Grassroots movements become the compasses for the new ecology.

The story of Kristen Christian who declared  a “bank transfer day” and called her 500 Facebook friends to transfer their bank accounts, after Bank of American announced a 5$monthly fee for  shopping with their debit card, snowballed a bottom up movement and forced the bank to withdraw from its plan,  is yet another example how we can all be shakers and movers.

True for issues regarding corporate abuse, true for issues regarding government or policy abuse – Occupy Wall street is yet another example. Thomas Friedman’s analysis of the current grassroots movements in America and India against corruption and excessive greed show the common denominator – the striving for a constitutive change.

Current bottom up protests, commercial or civic, do not stem just from external circumstances. These are the last straws that ignite bottom up spontaneous acts that spiral because they strike many cords.It is happening now mainly because when corporates and governing institutions are losing their ruling grip, whereas the state of mind of individuals has shifted to demand a new level of ecology from their providers and officers and recognize the entitled place of the people they serve .

The Icentered mindset stems from a natural sense of self induced empowerment that changes the basic approach to the place of the organizations  we interact with. Once users, people, dictate the perspective where providers of goods and services actually work for us,  serve us and accommodate our needs, bosses and colleagues at work are our clients, and our governing officers were elected as our representatives and as such are replaceable upon failure or distrust –  grassroots movements and connected conversations will provide the compass for  the new zeitgeist.

The very idea of sustainability implies a life line of validity, reliability and invokes trust and good reputation. Sustainability is about long term balance. Financial, operational, environmental. It’s about supplying needs and supporting from below.

It applies to corporates and governing bodies, to managers, providers, public officers and governors of sorts. On its face value it’s about solidifying approaches of businesses with and term goals.

With the web 2.0 and the winds of change that put users at the center and empower them with a natural sense of entitlement, sustainability should change with it and shift its gravity to harnesses the economic and business logic for the humane. That way it will become what is now essential for businesses that want to adapt –  a people centered long term strategy to management,  planning and corporate identity, one that takes into account the real implications for the users, environment and society, far above and beyond the profit lines and business goals of the corporate.

People discern essence from form. They no longer fall for slogans, marketing schmoozing and election speeches. The sustainability lens is measured by the trust that organizations and officers invoke, as perceived by people. It is about the level of involvement and commitment to socially aware activities, the authenticity with regard to bringing back the humane sides and social dimensions of projects and endeavors.

Trust is built bottom up, by connecting the dots of promises and deeds, everyday small steps that show real commitment, a language that is framed in a trust inspiring way.

Even if officers forget, users and citizens remember that sustainability and accountability go hand in hand. Therefore when providers, governors and corporate leaders treat their audience as equal partners to the process and truly see the people behind the users- their future is sustained.

It takes a high personal level of integrity and authenticity to become a sustainable leader – in the corporate, public or civic world. It demands a long term responsible vision that sees the greater good and exceeds short term tenure. It involves transparency, social solidarity, accountability and ethics.

It ensures a sustainable future for both givers and takers. The people.

The UN declared that the 7^th billionth person was born today in the Philippines. 7 billion people and very polarized life between those struggling for drinking water, a cup of rice a day and basic shelter, hygiene and medicines to ensure their very survivability while the ipad/smart phone western digital generation cherishes the pursuit after the latest, bigger, faster as defining traits.

These two modes of existence are not as detached as it may seem. Changes in  a westerner’s lifestyle may not directly affect the quality of life of struggling people in the third world, still we live in an interconnected global economy where the butterfly effect slowly and gradually carves its impact.

Things are rotten in our affluent global kingdom of Denmark. In many countries, a growing demand for dethroning corrupted systems is heard. In oppressed regimes, rioters demand freedom and a better life. In more democratic countries, frustrated from the failure of the prevailing economic systems, the calls are for an affordable and a more solidarity based future. The outrageous numbers of discrepancies in the distribution of wealth,  the economic inequality, greed and even financial corruption marked an era that is shaking the world’s well being all across.

What can we, the 99% , do in our daily life to make a difference?

Build new engines; develop disruptive life paradigms that will influence our social networks, environment and the axioms on which current crumbling paradigms are built.

Corporate responsibility according to the new zeitgeist should be measured by awareness not only to boardroom results but to the real value its products/services carry and its authentic engagement as trust building mechanisms that influence the corporate identity. These days solidarity accountability and social and environmental awareness gradually become a new measuring scale for a more aware,  just and politically correct existence for many organizations that up till now were led by profit goal seeking as the ultimate purpose.

At the same time we, users, have a responsibility as well.

We can, and should, harness our life style and usability patterns to stop the vicious circle that feeds and increasingly empowers the ruling 1%.

How?

Do we really need to consume all that we are consuming? Is more, newer, bigger the answer? Isn’t that the pipeline that feeds the suppliers of the closed club of the few monster companies that control everything.

The answer to the capitalist networks that financially own the world top down is a user centered state of mind that defeats it bottom up through non tangible weapons – deriving meaning from values and actions that do not require actual purchases, but give satisfaction by their very value – an internal sense of purpose and fulfillment that is not determined by others’ defined status symbols or social ladders.

User centered economy of the soul and social connectedness will replace hedonistic stimuli with soul fulfilling activities that carry with them a lasting meaning. It will be based on real social values of engagement, involvement, caring, solidarity has a much stronger communal and networked value than any financial or brand related bonds.

The social net will get a qualitative meaning as well, as we harness our social circles for challenging the practices that created the affluent society that translated happiness to external assets and very individualistic life style. It  will shift control back to us, users, and will force marketers to share a humbler less greedy spirit. Continuing in the same paths is bound to prove self destructive. On its simplest level, our palates will not suffer a loss if on supermarket shelves there will a choice of 4 yogurt flavors instead of 15 and our personalities will not be deprived if not wrapped in the latest brands. Modesty of settling for less can be as fulfilling as constantly looking for the next stimulus, which very quickly proves to be nothing more than quicksand demanding to be fed again and again to keep the thrill.

Only then a different solidarity based world culture may develop, that will hopefully find more compassion between all its 7 billion inhabitants.

In his article One country two revolutions, Thomas Friedman describes two opposing revolutions that occur simultaneously. On the one hand, the social revolution that rattles Wall Street and as contrast the hyper connectedness revolution that is transforming Silicon Valley.

While at its face value it may seem that those two revolutions are contrasting in nature, in fact they are the two sides of the same coin – the user/citizen at the center. Connecting the dots leads to the common denominator –two expressions of the same phenomenon – the voice of individuals shaping society bottom up, in a collective collaborative way.  In both new social is the order of the day. Social activism, social media, grassroots actions and collaborative crowdsourcing are the means. Both are expressions of the traits that characterize user centricity and citizen centricity–a free spirit, independent state of mind and a natural sense of entitlement.

In one revolution, citizens faced with economic concerns, unrest and distrust of the system, react in a bottom up participatory wave of voices. They refuse to continue and passively accept old orders. In the Wall Street Riots the movers and shakers are no longer distinct mavericks, but a collective of citizens that has become a mover aspiring to shake the paradigm that brought them to the abyss.People who fear fragile economies, feel exploited, abused and betrayed want to bring back the human factor into the equation. They call for a more moral, value based and socially aware governance. These riots ignite a communal call for a civic ecology that that places its people at the center of the system.

The Silicon valley transformation works itself up through a ubiquitous open ended individual empowerment, a user centered paradigm, and a social collaborative grid of bottom-up shared conversations and collaborative efforts to work on the best solutions.

  Both are poking the box , replacing top down hierarchal dictation, both reflect a paradigm shift, a new state of mind.

In the corporate world customer is king, all the more so in the civil democratic systems where the citizen holds the scepter as the raison d’être of the state.  Elected representatives and governors that will not realize that the people have crowned  anew the people and its well being, are jeopardizing their political validity.  

In a very fragile world economy, where tectonic shifts threaten countries, activism and sympathy are not enough to draw the blueprint for citizen centered social justice and solidarity based . The process of dethroning and crowning may be two phased. Where first new political powers will emerge, based on anger and frustration and on the call for change. Stealth leaders with no central political backbone, lead the protests, while political leaders that were formerly trusted , are rapidly losing the faith of the public. Obama’s failure to solve the economic crisis is such a case.

New leaders may arise, mastering the language of civil ecology based on solidarity, social responsibility, but lacking the tools, skills and political craftsmanship needed for implementing it responsibly without throwing  the baby out with the bath water.

A real citizen centered governance culture will revive the original and natural increasing returns dynamics where the people elect representatives appointed to really take care of their needs and act on their behalf, those who truly prove to fulfill this, earn the constituents’ trust, will enjoy a greater “rating” (the equivalent to share owner’s value in the corporate world) and will thus ensure their future credibility and their central place in continuing and serving the people.

When user centricity and citizen centricity, characterized by a free spirit, independent state of mind and natural sense of entitlement, are correlated against economic concerns, unrest and distrust of the system, change is bound to be cardinal.

The stagnation in the belief of individuals in the system leads to a sharp divide, as a bottom up participatory wave of voices refuses to continue and passively accept old orders and top down provider/ politicians’ self serving interests as an axiom.

The deteriorating financial circumstances all over the world, the fear of a recession ahead, the realization that the boomer generation inflicted a capitalism that went too far, that the ramifications hit all and threaten individual welfare, affordable future and growth, as well as the continuation of existing paradigms – all lead to a clear realization that more of the same doesn’t cut the mustard.

On different fronts individual reactions are mostly through small, personal and apparently minor tides of rejections –opting out, discontinuing, and looking for alternatives, in both the virtual as well as the real worlds. The tale of individualism that fed the systems to date and empowered catering for individual needs in the name of CRM or state policies was based on personal and sectarian fragmentations.

It is now turned against these institutions, commercial and civil, this time through communal social grids and in the name of social solidarity. The doubting crowds gradually take the reins in their hands on a way to radical transformations. Connecting the dots is moving from the serving parties who controlled the balances and gained power, to the users/citizens who claim what in their eyes is theirs to start with.

The fuse has been lit on many fronts, all at once. Same dynamics, different expressions. Signs are everywhere. When people, with a new state of mind go elsewhere, make new choices, opt for new providers, align themselves with new political voices, or as is the case in countries such as Israel and starting through Europe, calling overtly for radical changes – the ruling elites of corporations, financial systems and states, in many cases out of touch with what the people really want, must pay close attention.

These accumulated and dispersed reactions voice the same spirit:

Trust is gone. The contracts are being torn; new ones are in the writing. Bottom up, by individuals, groups and unfortunately in some places by mobs.

This fermenting realization will bring about new orders, as individuals tired of the deterioration in their life quality and as citizens claiming an affordable future for themselves, children and grandchildren demand to be truly put at the center. Even if now it’s mostly individual movers and shakers who carry the flag, quietly or aggressively masses will eventually align.

The deeper the tectonic shifts needed, the longer it will take for the tipping point to occur- but it is becoming inevitable, beyond the level of slogans, intentions and appearances.

When emotional meets economic and social, it crafts the seeds from which a plethora of small gestures and acts of individuals will connect the dots and together will create a shift that will matter. As Itoms in a people’s grid, what each of us feels, thinks and opts to do matters. Because we, users, citizens, matter – we are the heart of the system, its raison d’être.

When economies and countries go astray, individuals react bottom up, the wisdom of the crowds cannot be appeased just by educated charts and financial analyses. The increasing calls for transparency, culture and conduct that cater for the good of all, considers the well being of the citizens and exercises a reciprocal authentic pact are the heart of a new people centered paradigm, sensitive to the people that comprise it.  It should be based on new values that will put an end to old vicious circles and empower a new kind of society – more attentive to its citizens, to their quality of life, the meaning of their actions and not just their physical goods, where the people are actively involved in shaping the future economic and social structures of their societies.

Citizen centricity is part of the fabric of any state that is not led by dictators. The current protests in Israel are an exemplary case of a social movement that politicians must listen to. It is a call for action of the people – a call for engagement, for direct democracy where the official governing bodies fail,  and a mass of protestors, do not settle for just rioting,  but actively engage in drawing  the blueprints for their desired state, employing very educated communal methods, in order to create a better state, true to its original mandate to cater for its citizens.

The social unrest in Israel has started a month and a half ago with a group of youngsters that put up tents in Tel Aviv’s  most prestigious boulevard and called for affordable housing. In a country burdened by a huge army budget and security constraints, social welfare and affordable future no longer seem a luxury, riots aim for a change in priorities. It spread to hundreds of people sleeping in tents all over the country, and hundreds of thousands marching in protests calling for social justice. It’s the protest of the middle class, people who work hard but with the rising cost of living, still can’t make ends meet. Not a blood drop shed, no aggression – but not less determination.

In these riots, the protestors are changing the rules of the game. They don’t wait for their leaders to improve – they claim and negotiate, on behalf of all the people, dictate new standards and social values. In this citizen centered protest, people demand an affordable future for the nation’s  human grid that encompasses all.

This protest is a test case that awaits many regimes in the western world if they don’t become more citizen centered and understand the new rules of the game. It is not just about Israel. Unrest is lurking all across as people fear fragile economies, recession, are tired of unfulfilled promises and feel exploited, abused and betrayed by their politicians who scarifice the citizens’ well being for their political survivability.

The protestors in Israel are bringing back the human factor into the equation, igniting a communal effort to turn the state to a citizen centered state that takes care of its people through affordable housing, just taxation, welfare policies, control on prices of food, stopping privatization and a different allocation of resources.  They call for a more moral, value based and  socially aware governance, one that truly takes care of its citizens, and does not trick them with economic phrases and sugar coated spins.

The protestors are poking the box – using direct democracy tools, creating major debate arenas, where people are sharing views, making communal efforts and collaboratively creating a new DNA for the country. This collaborative creation is agnostic to political views, left or right are not the issue and the protestors make it a point to emphasize that it’s a citizen’s build-up, not a political one.

It is a paradigm shift, a new state of mind. Replacing top down  hierarchal dictation from our leaders who claim they are best positioned to decide what is good for us, with bottom-up shared conversations and collaborative efforts to work on the best solutions. The protests’ leaders make it a point not to identify themselves with any political party (The protests are not politically based, although the right wing governing coalition tried to show it as a left attempt to create unrest). This protest transcends political, geographical and religious boundaries). It’s against all politicians elected to cherish the welfare of its citizens as a primary consideration, who betrayed the cause using their positions to strengthen their political power.

It’s a call for social justice and solidarity, affordable future, capitalistic “modesty” of the rich corporates, equal sharing of the burden. It’s a call that unites everybody as a human grid fighting for a better, more moral based and socially responsible life.

New social is the order of the day. Social media, grassroots actions and collaborative crowdsourcing are the means.

The protests are not violent; the activities look more like political Woodstock style gatherings. Solidarity is sweeping everybody. Political debates, experts volunteering to negotiate on behalf of the people with a government nobody trusts anymore. Citizens don’t want to wait for the next opportunity to go to the ballots and choose again. They want social justice now. They want a shift in the set of values and priorities of the state to become more citizen centered and less state oriented.

It’s a lesson in direct democracy, citizen engagement and a people that takes its destiny in its hands – bottom-up, to redefine the original pact between a state and its citizens. A citizen centered state.

User centricity is primarily associated with marketing disciplines that put the user at the center. A cliché, cynicists may claim, devised by corporates to appease clients. A more evolved approach to user centricity truly makes the user a primary partner. As citizens we are users of systems created first and foremost to cater to our needs. Governing systems, just like commercial ones, need to be attentive to their users for their survivability and adapt accordingly.

In our life as citizens, user centricity is not always taken for granted as a primary consideration, and at times, not catered for at all. In many countries, very significant political, economic and social changes are fermenting or openly taking place at this very moment.

In non democratic regimes, such as the Arab states in the Middle East like Egypt, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Tunisia,  regimes, up to very recently, were  fear based. Till a moment came when the masses felt  they had nothing to lose.  A bottom up citizen based ripple effect swept the area and the people rebelled aggressively, no longer accepting the ruling dynasty paradigms of their dictators.

In the democratic western world – it’s fermenting in other ways. In some countries aggressive riots sprang – e.g Uk,  in others – non violent  protests, like in Israel, (where I come from), but not less powerful. All across Europe unrest is fermenting, as people, frustrated by the  economic unrest and the feeling  their current governing parties, delegates of the people, elected by the people and for the people, no longer attentively  cater for the interests of the people as their primarily consideration.

All are threatened by shifts and the unrest from the growing feeling of misuse of the credit and trust with which the prevailing parties were endowed. It’s already here or lurking behind the corner, and not just as a build up towards election day. The masses are losing faith in the thin closed circle  that brings time after time the same players in varied constellations and perpetuates solutions the citizens no longer trust.

All this unrest has a common denominator – the voice of the citizen. User centricity is not just about consumerism – it is about engagement, influencing and shaping the systems that serve us. Same goes for our identity as citizens, and our prerogative, or duty, if you wish, to  call out to put us, citizens, in our rightful place – as the center of the systems built by and for us.

The need for a new pact between the governing parties and their constituents is fermenting bottom – up. It’s a call for bringing back the human factor into the center of the equation. Sovereignty should be based on trust, Trust is enhanced by transparency. Both are  rare goods these days.

Citizen centered, Wecentered,  in the face of political, financial and corruption turmoil all across the world, is a paradigm that will  redefine the balance between politicians and us, citizens.

In a citizen centered state of mind it is not the governors who have an unlimited mandate because presumably they know best what the people should have and therefore a totally free hand to prioritize and dictate their worldview with blind oblivion to what we, the citizens, feel we should have.

Holding on to attitudes of   “though the dog may bark,  the caravan moves on”, blind to the growing and the shifting  power of  citizens,  blinds leaders from reading the writing on the wall. A state is a human grid. We are citizens and in democracies, the elected delegates should represent their citizens’ interests.

Citizen centered paradigms grow in dynamic movements through bottom up open systems, where citizens call for freedom,  better living conditions, hope, and in more affluent and democratic countries  a more just allocation of resources, and an affordable future.

The citizen centered paradigm demands a new lens for the relations  between the state and the citizens, for focusing on the citizens  and their well being. A state’s ecology is manifested by its social conscious, considering the human aspects of its officials’ operations and not losing the human touch in executing its policies.  The new citizen centered paradigm calls for transparency, culture and conduct that cater for the good of all, considers the well being of the citizens and exercises a reciprocal authentic pact with them.

I have just returned from over 2 months of extensive travelling, which explains why I have not written for a while.

In resuming writing the icentered blog I will add another dimension to the icentered paradigm – that of citizen centricity, or Wecentered, as another lens of Icentricity.

To date citizen aspects of user centricity evolved primarily around digital relations between citizens and governing institutions, aiming to facilitate interaction and make processes and information more accessible to citizens, within the framework of existing paradigms.

However, the political, financial and social turmoil taking place around the world make us all part of a changing paradigm. User centricity is not confined to web based digital life. The internet  and user centered web culture are among the main powers igniting and feeding  many of the tectonic shifts that are taking place. As citizens we are users of systems created primarily to cater to our needs. Governing systems, just like commercial ones, need to be attentive to their users for their survivability and adapt accordingly.

As we are proclaiming our rightful place in our relations with our institutions and states, user centricity exceeds by far preserving the relations between us and our governing offices. The earth is shaking in some countries, others are in the process of very significant shifts and others will follow if leaders fail to read the writings on the wall. We, citizens, in many countries, in many different ways, are claiming an affordable human centered life, demanding new orders, values and regulations that adhere to the people’s voice and needs in new pacts tailored around us and for us.

The next series of posts will be dedicated to citizen centered or Wecentered as part of a shifting paradigm in the relations between states, institutions and us, in view of the changing cultures, values and structures.

The spectrum of the concept of user centricity fluctuates from pin pointed data management of relations between users and online identity providers, the technical  federation of computerized identity schemes and up to  a holistic  user centered disintermediation paradigm.

User centricity is not just a concept for implementation in computerized protocols, federated identity management or CRM processes. Nor is it a corporate cliché’, a marketing lip service for “we serve you best” as “we see what’s best for you”

The above is a manifestation of business and process orientation of customer centric approaches that corporates, providers and organizations  claim, in top down unilateral relationship schemes, based on their mediation. They define what, how, where, when and in what way, in the name of knowing best what users need.

In that spirit, even in the distributed web and in social networks, users are deprived from direct access to many services or information strings that are provided for free (no free meal..) or fee of a sort. In exchange for services, users’ data  become the provider’s property, to be manipulated at will, without the user’s consent and many times even awareness. Commercial offerings are wrapped in schemes of captivity, profile base stickiness and a golden cage of web services that menace our privacy and  freedom. The centralization of provider-side service platforms makes sure that the data accumulated remain hosted on company’s servers, even when the architectures are cloud based.

Even claims of focusing on end- users require modifications. Taking a business oriented view, Brian Solis claims that that customer centricity begins with creating a climate of change. He claims that organizations need to really listen to their customer, tap into social networks where customers converse and adapt the corporate culture and inner processes in the organizations to the expressed customers attitudes and engagement, and thus be able to create change  by placing the user at the center of the design of the organizational systems, adapted to what they have learnt.

Still that approach assumes a patronizing top down intermediation. In a world where commercial offerings and social services are wrapped in schemes of captivity, profile base stickiness and golden cages of web services that menace users’ privacy and  freedom. The centralization of provider-side service platforms makes sure that the data accumulated remain hosted on company’s servers, even when the architectures are cloud based. Even when providers try to humanize

What combats that?

One approach was open source and free.  Services, offerings and source codes created bottom-up or through crowdsourcing

http://www.h-online.com/open/features/What-s-the-solution-cont-956215.html

However, user centricity is more. It’s a culture, a paradigm, a lens.

Real user centricity starts with taking the point of view of the individual, and not that of  the corporate or organization. A human point of view, of people flesh and blood that converse, engage, adapt and influence is different than that of corporates, even if those providers claim that they care about us, users. Organizations  don’t  care.

The human side, really looking at the users and adapting a culture that puts them in the center, requires a paradigm change.  Looking at the digital world through a prismatic view of each individual Itom , creates a new vantage point for web based relations. Once we look at it as a people’s web,  it’s an “I in the center” paradigm, where  each user becomes a distinct anchor,  an Itom.

In that paradigm of total disintermediation, the self sovereignty of users rules. They are independent, free, at the center of systems that serve them, equal partners to the processes and food chains created around them, with total control of their data, privacy and sharing – pulling services at their choices.

We are not there yet. Neither technologically nor commercially. The culture is already fermenting. User side services are beginning to bud, the road is still long. Yet the free spirit, independent state of mind and natural sense of entitlement that real Icentricity required, should become adapted  by organizations who want to adapt to the emerging digital landscape where users are the real center. Embracing transparency, compassion and engagement – soft values that enhance trust and a true sense of partnership.