Politically High-Tech
A podcast with facts and opinions on different topics like politics, policy, technology especially AI, spirituality and development! For this podcast, development simply means tip, product and/or etc. can benefit humanity. This show aims to show political viewpoints and sometimes praises/criticizes them. He is a wildcard sometimes. For Technology episodes, this show focuses on products (mostly AI) with pros, cons and sometimes give a hint of future update. For Development episodes, the podcast focuses on tips to improve as a human spiritually, socially, emotionally and more. All political, AI lovers and haters, and all religions are welcome! This is an adult show. Minors should not be listening to this podcast! This podcast proudly discriminates bad characters and nothing else.
Politically High-Tech
257-Protecting Your Digital Reputation: Navigating Online Challenges with John David
What if your online presence could make or break your career? Join us on "Politically High Tech" as we unravel the intricate web of maintaining a strong digital reputation in today’s hyper-connected world. With communication crisis expert John David by our side, we promise you'll learn how to safeguard your online persona and navigate the potential minefield of public opinion. John's insights reveal why vigilance over your digital footprint is more crucial than ever, especially when discussing polarizing topics that could sabotage your future opportunities.
Our conversation sheds light on the unpredictable nature of the internet, where a single misstep can reverberate through both personal and professional realms. Consider how the rapid dissemination of information on social media can turn a seemingly innocent opinion into a career-defining moment. We explore the importance of crafting a defensible online image, drawing lessons from high-profile figures and everyday businesses alike, to help you maintain a reputation that stands strong against the storm of misinformation and public scrutiny.
From the challenges faced by small businesses to the resilience of industry giants, our discussion highlights the necessity of having a solid communication strategy. With real-world examples, such as the restaurant industry and law firms facing crises, we underscore the value of expert guidance in managing and mitigating reputational risks. Whether you're an individual brand or a thriving enterprise, John's expertise provides a blueprint for protecting your online legacy and thriving in the ever-evolving digital landscape.
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welcome everyone to politically high tech with your host, elias. If you care about your reputation, especially online you know I'm going to sound a little dramatic here. We're kind of not kind of. We are in a surveillance state and a lot of us put ourselves there. Okay, so your reputation is more important than ever, especially digitally. Okay, because you post something that may look fun, but some people can misconstrue that and say, oh, this person likes to party a lot, get drunk, get a bit out of control, and that gets leaked out and that damages your reputation and job opportunities are going to be limited at best. At worst, it's gone obliterated. Okay, at least for a while until you get your act together.
Speaker 1:Why am I saying this? Because this episode is going to offer you a crisis communications expert, or I'm sure I changed the title around, but that's what I'm going to call it. He's really a communication crisis expert because, look, we're going to have a time where our reputation takes damage. They can try to prevent it. It's going to happen at some point, maybe on the intentional leak, or someone else tried to blackmail, expose us, and you do need a plan. You do need a plan. You can't just go oh, my goodness, my life is going to be ruined. Well, it can be if you let it, but there's a solution and I'm going to introduce you to this solution. His name is John David. It's plain, but you know what, sometimes plain is effective. Okay, it doesn't always have to be stylish, all right, and I'm just saying, of course, of the name. He has thick skin, I'm sure, and I feel comfortable saying that. And what do you want them to know about you in general?
Speaker 2:Sure. Well, you know you don't get to pick your name, you know. So my mom picked my name and so that's what we got to go with. You got to be careful there. Step out of line, you insult somebody's mother. And these days I do a lot more consulting. I work with a lot of CEOs and executives, and I also do have a pretty robust crisis communications practice where I work with companies that are dealing with issues of all different kinds.
Speaker 2:And I like to start off by saying a crisis is relative. Right, it could be something that could be, you know, an everyday occurrence with one company could be a, you know, existential problem with another. So it's all relative and so, you're right, it's important to be prepared. There's a lot of ground that we could cover, but obviously there's things about your own personal reputation which you know people should be, should be careful about. Uh, and then your business. How your business is portrayed for some of us. You know I, I am my business, so I can be really careful. I don't want to, you know I don't want to. I don't want to be too lean in too heavily on controversial stuff, because you know, you never know who you might offend. It's a complex ecosystem, I guess.
Speaker 1:That's putting them mildly, especially with some of the sensitive crowd. I'm going to use the political example by my name. It's been butchered and destroyed thousands of times. The nerve of my name been butchered and destroyed thousands of times. So the the nerve of my name being butchered, those nerves are dead long time ago. Alias, I mean I've been called all kinds of names wrongly.
Speaker 1:But besides that, let me get to the serious um topic at hand. Yeah, and when it? Yeah, when it comes to, like, online reputation, yeah, it's, it's very, very delicate, especially in politics. I can say this comfortably If you lean in a certain let's use the Trump magazine, for example you lean in that direction, the people on the left are going to go crazy. They're going to defame you or attack you and your policies accurately. Sometimes it's accurate, sometimes it's just political, hyper hyperbolic rhetoric, right, and if you are your business, I mean I'm gonna sign a broken record here. But, yeah, you have to like, protect it like it's your own life. I mean mean, I think that's how much protection that you need. And I'm not trying to be dramatic, it's just I mean me. I'm slowly learning that. I think some of my old episodes might haunt me. They pay for it if you want to expose me, especially some of my radical opinions.
Speaker 1:But, I just say lay it out there, and eventually you'll see my own evolution, because I curse less.
Speaker 2:I don't always have to go crazy just to get attention yeah, listen, I think I think that there's a lot, there's a lot to to be said for all these issues you're bringing up. So the first one is with your own personal reputation, right, first thing is is, you know, digital is pretty much forever, right? Um, uh, and so you have to be aware of when you're saying things, writing things online, that it's going to get uploaded to somewhere in the cloud and it could be there forever. You know, important that you think, before you speak these days, it's, it's, you know, I'll touch on the politics in a, in a second, but I always just like to say from a personal standpoint. Then we can talk about the business stuff. From a personal standpoint, I would say you know, you know, don't say something to someone online that you wouldn't be comfortable saying, like right to their face. You know, don't say something in your job, don't say something about business that you wouldn't be comfortable saying. You know, in the company break room, uh, you know. And then also, just be very careful about what you say when it comes to certain you know topics. It's like there's old, there are old lines, man, that you know don't talk about. Don't talk about religion, don't talk about politics, don't you know things like those are topics that you know, that that people are emotional about, and you get yourself in trouble and politics is perfect, like right now.
Speaker 2:Donald trump was elected president united states and love him, hate him, doesn't matter. The point of it is that you know he got whatever he got. You know he's, he's got 52 percent of the vote, or something like that. Um, you know he, he had, he had, you know, whatever it is, he's got 52 percent of of um, there's of of the people who are registered to vote there's about 240, uh million people in in america who are already over the 18 or older and and and then, uh, of those, there's about, you know, it looks like about 150 million of them voted, and then, and he got 52%. So, you know, you extrapolate out and you realize okay, number one, you know he didn't, everyone didn't vote for him, but a lot of people did, the people who are, you know, everyone had the right to, but they didn't vote for him. Um, and then number two is, a whole lot of people didn't vote for him, and so you know, again, it doesn't matter what you think, it doesn't matter why you fall, but the reality is like half the people don't agree with you and what are you on politics?
Speaker 2:So it's in general, you know, just be careful talking about that stuff, you know I mean because you end up, you could end up, you know, upsetting somebody, who's. You know who. You know who's upset who's. You know you're in the middle of a job interview and you you say something that is offensive to somebody and from in a political realm, and you know you may end up you may not, may not get the job, you may not get that contract that you're trying to get at. You know you're a salesperson. You may have, you know, any number of things. You get to offend someone by talking about these. You know these issues, these issues which are sort of combustible. So that's, you know, that's, that's sort of rule to me, that's sort of rule number one in the personal, the personal world, and it also, again, it bleeds over into your, you know, into your, into your business life.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, Especially the access of information. Yep, oh, John David said this.
Speaker 2:Oh, you know someone who I personally know has a difference of opinion from me and I just said listen, I'm not having this conversation online. That's not what I'm doing. I'm not going to do that. I'm very content with what I wrote, what I said online. I wrote some stuff. I put it on social media. I'm perfectly fine, anybody I know in the world can read it and they're not gonna. Then I'm not gonna offend anyone or anyone. They shouldn't be offended by me for that. Whatever, I don't get to choose who gets offended, but at the same time, I'm, it's all defensible, but I also don't want to get into, you know, uh, you know whatever. Uh, face to face, head to head, um, you know, uh, you know, argument over this or some of this, these things, because it's it's, because it's a no-win situation, because again, half the people don't agree with me and half the people I don't agree with them, and it doesn't matter which side we're talking about, it's both sides.
Speaker 1:And for those, for the offended I want to talk about those It'll take that one little clip, take it out of context and that's enough to do damage to the business. Rather, it's true or not, there's a fact that goes out there and we all know and I even read your profile, which I perfectly agree with. Anyone with a brain should agree with this. This information spreads real quick. It goes real fast. I mean, just look at social media, prime example. Once someone posts something out there, especially if this person's popular, when an algorithm loves a message, it's going to go out there. It's not about truth, it's about attention and it's how much clicks you could get. It's not. It was about truth. Some of the stuff will not be promoted. Okay, let's just be, let's just be honest. Not about truth, which is sad, but that's the. That's the reality, that we are in, right, and that's the unfortunate part.
Speaker 1:And reputation is very important. I was saying, oh, it doesn't matter if I'm talking about politics, technology, all of that, you carry it with you. Technology, all of that, you carry it with you. Some people, sadly, it's the other people that got the right to mold your reputation in that sense. That's why you have to do certain things. This is why, for you, especially those who got damaged reputations pay attention, seriously pay attention. If you have a good reputation, well, enjoy this at your leisure. That's all I'm going to say about that. Listeners and viewers, just pay attention, because this could be some good stuff. So you already got to the politics and the personal you know.
Speaker 1:So definitely and this is very basic, but I think some of you need this reminder don't post anything that a movie could consider it labeled pg-13 or rated r. I think you gotta aim for that. G rating. That's the, that's only analogy. I'm gonna say g rating, not even pg, because pg could be slightly offensive to the super sensitive. Pg-13, mildly offensive. Rated r or higher, very offensive OK. So there's a positive correlation right there. Stick to rated G if you're not sure. Ok. So that's professional, family friendly, all that, even though my brand is not the most family friendly, but it can be professional. So if I'm a slight hypocrite on this one, I'm proud of it. I'm looking out for you, not me.
Speaker 2:I have my own branch. No, absolutely listen, everything you're saying is makes makes a lot of sense. You know, when I wrote my book, there was a lot of things I wrote. You know, um, at the time, you know, my kids were my kids were like high school age and I had lots of parents and, like you know, it's like you know, like, yeah, I gave my, I gave your book to my kid. You know, I told him to read it, I gave it, I read sections of it to them and you know, remind it, just reminds you that.
Speaker 2:You know, remind that, listen, you have to be careful what you say on, what you say online and how you, how you behave online, because it's it's going to be, um, you know, you have an incredible, it's an incredible tool. This is an incredible tool in your, you know, in everyone's hands because you can. You know you can put information that can be read by anybody in the world. You can put it on there, on online, in two seconds. So very powerful and so you know, so you have to be really, be really careful. You know, with great power comes great responsibility, right A la Spider-Man. So I think that when that, that what companies have to do, is be said that you know you're responsive if something, if something goes wrong and you know that you're. You don't have to be um, you know, you don't, you don't.
Speaker 2:I think for larger organizations, I think it's valuable to sort of game out what might go wrong and what could what could be really problematic. Um, at a minimum, you need to have just the basics of a communications plan that you know how to um. You know that. You know how to reach everybody in your company in in short order. That you know how to publish something to your website in short order. You know that all the, you know all the passwords for all the social media accounts aren't, aren't in, just in. You know bob's phone right, that's accessible.
Speaker 2:You can make the if you need to communicate, you can um that if you're in a high profile business, that you have someone who understands um reputation issues, understands communications, understands. You know pr, media relations, because if something happens and it ends up where you're getting a call from a television station or you know a media, another media outlet, and they're getting ready to write a story about your company, you have, you can put forth, you know an effort to try to. You know either shape or mitigate or kill, even sometimes that, um, that's that, that's that story which could become negative coverage. So there's a lot of things that that that you, that a lot of a lot of things that businesses should be thinking about no, we at the, I call it the age of information and attention.
Speaker 1:So it's more important than ever. I think prior to social media, yeah, attention was important and all that, but now it's really in your face Because everything's about attention and information. Just like you said, it's an amazing tool. It's a double-edged sword. It really depends how you use the tool. Right, Sure you get the good, the bad and the ugly. And you use the tool right, Sure you get the book. You get the good, the bad and ugly and the unknown the stuff that you think could actually happen.
Speaker 2:Well, absolutely, absolutely. I mean, listen, there was a, there was a time when you know let's say, for example, that you know you went to a restaurant and you, you know, kind of you got lousy service. Or you went to, you know you went to go get some work done on your car and you waited forever, right. Or you were at a store, you know whatever, buying sneakers and the clerk was, you know, rude, right, what would you do? You say, okay, well, maybe I want to talk to the manager, right. And then maybe you get some, you know some. Maybe that makes you feel better a little bit. But if you're like really upset, you know, and you're like, okay, what are you going to do? All right, well, I'm going to go back to my go home and I'm going to go try to look up who the president of this company is, and then I'm going to go reach out to them somehow. And you know, I mean, like I said before, I'm like I'm old enough to remember when that from from a pre Internet person. So like, yeah, I'm going to write a strongly worded letter and send it to the president of the sneaker company, right, you know, that's a ton of work, right, all these steps I'm describing. And if it was, if it's even, if it's today and you want to go, okay, I go home, I go look online, I go see that the president of the company, this guy, I could reach out to him on LinkedIn or Twitter or whatever. It's still a bunch of steps, but now you know, if you get lousy service at a restaurant, you can take out your phone and open up Yelp and you can write a bad review before the check comes. So it's instantaneous. And so you have to pay attention to these things because that can have.
Speaker 2:You know, if you're a brand new restaurant and if you've, if you know anybody who's in the restaurant industry, they've probably you've heard these horror stories that you know somebody goes in and they get a bunch of bad reviews right when they start. You know, and maybe it's just because they just don't have their act together yet and you know they never. The restaurant never takes off because all the, you know all the there's no, you know, when somebody goes to look at the reviews on Yelp, it's all one, twos and threes. You know I'm not going to go to one, two and three. I'm not going to go spend my hard earned cash on on a to go out for my my, you know my friday night date night at some place. It's a two-star place, so it's it can have a. It can have a dramatic um impact, you know all the way around because it's just it's so instantaneous, so that's that's. That's one issue.
Speaker 2:And then the other part which I was kind of leading to before, is that some businesses you have, you know um, and the restaurants is just a really easy one to talk about because you think about, for example, if you went to your like local fast food place right, local burger place, you know franchise place right, nationally, a national brand, golden arches or whatever right. I'm saying you know in and out or where it depends on whoever where you are and you're in that that one location in your town, wherever it is in america, and a mouse runs across the floor, you know that's. That's unfortunate for mcdonald's or burger king or in and out or whatever right. And what's going to happen is you're going to have probably a bunch of local people are kind of like did you hear what happened? Did you see this? Or they read a review or whatever. But McDonald's is going to be fine, you know, in-n-out Burger is going to be fine, burger King is going to be fine, right.
Speaker 2:But if a mouse runs across the floor of your local family-owned restaurant, you know, at 8, 815 on a Saturday, that's existential. You know that could end up, that could kill, that could kill a business. So crises are all. Crisis is a relative thing. So you know you have to be prepared for you know there's the stakes are higher for some businesses than others, for some businesses than others, and then, with big companies, they often have more at stake because they have bigger problems.
Speaker 2:The company that's in the news right now, more than any other, with multiple crisis situations, is Boeing. Boeing's had these issues. They had the, they had the, the, the max 8 and the software and planes that crashed and people died. They had the door blown out of the uh of the one of the flights, um, they just had a strike that ended, um, and they're, you know they're in. That company, in my opinion, is in the middle of an existential crisis because they're, they're. So there's so many things that are wrong. Oh, they, you know they also. They left, they got. You have two astronauts stranded on the international space station too, right. So like, if you know, boeing boeing was used to be. You know, a blue chip brand, uh, you know, with a sterling, sterling reputation, and you hear it and you're like do you want to buy Boeing stock? Are you going to let your engineer kid go work there? It can be a huge issue. These can be huge issues For them. It's been several issues compounding, but they're having a major crisis mode over there.
Speaker 1:Oh, bowling, I think you already touched on this, I'm sure, but I want to have a pretty clear definition of what a communication crisis is for those who are just tuning in.
Speaker 2:Well, see, I think that that's a relative thing, right. So you know, like I said, you could have um, you know what. What. What happens with a? Uh, you know what happens with a company. It just it just depends. You know, it's like if you, you can have, if um, again some of these bigger, bigger organizations, they can weather, weather things better. But some, you know they're it's, it's, it's pretty rare, like most, most businesses are not going to deal with like a catastrophic existential crisis in their, in their company. It's generally not going to happen, but it's probably, it's likely that'll happen in everybody's industry. You know, and then, and the thing is that, and to me it's, how do you define, that'll happen in everybody's industry. You know, and then, and the thing is that, and to me it's, how do you define it? How do you define a communications crisis? You know. So, for example, you're um, you're a business and you're one of your um, you know, let's say, you're a law firm and one of your top partners is accused of sexual harassment. You have yourself a communications crisis, right, you have that if you have, if you're in a, you're in a business and you're a finance company. In finance, you handle people's money right and you and somebody has a problem, somebody is not. People aren't able to get their get to their money. You got a communications crisis. Um, there's certain businesses that I think always are going to have, like have a lot of trouble on, like review sites and like banks and credit unions. They're always, they're always going to have a lot of, have a lot of issues on online, because when you make a mistake and involve somebody's money, they get really, really mad. You know it's one thing if you get your. You know it's one thing. If you don't, whatever, you lose your, you know you go. Your reservation isn't held. You know, at the, at the, at the rent-a-car place, that gets you mad. But you know, if you, uh, if your your check doesn't get deposited on time, that's a whole cascading effect, right, that's people get really upset about that. I think you have.
Speaker 2:You know, these days there's there's issues, there's malfeasance of companies. You know there's people. You know people. You have people who's to steal from their employers. Um, you have folks who, uh, you know who to just do you, like I said, you get back to stuff like sexual harassment. You get back like employee theft. Um, you have folks who say things you know politically, politically incorrect, you know, in a, in a, in a in a business forum, um, all those things are all very possible, you know. So I think it's it's, it's, it's all relative and most companies, you companies, they don't think in those terms. But I would say that these days there's a lot of potential energy being built up that could end up coming back to haunt you if you have a problem oh yeah, okay, we did the diagnosis, we gave mile to existential levels of threat and you know they all are legitimate.
Speaker 1:This is not john david and I just making things up. I mean, just pay attention to the news. You can easily find a communications crisis, because that's what the news needs to report it, the crisis. All right, just think of it that way. Oh, yes, it makes sense. Okay, just just connect the two dots like that and you you can easily understand, with enriched context and what we were talking about. Yeah, bowling is such a great example, and what was the other one? I went through trouble oh, I refuse to call it x twitter with elon musk with his shenanigans, but it seems like he's pretty resilient.
Speaker 2:I think he's more somewhat of an exception, or I would say, I would say he's an exception because he's, you know, the richest guy in the world and, um, you know he's he. He put his money where his mouth is. He bought the platform and the rules are different. You know, I don't know you, elias, I'm just guessing you're not a billionaire. Rules are different.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, yep, You'll be right to say I'm not a billionaire, I don't have the two favorite levers that F you money? No, not there yet. So yeah, let's put it a little bit of rules, everybody else, it's just the way, the way it is.
Speaker 2:But the um, I mean the the thing that that I see. I mean, that is what, what the type of things that I work on is. My clients will, you know, get a phone call. Something happens with their business. They get a phone call from a journalist, somebody works at a local newspaper or tv station, and how do you, you know, what do you do when that happens? And that's that. That's more, and that that's way more likely to happen than getting a call from whatever.
Speaker 2:The lot of times people will get upset about a company or an organization. They, they, they, they can't, they don't feel like they're being heard, you know, which is goes back to point number one, which is monitor stuff. Have good customer service, treat your customers right and your clients right, and you're probably you can knock a lot of problems out before they ever happen. But if they're not, they don't feel like they're being heard, and then they reach out and call the help desk at the local TV station and then they call you, they call you up and they're like oh hey, we heard this happen to one of your customers and you know, what do you have to say about it? We're getting ready to run a story on this, you know, and tonight at five, and so you have to. You know, you got to triage that situation and I've done that plenty of times and sometimes, sometimes the company, sometimes they screwed up, you know, and you just got to say, hey, we screwed up, you know, we're screwed up and we're going to try to make it right.
Speaker 2:Sometimes you say, you know, you got to give me a little bit of time on this because what you've been told is not accurate and you know the person who's upset. They have every right to be upset, but they don't have the right to, you know, call you up and not tell you everything. They don't just tell you half. Call you up and not tell you everything, you know, just tell you half. And then sometimes you can reach out and tell you know, inform the journalist of the other half, and and they'll say, oh, I didn't know that. And yeah, and it's sort of, all of a sudden it's less newsworthy and less interesting and less shocking.
Speaker 2:And you can make up. You can make something go away, bad news go away before it ever emerges. But you have to be active and you have to have, kind of at least have this little plan in place where you can, where you're prepared to react, and your first reaction should not be oh, I'm just going to ignore this and see, you know, if they go away, like that's generally not the right move. Go away Like that's generally not the right move. Because, again, think about the example I was just telling you Somebody's upset with your company. They've got, they're giving, they're feeding half of this dramatic story to the reporter. There's no reason for the reporter to not. You know, if you don't call them back, that doesn't that's not a reason for them to not try you again. Now they might I mean they may not call you back, but because you know again, an hour later something else could happen. That's big, but you know, putting your head in the sand and ignoring it, that's not a strategy.
Speaker 1:And it seems like that's what some of these companies have done with the crisis just put their head down. Just put their head down, can't even speak. It just magically helped the problem, just go away, but it just gets worse. I mean ignoring it is just not the way. I don't own a big business, but even I know that. I mean.
Speaker 1:You already said a couple of things. That's very important. Make sure the listeners if you're getting this right accountability, take accountability, communicate, resolve the issues, be solution-oriented. Don't be a fertilizer to the problems just by ignoring. Oh, let's go away, then, okay, houdini came and the whole problem, um, ran away. No, doesn't go like that. Your actions is more magical than hoping for houdini to come down just magically clean up for you, okay. So that's all I'm going to say about that.
Speaker 1:And, trust me, I've been, I'll say, more conscious of reputation, not like in a paranoid kind of way, but I'll just say, uh, does it serve value? That's, that's the kind of mindset I have now even have to say some little shocking and wrong. Before I just like shock and awe, especially my older days in the podcast. Now I'm just like does it serve a real purpose to benefit humanity If a little shock and awe helps fine, but I'm not going to use it as a primary tool. My primary tool is to make sure that you get the message. Hopefully you improve. That's more of my main focus. It puts some entertainment on the inside. That's what I try to do here. Makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Make make try to do here, Make sense, make you know, infotainment, whatever you want to call it, sure. But yeah, I hope we're really listening here because this is very important stuff, especially if you own the business, especially yourself as a brand. For brand you, I'm going to call you brand people. If yourself as a brand is business, oh you better be paying attention to this, because reputation damage. If yourself is a branded business, oh you better be paying attention to this, because reputation damage, your cash flow, income is going to be damaged, opportunities are going to be damaged. I'm just putting it mildly. I mean to your point, most of it's not going to be existential, but some will cause some damage if you ignore it.
Speaker 2:Listen, I'll tell you a story. So I mean, aside from the fact that any company could become the victim of workplace violence, any company could have a privacy, a data breach, any company could become a victim of a phishing scam or whatever. But individuals, you know you can have, you can, things can can turn and go wrong. You know, in a really quickly and um, I had a guy reached out to me a few years back. He um, uh, he had some, he had, he had some real problems, I think I think he had. I think he had some problems, I think I think he had. I think he had some some um, some some mental health issues.
Speaker 2:But he was running a company in the construction industry, he was building, building homes, um, and he was you know small, small, small time kind of general contractor, kind of a guy, um, and he, he was at the local coffee shop, you know um brand name coffee shop I'm not necessarily gonna say who it is um, and you know he, he didn't, you know he didn't, get his coffee at the time. He thought he was supposed to get his coffee. He got upset, he went to go talk to the, to the folks at the counter. There was like an altercation. He kind of lost his temper and he went, you know he got, and while this was escalating and you know, brewing because it was getting worse, somebody took out their phone and videotaped this guy losing his mind you know mind at the coffee shop and it got the guy, the person who was filming it, put it up on YouTube an hour later and tagged the local TV station and they came out and they did a story on this whole huge altercation.
Speaker 2:And then, you know whatever, a couple of days later, I mean after the story hit, the next day after the story hit, this guy lost basically all of his clients. They just said, like he was so um, abusive to this. You know, lady, at the coffee shop, that they said, you know, we don't want to work with you anymore. And he lost. He lost his business, you know, and he ended up, I think, in a leave in town and I think part of his issue was he had some mental health issues, like you know.
Speaker 2:I mean I'm the farthest from a mental health issues, Like you know. I mean I'm the farthest from a mental health professional as possible, but maybe bipolar or something like that. But it can happen, man, it can happen, and there's a million examples like this. You know that you end up somebody goes and says something and does something, and not only does it hurt your personal reputation, you know I mean, it's one thing if you can't get a date right, it's another thing if you can't get a job. So you know I mean, if all of a sudden you're unemployable because of something you've done in the world, that's bad.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, no, absolutely. And this is why I would say this right Introspect try to get help before things blow up, because if you don't take care, if you neglect parts of yourself, it's going to simmer and it's going to brew and it's going to explode.
Speaker 2:That particular case. It falls into the category that I call kind of catastrophic, and when somebody calls me up and they've had this like catastrophic situation, I usually just tell them listen, you're in. You know. I mean you could hire me and pay me a lot of money, but guess what a long time to remedy. You know, because it happens. It happens People do things that do really stupid things, they really do really dumb things and it can follow them, you know, follow them forever.
Speaker 1:It's sad that that is unfortunate. I'm not going to gloat and laugh about that because that's just cruel, but that could happen to you. I mean, I think it was twice in my life. It almost happened to me. As I meditate, be self aware of your emotional state, mental state is very important. I mean, listeners, you already heard about me, you already know about me. You don't want to strangle co-worker for just trying to sabotage them, tagging as me, or or just just try to ruin everything to make my life a living. You know what by the set. What's the consequences after that? Will it be worth it? Yeah, you feel good for five seconds at best. Oh, yeah, oh, but the consequences?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, absolutely. Listen, the consequences are going to last much longer than that, absolutely, absolutely. And I'll say that it feels good for less than five seconds. It feels good for about a millisecond and it's that millisecond when you were trying to restrain yourself and you can't. You know, it's the, the old, the old line. It's like the words come out of your mouth and you wish you could bring, you, wish you could take them back. You see them leaving your mouth and wish you could take them back. Yeah, that's there, absolutely, workplace is is huge. Um, because you know we're just, listen, there's there's.
Speaker 2:You know, let's go go go watch episodes of mad men, right, it's the way it used to be, right, it's not like that anymore. You know, and it's the same, you know the same thing. Go watch episodes of the office, right, like, there's things that you watch, the things that happen. That's not how, you're not allowed to do that kind of stuff. And so you know, and it's, you know, I don't make the rules, I don't. I'm not, I don't make the rules, I'm not the office police, I'm just. I know what the HR people are going to say, and so you know you have to. You got to be aware of that I mean, yeah, and the same thing is. If you're a company and your employees are, you know, are step out of line and you don't deal with that appropriately, you can end up having a big problem and a whole other problem. If you're seen as a hostile workplace, if you're seen as somebody who's turning a blind eye to potential sexual harassment, those are all reputation killers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was a negligence for people to turn blind eye. And then that's fertilizing conflict. You'll be the fertilizer for conflict and they will try to control it.
Speaker 2:And then of course ideally fertilizer for conflict I like it.
Speaker 1:Just clean it out, destroy it from the root, from the root and atomical level, all right. So that's what I want to say, and just that me have that solution oriented mindset. Mindset does matter. Before I just think about what's best for me, screw everybody else. That is a fertilizer of conflict. So if you think solution oriented, you will knock down many, many problems, problems and, if not, get some help. If you can't do it, so it could be psychological, financial, whatever.
Speaker 1:I'm not your expert here. You know your life, you do some introspection and then you could just, you know, resolve, resolve whatever issue. I mean it's important. I mean this has come from someone who has dealt with depression and even near suicide, so I know what I'm talking about, my gosh, so I know what I'm talking about here. I mean I get it. All situations are unique. That's why you have to do your own introspection. We just talk about the generals here. Sure, because we cannot dig and talk about 8 billion different problems in within America, over 350 million different problems. That's impossible and it's impractical. And, trust me, I think we both would die because we haven't taken care, we neglected our physical health, mental health, all the other health gone OK, so we just can't do that. All right, so we saw the generals, the major examples, and then you can apply some of it to your life.
Speaker 1:So, ironically, this is not just a tech episode. This is even development as well, because this could be a teachable moment, and it has a little bit of political. So this is an ideal episode. It's a little bit of the three type of three type of episodes. I normally do a little bit of the three, a little bit of the three, even a little bit of politics in there, even though I keep that to a minimum because that's just listen. That's risky on its own. Unless you're in a left-wing camp, your job is to be pro-left. Fine, you know what message good for them. And then the same thing for the right. You know what messages are good for them. Know, know your audience, know who's going to be receptive. That's another thing. Because you approach MAGA stuff to lefties, oh, you're pissing off a lot of people. And if you preach, you know vice versa, you're asking for a fight. You're just like I said, don't be the fertilizer of conflict.
Speaker 2:Listen, it's really, I think it's important to man. A lot of this stuff is a lot of the personal stuff is just kind of that old. You know what you learned in kindergarten, kind of thing. You know it's it's. You know, you know, be kind to your fellow man. You know, um, um, it's, it's really important Know, know who your friends are, you know, know who you can talk to about, about things, and you know that you won't be judged and um, those are all important things and because we're in a time, like you're right, I mean, there's a time this is very volatile things. Folks are getting really are very fired up about certain issues and you know, like I said, it doesn't matter which side you're on, because there's 150 million people on the other side of you, no matter how you slice it.
Speaker 2:So the big thing you did talk about AI and I think in my world, where AI came in very early with chat, gtp and the ability to you know for AI to write for you, you know, and it was, you know very quickly, you know okay, is that students using AI to write term papers and stuff like that. And I think I think AI, I think it's a great, a great tool. It doesn't in my opinion, it doesn't replace ideas, but it's a great tool and I look at it and I was my lifetime. You know I went to journalism school and when I was in journalism school, you know we, you know, when I first started in journalism school, we were using typewriters and by my senior year in college, we were using PCs for the first time. So I went through the typewriter-to-PC revolution and then we went to the internet revolution, which changed things so dramatically.
Speaker 2:I think AI is the next big one and it can make your life a lot easier, but you have to be really careful about attribution and that you're using your own original ideas. I mean, I can already tell, like I can tell when somebody's used, like, for example, I get emails from people every once in a while and they're way longer than this person has ever written to me before and there's phrases that they just don't use and you sit and go. Yeah, they use AI to write this for me, to write this to me, and honestly, I don't. I have no problem with it because it's a tool. You know, it's the same thing, same thing.
Speaker 2:Are you going to be upset that I used a word processor instead of a typewriter. Are you upset that I've got better information in my document because I went online and used the internet to do research? So am I able to take my thoughts and use AI to just basically process them faster? So, but I think that the downside is that you're going to have you know where it's it's, you know it starts to replace you know, human ideas. You know that's. That's the big, that's the big difference. You know. The big difference is that you know, if you use this, if you use as a tool to help push your own ideas and your own concepts and I think you're in, you're, you're going to be fine.
Speaker 2:But if you decide that you're just, you know, I don't want to you know like and again, the high school term papers are a perfect example. You know I don't want to read David Copperfield, I just want, I just. All I need is 800 words on David Copperfield. Why would I? You know, then you're going to be in trouble because eventually the teachers are going to figure it out. And the same thing in business. You know it's like if you're, you know it's, it's.
Speaker 2:I look at it like, it's kind of like. You know the in the movie Jurassic Park, the original Jurassic Park movie. You know they took, they uh, they. They didn't, they couldn't finish the gene sequence and so they put the frog dna in right and that just changed. That changed the dinosaurs and the same thing. Ai, if you go, it's like what you put in, like it's gonna go. It's gonna go find some frog dna which is eventually gonna bite you. You know it's eventually gonna come back and get you and so I just think you have to be really careful with that. But I think the technology now it's pretty incredible how it's being. You know how it's being used to. You know from everything in the medical field to the business field, and there's it's. It certainly should not be a dirty word.
Speaker 1:Oh no, I agree. My overall opinion is a great tool as, of course, great potential. You said the positives. I'm going to balance out saying the negatives how it could cause communication crisis. Edited fake videos of this person saying something that he or she never said, or performed something he or she has never done. You know, things like this damage reputations.
Speaker 2:I'm sure you're aware of that yeah, I know it's a big concern when you see, because you see it and it's like you know the um I've seen, you know I've I've been been tricked by ai stuff online. Um, most of the time it's not anything significant, it's just like you know. There was this guy who had, like figured out how to make himself look like tom cruise and would do this stuff. I was like, man, that's tom cruise, but like you know it's, you know it's not tom cruise, but it looks like tom cruise, like that's that stuff's gonna happen and it's gonna be, it's and and you know it. What's sad about you know some human beings that they always look for the worst thing to do with something they look for you know they're, they're. You know, instead of you know, here's a guy who you know makes himself look like tom cruise to try to get clicks, you know, and somebody sees that and they go. So, yeah, I can make, you know I can, I can make my girlfriend a porn star with this. You know, I mean that and that's and that. That's really, really scary and I think that that's, you know, the one of the things that I, when I you know, when my online reputation book came out.
Speaker 2:I spoke, I spoke on the topic all around the country and one of my kind of one of my is like a big laugh line is I would just you know, as I would say I would say, you know, listen, we just have to. You know, stop taking pictures of your private parts, man. Stop taking, doing, stop doing crazy to. You know, stop taking pictures of your private parts, man, stop doing crazy stuff. You know, and I would say you know, tell your daughters not to take pictures of their private parts, not to take pictures of. You know, not to send topless pictures to their boyfriends and tell your sons to stop asking for it. You know, I mean, it's not just one, it's not a one way street.
Speaker 2:And the same thing is that you realize that these, you know, because digital can very much be forever, you just got to be, you know, you just got to be careful and you gotta be careful who you associate with. You know it's more important than ever. You know it's like. You know. You know everybody who's had some life experiences has been around the wrong kind of people at some point in time. You know you may have been around them for two minutes. You may be around them.
Speaker 2:For two years you've been around the wrong kind of people and you know you have to the people that aren't the right kind of people for you and you have to just make sure that you uh, that you're you know, you're watching, you're kind of keeping your nose clean. It's just simple. It's super easy for me to say you know here, but you know it's again, it's kind of, and part of it is you know, I've got two 20-something kids. So I know, like we have these conversations, you know remind them, you know don't just remember that stuff and they're pretty good about it. But you know, sometimes you know we make we make bad decisions or we make poor judgments or we get tricked, you know oh yeah, absolutely well, it needs to be said.
Speaker 1:yeah, I know it's easier said than done, but it needs to be said. It needs to be emphasized, right, because also forget it um, you know it's going to be porn central all over the internet and you know some of these things has already happened. And I like what you said about associating with the wrong kind of people. Yeah, we all have it for two seconds or two years, and the longer we are with them, the more it damages our reputation.
Speaker 2:The faster we get out we could quote, quote, recover, um, you know, and one thing that I, that I I think is really is really interesting and sort of heartening for me, as you know. So I'm a, I'm a, I'm a gen x, okay, so I'm, I'm, I'm 56 years old and, um, you know, I, I hear, I hear, know Gen Zers, or whatever, talking and they talk about things like oh, this, you know, I'm in a, this person's toxic and or they say something like, you know, I just it's like, you know, I need a wellness moment or whatever, and I think all that's actually incredibly healthy, you know, I think, because I think that a lot of that stuff, you know, when I was in my 20s and I was, you know, even whatever, my 30s, like we just didn't like talk about that, we didn't like, we really didn't think about our own mental health that much. We were just doing what we're supposed to be doing. Oh, we thought we're supposed to be doing what we thought we were supposed to be doing, and so I think that there's a lot to be said for the next generation.
Speaker 2:You know, gen Z and whoever is after Gen Z I don't know who that is right now, but that group. They have an incredible potential to do incredible things, and one of the reasons why is because of this self-awareness, which is a good thing. You know and and also aware of what's going on and the these you know these powerful tools and whatever the next powerful tool is going to be, because this is there's gonna be more. You know, this is the you know smartphones like 20 years old, right?
Speaker 1:so there's going to be something else yeah, there may be like a hologram or something like that.
Speaker 2:That's why you never know, you, never know you never know.
Speaker 1:I want to say, is that what the world was? One celebrity who she took a mental health break and then she came back strong, or simone biles, sure, yeah, yeah, I mean, that's a great example of that. And and I we know what some people's criticism oh, that's so weak, whatever, that's enough. But we go through stuff and life is like life is very different, like, let's see, 2024 is very different from even I could confidently say like even 90s. Okay, and I experienced both of those. The times was, these are radically fast paced. We got access to more information, even access to more junk. Let's be honest, it's a double-edged sword. Depend, especially depends like you use it. Yeah, yeah, I think mental health breaks it's a good thing yeah, I think it's.
Speaker 2:I think that when you look at that, when you um, I always, you know, try to suggest, okay, what you know, put yourself in that other person's shoes, right, I mean you, you know simone biles, whatever what you know, put yourself in that other person's shoes, right, I mean, you know, simone Biles, whatever, taylor Swift, you know famous people, right, you might think, okay, they've got. No, they have nothing to worry about, right? I mean, they're rich, they're attractive, they're smart. You know they've got everything going for them, smart, you know they've got everything going for them. But you know, I know for me that when I'm, for example, if I'm working on something and I'm in front of clients like for all day long, right, it's stressful, right, and I feel at the end of the day I'm exhausted, like I'm cause. I feel like, cause, I feel like I'm like, I feel like I'm like kind of on stage for for for eight hours when I'm, if I'm with clients traveling or at meetings or something like that. But I've got to be fully aware of everything I'm doing and I've got to make sure I don't say the wrong thing, and I've got to be working, doing all my work-related stuff, right, and imagine if that's your life all the time and imagine that, at the same time, you have people judging you all the time. You know if you're, if you're, imagine you know, you know whatever.
Speaker 2:Look on, look on on on twitter, slash x about you know any celebrity and you'll see there's, there's half the people are bashing them for some reason or another and that's that's something that you know. The rest of us don't. We don't have that, you know. You know, I mean, I know I don't. There's no, there's nobody out judging me. There's nobody looking at me and judging whatever it is in any part of me.
Speaker 2:And so I think that, like I said, I think there's an awareness of these things is really high and it can help you, because the online world it can be brutal man, you know it can be brutal, and there's lots of folks out there who are, you know, hiding behind.
Speaker 2:You know hiding behind anonymity and you know and if you're a well-known person, I mean I don't do like celebrity PR or anything like that If you're a well-known person, there's a lot of issues there, a lot of potential pitfalls, because you make a misstep, you know, and you know they're watching how much. You know you tip at a restaurant. They're watching how nice you are to the doorman. They want to make sure you're not you know that you're polite to your dog walker, you know, and these may sound like rich people problems, but at the same time it like just you know. You know where anything can happen and that's that's why I I say, when it comes to online issues and when it comes to, like communications, of crisis communications, the strange things happen in every business. They just need to be aware of what's going on and watching what's going on around them so that they can, so that you know they can respond if something does turn yep, no, that's well say.
Speaker 1:Well, you may not be a celebrity pr, but you still do important pr with businesses and that's still very, very essential. That's still needed. You know, and I'm not gonna I could knock you down for that listen, listen, small business.
Speaker 2:Like I said before, a small business is just as at risk of a problem as a big business. You know, again, I have clients, they're big organizations, they have sales. You know they have revenue in the you know hundreds of millions of dollars plus, dollars plus, and they can have a problem. That could cost them a lot of money, but they're probably they're, you know, um, they're probably going to be fine, you know. But if you're, if you're in a small business and you know you don't have that cushion, you don't have that, that, that that financial wherewithal to to deal with that crisis, and that you could be, you could be done, you could be, like I said, like the contractor. He's contractor, he's out of, he's out of business, you know.
Speaker 1:So, yep, the anonymous contractor, and that anonymity is for his benefit.
Speaker 2:Oh, without, without, without, without, without without, without, without, without without without no, no, no, no.
Speaker 1:I would not want anyone doing that to me, even though some of you filthy trolls out there I don't you know?
Speaker 1:shame on you, that's what I'm gonna say. You cowards anyways. That's all. Let's do that. Plug in. Why are we talking all this communication stuff? It's just random. No, because he runs a pr firm. All right, let's do that shameless plug. Let's plug that business in. And whatever else you want me to plug in. Let's do that shameless plug. Let's plug that business in. And whatever else you want me to plug in. Let's do that right now. It's not just here for nothing.
Speaker 1:So this is David PR Group. All right, he has a phone number. Yes, I rarely do phone numbers, but they still important, they exist. It's a smartphone, okay, so I just got to go a little old school here. I don't mind. You know, I think my mind is more Gen X, even though I'm a millennial. So the phone number is 305-724-3903. And I repeat that again 305-724-3903.
Speaker 1:Ok, look, if he's having a reputation issue's a guy you're gonna need contact. All right, and it's not just that you know he could deal with. He does with a whole bunch of stuff corporate startups, commercial financing oh, very important. Insurance, real automobile dealerships, yep, all of them could be prone to communication crisis, especially if something just happened. You can't prevent all of it, but hey, at least you got a fighting tool against it. You can't prevent it, and you could call that number for a free consultation, or you could contact him through email, just like what some normal people do these days. So I'm gonna link his site as well and, yeah, check it out. Check it out, especially if you're having a reputation damage, okay, or you just want to know about it, or you think, or you you're about to start experiencing one. Contact him. All right, small or large, he's inclusive on that. So is there anything else you want me to add before I wrap this up?
Speaker 2:You know, listen, I think you've covered it Like I said, my website's davidprcom. I'm always open to talk to people if they have issues or problems or concerns. I need a sounding board. I mean, this is kind of this is what I do and you know and I'm so. I'm always happy to talk to somebody and if I can't help them, I can, you know, point you in the right direction or give you some advice. I'm wide open to have, you know, have a conversation.
Speaker 2:You know and you know, if you're have any concerns about these sorts of issues for your business and you want to try to be better prepared, we can work on a plan to do that. And if the stuff hits the fan, then you need somebody to call that local TV reporter for you. I mean, there's value in having a third party do it, by the way, because there's a lot of value to having. I know how they operate, I know what the rules of engagement are and I know how to speak their language, and so there's value in having a third party person help you. I know how to speak their language, and so there's there's value in having a third party person help you. So we are in this.
Speaker 1:We are in the shameless plug part of the call of the of the Okay If it's, if it's relevant. I mean you could have been plugging this in five times, I'll be okay with it as long as it's relevant. That's, that's my own, that's my only. It's not even a rule. That's just to me, that's just my guideline, because I don't really have any strict rules for that.
Speaker 1:So, hey, I mean there's some people that plugged it in, especially with Perfect. Oh yeah, you go check this out. This thing's happening. I know it's a little tasteless to some of you, oh well. Okay, you know he already gave you some free tips. Okay, give him a break. All right, I just add my little contribution, if you will, to it. Let me give you some free tips, all right. So if you're critical on that, you got a problem, you need. You need money, you need to spend some money, especially if you can't solve the problem yourself. Okay, that's why services exist. So, anything else you want to add before I wrap this up, Thanks for the opportunity.
Speaker 2:It was fun.
Speaker 1:Alright, no, thank you. So whenever you start listening to this podcast, you have a blessed day, afternoon or night. So one more thing I need to plug in for this episode. Support this guest, john David, by purchasing his book called how to Protect or Destroy your Online Reputation the Essential Guide to Avoid Digital Damage, lock Down your Brand and Defend your Business. You can easily find this on Amazon. I'll provide the link at the description of this episode. Thank you and enjoy your life you.
