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Re: MY Process compared-Monolog vs. Dialog
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Marek J
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Jul 16, 2001 21:22 PDT
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I will talk about Monolog vs. Dialog as a Corporate Conversation in the
light of Chris vs. Chris here (aka Chris The Brand'er vs. Chris the Rip the
lid off'er)
Introduction:
Chris Macrae wrote:
| | Lets try this out this 1-2-3 on you tough Cluetrain examiners: the career
confessions of a brander through the decades. Remember where I use the
B-word below you could use a longer phrase like human relationships people
value (strangely quite close to the original definition of marketing circa
1950 before mass media distracted a lot of people). Also, this is only a
conversational draft- doubtless I should word it better as time permits.
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OK, I know you are sticking to your definition of brand. The interesting
inquiry here would be how come you are sticking to it while the rest of the
*world* (loosely defined) has a completely different definition. (because
the definition shifted)
I would say CLocke already mentioned this and I quote:
~"using terms like "advertising," "brand," "broadcast" and so on, obscures
the meanings these words have taken on in an environment radically different
from that in which they were coined. if you or others have reinterpreted
"brand" to mean something else, that doesn't mean that it carries the new
"meaning" you have unilaterally attached to it"~
Main Point:
Let's distinguish something here.
Monolog vs. Dialog.
My favorite topic in language and conversation studies of businesses.
Yippee.
What if Monolog is a Dialog that has stopped being a Dialog and turned
itself into a Monolog? At some point someone was involved in a dialog and
now there is no more dialog; the conversation moves into a Monolog. The
Monolog is like this circular conversation based on primitive logic. This
logic keeps is circular, we'll talk about that but first this...
How to recognize a Monolog is when someone keeps repeating the same things
over and over and not being conscious to it at all. (a major clue in looking
at Corporate communications) Example: you call a company and a person
answers with a monotone voice of a machine: "Hello, XYZ corporation where
we love our customers, this is Johnny, how can I help you." - This is a
point where you want to take a baseball bat and beat your own telephone and
smash it to pieces. That's how fucking exciting it is to listen to this
Human Monolog Machinery.) I get these phone calls at home. I ask the guy on
the other end - "what's your favorite color?" - and he is completely
confused. I just want to wake him up because I will not interact with his
monolog. Then we talk about art and literature and some cool movies. At the
end he forgets to try to sell me whatever he was trying to sell me. That's
how asleep to your own life the monolog can make you.
Individuals in a group are glued together through the language of the
monolog. Think of it as a very familiar thing that you keep hearing over and
over but you are really not hearing it because you are stuck inside of the
monolog. Only when you can start hearing the monolog can you then start a
dialog about a monolog. And here is a trap - The dialog you start about the
monolog can itself become a monolog. Nice language trap - I can see that
Cluetrain Conversation (The dialog) can very easily become a Monolog but
that's another topic.
With this long introduction I want to point that at some point (as was
stated by both Mister Brander and Mister Icebergian) the conversation called
'Branding' and 'advertising' really existed as a dialog. People used to
relate to those phenomenon of business in the context of a Dialog. The
'Brand' was something to rely on, something familiar, a visual cue, a clue
that if I do business with this company I will be satisfied. 'Advertising'
was something that informed people about companies. These days of Dialog are
long gone. Today we live in a World of Monologs about Brands and
Advertising.( Am I making any sense here? ) and Cluetrain is turning up the
VOLUME on the MONOLOG. Just look at RageBoy, Norlin and TDCRC.com, These
guys are crazy. They are TURNING UP THE VOLUME on conversational Monologs of
Corporations with some crazy writing. There is a point to what they are
writing about. It's about breaking up the monolog.
What about this monolog glue? The logic behind is what keeps the
conversation stuck in a circle. You become stuck in language and the
language you use. The circle is so tight and Dialog-proof. No one can
interact with you because the Monolog would fall apart if the logic was
disturbed and what keeps most Corporations in existence today is the
strength of their Monolog.
But how did they become that way? Maybe at some point some guy comes along
and starts evaluating logically that if you have a good product and service
then people tend to part with their money in your favor very easily. The
company has a name and a logo and a certain image in a marketplace to
identify itself to others and others can identify it. This could be called
Brand. So this guy then concludes in primitive logic that all you need is a
good Brand. and the product and service will follow. It's completely
logical. The logic is linear, it does not take into account that the Brand
is the by-product, an outcome of the product and service a company provides.
But that's too much thinking. The linear logic always wins. Brand=Revenue,
Brand=Consumer Loyalty. Then this guy comes up with a method to manufacture
Brands that would have all the appeal of the Original Brand to capture the
Consumer Loyalty and Revenue flow. Thus a modern Marketing is born and then
you have market researchers, TV ad actors, professional drivers on a closed
circuit, batteries not included, your mileage may vary, fine print, prices
like $9.95, sponsored events, jingles, free samples and so on and on...All
of it designed to suck you, the consumer, into a giant Corporate Monolog.
And now Chris Macrea wants to recapture the Dialog about Branding but we are
not listening because we got unstuck from the language of monolog about
Brands. We are not listening because so much what he says reminds me of the
Monolog I have been bombarded with for so long and I don't want to be sucked
into it.
Maybe a better thing would be to start a new conversation rather then
resurrect the old one. I believe Cluetrain started that new conversation. I
can also see that Cluetrain could become a Monolog and eventually it may but
that's why The co-authors say that Cluetrain is not a movement, not an
ideology, not a method, not a recipe, not an answer, not a circular monolog
based in a primitive logic. It's an open ended conversation, a dialog moving
forward. It's an invitation to see what's possible when people are not stuck
in Monolog but are engaged in a conversation that is nonlinear and
unpredictable. Cluetrain is a conversation to begin other conversations.
Gosh, there are 95 fucking theses. You can have thousands of new
conversations about it.
Ok. That's my theory of Monologs and Dialogs. Please remember this is a just
coming straight from my head (or my ass)
Moving on with the response to Chris M....
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1) 1980s as a consumer reearcher I could believe in my own integrity as
influencer of companies by saying look I've found out from consumers they
like you to do this better : of which these are no-brainers because they
wont cost you anything, while these take some investment but would take
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you
| | ahead of competitors and be really humanly useful so why not?. This worked
for most of the 1980s, then for complex reasons (eg market research got
outsourced or market research managers became governed by political
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numbers
| | folk) this sort of brand advice got less and less acted on -or listened
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to -
What you describe above is a perfect example of Corporate Monolog Machinery.
No one is listening. They are too busy defending and perpetuating the
monolog.
(Aside : actually my favourite work was in developing
| | countries -eg India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Parts of Africa - where the
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needs
| | were greatest and simplest to win multinational companies over to. If you
share eg Fast Company's interest in improving marketing in developing
countries do look at a conversation we started at
http://www.egroups.com/group/needsmarketing )
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Maybe in other countries people are listening a lot more and willing to
engage in a dialog.
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2) 1990s a group of brand gurus came up with the following joint argument
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:
| | look Mr Ceo the number 1 thing consumers tell us they want (if they are to
have any relationship at all with your company) is to know that the
employees believe the brand promise messages every bit as
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much -emotionally
| | and practically - as you are broadcasting the consumer to do . Can your
company
live with that idea? (And if you want to: that means open sourcing
knowledge of what your brand leadership is most simply about so that every
employee of every discipline can feel involved, interact, and see that
everyone sings , acts and believes in the same raison d'etre).
http://www.instituteforbrandleadership.org/Brand_Chartering.html
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That sounds like a wishful thinking on your part Chris. I can see you are
passionate about the conversation but they are not listening buddy...
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Frankly, this idea has had its ups and downs in terms of starting a
commercial revolution! It's actually the most central idea right now among
brand advisers who passionately want to be able to live with their work.
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Good luck. This is a uphill battle. Corporations will never give up their
Monologs. The very structure of their monologs keeps them around. When they
start getting engaged in a conversation the company will become unstuck but
then it will also fall apart.
| | However in casting brand as learning or knowledge it has become vulnerable
to very big IT suppliers who want to sell in their systems BEFORE any
concern for the actual human conversation the idea needed to be the real
core of organising around. And anyway this leadership idea requires a kind
of open mind set among the top board that is culturally the opposite of
command and control management. So take 3....
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Yes, it requires an Open Mind. They would have to start seeing the linear
logic as a glue that keeps 'more of the same' and 'more of the same' and
'more of the same'.
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3) 2000s Today's battle ground (for me) is that there's only one thing
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that
| | connects boardrooms of all big companies. They are controlled by the
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balance
| | sheet and 90- and 365 day reporting governed by its monopoly way of doing
the numbers. (They are conditioned Palovian style by their compensation
performance contracts that are equally short-term. This leadership smog is
totally destructive of a model which says your business will grow over
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time
| | according to the value integrity of your human realtionships)
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Pavlovian style is a good analogy in this situation. Look closely at the
language of the corporation.
If it sounds the same over and over and over you got a clue these guys are
stuck in a monolog conversation.
If you are passionate to break this circular thingies I would suggest you
TURN UP the VOLUME on the monolog.
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Now what comes next is work in progress (depending on your attitude you
could contribute or naysay);
Develop an alternative standard that is more humanly compelling for
navigating a company by than the balance sheet and 90 days numberising
Fault line 1: Position sustainable business of the future as a human
relationship system (the value you enable all stakeholders to derive from
relating through your brand value as a community exchange).
Look at such key communal criteria as how do you develop win-wins between
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2
| | or more of these stakeholders. (Hush) The more of these you explicitly
design into your model, the more you the Board start to free yourself from
robbing most stakeholders to satisfy one greedy one. Involve network of
experts of any innovative discipline that boardrooms sometimes listen to.
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this last sentence shines a lot of light on the design of the language. 'the
boardrooms sometimes listen to' . Sure, they will listen to as long as it
supports the Monolog or doesn't damage it too much.
| | Ultimately beseige the numbers men until they are scared there's something
they dont know about what really drives business. Try and get eg somebody
like MIT's 2005 open MBA content to the world giving this human
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relationship
| | standard their blessing...
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They don't need to give it any blessing really. I mean, really? Do they?
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Find some panel that is recognised as beyond reproach in governing this
standard. Remembering like David versus Goliath we're taking a shot
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against
| | an accountancy system that starts with every powerful piece on its side
apart from what's humanly right to want to be (self-)organised by.
Fault line 2: talk up how consumer agents on the net will increasingly
search out companies who have open business models as relationship
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systems.
| | Programme the agent so it doesnt even recommend you contact a company
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which
| | either doesnt have such an open business model or doesnt live it. Talk up
how actually these same agents will be used by each of us individual human
beings not just to buy, but in searching for employer relationships and
more.
Our agents will be the conversation openers to the companies we'll even
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make
| | a
first step of engaging with. They will ultimately make the human being the
main stimulus transmitter and the business organisation (with any future)
the response whose integrity is worth a relationship. Branding will be
owned by every human being. ( And our new -or clued - economy will have
started)
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Chris. This is already happening. Except you are not seeing it because you
are looking for Consumer Agents. There aren't any. There will never be any
conversation openers and stimulus transmitters.
I ask you to start looking at the Group Monolog that's driving your actions
and your language. You are a passionate guy but start looking where you are
stuck with this Branding thing that normal people on the street have no clue
what you are talking about.
I can see your response can be something like this: Come over to your
egroups and listen to us and you will understand.
I want to say to this: forget it man, if you can't just talk to some guy on
the street and get your point across in normal language then you are running
a monolog on him...
Thanks
Marek J
http://soapbox.radioPossibility.com/
Amused To Death | from monolog to dialog.
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