Sunday morning’s Tsunami warnings, following the massive earthquake in Chile, were covered extensively in broadcast media at the time and most people were probably informed by the time the event reached our shores.

However while our civil defence authorities may be congratulating themselves on a job well done when an emergency didn’t eventuate, a full emergency is the real test and is likely to have exposed some serious communications deficiencies.

If loss of life is to be avoided in a real emergency, particularly if precious hours are available to make warnings, clear and concise information is crucial. On Sunday morning, if a serious tsunami had occurred, I believe that it’s inevitable that a lack of relevant, localised information would have contributed to a loss of life.

Let’s consider what most peoples’ concerns would have been on Sunday morning?

1. Was there a threat of a tsunami in my area and how serious was the danger?
2. When and where was the danger likely to occur?
3. What should I be doing, if anything, as a result of the possible danger?
4. Where is the official place I should go to get information that is completely reliable and not just a reporter’s musings?

On Sunday morning, Civil Defence’s reliance on traditional broadcast media could not adequately deliver answers to these questions, when it’s commonly accepted among communications professionals that the internet is the ideal medium for such circumstances. Yet it is inexplicable that our Civil Defence authorities have yet to develop an adequate communications strategy that uses the internet fully and more centrally in such emergencies.

At no point while I was listening to Radio New Zealand National or, television bulletins on TV One later in the morning, was I directed to the Civil Defence website, which I only discovered to be the ‘official’ information site once I’d searched for it on Google. And by the time I did find the website, it failed to deliver sufficient quality information to satisfy my needs if a serious tsunami was about to occur.

Traditional broadcast media’s deficiencies in an emergency are obvious. Newspaper reports are generally at least a day late and while television and radio can broadcast highly current information, the format does not deliver in a manner that gives useful information when needed.

Broadcast media simply doesn’t have the ability to give people emergency information that is precisely relevant to their urgent needs. Instead on Sunday morning, if I listened for long enough, I received periodic reports about the level of danger and some generalised local reports. But mostly listeners were subjected to irrelevant stories to fill the space about campers evacuating a camping ground north of Auckland, or people still fishing off a beach in Dunedin.

So what should broadcast media be doing? It should confine itself to reporting only essential information relevant to the emergency and constantly repeat the Civil Defence website address where viewers and listeners could be directed to local and relevant content.

And what of the rest of Civil Defence’s web strategy. My Google search using the word “tsunami” failed to bring up the Civil Defence website on the first page, when it should have been presented at the top of every relevant search. And once the website was found, the information presented was seriously inadequate for the purposes of any citizen action.

On Sunday, no one in New Zealand died from the tsunami, but once again we have been warned. My hope is that our Civil Defence authorities don’t tell themselves that they did a good job when they should be learning the lessons the rest of the world has – to harness the power and speed of the internet and to properly coordinate it with other media. Your life might be at stake.

The teacher unions are forming up for a fight over National Standards with the primary teachers union (NZEI) claiming that they are untested and the process has lacked consultation – see campaign site.

Against this backdrop, the Prime Minister came out swinging yesterday with a threat to sack boards and trustees who refuse to introduce the policy – see Stuff.

The government also announced a $200,000 information campaign on National Standards, apparently targeting parents.

I’ll leave the pros-and-cons of National Standards to others, but the question about the government’s communications plan is interesting.

Of course successive governments have used tax payer money to promote their programmes. Opposition parties, including National many times between 1999 and 2008, often accused the government of political propagandizing. Now Phil Goff is accusing this government of the same.

It is a nonsense to say that governments should not sensibly spend money on promoting government programmes, if it means that people gain an understanding of what the programmes are about. Equally, campaigns to assist people avoid injury or access services are useful, although there can be some debate about the extent of it in this country.

In this case the motive for the government seems different. Firstly, there has been a build up of fairly serious opposition to the government’s plan from many educational experts, parents, principals and teachers. Secondly, the government appears to have hastily cobbled together a campaign which simply looks like a reaction to the building opposition.

If the government had simply wished to inform everyone about the proposal, it would have been planned long ago as part of a process of consultation and implementation. Instead it’s a reactive response, expressly targeting parents with the obvious intension of winning the public debate.

Imagine if, on the other hand, the government had the buy-in and support of most teachers and education experts. That would provide a sound platform for communicating useful information about the programme where no one should quibble about spending a million dollars or more! As it stands however, they’re spending a mere $200,000 of tax payer money, which probably buys them a public relations consultant and a few leaflets!

But that’s what happens when you’re under attack and forced to respond.

I know that I’ve entered into a completely new era when I notice that for the first time in my life, I’m older than the Prime Minister of New Zealand and the President of the United States. Actually, it’s ancient news because it’s been over 12 months since Helen and George W’s departures.

Yes, I’ve grown up with the idea that we have leaders who are smart because they’re older and wiser than the rest of us.

It seems that so many myths are evaporating in today’s world that it has become difficult to know what to trust and what not to trust. We live in an age where everyone wants to know – and can discover – how everything is done and made. So many of us give ourselves the licence to know all we need about our own health, our kids’ education and the rubbish collection.

In the world that I inhabit, I’ve been a working professional for more than 30 years in communications where the creator of a message has had considerable control over all aspects of the message. But unfortunately, the communication was largely only in the hands of those who could afford to own it and the communications were in one direction.

But thankfully that has now changed. Anyone can have access to media channels that allow huge opportunities to promote ideas and issues, and have conversations about those ideas and issues. It’s empowering for individuals and for those who are more community minded about things.

The phenomenon that is ‘social media’ is demonstrating that communicators (read that as ‘everyone’) need to abandon the power-and-control model and enter into the world of conversations that is revolutionising community, business and personal life.

Don’t just take my word for it, the evidence is everywhere – one of the many blogs I follow is by Jeremiah Owyang, a Silicon Valley social media ‘guru. He and many others are not merely evangelists, they’re proving over and over that the benefits of this social revolution is here to stay.

So roll on the ‘conversation age’. I wonder if George W Bush is on Facebook? I’ll check right now!

The plight of struggling charities has bugged me for some time.

In 2001 I was asked by the then mayor of Hutt City, John Terris, to attend an all-day meeting with a local childrens and families charity. John called the meeting of business people who he thought could brainstorm ideas to assist the charity through some tough financial times.

In a nutshell the problem went like this; the charity relied heavily on contestable government funding to stay afloat. But at best this funding would always leave a significant short-fall, so the organisation needed a top-up from the community or other sources.

Add to this scenario the escalating demand for the charity’s precious services, together with a diminishing ability by the community to commit voluntary support, the picture was grim.

The good news however was that the meeting of business people and charity officials worked out a way to rescue the organistion through its immediate dilemma. But the longer term problems remained largely unresolved.

The sad news for charities almost 10 years later is that little has changed, except that the demands on charitable services have increased, and the resourcing issues remain as difficult as ever.

One of the key lessons for me from the 2001 meeting was the benefit that can be derived from bringing community skills to the table that are often freely available. After all, those involved at the coalface of charities are often not accustomed to working with strategic planning and money matters.

But there are other key areas where it’s clear that charities and all not-for-profit organisations can profit. The internet is now one of the most valuable resources available for communicating, building support, organising and fundraising.  But it still needs an appreciation of the opportunities, the online tools and the skills to use them.

That’s part of the reason at FRESCO we’ve developed Issues.co.nz as a free resource to help charities with these very things.

Maybe John Terris’s inspired request can still have longer term benefits.

Prince Philip is a grumpy old man and frequently the laughing stock of those who appreciate a tosser who’s always ‘two steps behind’.

But the man did have a point when he recently told of getting his grandchildren to programme his TV.

He apparently said: “To work out how to operate a TV set you practically have to make love to the thing. They put the TV controls on the bottom so you have to lie on the floor, and then if you wanted to record something the recorder was underneath, so you ended up lying on the floor with a torch in your teeth, a magnifying glass and an instruction book.”

The 88-year-old gent was laughed at by most media accounts I saw, but he was clearly lashing out at the design of modern televisions, claiming they are too hard to use.

We all know people who communicate so that no-one can understand what on earth they are saying. In individuals I’ve assumed it has something to do with the mixed-communicator’s perverse need to control relationships or attract attention to themselves, even if only for petty scorn. The mentality seems to be; if others are set up to fail because they’re confused, you can be the winner.

But why is it that so much commercial communication is incomprehensible – text in a brochure that’s eye-strain small or graphics that scramble the brain? And why is it almost impossible to tell the difference between the ‘shampoo’ and the ‘conditioner’ when standing in the shower with soap in your eyes?

I’m sure that the answer is not a perverse one. Communication that doesn’t communicate clearly is bad communication and it results from a lack of care and judgement.

Grumpy old men complain about nearly everything, but in this case, Prince Philip communicated with great clarity.

In a future post I’ll raise another issue on the subject of loony communication – billboards.