SOUTH WEST LONDON — They say it’s broken.  But I am not convinced it ever really worked.  The company cascade is like the Lost City of Atlantis… or the missing Beach Boys album.  Many people think it’s out there, but disappointment is the most likely outcome.

Here’s how the theory goes:
• You start at the top with a message.
• You give it to a few people.
• They give it to a few people.
• And soon enough the whole business has heard.

Not only have they heard, but they’ve received a compelling, first-hand account of something important.

It can’t fail.  And what a compelling idea.  So simple, so… unlikely to deliver the results you are seeking.

The problem with cascades is that, in spite of some great theory and massive stores of ‘best practice’, they rarely do what people want them to do.

There are two problems: Expectations and implementation.

The expectations for cascades tend to assume that a message will make it through the business.  And that the message will arrive in one piece.  And that people will know what to do with it.  And — perhaps most wildly optimistic of all — that it will change people’s behaviour.

Those expectations are not bad things.  It would be great to have any system that could do that.  But they are simply unrealistic.

The same often happens with the implementation.  We tend to believe that a compelling bit of prose, or an arresting headline will ensure that a message arrives at its intended location.  An unfortunately that’s unrealistic too.  Cascades tend to focus on reporting facts, to avoid misinterpretation.  And facts, unfortunately, are not what drive people to change their behaviour.  Behaviour is driven by understanding and appreciation of information.

To get that you need to explain information, provide context and ensure understanding.  Few cascades can do that.

It’s a shame really.  Because an employee cascade is a very enticing prospect. 

Unfortunately what we want the cascade to do it simply more than it can.

/df

OUNDLE — There’s always some good that comes every year. I get great pleasure out of those little celebrated innovations. Here are a few of my favourite from this past year.

The end of tinned food — My twelve-year-old daughter asked me what a can-opener looks like and how to use one. As a child growing up in Canada last century, and here in the UK too, no one could make it to 12 without a good knowledge of watery peaches, and corn, and spam…

But we can buy all that fresh in shops now. That’s gotta be progress.

America let’s poor people be sick — Universal healthcare is common in almost every country I have lived in. Now the United States get it too. Who would have thought it. And all without too much rending of garments.

I sat with a very successful retired Doctor at a baseball game in Cape Cod this summer. He explained why the US didn’t need universal healthcare. “They say 30 million people don’t have health cover. But I know about 25 million of those are illegal immigrants anyway…”

Yes, it didn’t work for me either.

Indestructible footballs — I don’t know why I find this strange. But one of Sting’s buddies is pushing the idea of footballs that cannot be broken, punctured, etc. to give to kids in war zones. I am still not convinced this isn’t a hoax. No question it is a nice sentiment, etc. But the idea that your whole village and family could be wiped out… but at least you’d have a football…?

I’m not sure.

My Quote of the Year — “People say stupid things. Get over it.”

So says my very large, black American friend who is virtually the only black executive in his mid-western town.

I wish I could share his sentiment more often. In other words I wish that I wasn’t affected by what people said. And I wish I never said stupid things.

Geeks of the world, unite – There was a breathless link on Twitter this week. “You can now wear your handle,” it said. Which sounds a bit awkward to civilians. But in fact, it was this: http://survivalofthehippest.com/

I had long thought that this was the worst that things would get: http://www.fabjectory.com/

Well, maybe it is still the weirdest.

How has your 2009 been?

What do you wish for 2010?

/df

LONDON — There seems to be quite a bit of excitement out there about Google Wave. Here’s a blog I was sent to earlier today. Look how many comments there are in a few hours.

There’s a lovely short video here too that will show you what Google Wave is all about.

To me it looks quite similar to the demo I saw in August of Microsoft’s OneNote. A lovely guy from Pfizer explained to a group of us how it’s should change their project processes. And I find both quite compelling. Here’s a video about it too.

In many respects I am dying to try both out.

In many other ways I suspect that I won’t and I can’t. My brain is already programmed to using email and other software. I recognise that this is better. I even suspect that in a few years or month I will be using it. But I can’t get excited now.

The Google Wave video says “email was invented more than 40 years ago, Google Wave is what we would do if we invented it now.” Well, I was invented 40 years ago and I don’t think I have out-stayed my welcome yet.

In fact, I am still quite keen on writing letters. You know, start at the top and work down from left to right on a piece of nice paper? I like that too and people are still doing it (although not in Britain with a Royal Mail strike).

/df

LONDON — As part of the course that I am have been asked to give in Kuala Lumpur later this month, one of the participants sent in this question:

Q: Will you be covering the topic on top-down and down-up internal communications?

In responding to the question I realised that the answer may have a more generalist interest. So I thought I would repeat it here.

My answer read something like this:

It is part of my introduction and it runs through the entire two days.

I believe that ‘communication’ needs to be a conversation. That means at least two parties exchanging information. That is what separates internal communications from advertising or public relations — the messages and delivery changes according to the audience, the content, the context, etc. And it it is why it is sometimes much harder to do internal communications than to do other corporate communications. You need to get managers and leaders to talk AND listen AND think AND adapt AND respond.

And in light of that, top-down and bottom-up, both have their times and uses.

What do you think?

/df

AL DUOMO, FIRENZE — I know how I feel about graffiti on historic monuments. I don’t like it. There is no value in defacing ancient monuments, like Lord Byron famously did at The Temple of Poseidon in Greece.

But as I stumbled, puffin down the 463 steps from the top of the cathedral in Florence this afternoon, I saw a big black pen scrawling saying something like “Do something exceptional by treating people well and you will be rewarded with grace.” It was well positioned and written in a striking hand. And it was noticeably different from the other graffiti on this historic site.

It was the only religious message I actually got in visiting churches all day.

I am quite ashamed to say that. Because even in the Uffizi Gallery the only real message I left with was that there were a lot of wealthy Americans who contributed to it. And that gallery has some of the most striking art I have seen in my life. (Even through a bus-load of hopped-up French school children.)

What I appreciate about the religious graffiti in the Duomo was that it was unexpected. It was different. It was delivered in a new way. Even though the message was not new, or the location all that unexpected.

It broke the rules. And that broke through all the other noise.

We, as organisational communicators often have to do that. We risk our jobs by doing it sometimes. And we risk breaking down our entire system if we do it a lot. But it’s often worth the effort. It’s often the only thing we can do to shake up the world. To break people out of their complacency.

Just don’t get caught.

/df

When the wind of change whistles into play
will I blink or flinch away?
The wind of change wont whistle me away
if I spin my tails and sail.
And sail away, let yesterday become today.

CIRCLE LINE — I recognise that I am not the right demographic for the Brummie, bedsit, white rapper The Streets. But I have just bought the new album and I had to choose between a CD and a limited edition USB.

(That’s a compact disk and limited edition universal serial bus!)

I don’t know which sounds worse. I liked LPs. I liked the big cover art and sleeves that decorated my dorm room wall. I liked making thunder sounds by shaking the vynil.

But that’s not coming back. It’s the day of the USB key.

We like our media mobile now. And we’ll buy more than one copy if we really like it.

How does the company newsletter fit into this world?

Uncomfortably. At best.

All hail the mobizine. You heard it here first.

/df
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