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Fascinating public sector blog case study
Josh Hallett has written a fascinating account of
the METROBlog Orlando. A public sector organisation created the blog as
part of a public consultation exercise but you can't read the blog now
as they pulled the plug. It appears to have been a case of a group of
people who had very limited understanding of public relations who made
a bad decision based on ignorance.
It's a problem I come up against in both my professional PR
consulting role and as a poitician. It's not a new one and it comes
from the same school as the one where everyone thinks they are experts
at writing and communicating just because they do it every day.
UPDATED: Please make to take the time to read Josh's original post
and the comments below. I just want to make it clear that I am
critiscising the Metro commissioners and not the public affairs team
who deserve enormous praise for their excellent initiative.
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To date 6 Comment(s)
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Bob
/ Website
(16.11.05 14:05)
No, you're wrong. I have a very good understanding of public relations. The blog promoted two-way communication between my organization and citizens. Unfortunately, a select group of elected officials were blinded by fear and forced the blog to be shut down. Get the facts straight before you rush to judgement (it's called research, in case a PR "guru" like you didn't know.) By the way, the correct spelling of Josh's last name is Hallett.
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Jen
/ Website
(16.11.05 16:26)
From Josh's blog:
"In reality a select group of commissioners that are extremely risk averse did not like any public criticism of their actions. Many of their critics often said that these local politicians do not really want to hear public input (synthetic transparency?). Shutting down the blog only confirmed this."
This was not the public relations' staff decision. Bob and I adamantly opposed shutting down the blog but were overruled.
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(17.11.05 09:46)
Bob/Jen
I think either I've not made myself clear enough, for which I apologise, or you've misunderstood what I said.
I was agreeing with you. I've just re-read what I wrote and I still think it's clear, although I will go back and do a second post making it even clearer.
My reason for linking to the post is that I think it was an excellent initiative and most interestingly mirrors some of the discussions I am having with public sector organisations in the UK - including local transport executives. I think the confusion has arisen because of the difference between the UK and the USA. In the UK In the UK we have a local transport executive which is made up of officers and staff. It is governed by a local transport authority which is made up of elected local politicians. In Josh's original post it said it was an executive committee meeting that took the decision to take the blog down. It referred to commissioners but didn't say if these were officers or politicians.
Given that the original post made it clear that the public affairs team introduced, supported and defended the blog I don't fully understand how you could think I was talking about you. It is obvious that anyone in your role has considerable public relations and public affairs experience but equally obvious that other members of the management team and elected politicians don't. Indeed you should be praised for your foresight and initiative in using a blog as a public consultation channel. It is something I have been promoting for sometime and I fully understand the barriers you were up against.
I also think that the original post was confusing as it said that "a group of commissioners did not like that the blog allowed for public criticism of their actions". This made me think that the commissioners were indeed other officers of Metro. In my experience, both as a professional public sector communications consultant and as an elected politician, it is usually officers who are more sensitive to public criticism. Politicians have to live with public criticism every day, officers don't. The reference to "action" confirmed in my mind that commissioners were officers as politicians don't usually have a responsible for implementation which is what it sounded like was meant by "action".
I have nothing but praise for the initiative and would love an opportunity to see more of the detail behind it. It will make an excellent case study for some of the people I am talking to.
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Bob
/ Website
(17.11.05 12:43)
Stuart,
I apologize for my comments. I did not mean to come across so harsh. Two months later, I am still very disappointed by the "death" of our blog. Thank you for continuing the discussion through your blog. We've only seen the beginning of public sector blogging. There is still so much untapped potential.
Kind Regards,
Bob O'Malley
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Jen
/ Website
(17.11.05 14:31)
Thanks for clarifying, Stuart. Both Bob and I are clearly still mourning our loss and may have been a little overly sensitive about the comments. We appreciate you contacting us.
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