Rob Paterson is writing about this week's sessions at the Public Media Conference 2007. This compelling insight is from a post about a two-day pre-conference meeting for public broadcasting CEOs:
... For me, motive and hope is the key to change. As Alan Deutschman shows us in Change or Die, being told you are going to die - the substance of much of what we heard in the last 2 days - is not the great activator for change that we think it may be. 90% of seriously at risk patients do not act on their doctor's advice. ¶ So why don't we change, even if we know that if we don't we will die? To make a big change - to think web versus terrestrial, to think collaboration versus me alone - often means to change our identity. If our identity and our personal story is attached to these things, then in 90% of the time we would rather die than change the identity that we had come to rely on. We martyr ourselves for this identity. This is what is the real barrier. ...
And then:
... Ideas do not change us. Only experience changes us. Changing experience has to be deep and repetitive to change the habits of a career. ...
Link: Rob Paterson's Weblog.
In a later post, Hyperlocal - Saving the World, Rob addresses mission directly:
One of the powerful trends that I am witnessing is the growing recognition in Public radio and TV that There is a huge opportunity for public media to secure a viable future by serving the hyper local community. I will post more later about what I have seen and heard about how this can be done for very little money. Please take it on faith for now that the how is now known. ¶ The big idea is that in a hyper linked global world - the hyper local becomes the most important place. If the 20th century was about nationalism and the nation statee. The 21st will have to be about a shift in power back to the small local community.
Link: Robert Paterson's Weblog. Bingo. While we're all scrambling to see how we can make money on the web, mostly by monetizing repurposed legacy programs in new ways (and there are ways to do that), the truth is that the real power of the web is to help us be more significant institutions in our community. It's way better than our time-limited hit-dependent broadcast delivery. For non-profits, it's about mission. Show me the money! the mission (and the money will take care of itself). --Dennis
Rob's comments certainly are welcome. The "do this or die" message has been working just fine on me -- but that's because my identity is not wrapped up in being a broadcaster. Indeed, my professional life has been aligned with new and disruptive/transformative technologies and, in fact, with jettisoning old technologies and methods on a regular schedule. I've made a life out of learning and changing out the old for the new (perhaps it's become too easy?).
When I've telegraphed (no pun intended) the need for change to my long-time broadcasting colleagues, it has, so far, fallen on deaf ears. I think Rob has the reason pinpointed. I've heard this "fear doesn't motivate" message before, but I hadn't considered it would (naturally) apply in my situation, in public media, in a small/medium market.
Lately I've been toying with the idea of running off to start a parallel public media service that meets the objectives Rob and you, Dennis, point out -- hyper-local service, infused with all the citizen participation powers I can muster on a nonexistent budget. I'm thinking of inviting the help of a few public media veterans, especially as editorial guides.
I'm excited by the potential challenge (if I'm willing to take it on virtually alone), though I wonder about funding and finding the right people to participate and, well, hurting the old public media service I still enjoy to a great degree.
But I have to admit, I came to public media because I wanted to be in a mission-driven organization, I wanted to do something that mattered, that had impact. Instead, my job is, presently, to defend the old fort while opposing armies dig (or digg!) in for a siege. I'm told we're Thinking about the future -- planning our next moves, surveying the landscape, waiting for the right time to execute a new strategy. But I'm not sure I believe that anymore.
Posted by: John Proffitt | Saturday, 24 February 2007 at 14:40