#396 Public Perception and Leadership

Public Perception and Leadership

Actions and consequences

Managers are often exposed to the public perception of their actions.

Extraversion is often more prevalent among them than introversion. This means that managers' actions quickly become visible to the general public. They are quickly disseminated through social media, with negative behaviour often reaching the general public more quickly. Managers' actions are always placed in the context of the organisation. Conclusions about values, guidelines, and the moral compass are drawn just as quickly. The question of how to deal with this often arises, especially when behavioural patterns are negative in nature.

What external impact do managers' actions have?

Actions

There are numerous examples where managers have caused major problems for the organisation through their actions. Gerald Ratner, CEO of the Ratner Group, described his own company's products as 'total crap' at a meeting at the Institute of Directors. Although it was probably meant as a joke, the company was ruined by the statement. Ratner was fired, and the company was sold and renamed to clearly distance itself from the statement made by its own CEO. Travis Kalanick, then CEO of UBER, was shown verbally attacking drivers whilst establishing a toxic corporate culture. The #DeleteUber campaign followed, and the CEO was removed from the company due to the severe damage created. John Schnatter, CEO of the international pizza chain Papa John's, made racist comments. Dismissal, company damage and an image that has still not fully recovered are the consequences. Adam Neumann, CEO of WeWork, stood out above all for his luxurious lifestyle, which he openly displayed on social media. The company, on the other hand, was not doing well at all. The IPO failed, Neumann had to leave the company, and WeWork filed for bankruptcy. Oscar Munoz, CEO of United Airlines, defended the forcible removal of a passenger with a valid ticket from the aircraft to transport his staff. This action resulted in one billion dollars of damage to the share price and an out-of-court settlement with that passenger. United Airlines suffered massive damage only shortly before as the song 'United breaks guitars' went viral. Until then, however, the learning curve seemed to be relatively flat. Elon Musk has a negative reputation in many contexts. He has led the value of X, formerly Twitter, to a fraction of its purchase value. As CEO and advisor under Trump, he made a gesture with his right arm raised that was interpreted by the people as a right-wing extremist Hitler salute. Tesla's sales figures have been in free fall ever since, with the long-term outcome still unclear.

Consequences

In principle, the presumption of innocence applies. Every person is entitled to this at all times, everywhere and without exception. If you think that you have not committed any wrongdoing, say so and prove it. You do not have to expose yourself to an arbitrarily angry mob. Reversing the burden of proof is also unacceptable. Always consider the available facts for every action on your part.

However, if unacceptable behaviour by one of your leaders occurs, there are clear instructions that must be followed. Avoid portraying yourself as a victim. If you believe that supposedly nobody is allowed to say anything today, if you believe that people have become too sensitive, if you believe that you can throw around the word 'woke' as a pejorative, you will achieve the opposite of what you want to achieve. Similarly, avoid saying that the public has overreacted. Denying an emotion without factual evidence will cause escalation, not de-escalation. It is equally fatal if you talk but do not act. Announcing consequences without implementing them prolongs the scandal and also prolongs the negative consequences.

You must act immediately; personal consequences are often imperative here. Check comprehensively and quickly whether the behaviour shown can still be corrected or whether it allows clear conclusions about views, beliefs and values. If this is the case, compare the actions shown with the organisation's values. If these have been massively violated, the manager is no longer tenable, and removal from the position is unavoidable. If you set standards that are different for managers than for employees, your organisation and every manager within it will lose credibility across the board. Accordingly, social delegitimisation takes place. Employees then see values as lip service and will no longer follow your company's leaders. This aspect also results in staff turnover and a correspondingly negative image. Instead, accompanying measures should be taken to repair the damage and restore the credibility of the management level.

Optimisation

Have your managers professionally trained in rhetoric and presentation skills to prevent such escalations. Regular professional media training is also essential. If you think you can do media training once, you are mistaken. The media landscape is becoming more complex. There is economic pressure on media outlets, and the next big story, as well as the one often clicked on online, better comes along today than tomorrow. Accordingly, you need to face this landscape with professional training. Annual or at least bi-annual training is essential. Media expertise is not a one-off event. These measures must be supplemented by professional support in an emergency. It is of central importance that you know the values of your managers and compare them with the organisation's values promptly. The greater the delta, the more action needs to be taken.

Conclusion: managers' external impact, led by public perception, is stronger than ever. Check the congruence between your managers' and the organisation's values at an early stage. By doing so, you can ensure an optimal result through professional actions.

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More on this topic in this week's podcast: Apple Podcasts / Spotify

For the podcast transcript, read below.

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Let's have a chat: NB@NB-Networks.com

Contact: Niels Brabandt on LinkedIn

Website: www.NB-Networks.biz

Niels Brabandt is an expert in sustainable leadership with more than 20 years of experience in practice and science.

Niels Brabandt: Professional Training, Speaking, Coaching, Consulting, Mentoring, Project & Interim Management. Event host, MC, moderator.

Podcast Transcript

Niels Brabandt

Leaders and their public perception . You probably remember when you saw a leader and that leader might have had in that moment a public perception . And, no, I do not mean when, Donald, during the Christmas party, your local CEO suddenly started to dance the Macarena during the annual Christmas party . No . That's not the one we're talking about . We're talking about the public perception of massive acts in public . Some action of some leader, some action has a consequence that you didn't expect it will have . And the question is, how do we handle this public perception and how do we train our leaders ? How do we shape our leaders that they are prepared for the world in which we are today ? Let's face it . Many of the leaders like to be in public because for different reasons when you look on leadership levels, you have more extroverted people than you have introverted people . Extroversion is more common amongst leaders than it is introversion which comes with a price tag . When you see that extroversion, you often see that certain actions suddenly end on social media, they get shared on social media, and suddenly you have a huge outreach, however, not an outreach you actually wanted to have . And every single of these actions of that leader is put into the context of your organization . People will connect the leader's action with the organization, the corporation, the brand, all the brands if you have more than one of your corporation . So when any kind of action has a consequence in public, how do we deal with that ? How do we deal with actions of leaders, leaders actions, and the public perception ? And I just give you a couple of examples of how leaders actions had massive impact on organizations performance . We start with a classic one, Gerald Ratner in The UK, Owner and leader of the Ratner Group . He is selling low cost jewelry . It's quite a number of years ago, a bit more than two decades . But it was fancy jewelry when you look at them . It was a jewelry people like to have . And when he sat at a meeting at the Institute of Directors and he said, many people might wonder, how can we sell a glass dish and a crystal glass for less than a tenner or for $6.95 British pound back in the day, so roughly $10, a bit less, actually . And people were like, yeah . How how do you actually do that ? And then Gerald Ratner said, and I think he wanted to I think he wanted to tell a joke by saying that . He said, well, we can do that because it's total crap . That these were his words, word by word statements . So he openly said, we are selling you very low cost material, basically garbage . And the the consequences of that was the downfall of the whole company . Sales went down . Gerald Ratner had to leave . The whole activity is now known as doing a Ratner . So it's it's it's a whole idiom now . People now connect that name . The whole company, by the way, then was purchased and rebranded because anyone connected Ratner Ratna with low and cheap products that no one wants to have and a leader who obviously doesn't stand by their values . So the whole company collapsed after just one short phrase, and that phrase had basically because it is total crap five words . Five words and the downfall of a whole company . And when you think, well, things can happen, you know, this is the one of a kind experience that some people might have, the good the good old urban legend that we will tell for for centuries to come . But today, this is different . Yes, it's different, but not as you think . If we I I I will give you a couple of other examples here . Travis Kalanick from Uber, he implemented a very toxic corporate culture, including talking down to Uber drivers themselves . And, by the way, these are the people who drive your product, who bring your product out there . And when this got to public because someone filmed it, then not only did Travis Kalanick need to leave as the CEO of the company, there was a massive damage to the whole brand . There was a whole action, where people had the hashtag delete Uber, don't use the app, etcetera etcetera . Massive investment to prevent the negative image to sustain . Uber today is doing way better . However, still, we see that it took years and years to recover from that story because one leader misbehaved or showed misconduct . John Schnatter from Papa John's . It's a pizza chain that some people even know in Europe now . They are usually more in The US, but they are now a global brand . After racist statements, the CEO of Papa John's, John Schnatter, had to be fired . And, of course, people questioned the values . And Papa John's for a long time was known as the Donald Trump or the old rye pizza or whatnot . And even today, in my opinion, at least for me, it does it it has not recovered . Do I go to Papa John's ? No . I will probably enter that store when I have to choose between either starving or eat that because for me, it was not too credible . It felt it always to me, that's just a personal opinion, always felt they were more sorry about being called out than actually being sorry about what this person did . And we have more examples . Adam and Adam Noi and Adam Noieman from WeWork . And you know might think, well, is this WeWork some business ? So first, yes, they are . His very extravaganza lifestyle, which he put on public, on public display on Instagram, especially, or on TikTok . And by the way, I want to put my industry here as well . When you when when you look at what certain trainers, speakers, coaches do on Instagram with the oh, look at my house, look at my car, look at my Learjet, look at my business suit, look at look at my business lounge where I'm waiting for my business class flight and you pay all this . So first, I would strongly recommend do not work with anyone who does that . Second, they are nowhere near as wealthy as they pretend . And third, all of these people became very quiet during COVID because they were usually bankrupt . So what happened here after Adam Neumann put all of that online, people questioned if he's dealing well with the company's finances . Turns out he does not . He was fired . The IPO, the initial private offering, the taking the brand to the stock exchange market failed completely, and it ended, as we all know, with WeWorked filing for bankruptcy . They are now kinda trying to come back . You still see WeWork here and then . Let's see how their story continues from here . And there's even more . Oscar Munoz from United Airlines, CEO of a large international airline . Maybe you remember when they had this moment where they wanted to make passengers leave a certain plane because they wanted to have their flight attendants who needed to get somewhere to get on that plane . And they offered money to certain people, couple of people left, but but enough people left . And then they started to raffle who now had to leave the plane despite having a fully paid ticket . And what happened then was the passenger that was raffled, refused to leave, and he was dragged violently off the plane by security . All that went on social media and the CEO of Oscar Munoz in Munoz in in the beginning defended that action . Result, 1,000,000,000 loss on the stock exchange market within less than a week . Congratulations for that . Usually can't burn a billion that quickly if you try to . Massive PI disaster . Took years for United to recover . And when people say above and beyond with United Airlines, anyone comes up with either that story or United breaks guitars . That's another story where they didn't act too well . So you see that these misconducts often by senior leadership has has massive consequences . And by the way, you're all waiting for that name now . I know it . Elon Musk . Of course, from Tesla and SpaceX . The gesture he made where he said, oh, my heart goes out to you pretending it's not a Hitler greeting . No one in Europe purchased . No one in Europe bought into that that story . And by the way, purchasing now, the purchasing numbers of Tesla are in free fall . The the company x, formerly Twitter, already is in free fall with its value, but that's an ongoing story for years already since, Musk took over . And now the next thing is Tesla . When you look at different companies and different countries in which they are acting at the moment, you have slight, slight sales going down roughly 10% in The UK . In other countries like like France, way more than half of the sales went down . In Germany, a business owner received public praise because he put a video online where he says, I'm now giving back my Tesla even before I purchased them . I know I'm gonna make a loss on them, but it just doesn't align with my company's values . So that's how you act when someone puts their right arm straight up pretending that it's not a Hitler greeting and no one's gonna believe that anyway . So this massive impact, always based on public perception, needs to be dealt with . So what are the consequences we have to take from here ? How do we deal with this ? So first, and that is the foundation principle . Anyone, every single person has the right to the assumption of innocence . So when you have a certain public thing going on, when you see something in public happening and you say we haven't done anything wrong here and we we we we pretty much either either we can prove that we haven't done anything wrong or there isn't proof that we have done anything wrong, it's just chit chat . You have the right to stick to that . When you say, hey . We haven't done anything wrong . Make your statement and say, all not true . Goodbye . That is your right . And anyone who tells you you have to defend yourself against unsubstantiated claims, that's, of course, straightforward nonsense . So when you have to when by the way, when anyone claims you have to defend yourself against unsubstantiated nonsense, that abolishes a basic principle of democracy, and that's the assumption of innocence . And anyone is entitled to the assumption of innocence, no exception . However, when you see that obviously something went wrong, giving you the example, when you raise your hand straight right right arm straight up, just do a Google search . Google picture search will will tell you what kind of gesture you you did there . If it's intentional on that, not . You have to deal with it because you will be found guilty of it by evidence . Not by hearsay evidence, but by relevant existing hard evidence . Very important is there are a couple of common mistakes . So what's wrong is that you say, oh, no one is allowed to say anything anymore, everyone is just offended, they are all left wing lunatic woke people, all of that kind of chitchat basically just means you just don't like to be called out . You don't want to admit that you did anything wrong . However, anyone knows that you know you've done something wrong, but you just don't like to be held accountable . That will never go down well with the general public, so refrain from doing that . As soon as someone screams left wing, woah, blah blah blah, all of that doesn't lead to anything . Second, when you tell the public that they overreacted because what you do here is you tell people your emotion is wrong . And when you do when you tell people an emotion is wrong, they most likely will not say, oh, thank you very much for telling me . I will accept that . So be sure that you do not do that either . Third one, please do not do the following, speak but don't act . Oh, yeah . We're gonna take care of it and then nothing happens . So people will very quickly see that when you just try to get away with it, you talk about it, but you do not show any kind of consequences . That, of course, is not possible . How to do it better ? First, you have to act, and often this acting acting comes with a personal consequence . Quite often, leaders have to leave their position . I give you a very simple example . Martin Winterkorn, former Volkswagen CEO, he didn't personally build in that device that switched on and off when the car tried to fake the emission numbers and bring them where they actually should be . It was not built in by the CEO . However, the CEO is the leader of the whole company . And when your people in your organization do such a criminal thing, then you are accountable for that as well, responsible and accountable . So Martin Winterkorn had to leave . First, he didn't want to, but then public pressure became too big, so he resigned . Second, you always have to see and check . Is the action that was committed still, let's say, changeable ? Can we turn I don't I don't wanna say, can we turn times back ? But can we turn things in a way without using spin doctors, by the way, without trying to just tweak things ? Can we still say, hey . It was wrong, but we educate the person . It's not gonna happen again . There's a very important point here . Certain actions can be corrected . However, when people are convinced of what they do and they and they show a certain mindset, they show a certain opinion . They show a certain they show a a shirt, a a certain kind of pattern . When that happens, when when people have a certain belief, then you have to take action . If someone raises their right arm up and that looks like a straightforward Nazi gesture, a Hitler greeting, and you say, oh, it's just fun, isn't it ? Wasn't meant that way . No . That that's not how things work . Very important is when someone shows certain beliefs, certain points of view, you have to compare, are these compatible with the organization's values ? And if they are not, this person has to go . And of course, third, you have to hire and use professionals to accompany everything you do from here . And I know that often people say, oh, I heard one of these communication agencies, and they wanted to charge me more than €500 dollars British pound per hour . Some of them even more . Yeah . Of course . What did you think ? They will charge you exactly the same as your prestigious law firm because they help you to not end up as a complete disaster with your brand, your organization, and your people . So be aware that they help massively, and when they are when they are massively helpful, there's a massive pay included with that as well . So how can you now, of course, optimize things that you do not end up in that situation in the first place ? So first, you need to professionally train your people regarding rhetorics, presentation, any kind of public speaking . If you need help with that, please let me know . I'm happy to help with that . I'm doing it for more than twenty years . But you cannot just let people off the hook, off the chain, and say it will go well somehow . No . It won't . And second, leaders need professional media training, and media training means delivered by professionals . I give you an example . For example, I'm part of the Claperton team, and Guy Claperton is a very senior, very experienced, very professional media expert in The UK, one of the leading ones in the whole country or in whole Europe, if not worldwide . And he delivers media training to senior executives and important people who now know how to deal with the press . And by the way, when you say something like, oh, I already had my media training, it depends on how long it is ago . Media training, in my opinion, should be given either once a year or at least biannually . Every other year, you should have media training . And the reason is very simple . The media landscape changes . Often, media outlets are owned by investors, and these investors are in for the money . And they say bring me the story . So it's getting tougher and tougher and tougher every single year . People want the story and they will get it out of you if you only drop one single line that is not coherent or might be attacked in one way or the other . So you better update your media training annually or every other year . By the way, if if you need contacts here, I can get you in contact with him by directly . Let me know if you need any kind of help here . In addition to that, of course, you need you always need to have professionals accompanying people, coaching them, helping them on the way to getting there because you always have full time people who do this do who who do nothing else than professional communication with the press and the media landscape today . And be sure that you use them and be sure that you tell your leaders and executives that they cannot hesitate to use them . You need to use them . There's no question if the question is only when do you use it . However, the most important aspect here is you need to know the belief system of your leaders and executives early . And then you have to compare their belief system, their values, what they think, and and and the values they have that guides their their actions, you have to compare that with your organizational values, with your organization's values . And by the way, when there's no congruency, when they are not the same, and when there's quite a big delta between them, you need to have different people in place . You cannot keep a leader where you say, well, you know, it's, bit of an outdated person, but they bring in good money . I can tell you how this ends . We have this with a Bavarian conservative party on national television in Germany, where one person said, oh, immigration, and then they went on about immigration . And then someone asked, what about Roberto Blanco ? And Roberto Blanco is someone who immigrated to Germany, today sings German Schlager, and is a black singer . And then the conservative MP said, oh, yes . Roberto Blanco has always been a good and then dropped the n word on national television . It was later justified with, oh, yes . You know, I'm from a different generation . No one was offended back then . This is the moment why you have in The UK this term or this idiom, do you need a shovel ? Because you're already deep in a hole and you're digging deeper and deeper and deeper, but every phrase that you say, every statement you make makes it worse . And that's why you need professional coaches next to you at the moment of crisis . And there needs to be a predefined plan when do you use them . Taking all this together, summing it up, the public perception of leaders actions is more present than ever before . The landscape becomes tighter by the minute . Check very well the congruency between your leaders values and the organization values, the organizational values, the organization's values, and check for any kind of delta as early as you can and take actions accordingly . And if you do what we just discussed here, then everything will be just fine . I wish you all the best doing so, but when you now say, woah . This is, this is complicated, isn't it ? Yeah . It might be . It might be indeed . So very important is if you have any kind of questions, feel free to contact me . It doesn't matter if you just want to have a question answered or if you say, hey . We need a training, a coaching, a speaking gig, or whatever else . Every kind of contact is and any means of contact is mentioned in the show notes of this podcast . So below this podcast, you see my email address . It's nb@nb-networks.com . You see my LinkedIn . Feel free to connect with me on there and text me there as well . And, of course, you see my website nb-networks.biz . There you also find the transcript of this podcast . The second aspect which I always recommend is join us for the leadership letter because we have live sessions and they are free of charge for our listeners and for our readers . So go to expert.nbay-networks.com . Once you've been there, you can enter your email address there and then feel free to sign up . You receive only one email every Wednesday morning . It's a % content at free guarantee . You get free access to all the podcasts, no paywall, free access to every single article, no paywall, all for free at no charge, and you get the date and the time for the next live session including the direct access link to join us for the online session . I'm looking forward to seeing you there . The third aspect, however, is the most important one . Apply, apply, apply what you heard in this podcast because only when you apply what you heard, you will see the positive impact that you obviously want to see in your organization . If you need any kind of help, let me know . Feel free to contact me anytime . I answer every single of my message within twenty four hours or less, so I'm looking forward to hearing from you . And at the end of at the end of this podcast, there's only one thing left for me to say . Thank you very much for your time .