Executive Pay Addiction

Smokers like to point to the calming effects of smoking, relaxing after long day with a drink and a drag - the satisfying puff after a lovely meal. But they also like to draw attention to the charging effect of smoking, how when driving long journey or fighting jet lag a smoke will help to generate some energy.

Until a friend of mine, a frequent ex smoker, drew my attention to how untenable this position is; I had not realised that my habit was not a useful habit with some risky side effects that will never catch up with me, but an addiction. Of course, with hindsight, it is ludicrous to think that an artificial stimulant can also work as some kind of calming influence. It’s just an addiction.

The first step in dealing with smoking addiction, for me, was to choose to fight it. Of course I had some great incentives, a new family and loving wife, but at the end of the day I had to choose to do it for myself. Part of that process of choosing to fight the addiction meant deconstructing the arguments for smoking. And the first one was, this drug does not solve anything, least of all the effects of stress or tiredness.

Those in our community that deny executive pay is excessive invoke ‘the global market.’ And why not, what could have a nicer ring to it than the market itself, and global one at that. After all, two-thirds of FTSE 100 companies are global operations, for whom the UK is a small part of their operation.  However, these same people also use the global market as the same reason why low wages are very low and high wages are disproportionately high. 

How can one overriding factor drive leaders of our largest organisations to have salaries 40, 50, 60 even 100 times higher than the lowest in their organisations, while simultaneously driving the gap between the two wider?

The same reason 10 million people smoke in the UK – addiction.

Going Social

“New technology doesn’t change the way our brains work. Social networks are not new. For thousands of years, people have formed into groups, built strong and weal relationships, formed allegiances and spread rumour and gossip.” 

Paul Adams, former Google designer that created Circles in Google Plus.

As technology evolves, so do the communication tools we can use, but our behaviour remains the same. Consider the introduction and the role today of the pager, fax machine, text messaging and email. 

We once lived happily without any of these tools, then they became essential, and now we live quite happily without the first two and the last two are in decline. But we are still communicating. 

Sharing ideas, opinions, good news and bad. Share tips and football transfer news, arranging meetings and seeking forgiveness for being late.

So what does it take to go social? Nothing. You’re doing it.

You are already doing all the things that constitute going social, all you need now are some new tools. Twitter, Linked In etc., pick them up and use them. And how do you learn how to use them? Just the same way you learned how to behave at a dinner party, football match, nightclub: You watch what everyone else is doing. You watch, you listen and when you have something to say, you say it.

What could be simpler? Even my Mum's doing it.

Being Social

Social networks haven’t grown exponentially just because people enjoy the warm and fuzzy social interaction that leads them to think oh I can spend hours doing this. The fact is they bring their friends, family, colleagues and clients together because the information created in social networks is extremely important and valuable.

In a previous blogs, My wife is the Typical Facebook User, I argued that my wife’s killer App was the NCT Nappy Locator. This app allowed her access to valuable, time sensitive, location specific information on where to change our daughter’s nappy.  This incredibly powerful tool was available for free, in return for simply adding her views to the greater discussion.  And that’s ‘being social.’

If we don’t have access to the information held in social networks, we are less valuable as an information source in our own right. We collect information such as who knows whom, a politician’s comment on a news article alongside views of hundreds of readers just like us, a personal blog from someone that does the same job as us for a competitor, a personal blog by a client on something that is important to them, and we add to it. We add our own perspective that is informed by what we have collated and we decide how to use it.

Detractors of Trip Advisor (as seen on Channel 4 in the Uk the other night) argue that its system is faulty, mainly the part about letting everyone add their comments without more robust validation. But because we can see every review that person has posted (and maybe their Facebook profile if they allow us to); we can make our own mind up whether we value their opinion. Do they appear to moan about everything, or does this post appear to be a genuine gripe. We decide, not the hotel. And the insight is valuable, not just because of it’s independence of the vendor, but because we can add our own perspective and correct it if our experience differs. And that’s ‘being social.’

And the price to access all of the information that we can add our own unique perspective too? Be social and engage in it.

Doing Social

I was fortunate enough to catch up with the Martha Lane-Fox of pensions for coffee this week; the brilliant Mackenzie Nordal.  After swapping photos and stories of our babies, we reflected on how much the asset management industry has achieved in the two years since her and I first met and mallowstreet was launched.

Mackenzie and Co’s launch of mallowstreet coincided with my own efforts to convince colleagues that social media has a role in client engagement. So it made perfect sense for us to combine intellect to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes.

The challenges we faced then were, in no particular order, ‘this stuff is just for kids,’ ‘I don’t have time for it,’ ‘compliance will never let you do it,’ and my favourite, ‘it’s just a fad and will never catch on.’

The inertia was akin to convincing a small child to wade into the sea. Now while there are clearly children that take to it like the proverbial duck, most need a combination of coercion and encouragement. We took baby steps, establishing small beachheads that we share learning from. This built confidence in those that we showcased and the determination to overcome their fears in everyone else.

So here we are, 18 months on, and standing with the sea up to our middles. Confidently splashing our hands in the water with a random blog written according to our agenda and engaging with the occasional passing beach ball with a random forum post. We all have the correct kit now, updating our profiles and ensuring we log in just often enough to ensure nothing looks out of date for too long.

This is doing social. I don’t mean this harshly, as we have all come a long way to get to this point; but this is ticking all the boxes to satisfy the people that sit in the offices where the air is a little sweeter and the carpets a lot thicker, we are in social media. 
Doing social is not being social; that’s the next bunch of fun we’re going to have together.