parted company with Rio Tinto and Tony it comes to what we also call in in this profession of ours. There is blood on the floor. There is always a sec, you know, a ritualistic sacrifice if you like, and we’ve seen it a few times very recently a MP is another case in point Rugby League club had a o a chairman that had done some bad things and he refused to go keeping them in the process of putting their reputation on the line in the headlines for much longer than it was necessary. So the social licence to operate covers a lot of territory today, thanks or not to social media.
Tony skinner 02:24
That’s right. And I mean, it’s moves. Look, it’s such a Moveable Feast. It can move faster than you I just something just popped in my head. It’s like a herd of wildebeest. And you’re chasing the herd of wildebeest and it changes direction and tramples you. 
Janie 02:42
Oh, that’s a fantastic analogy. Now let’s play around with that that trampling if you like, if you think about social media has changed dramatically over the last decade said and you know, and now we’ve got enablers technology has been you know, you’re talking about it failing, but In a sense, it enables and it enables you the wild beast, if you like out there in the online world to gather momentum and gather community and have new communities emerge about just a single issue. Let’s take an example of that with the back of June, back June 11. A firm I recall, President Trump was holding his first election rally in some time and it was a really big deal because in Tulsa Oklahoma and the body what it did is it fired up the wild bees and these wild beasts were actually the K pop fans who have become wider. Quite a trend and to anybody who’s listening to this or anybody cares about reputation and trends. Be aware of the Kpop fans because what they are set their height they’ve set their standards really high Charlie, they’re actually on record saying they wanted to break all records. So they’re going out to be political campaigns, big activism and so back to Trump. They encourage their fans and then the tick tock has got involved thanks to a grandmother in Iowa, who they basically said let’s buy up all the tickets, and so that we can have empty stands at the Trump rally. And that actually that is actually what happened. So you have Kpop fans, igniting and getting the wildebeest trampling everywhere and it quickly changed direction from the Kpop fans to tick tockers and the tick tockers mostly young people, but it actually was started which I found interesting todi by a grandmother in Iowa. And so you know, the the Trump camp were completely hoodwinked you know, trampled over caught at their own game.
Tony skinner 05:01
So how do you be, we’re gonna stick with this analogy. So how do you be the lion that the wildebeest run away from? And you can then push them in a particular direction and pluck one off and be six and get some success?
Janie 05:18
Well, that’s a fantastic question. And it comes down to a couple of things. One is, somebody in your organization needs to be the boundary scanner in the sense of they’ve got to be like the lion, they’ve got to be looking out for the prey, they’ve got to be looking out for the movement of the herd. They’ve got to be monitoring us. And they’ve got to be able to know when to peel in and nip that one and take it away. And that comes with great understanding of not only how the social media world 
works, but but actually trends. And understanding issues management understanding trends in community and the changing of, expectations so media monitoring, social media monitoring, looking for emotions, looking for when suddenly it takes off, you know, there’s a there’s a trap, you know, the herd is taken off. You’ve got to be able to monitor to do that literally, minute by minute. And like, like the news organizations do try to they monitor every six minutes. They’re looking at their stories and how they’re trending. And if that headline needs changing, so you innocent, you’ve got to be in life that you’ve got to look out for trends, you’ve got to monitor trends. And you’ve got to realize that for every negative story out there, it’s going to travel faster, deeper, 1200 times faster and deeper than any positive news 1200 times. So you’ve got to be able to recognize troll Fake News. It’s a very sophisticated world today. So it requires people in reputational risk, or for anybody wanting to employ somebody, but that they’ve got to know behavioral science, human condition, human behavior. And they also have to understand systems. That’s the key. That’s the Key today,
Tony skinner 07:20
So, for me, as a business owner, how can I be the giraffe? looking out for the world of beast and the lions? And staying ahead of the pack? Oh, my God, what a great analogy. I’m sucking it for all it’s worth.
Janie 07:37
Yes, you are. You are. I have a look. I think metaphors are the miracle of the message. Totally. So you know, let’s go for it. So the simplest thing you can do is to have a Google Alert on your business, have a Google Alert on your business category is the very basic of things to do. There are other sites like ask the people think you’re at some.
Tony skinner 08:07
Yes. Yeah,
Janie 08:09
yeah. And you can put in a term there and see what’s trending. That’s a second thing you could do. The third thing is also have Google Trends. Look at what Pete what what are the what are the trends on Google? And you know, Google is Google. And it’s, you know, Lord Google, so very powerful. Yep. So there were three things. So in other words, the giraffe is looking at trends. The giraffe is keeping abreast of topics that are trending in, my industry in my topic area in my area of expertise is really, really important. The other thing is join a few LinkedIn groups getting get involved in Facebook groups in your topic area and see what the conversations are just, you know, put something out there and see how people respond to it. So it But the simplest thing is just have a Google Alert if nothing else.
Tony skinner 09:05
Yeah, and it’s interesting, you should say that because again, we’re gonna suck this analogy for all it’s worth. I heard the other day that apparently, giraffes only sleep for eight minutes a day. Are you know, that’s what apparently was on a football show. So I don’t know how, okay, you know, I’m gonna look it up. And you know, we’ll get to that. So that just shows I’m gonna look it up. How much do giraffes sleep? So it just shows if you’re trying to be that giraffe and you try and do this all yourself. And the bigger the company, the more employees that you have, the more things go wrong. The more reputational risk that can happen, the more you need someone like you.
Janie 09:47
Absolutely, And you need a team and you that I believe the larger the organization, the more resources because and the reason why you need to do this is because reputation can now be measured. in over a decade or so ago, people said it was an intangible asset reputation, but now they’re actually very, very serious firms, you know, like the delights of this world and that are actually measuring fun in very strong financial terms. So for let’s take, so at a minimum, your reputation is worth about half 50% of your annual turnover or market cap, right. So let’s take Apple billion dollar company or trillion dollar company and let’s just say a billion, all right, it’s worth its market caps billion. So what’s half of that? That’s a lot of money. At stake, so in Apple, you there would be constant monitoring of you said there will be many, many giraffes, and not many people will be sleeping. If there’s a crisis that happens you you’d be monitoring, you know, literally minute by minute. So that’s probably the best analogy that I can give Well, not analogy, but sort of references that you can it’s tangible, an asset, your reputation is an asset that is actually now on the books.
Tony skinner 11:25
Yeah, and that’s exactly right. It is an asset. There’s, again, especially the smaller you are, it’s you, that is the business. So your business depends on you having a good reputation. And if something happens, and you don’t keep up with what’s happening in the industry, and you get left behind, you’re not keeping an eye on things. You get attacked and eaten by the lion. And a few bones is not going to help you at all.
Janie 11:53
Oh, absolutely not. So if you’re a so again, let’s talk about you know, small and medium sized businesses. So We’ve talked about at the minimum or having a Google Alert. The other thing is consistency of brand. So, I’ve worked with a colleague in executive image, and we work to protect reputation and promote brands. And we use something that we call a, b, c, d. And the a is a is for appearance. And and and obviously, in zoom, people have got pretty lazy and complacent and wearing their sweatpants. Well, in fact, you’ve got to you’ve actually got to be consistent in your periods, whether you’re face to face or online, then B is for behavior. And clearly we’ve seen some bad I’m sorry, Tony, but they’d be boys bad boys Behaving Badly so your behavior will trigger a reputational crisis. This C is communication, consistent communication. You know, know what your brand messages and be consistent with that. At the day, which is what is probably become even more important today is your digital footprint. So you want to be consistent in every digital platform. So if you’ve got a different photograph on LinkedIn to different on Facebook, and it’s different on Instagram, people are going to be confused about who you are. So you need to really Google yourself and see what comes up and look at your images. Look at the messages about yourself you might be really surprised what comes up but there is a huge need to tick the boxes and know your A, B, C and D
Tony skinner 13:41
Well, I’m looking at my name and I’m not finding me at all on finding many other things Tony Skinner music people named Tony Skinner on Facebook. There you go, Oh, I do shop but it’s probably because I’m locked in and I yeah, look yourself up.
Janie 13:58
Yeah, very It’s actually where you want to be is, is you what, what’s my Google reviews are so important. And we are having a little unfair chat. And you asked me about, you know, Google, and your business, but actually, Google’s algorithms and they love businesses, they love businesses that have Google reviews. And that will get you a higher ranking on Google. You’ve also got to know your SEO, you’ve also got to know that, you know, it’s sophisticated. vigilante activists online, can get in and hack anything at any time, nothing is private, nothing is really secure. So and they might put up a URL that copies you I was hacked the other day and somebody copied me on Instagram. That was a bit of a wake up call for me my reputation. So you’ve constantly got to be very vigilant and look at your privacy settings and your security settings and just double check that everything is in place. And lock up as much as you can lock up, align or lock up a wheel to base. You’ve got to be over to do as much as you can control your reputation, because it’s the only thing you’ve got in business. 
Tony skinner 15:11
Absolutely right. Like, so. You had some great tips there to look yourself up and go to Google Trends. And certainly Google notifications. I do use Google notifications. In other tips you’d like to share?
Janie 15:25
Yes, no, you’re known your stakeholders, the make it or break it people in your intimate circle, your business partners, your associates, your supply chain, and how are you keeping in contact with them? How are you networking with them? Because you need to know intimately their information needs and their communication needs, because in a crisis, it’s all about them. And are they going to come out and support you? Are they going to fend off the line for example, or are they going to feel More to the line because they actually a bit pissed off, because you’re actually never returned that phone call from two weeks ago. So you’re never knowing intimately and I’m really mean to the point where you know that one of your peak clients is having a bit of a sneaky affair and in most likely when you know the crisis, it’s going to be a Friday night or over the weekend. And he or she might be with the lover and not at home with the family. And if this has happened to me, Tony with one of my clients, and it was a nice to know basis. But but they were few of us. There were a handful of us in the close circle of the advisory team that supported this particular big agribusiness organization. Because we knew that’s what we would have to call him at the mistresses or indeed have em somebody had the mistresses mobile phone number, so that’s what I’m talking about. You’ve got to have that level of understanding and level of understanding information needs communication needs. Because that’s what you need friends, friends, what you need in across this particularly when social media is going out of control.
Tony skinner 17:10
Absolutely. And I found something here. I’m gonna see if it plays correctly. That is the sound of a wounded beast.
Janie 17:24
Oh goodness.
Tony skinner 17:31
That strike today again, what a great, great opportunity to finish. Great Janie thankyou so much for your time. Glad that we finally got to do the interview.
Janie 17:41
pleasure. Thanks, Tony very much and good luck to everybody out there and look after that precious reputation of yours.
