Philadelphia Business Journal

I was sweating through my final abdominal crunch when I noticed the cute 20-something personal trainer trying to whip a middle-aged woman into shape. He was doing a good job so I thought. When I looked a little longer, I noticed he wasn’t really paying attention to her. Head down and fingers flying across his iPhone, he was texting, chuckling and occasionally glancing at the woman now struggling to loosen a lever on a machine.

I knew it was none of my business, but I couldn’t control myself when I walked up to 20-something and said, “Excuse me, if I was paying you to pay attention to me, I would have fired you 10 minutes ago.” Looking up from the phone somewhat bewildered, he stared at me and then said if you had been here earlier and maybe saw our workout, you would have seen that I was watching her, but I have this cool app on my phone… [Read more…] about Short attention spans are a huge threat to … where was I?

I recently had the opportunity to participate in a realistic risk exercise involving scores of local state and federal officials. The purpose of the day- long event was to allow participants to implement emergency response plans, coordinate activities and practice responding to a potential incident that could threaten public safety in order to protect the public should a real life emergency occur.

As an evaluator of communication tactics and strategies, what impressed me most was the constant attention of every participant across multiple agencies to protect those who were affected by the threatening situation that was unfolding. To their credit, no one asked how they could protect their organizations’ reputation but instead at every turn of events, the focus was on protecting the public from harm. No one tried to hide information. No one even talked about damage control. In role playing scenarios, they told the public what they knew as often and as quickly as possible in order to keep people informed and manage the message. [Read more…] about At Penn State, people in power forgot some basic rules

As wheels went up for the eight-hour flight to Munich, Germany, followed by a layover and another flight to Prague, Czech Republic, I exhaled thinking, wow, finally, we really are on vacation! I had planned it, booked it, talked about it, and pictured it for nearly a year. But as we soared to cruising altitude I wondered, are any of us really on vacation anymore?

We turn the away message on but continue to check email. We say we have limited if any access to voicemail, then quickly respond to messages or have someone do it for us. It is the world we live in and responding regardless of what continent we are on is expected if only to reiterate we are away and will deal with whatever must be addressed when we return. It makes me wonder if we’ve become incapable of truly relaxing. Are we ever really able to check out anymore? [Read more…] about Even when the away message is on, you’re never off