Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Trust: Easy to Lose and Hard to Win Back

A new WSJ/NBC News poll finds that Americans trust only two institutions, the military and the tech industry. One WSJ commentator theorizes that the regard for the tech industry stems from less government regulation.
Washington has never created a federal computer commission, nor have state governments mandated which applications must exist in a standard smart phone. Without such interference, consumers have been largely free to choose the products and services they want, and producers have been largely free to supply them.
Your humble observer doesn't agree with his analysis.

Established institutions have a mission and a code of ethics. The public trusts those institutions which have shown that they adhere to both; the strongest evidence of sincerity is the punishment and/or casting out of individuals who violate the institutional codes. Saul Alinsky's 4th rule is insightful:
Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.
The Internal Revenue Service, news organizations, and churches are examples of institutions that not only failed to self-police but tried to cover up mistakes and malfeasance.

With regard to the military, it took generations of hard work and leadership after Vietnam, as well as successes in the field of battle, to reverse the public's negative perceptions.

The tech industry's high standing, IMHO, is based upon:
  • a long, consistent history of generating innovative products
  • the most successful individuals (e.g., Gates, Jobs, Zuckerberg, Brin & Page) convincing everyone that their wealth is a by-product, not the goal of their efforts. They do this through philanthropy and by continuing to work harder than everyone else long after they made their $billions.
  • the absence of scandal and "evil" behavior (so far). If the tech industry continues to be seen as eroding privacy, however, look for the industry's high standing to vanish. © 2014 Stephen Yuen
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