The Construct

I really admire how Hyundai made a killing in the US market mostly through clever marketing techniques. Offer a buyback option without impact on credit score to car buyers who are to lose jobs after the purchase during the recession? Gutsy and risky for the company but it worked and whoever thought of that can now be regarded as genius.

Some people call it “anxiety” marketing and who doesn’t want to place themselves on the safe side when it comes to big purchases? I would. Heck, even I would consider getting a Hyundai with that kind of deal even if I’m all for Japanese cars.

Anxiety marketing is about placing the buyer in a “no-worries” mentality. Worked pretty well during the height of US recession. While most companies try to do that through hyping on product benefits and brand loyalty, long-term money-back guarantees, credit score security, and the chance to get out of obligations look much more appealing.

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Details. Details. Details. Can’t emphasize this enough. A few of my acquaintances who have just recently graduated are wondering why getting a job suddenly became so tough compared to how graduates from last year had it. Well, for one, the global economy is really shot. Most multinationals (the biggest employers in the country) have frozen their hiring leaving a lot more people to compete with a few positions across industries.

However, one X factors to getting jobs is how an applicant presents himself or herself. Here’s a reality that you really have to consider. You might be good and quite competent, however, the odds are that there are other good people around, probably just as good or even better than you. Don’t let your school, degree, or honors be a guarantee that you’re the fastest gun in the west and that you have to be paid top dollar.

With the financial crisis sending even the best people in other industries back to the job market, companies can hire people who have three times the knowledge and experience at the say pay grade. At the end of the day, the it’s the person who can make compromises and position himself or herself as of the most and best value to the company who will get the job.

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Just finished reading The Bro Code by “Barney Stinson” and what a fun read that was. Too bad, most of the provisions doesn’t really apply to my current lifestyle since, as far as predicaments go, I’m more of a Marshall (sans the law thing and the height) than a Ted or Barney.

But as far as the for-the-Bros articles are concerned, I think I’m a pretty good Bro. Some lapses here and there, but I do meet most of the conditions in general. I’m a pretty supportive, Bro. Too bad I think I’ll be a useless wingman.

Oh and here’s an amusing one:

It is unacceptable for two Bros to share a hotel bed without first exhausting all couch, cot, and pillows-on-floor combinations. If it’s unavoidable, they shall prevent any incidental spoonage by arm wrestling* to determine who sleeps under the covers. Once decided each Bro shall don as many lower layers as possible before silently fist bumping the other good night.

Hehehe… Reminds me of something from a little over a year ago. The image of two bros spooning will forever haunt me.

As far as organizational communication goes, this is one question that many a communicator should always take into account. Place oneself into the target audience’s shoes and ask, “What’s in it for me?”

Whenever I teach business communication, the part on which I give most emphasis always is communication planning and audience analysis. The problem with some writing manuals is that they prescribe the “best” formats and step-by-step processes failing to take into account the various communicative contexts.

For example, many writing manuals would prescribe the up-front format – a brief and concise format that begins with the summary of the message. While this does work effectively in most business organizations, I have observed that some more traditional organizations would prefer a more academic format – the one with the typical intro-body-conclusion structure. It’s always a choice on what format would probably better suit specific contexts.

Everyone in the organization has his or her own politics to consider. The simple existence of management and subordinates and yes-men and rebels in organizations are a testament to that. It often hard to identify these from an outsider’s perspective. However, for internal communication, one can have a fairly easy time through continuous observation.

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Globelines Broadband subscribers are really pissed off. Many of them are threatening to jump ship and not at all threatened by the lock-in clause. If only class action lawsuits aren’t that foreign in this country, I’m pretty sure that Innove/Globelines would be facing one right now.

Rumor has it that Globelines will be making a statement by tomorrow and I’m one who’ll be anticipating what that news will be. Are they really placing a cap on P2P download volumes and throttling our speeds?

One issue that I am really curious about is Innove/Globeline’s business case for throttling bandwidth. What’s the point in sneaking this provision in the new subscriber’s service agreement. This just makes me rethink the basic ideas regarding business (and reminiscing my days as a management trainee reading Drucker).

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