Playmaker's Forum
Preempt
Preempt: PE
Definition
Action that reverses competitive position, giving the player a superior advantage, limiting a rival's ability to exploit a player's weakness, or both. Preempts are usually decisive and swift so as to surprise and disable the competition.
Deniers Preempt the Labelers
June 17, 2009
Global Warming Camps Trade Hardnosed Plays
To say that plays are being run in the debate on global warming is a little like saying there are skinned knees in rugby. It's obvious.
This week's advertising salvo by the free-market NGO Heartland Institute gives us fresh cause to review the influence strategies at play in this full-throated debate on greenhouse gases climate change and the like.
Take note of the Preempt so skillfully employed in the Heartland ad (shown at right or click here). The headline Un...Scientific Method and supporting copy chalk out what Heartland supporters feel is bad science by science-proud proponents of global warming theory. The play is a preempt because bad science is core to the critisisms that have rained down on the global warming doubters from Al Gore to this week's White House climate change report.
The effect of the ad is to claim to be stronger in areas where the rival is thought to be superior.
This is hardball. Heartland's Preempt is an attacking play found at the extreme high-engagement edge of the table of influence strategies. Accordingly the play is high-risk because it forces Heartland to bet its credentials against studied opponents.
What accounts for such pointed playmaking? Consider the corrosive play that is run repeatedly on the doubters of global warming. They've been Labeled as deniers a very hard tag to peel off not only because one who denies must show he or she is not blind to facts but because the denier sound-bite connects so easily to another class of ridiculed doubters -- those who deny the existence of the Holocaust.
The implication that global warming doubters are as irrational and hateful as Holocaust deniers is toxic. But the connection is made not by way of an overt Label by the way but of a more subtle Screen.
The Label is a middle-of-the-road strategy in our table. A simple framing play joined by the likes of the more diplomatic Recast Filter and Screen. But when well-run it has all the power of the most attack-minded stratagem. That's surely what has contributed to Heartland's pugnacious Preempt.
Posted by Alan Kelly
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Ping
Ping: PG
Definition
An oblique reference or suggestion, enabled either by a player's mere presence in a marketplace or its implied interest in topics, ideas, events, and developments.
A Lesson in Pings
June 3, 2009
How a Subtle Play Can Be Very Poweful
A Ping is often the most misunderstood play on The Playmaker's Table. Just because it resides on the left -- hence making it a low engagement play -- doesn't mean it can't be powerful. Case in point...
Using only a Facebook status update Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff this past weekend sparked massive speculation that Salesforce could be reengineering its AppExchange to run standards-based HTML 5 code.
What was Benioff's play? How did he spark such mass speculation?
With a simple Ping : 'Working on salesforce.com's new architecture.'
The lesson is that Pings -- if well run -- can swing the playmaker's pendulum as forcefully as a Bait or a Call Out.
Posted by: John Koval
Photo Credit: idiomsbykids.com
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Call Out
Call Out: CT
Definition
An overt public expression of doubt or concern, usually aimed at a competing person or organization, intended to call into question a flaw in the opponent's position or message set. Call Outs often have a tone of moral authority; they're judgmental and direct.
Challenge
Challenge: CH
Definition
A public appeal, suggestion or demand by a player, designed to mobilize and/or inspire a person, organization or broader constituency to consent or take action. While Challenges may range from timid to caustic, they convey a benefit to the targeted player.
Je t'accuse!
May 18, 2009
Bruni's Play on the Franco-Papal Alliance
French First Lady Carla Bruni Sarkozy stepped on Pope Benedict XVI's Prada's yesterday when she ran a two-part play. Part One was a scathing Call Out on the Catholic Church's position on contraception in Africa. Part Two was a Challenge to the church to evolve on the issue.
In playmaking such aggressive moves are usually countered in one of three ways: (1) They're directly rebuked or (2) They're subtly de-positioned or (3) They're ignored.
How will Benedict XVI respond?
Don't expect him to Call Out the first lady for her comments. Although it might appease conservatives and the clergy he'd likely alienate moderate Catholics--many of whom share Bruni's position.
Instead expect the Pontiff to Pass on confronting the first lady. Benedict is savvy and he understand that if he rebukes her directly the publicity would only vindicate her cause.
The Playmakers think that Benedict will employ surrogates - e.g. the Cardinals and the clergy - to run Condition class plays to minimize her attack and to frame the church's position.
What do you think? Will the Pontiff respond and if so how?
Posted by: John Koval
Photo Credit: The Telegraph
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Deflect
Deflect: DF
Definition
The attempt by a player to divert a rival's attack, either to avoid or minimize its impact. Deflects typically bend - they do not break or significantly alter - an opponent's play action. They are usually run under duress and on-the-fly by a player with inferior resources against a superior threat.
Dumpster Diving America's Cup Style
May 12, 2009
Taking a Page From Ellison's Playbook
Back in 2000, someone from the database giant Oracle was caught sifting through the garbage bins of its rival, Microsoft. When asked by excited reporters about this astonishing, though legal, revelation, CEO Larry Ellison blinked and said, Yeah, so what?
It was vintage Ellison, running a calculated Crazy Ivan, an attacking play found on the Playmaker's Standard Table of Influence Strategies.
Ellison's skills for diffusing scandal may be called upon again as the billionairre's rivals in America's Cup sailing -- a Swiss ownership group called SNG -- have reportedly caught a member of Ellison's BWM Oracle syndicate photographing their super-secret sloops -- a no-no in the arcane world of America's Cup racing and in Switzerland to boot.
The object lesson, we're giddy to blog, is that playmakers abound on water as well as land. Reported by the New York Times yesterday, a spokesman for BWM Oracle tossed a Red Herring onto the public poker table: '[SNG] is once again trying to avoid the Court's clear judgment by making trumped-up allegations that have nothing to do with the matter at hand.' He was referring to legal maneuvers that have punctuated this latest installation of America's Cup lore.
The BWM Oracle surrogate quickly reminded media and Cup followers that, legal observation of competitors is common practice in the America's Cup and other major sporting events." He was referring to the Swiss's recent shadowing of BMW Oracle's speedy new trimaran design a sure threat to the Swiss. Hypocrites the spokesperson was meaning to say.
How did the Swiss counter? Perhaps they'd watched Ellison in 2000. They ran a Crazy Ivan. Yeah so what? After all the viewing of a boat on public waterways is no more illegal than the reading of someone's public trash. It's out there for anyone to see.
And what of the accused a Frenchman named Jean Antoine Bonnaveau? His play was perhaps the most skilled a Lantern to inoculate himself and implicate his employer: "I was officially authorized by my company to carry out this reconnaissance.'
As they say in sailing Bonnaveau might be off the boat but he's no fool and perhaps he'll stay out of jail. The larger question now is what plays will Team Ellison run to keep the Swiss out of the courts.
Post by Alan Kelly
Photo credit: www.fairfieldweekly.com/article.cfm?aid=6787
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Fiat
Fiat: FT
Definition
The declaration of information or demonstration of capability to a marketplace. Fiats are characteristically run without fanfare and rely on the position of the player or the merits of the declaration to shift a competitive dynamic.
Trial Balloon
Trial Balloon: TB
Definition
The preview and testing of preliminary ideas or tentative plans. To reduce a player's exposure, Trial Balloons are often run without attribution to the player or positioned as temporary.
Where are the Playmakers?
April 30, 2009
On Twitter!
What's in a Tweet? Plays.
Where are the Playmaker's? On Twitter.
What are they doing? Running plays.
The playmakers recently presented the preliminary findings of a joint study between The Playmaker's Standard and the Carolina Observatory on Corporate Reputation titled What's in a Tweet: How Corporations Use Twitter for Competitive Advantage. (See attached PDF study on the left.)
The study, presented at the general session of the Society for New Communications Research's NewCommForum in San Francisco, demonstrated how corporations use the social media as a driver of influence and strategy management.
What's are the preliminary findings?
- Condition class plays are prevalent but often not immediately apparent
- Plays embedded in linked articles
- Plays are run through pictures
- Lantern are run preemptively
- Disco allow a company to quickly advance a conversation while maintaining credibility
- Attacking plays appear to be out-of-bounds
- Testing and Luring plays are seldom run
What are the main takeaways?
- The second-by-second conversations of Twitter ARE plays
- Companies can effectively -- and cheaply -- drive competitive advantage through Twitter
- Every play has a counterplay, but these are run sparingly
- Playmaking on Twitter is a careful dance
For the full study presentation, click on the PDF on the left.
Posted by: John Koval and Alan Kelly
Photo Credit: 923now.com
operates.For a complete list of all CSR programs, click here. We challenge you to find a program that's not a Red Herring + Screen.
Posted by: John Koval
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Red Herring
Red Herring: RD
Definition
An action or communique that draws an opponent - usually a competitor - away from its preferred position or intended course of action.
Screen
Screen: SN
Definition
The attempt by a player to borrow issues, ideas, events, or other symbolic references to advance its agenda or thwart a competitor's movements.
The Plays of Corporate Social Responsibility
April 15, 2009
Aren't They All Red Herrings + Screens?
The playmaker's have long suspected that all - or if not all, than 99% - of CSR (corporate social responsibility) programs are Red Herring + Screen plays. For the sake of brevity, we will use the example of Exxon-Mobil in this post (although we've listed at the bottom of the post other CSR programs) that fit this mold.
In this case, Exxon-Mobil Partner with professional golfer Phil Mickelson and his wife Amy to form the Exxon-Mobil Teacher's Academy. (Click here to view the TV-commercial. To note: Exxon has not posted the commerical to YouTube, ostensibly to avoid a repeat of the General Motors Chevy Tahoe CSR TV-commerical debacle.)
The goal of the academy is to provide third-through fifth-grade teachers with the knowledge and skills necessary to motivate students to pursue careers in science and math. The inferred purpose is to inspire students to become the engineers, mathematicians and scientists of tomorrow.
A noble cause, right? Of course.
But the question is 'why': Why does Exxon need to donate millions to Phil's academy? What's the strategy - or more appropriately, the influence strategy - behind Exxon's move?
To understand why, one has to consider the average day at Exxon. The company faces attacks from myriad parties on multiple fronts (see Influence Strategy Map How Exxon Plays PR Dodgeball.) In effect, Exxon's CSR strategy is to bend, blunt and flip its critics' arguments. Sponsoring the Exxon-Mobil Teacher's Academy is one avenue through which it accomplishes this objective and gains competitive advantage in the marketplace of public opinion.
What about the Screen ? In Exxon's case, it's natural to associate with math and science when the bulk of its company is made up of engineers and scientists. Hence, Exxon lends its credibility to a cause that fits its corporate image.
Voila! A CSR program. A textbook Red Herring + Screen ! Do you agree?
Other Red Herring + Screen CSR Programs:
Starbucks
- Diverts criticism from those who claim its exploits the profits and labor of those from tea and coffee growing regions by supporting various charities that operate in these regions.
Hilton Hotels
- Diverts criticism that it's a polluter by belonging to various Green Building Initiatives.
IBM
- Among many that it supports IBM diverts criticism by supporting green causes and socioeconomic development programs that operate in many of the areas where it operates.
Gap
- Stops criticism before it starts by actively supporting public health and prevention programs in the textile producing and manufacturing countries where it operates.
For a complete list of all CSR programs click here. We challenge you to find a program that's not a Red Herring + Screen.
Posted by: John Koval
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Label
Label: LB
Definition
A word or phrase - self-given by a player or attributed to an opponent - that reshapes or deepens the meaning of the recipient's position, brand, or reputation. A Label, typically rooted in symbols and metaphors, is characterized by simplification, alliteration, and other semantic tricks.
Lantern
Lantern: LN
Definition
The deliberate and preemptive disclosure by a player of its own flaw, mistake, or some source of potential embarrassment or controversy.
Setting Expectations
March 31, 2009
Coach Cal Uses the Lantern to Innoculate Himself
Having witnessed three predecessors not live up to the University of Kentucky's high expecations, newly arrived coach John Calipari was quick to employ the Lantern as a strategy to set expectations and freeze UK's tough fans and boosters. 'I'm not the grand poobah or the emperor,' said Calipari during his introductory press conference.
The jovial Calipari -- hailed as a great fit at UK for his ability to schmooze with fans, students, boosters and media -- ran a fair set of plays from the Frame sub-class during his introductory press conference. He Label Kentucky as a 'storied program;' Screen its past successes and the state's blue grass; and self- Labeled his own emotions as 'humble and excited.'
We know that Calipari runs great defensive plays on the court, but we really can't wait to see how he runs defensive plays off of it. How will he respond to the inevitable Call Out on his coaching ability when he makes his first mistake? Get ready to watch him run Recast and Bear Hug when dealing with UK's over-expectant fans.
Posted by: John Koval
Photo Credit: espn.com
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Preempt
Preempt: PE
Definition
Action that reverses competitive position, giving the player a superior advantage, limiting a rival's ability to exploit a player's weakness, or both. Preempts are usually decisive and swift so as to surprise and disable the competition.
Screen
Screen: SN
Definition
The attempt by a player to borrow issues, ideas, events, or other symbolic references to advance its agenda or thwart a competitor's movements.
Persian Preeempt
March 19, 2009
Obama Uses Soft Diplomacy on Iran
President Obama did what many of his predecessors haven't had the gall to do. He ran an unabashed Preempt on the Islamic Republic of Iran by wishing the nation a Happy New Years (or Nowruz) while Screen the long and proud history of the Persian people in his message.
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