EXPECTATION MANAGEMENT AND PERCEPTION - The Democrats must properly "Network" the American Public

Share this ARTICLE with your colleagues on LinkedIn .

---

Expectation Management and Perception

If the Democrats are to sustain their circumstantial advantage, they must acknowledge and apply some rudimentary behavioral psychology.

--From an Article Written By Douglas Castle for THE NATIONAL NETWORKER NEWSLETTER and originally published on June 14, 2009.

This article © 2009 by Douglas E. Castle and The National Networker : Reprinted with permission. This article has been substantially edited from its original form in order to fit the format of this reprinting. The author expresses his gratitude to Linked In for providing the networking and communications forum which made this article possible and to BUZZFLASH for kindling the spark which inspired its creation. The author is neither a Democrat nor a Republican and is not affiliated with any political party. ~

Preamble:

In any relationship of trust or responsibility, management of your counterpart’s or charges’ expectations is crucial. When networking (as every political administration has done with the American People en masse), you must be perceived as honorable, competent and consistent. President Barack Obama and the newly-installed Democratic party has an initial advantage, since the previous Republican administration is currently in a leadership vacuum and is greatly suffering from the public perception that its actions, or inactions, precipitated the current economic crisis. The Democrats have to rapidly upgrade their networking skills in order to keep and hold their influence and to sustain their circumstantial advantage.

A recent article in BUZZFLASH spoke of the decline of the G.O.P. But the deterioration of its reputation following the Bush administration, leadership issues and apparent blame for the precipitation of the current economic crisis are still not enough to keep the Democrats in the good graces of the increasingly wary American People, who are looking to the Democrats as their last hope for a restoration of a “normal” United States.

The G.O.P. badly mis-networked the populace. Despite this, the Democrats need to sharpen their leadership and public relations skills, especially in the areas of expectation management and perception, if they are to remain in power and reap the political rewards of having helped to solve a frighteningly real economic crisis – and a still unresolved crisis of confidence.

Please download this article (either for reading or for printing) in its entirety from http://twitlik.com/EXPECTATION .

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

Some Key Terms: Networking the American Public, politics of perception, confidence, image-building, networking, Linked In, BuzzFlash, MediaFire, Articles by Douglas Castle, economic recession, TNNW, crisis of confidence.







__________________________________________________________
KEYWORDS, TERMS AND ORGANIZATIONS:

globalism, CFR, NGO, UN, WTO, IMF, central bank, outsourcing, offshoring, capital markets, import, export, international trade, strategic alliances, e-commerce, entrepreneurship, social networking, banking, finance, trade, ventures, business, securities, stock exchanges, indexes, futurism, trends, citizen ambassadorship, enterprise, capitalism, international politics, commodities, prime rate, LIBOR, foreign currencies, foreign exchange, blogs, blogging, bloggers, aol, google, yahoo, msn, AP, news, media alerts, world government, world governments, international affairs, treaties, tariffs, trade restrictions, marketing, advertising, business development, arbitrage, obtaining capital, promotion, publicity, EU, NATO, military affairs, government regulation, trade restrictions, liquidity crisis, business opportunities, web-based businesses, communication, communications, technology, intelligence, embassies, consulates, business resources, Douglas Castle,The Internationalist Page, The Global Futurist, international politics, elections, time management, cyberspace, AI, energy, industry, productivity, Mixx, Digg, Technorati, Sphere, Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, LinkedIn, advertising, economics, strategy, management, cooperation, widgets, blidgets, links, incoterms, CCH, UCC, freight forwarding, custom house brokers, diversity, employment, culture, micro-loans, technological convergence, trends, financial planning, FOREX, futures, stock index, inflation, recession, sub-contracting, Department of Commerce, the next generation, amnesty, humanitarianism, foreign aid, philanthropy, charity, cooperation, peaceful cooexistence, a world without walls...

EFFECTIVE ORGANIZATIONS versus INEFFECTIVE ORGANIZATIONS

Share this ARTICLE with your colleagues on LinkedIn .

---

Dear Friends:

I won't preach about organizational basics... a good charter and mission, leadership, management, acquiring talented and deicated employees, partners and volunteers, fiancial responsibility, teamwork, communications, command and control, or the cold fear of asking for needed investment or capital contributions that seems to paralyze so many of us.

On point, an organization exists to accomplish a mission or to solve a problem. Everything else is secondary, merely the means toward that noble end. When we lose sight of our Mission or purpose and begin to merely "take actions and make noise", we begin to fail. An effective organization has strength, consistency, integrity and generally, speaking, takes the moral and ethical "high road". They build multiple bridges and open channels, and don't invest i baiting and making enemies. They find friends, and do their best to convert enemies through a combination of education and emotional appeal. They look for common ground instead of for hurtful differences...and they exploit and expand that common ground. Successful organizations (for the longer term) grow by uniting instead of dividing.

I want to share some wisdom with you. Hatred kills. It kills us as individuals, it kills organizations and it destroys credibility and reputations. If you must be branded, be branded as a fighter...but never as a hater. Don't campaign against individuals and rake through the muck of their misdeeds. Ask them questions. Pose challenges. Offer to "help" them. Be morally unassailable. Do not be branded as a hater, a "negative campaigner", a persecutor or a prosecutor. If you appear concerned but not governed by emotions, people will tend to associate that with greater credibility and more objective, "mature" reasoning -- whether or not it is, in fact, true. And don't let your organization be any of those negative, "irrational" things;

1. A proponent of more legislation, regulation and government action concerning personal freedoms and choices, or of government intrusion into free enterprise or personal affairs. There is too much of this already, and it invariably generates poor and unforeseen results;

2. A street-corner screamer (with placard) at every "evil" institution or person that (or who) does something naughty or sells something unhealthy. Screamers (a 60's thing) are like sensitive car alarms. At first they are annoying. Then, they fall into the backdrop of unremarkable noises. Finally, they are either the butt of jokes, or they get disconnected (like the battery on the smoke detector over my stove in the kitchen);

3. A collection of fanatics who want to hate and denounce, instead of inform, question and solve problems. When fanatics fall out of fashion, they are generally exiled, laughed about, beheaded, burned at the stake or crucified. None of these makes for an enviable retirement plan;

4. A fringe player joining in the fray of partisans with their own agendas and "wrongs" to avenge. These people and organizations cannot ever raise funds -- people don't want to go on record as supporting them. They are seen as eccentric. They tilt at windmills, like Don Quixote de La Mancha, but without his romantic virtue;

5. A negatively-themed, exclusionist group.

As smart organizations, we have to applaud the good (no matter who is attempting to do it); question or challenge the policies (not the people or the companies) of people and companies with respect to obesity; conduct research, support programs and produce a good product or service; encourage positive thinking and efforts; provide newsworthy, interesting content and campaigns to heighten awareness; and, to provide incentives for problem-solving and productivity.

Let's be like a virus and infiltrate the social machine so that we can transform it: Let's not be protesters on the Whitehouse lawn. Let's convert and absorb our enemies, or obscure them by being superior and inclusive.

Our organizations will be judged by the company we keep, and by the words that we say.

Faithfully,

Douglas

DOUGLAS CASTLE
at http://www.linkedIn.com/in/douglascastle
CHILDREN'S INTERNATIONAL OBESITY FOUNDATION - HELP SAVE A CHILD'S LIFE.
THE GLOBAL FUTURIST
THE INTERNATIONALIST PAGE
HUMANITAS MAXIMUS