It was my turn to blog in the wrap up class of Reputation Management, our quarter long, collective experimental journey at the GSB.  Although there was one more class to go, this was the class where we were to sum up our collective journey down Reputation Way. I happily began to type my blog entry (as I had mapped it out in advance), hoping to simply fill in the blanks during class and hit the submit button on WordPress as I walked out the door.

More than halfway through my 600 words, however, Allison Kluger, the co-instructor and founding architect of the course, took the class stage. With her bright smile and warm enthusiasm, she began to share a story about her early career with Good Morning America (GMA).  She began with two mantra’s she learned from her mother as a child that have been life lessons for her:

1)   Treat people the way I want to be treated.

2)   It’s not what happens its how you deal with it.

After getting to know Allison over the past few months, the mantra were not surprising to me. We witnessed through the course the deep and enduring relationships she has cultivated with amazing people throughout her life, and her incurable positive attitude, presence, and genuine kindness toward others.  We had heard her war stories working in the media, and her battles overcoming stereotypes and not being taken seriously at many points throughout her career. Through it all, she treated everyone with respect and generosity, ensuring that her reputation prevailed. With each challenge her gracious response enabled her to take a next major career step forward. She seemed to always approach her challenges with a ‘chin up’ attitude, seeing the bright side of each difficult situation she encountered.

With her cheerful disposition and pleasant tone I was completely unprepared for the story she then told.

She had been in a horrendous car accident as a young GMA producer, while sent on location to Dubuque, Iowa. As she described the severity of her injuries, including a partially severed leg, a crushed right arm and the first aid she conducted on herself before forcing her very damaged leg to walk out of a corn field to a pitch dark rural road, while nearly bleeding out – I could no longer type.

The dissonance between how I had grown to know her over the past few months and the gore and tragedy of this story caused me to sit up in my chair.  Narrowly avoiding amputation of her leg, Allison could’ve chosen to let that situation embitter her. She could’ve chosen to hold a two-year pity party, instead of zealously pursue physical therapy.  She could’ve sued GMA and never returned to the company, blaming them for what had happened.

Or worse.

Instead, she chose grace and kindness, dealt with the situation as her mom taught her – both at the time of the accident, and for the years of healing that followed. After thinking about it, actually, there was no dissonance at all, except that she did that at 23.

Incredible.

She defined the tragedy. The tragedy did not define her.  Like tempered steel of a prized Samurai sword, the accident tested her physical, emotional and psychological limits.  She was forced to bend, over and over again, beyond what seemed possible.  But she never broke.

I will carry her story with me, along with many lessons from this class:

“Don’t let tragedy define you”

“Go with your gut, follow your passion”

“Own up”

“Failure can be a badge of honor”

“It’s easier to create than repair a great reputation”

“Be a conscious content creator”

“Do the work, be true to your beliefs”

To Be Or Not To Be, That is Reputation

Our journey together in Reputation Management has now come to a close.  We have learned, that like Hamlet’s dive into what it means to “be” (e.g. human being), it is in the tension between living and dying where the deep questions of life are posed.  As we build careers in the digital age and seek to have impact in the world, reputation will similarly impact and define how we live and die in our careers.  And how we plan for, predict and rise to challenges will shape how others see us.

Daniel Diermeier summed it up well in his book, Reputation Rules, our ‘textbook’ for the course, “Reputation management is not the domain of specialists or experts.”

It is up to each of us as leaders in our respective fields and occupations to serve as reputation stewards – not only for ourselves, but for our organizations and those within them.  Reputation needs to be a core part of how we design and build companies and teams and how we define organizational culture, wherever we go.

Thank you JD an Allison for a wonderful journey.

Today is the final day of our GSBGEN course, fondly referred to as “Reputation Management”.  We covered much ground in this course and our discussions have segue into many topics.  Our guest speakers have evoked and provoked us into some profound discussions.

So today, I thought I’d sum up what I was able to glean from this course.  Foremost, I’d like to say thank you classmates, JD, Allison and Lukasz, for a very good course.

I find myself often thinking about the “Trust Radar” that we discovered in our “Reputation Management” textbook.  The four fields of Empathy, Transparency, Commitment and Expertise are important to consider in formulating a response that enhances rather than diminishes one’s reputation, particularly when faced with a moral dilemma. The media magnifies and multiplies words but ultimately what seems self evident is that people pay attention to those they trust.

Of course, learning about “Reputation Management” is not merely about dealing with crises. I recall one of our guest speakers explaining that “reputations persist in the mind of those around you”.  As such, ‘Reputation’ can be an asset and global companies that harness its powers can further advance their cause in today’s age of social media, globalization and heightened moral sensitivities. In times of adversity, one of our guests reminded us that companies can “play offense” to both defend and enhance a reputation.

I also reflect upon reputations that exist for institutions that have lasted 200, 800 or even 1,000 years. How do Stanford University and other enduring institutions maintain their reputations despite inevitable ups and downs over the course of history?

I’d like to take leave with a quote that was shared with us in class, which to me makes much sense as building and sustaining a reputation is a lifelong pursuit — “It does not matter what happened, what matters is what you do next”.

Forrest Sawyer doesn’t manage his reputation. At least that’s what the veteran journalist would have us believe. Forrest Sawyer, high profile television journalist, former anchor of CBS Morning News and former ABC news anchor for World News This Morning and Nightline told our class today that:

“Reputation management is a sales technique, not a technique for living.”

Sawyer started out by giving the class a choice between hearing the “absolute honest, no holds barred” truth from him for the next hour, or a carefully crafted biography. Trick question? Obviously Sawyer expected us to choose the former. A rephrase of his offer is ‘do you want me to tell you the truth or the half truth?’ The inherent contradiction in Sawyer’s words – the tension between true choice (as it was presented to us) and the illusion of choice – ends up being a harbinger of several contradictions and puzzlements embedded in Sawyer’s discussion over the next hour.

Sawyer pressed the class to provide an acceptable definition of reputation management. It was unclear to me where he was going, as he challenged definitions that included such things as the ‘importance of having personal awareness of how your behavior affects perception and can either inhibit or enhance your career.’ Not good enough. Sawyer moves on to the next hand. That person says something akin to ‘reputation management is about not only having this awareness but knowing how to avoid actions that are counterproductive to us achieving our personal and professional goals and take steps that help us reach those goals as efficiently and comprehensively as possible.’ Nope, not it. Sawyer moves on. Now this is about the moment where I start furrowing my brow.

Sawyer ultimately answers his question. He says the goal of reputation management is to manipulate people’s perceptions of us, specifically, manipulating them to think “nice” things about us. Hmmm. Not the most profound definition but in no way wrong at all. But so were the myriad of other rephrasings offered by my fellow classmates. Frankly, if a class of Stanford MBA2s couldn’t come up with an accurate definition of ‘reputation management’ in a class called Reputation Management no less, I’ve wasted the last two years of my life in this institution. So of course they got it right.  So why was Sawyer spending so much time challenging these definitions? It seemed to me that what Sawyer was looking for was a statement from someone in the class that positioned the idea of reputation management as a negative concept and somehow equated it with affectation or pretense. He likens reputation management to what “con artists and commodities traders do.” Not exactly an endorsement.

After “defining” reputation management, as he saw it, to the class, Sawyer challenged the idea that what we want to be doing is “managing” our reputation. He suggests that reputation management is inconsistent with authenticity. He says that he personally has always been more concerned with being himself and accepting that not everyone will like you.  Instead of managing, “why don’t you just do the right thing,” Sawyer asks.

Again, puzzlement. How is being self-aware, understanding the impact of your actions on others – positive or negative – and aligning your behavior to be constructive rather than self-destructive antithetical to being yourself? If I know that screaming at my subordinates kills their motivation, leads to attrition and will eventually get me fired, does working on my anger issues and the way I speak to people mean I am inauthentic? Some might think that’s called self-improvement, and non-self destructive behavior. Would Sawyer recommend instead that I just keep doing what I’m doing, let the company fire me, and keep skipping companies until I find one that lets me behave how I want to? What exactly is the purpose of this kind of behavior? What person wants to make their life harder? What person wants to minimize the likelihood of accomplishing their goals?

“If you have power, screw reputation!”

Sawyer then goes on to clarify the only scenario he believes justifies reputation management, otherwise known as ‘being fake.’ “When not in a position of power, you need to think about what people think about you,” he says. What constitutes power? Wealth. “If you are a billionaire in this country you can do damn well anything you want,” he says. How rich is rich enough? Sawyer’s answer: a billion.

Wealthy people, says Sawyer, don’t have to manage their reputation. As case studies, he offers the examples of HSBC and tobacco companies. In the case of HSBC, he highlights when it was discovered that the company was laundering money for drug dealers and terrorist organizations, and yet faced no significant consequences from the U.S. gov’t. The company was fined but company owners faced no jail time for their illegal and deliberate acts. The same he said applied to tobacco companies, who it has been clearly established put known carcinogens in cigarettes, yet remain in business and continue to flood markets with a known deadly product, with the consent of the government.

I’m not sure what Sawyer is recommending to us. Yes, multi-billion dollar businesses get away with illegal and immoral activity all the time. It’s the nature of a society where money can buy influence, in everyday or legal settings, and where gov’ts are either corrupt or manage tradeoffs whoever those in power see fit. At the same time, we don’t live in a lawless society. Tobacco companies, like HSBC, tried to conceal their behavior for a reason. It’s not a given that billionaire = license to do whatever you want without repercussions. Furthermore, the tobacco industry has suffered greatly since the 1990’s, when several U.S. states successfully sued tobacco companies. In 2004, the U.S. became the 108^th country to sign the World health Organization’s Global treaty on Tobacco Control, which has broad restrictions on the sale and advertising of tobacco products. So how exactly is this a plausible argument for the idea that those who have power don’t have to manage their reputation?

“What I really care about is change”

Instead of reputation management, what is really important, Sawyer says, is effecting change, and the best way to effect change is to “tell the truth the best way you can.” Sawyer is an advisor and board member of Edison Pharmaceuticals, a medical research company that develops treatments for children with mitochondrial diseases. In my research of Sawyer prior to class I discovered that Sawyer has more than a cursory interest in medical research and health solutions. Sawyer is also co-founder of Ampere Life Sciences, which develops foods that target antioxidant and other medical deficiencies.

I admire Sawyer’s passion for medical research. I also applaud his exhortation for people to be agents of change. Where I find disconnect in Sawyer’s message is what seems to be his suggestion that managing one’s reputation and being a change agent are somehow in conflict. A classmate points out that Martin Luther King Jr., one of the most impactful leaders of change in U.S history was in fact someone who did a lot of things intentionally to manage his reputation. Sawyer’s response: “Yes, to affect change.” This was yet another moment where I had to furrow my brow.

What exactly is Sawyer’s thesis? Reputation management is not something to aspire to unless someone is a billionaire or trying to affect change. Still, as someone who values change, Sawyer himself never resorted to using reputation management, as did others the likes of Martin Luther King Jr. And the reason Sawyer frowns on reputation management is that it is akin to deception, inauthenticity and the work of con artists.

“You don’t get to where Forrest is by being apolitical.” – John Katz, Executive Producer of CBS Morning News

In An April 12, 1992 New York Times article titled “Forrest Sawyer, Gathering the Spoils of War,” friends and colleagues describe Forrest sawyer as ambitious. One acquaintance even noted: “He was restless. No one ever accused Forrest of being humble or of not going after what he wanted.”

Forrest Sawyer was one of the most successful broadcast journalists at two of the largest news networks in the U.S., CBS News and ABC News. He was granted exclusive reports all over the globe and received numerous awards, including Emmy’s for these reports and his documentaries. Did Sawyer get to these heights through luck? Was there no strategy, no deliberate steps, no politicking taken to get himself onto the nascent news stories that he wanted, the ones he knew would be the most impactful, and henceforth, the most reward-worthy?

I don’t know what Mr. Sawyer’s politicking ability may or may not have involved during his journalism career at these major news organizations, but I know like every other man/woman in corporate America, he had to convince someone to give him the opportunities that they did, and I doubt these decisions were all auto-pilot yeses. I hope, however, that Mr. Sawyer sees what qualities or actions of his helped him get these approvals. That’s the power of reputation. And he cannot say with any certainty that another man in his position – and I’m sure there were other journalist competitors each time – could have possessed the total opposite of his attributes and reputation (something who is truly “authentic”) and have achieved or can achieve the very same things that he was.

Today is the penultimate class in our Reputation Management course. This class follows the Reputation Expo held on Wednesday

The agenda today includes: i) a discussion on topics form the final chapter from Reputation Rules; ii) debrief from the Expo; iii) comments on student case studies.

Today, we also benefit from visitors that have come from afar, including London, Chile and several cities across the US. Welcome all!

1. JD kicked us off on a discussion of the ‘Expert Trap’. Classmates chimed in and offered a succinct explanation — the ‘Expert Trap’ can be described as a lack of empathy towards people who are not experts in your business.

Another important aspect is the narrower viewpoint that ‘Expertise’ often causes. From a corporate viewpoint, people who know certain subjects so well may well miss other important perspectives that would be obvious to others.

2. JD presented a photo that showed  someone pointing a gun towards a 12 year old boy and an older relative. JD asked our visitors to articulate their visceral responses to the image. Reactions include ‘scary’, ‘shocking’ or that someone had gotten into a situation unintentionally (perhaps a burglar running into a family).

3. JD then asked for someone with army experience to explain what is happening, in other words the view from an expert.

Eric Wittreich pointed out that the boy in the picture is Elian Gonzalez and made certain precise, expert observations (to the awe of his classmates). Eric pointed out that the person holding a gun is an army officer who had his eye on the boy, had pointed his gun towards the adult relative but did not place his finger on the trigger.  From Eric’s observations, it became clear that the person in the photo had acted proactively in a pre-planned situation, was very well trained, in control of the situation and not a threat to either Elian or his relative.

4. How do we avoid falling into the ‘Expert Trap’?

Some thoughts:

a) awareness is the first step, i.e. think through before talking,  ‘choose your words carefully’;

b) create a focus group to react (instead of relying on certain individuals);

c) identify who would receive or be affected by the message and how they would react to the message; even though a focus group is helpful, contrarian views do not always surface in group discussions and those views are key in this context;

d) hiring for diversity (for example, the d.school espouses hiring team members that come from different areas of expertise);

e) use social media or crowd-sourcing to identify opposing viewpoints.

5. Debrief on Reputation Expo. We first discussed how  various students obtained feedback on their personal reputations, prior to creating their props. Some students spoke to close friends, some relied on Facebook posts (including Facebook likes!). Another important aspect is whether individuals with startups would choose to present their startups or something directly related to their personal reputations.

6. Avinash Sood created something original specifically for the expo and explained what went into the work preparing his book. Avinash thought about what are his priorities and furthermore, what does he needs to do to live up to his ‘vision board’ and reputation.  Avinash made a special ‘call out’ to Omar Saleh, who wrote down guidelines that he will hold himself  to in future (at the Reputation Expo, Omar prepared a 15-20 page booklet, which he shared with others). Omar humbly said that his booklet is a ‘work-in-progress’ but certainly his approach won plaudits from several classmates.

7. Jason Moran explained his thoughts on the expo. Jason brought his newborn son and presented a slideshow which listed certain attributes that he would like his son to remember him by. Again, a thoughtful approach that was appreciated by several classmates.

8. Other perspectives mentioned: i) in presenting their reputations to others, several people discovered what others knew about them (after all, reputation exists in the mind of others); ii) a variety of formats were presented at the expo, not just the usual slideshow which would be typical of students at a business school.

9. Winners at the Expo were presented with their awards. Congratulations!

Most Original: Ankur –

Most Inspiring: Aulani –

Most Unexpected: Faris –

Best First Impression: Elad —  Zipho — Mada

10. Allison shared with class an experience that she went through in an accident on a lonely road in Iowa some years ago, when she lost control of her vehicle. Allison was on her own and had to leave the accident scene looking for help. After finding certain good people who helped her and contacted emergency services, Allison was brought to hospital. The accident took a heavy toll on Allison – a portion of her leg had to be removed and her car resembled an ‘accordion’.  With therapy for couple months, Allison recovered from this accident.

Allison explained that a lesson she learnt from her Mother helped her deal with what happened – “It’s not what happens, it’s how you deal with it”.

In situations of adversity, it is important to think strategically, remain calm and be aware of who & what is around us.

11. How do we feel about each other from this class? Allison explained how JD makes her feel when she works with JD and how that is important to her. We may also want to think what we have learnt, what we will take away with us and how we feel about each other.

Allison also reminded us of the various speakers we benefited from in class and certain key observations from each speaker. Thanks Allison for lining-up an impressive guest list.

12. JD spoke about his experience and reputation at GSB. JD was hired at the GSB as a faculty member for Communications on June 1, 2007 (JD – Happy 7th year anniversary!). Initially, JD helped create the MBA capstone class on Communications. In his new role at the GSB, JD found an opportunity to be an entrepreneur in the context of academia. Through his work, JD has established a reputation as a hard-worker (who very much enjoys his work), passionate about communications, teaching and getting to know his students. JD enjoys developing lasting friendships with his students and is a great believer in providing feedback to one another.

JD also shared his desire to become a father later this year and realizes that certain compromises may need to be made, given his very busy schedule.

In finishing, JD acknowledged the class for being the first cohort in the new Reputation Management course at the GSB!

Onwards to Monday’s session with a guest speaker from Facebook.

Forrest Sawyer’s visit to class triggered a high level of student engagement and discussion, thanks to his rather confrontational stance and statements. He supplied a great deal of entertaining discourse and no shortage of controversial opinions, but for this blog post I choose to focus on his communication style rather than his content. I found his style to at times enhance his reputation in the room and support his argument, while at other times it played an opposite role and in my opinion hindered both his credibility and his likeability.

I thought that Forrest made a memorable first impression in the room with his stance (he remained standing the whole time) and his request to JD to repeatedly lower the volume on his microphone. This conveyed to me a certain sense of humility and informality. Early on he also stated, “I’m the resident contrarian.” I thought it was a pretty savvy persuasive technique for him to start off by asking the audience what type of talk we preferred, for a number of reasons: Not only did he preview the rest of his talk and set our expectations for a direct and contrarian viewpoint, but he also got the audience to engage and opt in to his talk (since he knew that we would obviously all vote for the “honest” talk), making it somewhat more likely that we’d buy in to what he was saying.

Forrest also used a highly confrontational style throughout this talk, since he would repeatedly invite students to challenge him but then as soon as they started talking, he would interrupt them or cut them off entirely. For me, this communication style brought up lots of concepts from classes like Touchy Feely and High Performance Leadership: while it was definitely a strong, commanding and aggressive style that probably elicited some respect from the audience, it definitely hurt his likeability. I don’t think he realized how unfavorably his brash style reflected on him, but I noticed students in the room increasingly showing their dislike through their body language; for example, people were giving each other looks and scoffing at some of his statements.

Some other patterns in his communication style that I found to be effective included the use of many examples, such as HSBC, William Crystal, Martin Luther King, Jr., Gandhi, and even Galileo, to prove his point, as well as the use of self-deprecation. An example of the latter was when he said, “I wish I hadn’t been so stupid” as a journalist. However, the interesting thing I noted about his use of examples was that many of them had clear flaws in the logic behind them, but he was so forceful in his communication style that he was not always challenged on them.

One of my clear takeaways from Forrest Sawyer’s visit to our class was about the power of the “how” when it comes to persuasion and communication. His overall style was quite consistent in that what he said, how he said it, and even how he stood were all forceful and contrarian. His use of controversial black and white statements like “reputation management is bullshit” and “what we’re really talking about is power. If you have power, screw reputation” in addition to his penchant for cutting people off contributed to a strong presence but hurt his likeability. It’s unclear what the net effect of this was on his overall persuasiveness, but for me at least his style made me less receptive to his message.

Erik, threw down a respectful challenge to Forrest while commenting on Jason Moran’s blog posting.  Forrest was kind enough to respond.  See below:

Nice post.

I think Forrest was guilty of his own criticism: “manipulate the facts to further their own goals.”

Sir – you asked for just one positive outcome of the Iraq war? I could list a hundred. Here are three that quickly come to mind: 1) Children received immunizations. 2) Schools were rebuilt and attendance is up 80%. 3) Corporate corruption has decreased. Whether or not these justify the war is not the point – the point is there are many instances of good that came from the action. Is your responsibility to tell us that the war was good or bad,or is it to present the facts and let us decide?

Sir – you said the last two administrations have lied about NSA’s collection. It’s absurd to think the NSA is monitoring every piece of information about us. My believe is that the truth in the NSA’s collection lies somewhere between what they tell us and what you believe. Please show me the magic database – in order for you to be so strongly opinionated that they are collecting everything, I’m assuming you’ve seen first hand this database? Again, I challenge you to show us the truth and allow us to decide based on facts if the U.S. has gone too far.

Thank you for a fun class. It was definitely a change of pace for us and I appreciate you upholding your promise at the beginning – no holds bar! I hope you view my post as the same. Best of luck in your new endeavor.

Cheers,

Erik

___________________________________________________________________________

Forrest’s reply:

Erik,

Allison sent your blog post for my review and comment.

First, thank you for the unvarnished challenge to a couple of the ideas I tossed out. I believe the more we challenge so-called “authorities” or “experts” to support their ideas with evidence, the clearer will be our own thinking.

That said, let me address the issues you raise with equal candor.

I understand you have a military background. My father was a Navy man, and I’ve spent some long months with our troops in war zones around the world. I don’t know if you were in Iraq or Afghanistan, but either way you are acutely aware of the sacrifices our uniformed men and women have made. You also know how hard so many of them have worked to help the Iraqi people.

I get it. My friendships with the men and women I’ve come to know and my respect for their service actually sharpens my criticism of the willingness of our leaders to place them in harm’s way for what I consider to be demonstrably bad reasons.

So in that spirit let me address some of your thoughts. You write:

“Sir – you asked for just one positive outcome of the Iraq war? I could list a hundred. Here are three that quickly come to mind: 1) Children received immunizations. 2) Schools were rebuilt and attendance is up 80%. 3) Corporate corruption has decreased. Whether or not these justify the war is not the point – the point is there are many instances of good that came from the action.”

I believe you have just committed the logical fallacy known as “post hoc ergo propter hoc.” Most commonly, this mistake is defined as thinking that since event Y followed in time event X, event X must have caused event Y. In other words, temporal succession implies causality.

For the sake of argument, let’s accept that some things are better now than before the US invaded. Does that mean things have improved because we waged this costly war? Could we not equally say that, 38 years after the end of the Viet Nam War, Vietnamese per capita income is dramatically higher. Would you therefore conclude the war did some good things? Not at all. In fact, there are a complex of factors that improve life after any war.

I submit that the Iraq War itself did not lead to the outcomes you admire and in fact impeded progress by such things as bombing key infrastructure, decimating civil order, and creating a situation where disease spread all too easily. Support for this claim comes from considerable independent analysis from, for instance, NGOs and specifically from my own visits to the country and discussions with various involved parties.

It is true numerous things have improved since the war, including school performance. This is largely because the US and Europe instituted draconian economic sanctions after the Gulf War. The sanctions caused enormous suffering in the populace but did not lead to Saddam’s ouster. In other words, we wound up punishing the people of Iraq for Saddam’s sins. Unintended consequences.

I argue the improvements you point to were a direct result of the lifting of economic sanctions and by massive economic support from Western nations. These changes and much more could have easily been accomplished without an illegal war that was waged under false pretenses and in violation of the Geneva Conventions. The war itself destabilized the region; left somewhere between 100K and 1M Iraqi dead and 4289 Americans KIA with an estimated >100K wounded; destroyed the country’s infrastructure (including a lot of schools that – you’re right – have mostly been rebuilt by now); stirred ethnic conflict that continues today; empowered Iran; and – well, to use your phrase, I “could list a hundred” deleterious results of this ill-conceived, horrifically managed war.

The Iraq War was quite simply the greatest military disaster since Viet Nam, and we continue to suffer the consequences. This in no way diminishes the great work of America’s soldiers, Marines, airmen/women, and sailors. Many have contributed greatly to Iraq’s return from ruin. It is the decisions of America’s leaders that failed them and caused great harm to Iraq and the region.

To be clear: the primary goals of the war were neither to eliminate WMD nor to “free” the Iraqi people from a terrible dictator. They were: to gain US corporate access to the last pristine, easily recoverable stores of sweet, light crude in the world; to establish a military platform from which the US could then launch initiate regime change in Syria and Iran; and to build a model of neoconservative economic thinking.

All of these efforts ended in disaster, although China has done very well in the wake. Incidentally, all of those claims have enormous amounts of supporting documentation, though it took us a few years to get it. I can point you in the right direction if you want to dig in.

As for your claim that “corporate corruption has decreased,” with respect, I must tell that is simply not true. A simple Google search can help you with this, but here’s an article for starters:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/iraq-10-years-on-how-baghdad-became-a-city-of-corruption-8520038.html

If you want more detail, I can provide you with a voluminous reading list about corruption in Iraq, past and present. And let’s not even mention the $9B in US cash sent by the US on pallets in C-130 transports that just went missing, never to be found. No kidding, $9 billion dollars in cash. Do you know how hard that is to hide?

A last point on this issue before moving on to the NSA. You ask:

“Is your responsibility to tell us that the war was good or bad,or [sic] is it to present the facts and let us decide?”

As a matter of fact, in the case of this class discussion, it is neither; but that’s not really what you’re asking. You’re asking about the responsibility of a journalist reporting on the war and its aftermath, and that’s a marvelous question.

No one – that is, no one – worth his/her salt can commit journalism by simply listing facts. One must gather facts as best one can, confirm them as best one can, and assemble them into a meaningful story. This inevitably means drawing conclusions.

The important point you are emphasizing is that one’s conclusions must be defensible. That means you better know what you are talking about and be able to back it up. And if you get something wrong, admit it. Fast. And when you get it right only to be met with howls of complaint, stand your ground…and maybe do even more reporting because those howls likely mean you’re on to something.

You may have noticed that television journalism has veered from this principle. We have all manner of pronouncements from on high by people about whom you are right to be suspicious, just as you are absolutely right to challenge my assertions. I hope you apply the same intellectual scalpel to the talking heads on TV. I know a lot of them. You’d be amazed at how they can offer strong opinions on subjects about which they know very little.

Now on to the NSA. You write:

“Sir – you said the last two administrations have lied about NSA’s collection.”

I’m not sure if you’re challenging this assertion on its face but – just for the sake of clarity – here’s a good example of what I meant:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsmo0hUWJ08

DNI James Clapper in stone-cold lie before the Senate Intelligence Committee, no less. Interestingly, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Or), who asked the question in the link above, knew the answer was a lie when he heard it but was constrained from pointing this out because of secrecy laws. In fact, he asked the question just to get the lie on the record.

But what about your larger question…can the US National Security State (which extends beyond the NSA) really scoop up millions and millions of “electronic transactions?” Really? It sure can.

Now, you are correct in challenging my assertion that they DO collect everything. In truth, we don’t really know the precise extent of the sweep because we can’t get a look inside the NSA’s files. Nor can we know the current level of their growing capacity to sweep data.

You have a fair point, so what DO we know?

We know this from several whistleblowers and from the NSA’s own documents they have been collecting trillions of transmissions and at least aspire (in their own documented words) to collect ALL electronic transmissions. Hard to believe, but there you are: the desire and rising potential for Total Information Awareness.

We know too that they have established back doors in the communications company’s computers: Google, Facebook, Verizon, AT&T, and so on.  We also know NSA operators have used this ability to spy on girlfriends, rivals, and politicians of all stripes, though they promise not to do it again. Purportedly, the NSA intends to hold all of these searchable data for a minimum of 5 years and is in the process of building several massive centers for that purpose.

All of the above claims are rather nicely documented and easily found through a simple web search.

Of course, we also know it’s pretty much impossible to sort through all the information they’re gathering. So, per the NSA’s own documents, they have established algorithms to help them find patterns they deem significant. This is accomplished at top level by a search of metadata. Then, once they strike a hotspot, they can then dive more deeply into the stored information and expand their sweep to whomever the target(s) may have touched.

For the most part, this means that, although they’ve collected your information, they don’t care about it or you. Unless, of course, you pop out for some reason or another. Ask the people who have mistakenly been put on the no-fly list how much fun that can be. FYI the best figure for the number I can find for the people on that list is 400K and growing.

That’s a lot of terrorists, wouldn’t you say?

Now, why is this of such great concern?? Why are so many people up in arms?

First, it seems on its face to be an infringement of our 4^th amendment rights, though I assume today’s Supreme Court will disagree by a 5-4 vote. Second, the government can use the information it collects for many things beyond finding potential terrorists, for instance, impeding political opposition. Third, by all verifiable accounts, this massive surveillance hasn’t been very useful in finding real national security threats, while it has cost taxpayers an astounding amount of money. [We don’t know exactly how much money, of course, because that too is a secret from the American people.]

Finally, I’d like to thank you again for your challenging questions. It’s always fun to pressure test my thinking. And my apologies for the prolix response, but you’re tough and I wanted to be thorough.

To save you some search time, below is a little information about surveillance. Follow the breadcrumbs and you’ll find lots more. Incidentally, I find reading some of the actual Snowden documents to be quite helpful in understanding the extent of these programs.

I feel compelled to point out that most of what we know about this area comes from whistleblowers, some of whom have had their careers destroyed, some of whom are imprisoned, and the most notorious of whom is in exile in Russia. For the crime of telling Americans what is being done to them and in their name, they have been called traitors. I think they’re heroes. But that of course is just my opinion. You should draw your own.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfS2Op9l3nk

http://www.propublica.org/article/nsa-data-collection-faq

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/31/nsa-top-secret-program-online-data

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-infiltrates-links-to-yahoo-google-data-centers-worldwide-snowden-documents-say/2013/10/30/e51d661e-4166-11e3-8b74-d89d714ca4dd_story.html

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/30/nsa-americans-metadata-year-documents

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/09/nsa-loophole-warrantless-searches-email-calls

As a founder of an early stage start-up , I often wonder, how can I make sure that my company has the right reputation. We put our customers first and spend every waking hour making sure they are satisfied with our product and our quality of service. But while customers look at our App Store reviews to make their decisions, it’s not as easy when it comes to potential investors, employees and strategic partners – they look at the reputation of the founding team as the reputation of the company. So for us founders, managing our offline and online reputations is crucial.

Last Friday Matt Ivester came and spoke about exactly that – how we can become better at managing our online reputations. As I looked through my Google search results and compared them with those of my classmates I realized I have a step above everyone else – I am the only Mada Seghete in the world – which means others won’t confuse me for someone who robbed a bank or was accused plagiarism. So the great news is that my online reputation is my own – but for those of you with more common names, there is still hope. You can find ways to brand yourself by adding a middle initial to the name you use, or by finding ways you can create enough positive content about yourself that it become obvious you are a different person than your evil doppelgängers. So, in Matt’s words, when it comes to reputation management you can not be like Katie Perry and just say “Oh well”, you need to be proactive in managing your online reputation.

In a few easy steps:

1. Inventory your online reputation. Start with Google, but also look at your Facebook profile. Make FULL use of privacy settings – having a strong network on Facebook is important and can help, but make sure you don’t share everything with everyone. You can even go into setting and remove access to your older post to make sure you drunken hidden pictures are not public. And if you think you don’t care, know that 70% of employers have rejected candidates because of their Facebook profile – be it racial comments, bad grammar or pictures of you doing drugs.

2. Delete bad content within your control – this includes incriminating photos, flaming blog posts, embarrassing comments, etc. You should try to remove bad content even if it’s not within your control, many times simply asking the person who posted to remove it can lead to a good outcome.

3. Create positive content to bury negative content. Having an about.me page, a personal website, creating content on blogs and having a LinkedIn page are important steps to creating good online content. The more great new content you put out there, the easier it will be to bury older content that might be less flattering.

4. Keep up with your reputation. Online reputation is always changing so be sure to keep up with new things that might come up about you. Set up google alerts for your name and enable the post review for Facebook posts – this way you can review every pst before it appears on your timeline.

As an tech entrepreneur,  your reputation is important, so make sure you are aware of it and always working on improving it!

Today, I entered class to a hauntingly familiar voice.

…Test 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10…Test…Test…Test… 

And then it came to me – it was the calm, yet spirited voice of Forrest Sawyer. It was the same voice that echoed in my family’s living room when I was a child watching ABC Nightly News. It was the voice that I trusted to tell me what was really happening in the world.

Forrest was here today at the Stanford GSB as a contrarian.

“I don’t really understand what you’re doing here,” he said and then proceeded to ask us “What exactly is Reputation Management?” After some brief answers by several of my colleagues, Forrest provided his views on so-called “Reputation Management.” His perspectives were from the perch of a watchdog journalist that had dedicated most of his career to uncovering the truth that governments, corporations and even powerful individuals had tried to hide.

Forrest talked about his experiences in which both individuals and entities had tried to manipulate the facts to further their own goals. He first spoke about the Iraqi war… and how he discovered that the oil wells were burning. He then spoke about his uncovering that RJR had known, since the 1950s, that the firm was “selling cancer.” He then spoke about HSBC and how the bank had participated in deeply criminal activities for an extended period of time, yet no one had ever gone to jail.

Indeed, the implication was that “Reputation Management” was effectively an attempt to manipulate the facts in order to hide the truth. It seemed that Forrest couldn’t believe that the GSB was teaching us how to do this. Instead, Forrest advocated that we should let our actions form our reputation.

Forrest then elaborated by saying that Reputation Management was, in fact, Brand Management. Further, he said that Brand Management was needed only for three reasons. First, it was needed if you weren’t from a rich family and needed to get a job. Second, it was needed if you were a con man and needed to continue to commit fraud to earn your living. Third, it was needed if you were part of a corporation that was engaged in selling commodities.

With all due respect to Mr. Sawyer, I think that there are a great many of us that do not come from a rich family and do need to get a job. Further, the truth is that many of us will eventually be part of commodity businesses, whether we like it or not.

It also seems that even very talented people, especially at the beginning, need to build their personal brands to be successful in today’s day and age.  Then, there is the question of whether perception is reality and whether reality is the truth. Or, is there just one perception, reality and truth?

Towards the end of the session, JD Schramm brought the discussion full circle. He rightfully stated that one cannot rely solely on perception management to form a good reputation. That is, there needs to be substance, meaning and authenticity around one’s actions as well.

I thought about this construct as I left the room. I considered Forrest’s noble mission of “comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable.” However, I also came to the realization that Reputation Management (in addition to executing “right” actions over an extended period) may be necessary to achieve a suitable position in society before one can effectively execute noble missions.