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.

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.

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.

In a user centered trust based culture, respecting users’ freedom, choices, set of values and their need for trust through transparent information, will bring a new spring to the dynamic power balance  in the relations between providers and users.

As we increasingly turn from citizens to engaged consumers of information, services and goods in many systems we interact with, providers need to become more attentive to the growing user centered culture. Once fighting over our attention is not enough – humility is called for: fighting over our trust demands adapting to the growing zeitgeist of more humane soft values: transparency, relinquishing control, accepting our state of mind and adapting to it.

Recent amendments to the Consumer Bill of Rights, originally articulated by Kennedy in 1960, suggested lately, reflect the shift and scope enlargement of consumers’ place in the food chains.  The growing user centered dignity emphasizes what consumers’ consciousness puts at center stage:

“to be protected against fraudulent, deceitful, or misleading information, advertising, labeling, or other practices, and to be given, by all goods and service providers, unrestricted access to the complete information needed to make an informed choice, including but not limited to ingredients, materials, origin, labor conditions, life cycle, and political activity.”

The original consumer bill of rights treated the basic consumers’

• The right to safety: to be protected against the marketing of products and services that are hazardous to health or to life.
• The right to be informed: to be protected against fraudulent, deceitful, or grossly misleading information, advertising, labeling, or other practices, and to be given the facts needed to make informed choices.
• The right to choose: to have available a variety of products and services at competitive prices.
• The right to be heard: to be assured that consumer interests will receive full and sympathetic consideration in making government policy, both through the laws passed by legislatures and through regulations passed by administrative bodies.
• The right to education: to have access to programs and information that help consumers make better marketplace decisions.
• The right to redress: to work with established mechanisms to have problems corrected and to receive compensation for poor service or for products which do not function properly.
• The right to service–the right to privacy, courtesy, and responsiveness to consumer problems and needs and all steps necessary to ensure that products and services meet the quality and performance levels claimed for them (Added by Clinton, 1994).

Many of these things seem obvious today, although the recent amendments reflect, more than anything else, the spirit of users’ consciousness, based not only on awareness of the quality of goods and services consumed, but to what they stand for, our understanding that manufacturing conditions  of goods and our judgment of  corporate identity of the provider.

We expect from our providers engagement that exceeds CRM discourse and corporate oriented revenue making policies. We expect transparency and a more humanizing culture. Therefore this bill goes as far as the political intricacies that corporates employ – such is the level of consumer scrutiny of their providers.

As we, users, increasingly see ourselves as equal partners in the process and are aware of our power, the shifting balance calls for a new level of ecology, for paradigm change that will flow with the openness, freedom and central place, that we, conscious consumers, have today.

Providers that will accept the evolution of consumerism, sign this bill and adapt to its spirit, will prevail in the shifting user centered paradigm.

Transparency empowers trust.

The internet is one of the most significant catalysts of transparency. Users own conversations, foster diversity, choices and openness.  The internet, information technologies, social media and users’ engagement have cultivated a culture of open sharing.  They keep providers, leaders, corporates and governments under a glass menagerie,  evangelize virtues and broadcast any misbehavior.

The internet allows visibility that we can’t control. Visibility on people, actions – from Facebook, LinkedIn, blogs, articles, comments…. It makes us vulnerable, because we can’t control people’s reactions to what we do or say –voluntarily through the likes of  Facebook and up to bully disclosures of  Wikileaks – we are more exposed as people, employees, managers, officials, politicians…

This leads to greater personal accountability. Once we understand the inevitable power of the  exposure  of our actions, for better or worse, it leads to greater awareness to who we are, and accountability as to why we do what we do. The internet allows us to harness, share, cooperate, engage, become more sensitive to our surroundings – human, social, environmental.

Transparency becomes a key to authenticity.  In our personal life, transparency of social networks, a sharing state of mind and web culture support and empower our authenticity. It makes it natural for us to expect it from the brands, services and systems we interact with. We grow to demand the same accountability from our employers, providers, leaders.

Traditional conservativism cherishes playing one’s cards close to the chest, having full control and disclosing as little as possible, as a means of manipulating reality for corporate, sector, government and even personal interests.  Once organizations cannot control the ripple effects of their doings, gates, walls and a unilateral  top down control become a non applicable paradigm in an age of being under the constant microscope of user monitoring.

Embracing a state of mind of transparency spells a new paradigm – one that transcends regulations and is based on openness, disclosure, accountability, open systems as an organizational culture.  It requires relinquishing control in favor of direct connections, letting others decide. It’s a window to who corporates, institutions and individuals really are, what they stand for.

Therefore it becomes a cultural imperative for brands, corporates, organizations and governments.

Authenticity is a key to trust building.

The internet is more than just a global system of interconnected computer networks. It’s about us, people, and not just about technological platforms and apps, bits and bytes.  It is key in establishing transparency, authenticity and trust mechanisms and  plays a cultural and ethical role that transcends its material, practical and functional aspects.  Therefore the soft values that we users embrace as part of a web culture, will drive changes that will ensure a trustworthy, transparent, empathic way of life, that corporates and institutions will have to embrace to reach us.

Trust based relations are the new green – the key to a clean web ecology.  This fabric is what matters now – a new ecological culture of transparency, trust and engagement that individuals, corporates and institutions alike must embrace.

]]> http://www.icentered.com/trust-is-the-new-green/feed 0 http://www.icentered.com/user-centered-and-icentered-different-lenses-for-user-centricity http://www.icentered.com/user-centered-and-icentered-different-lenses-for-user-centricity#comments Sun, 20 Feb 2011 12:27:44 +0000 Ayala http://www.icentered.com/?p=616

User centricity is a universal approach that takes a holistic systemic view of  the place of the individual in it. As the web’s ubiquity becomes a given and an increasingly growing part of our interactions is web based, the issue of user centricity takes a more significant meaning. User centricity can no longer be seen as just a design principle, but the other way around, especially as user centricity and trust, an essential element in 21^st century web and business culture, go hand in hand.

User centered semantics comprise of multidisciplinary approaches – philosophical, social, economic principles and a fundamental set of values and concepts that assume:

• Open ended systems, interoperability protocols, design premises.
• User control over data, privacy, identity management…
• User controlled data portability
• Transparency
• Users own conversations, interactions, privacy and sharing
• Simple, intuitive usage design and inclusive user experiences for the weaker digital populations.

Once the user is truly at the center, user centricity requires balancing the interests of all parties involved, users, providers, institutions, architecture designers through a cooperative discourse that looks at all as equal partners and respects the rights and interests of all, through transparent mechanisms that enhance trust.

In web based systems, these values and premises can then be translated to define design principles of enabling and supporting technologies, platforms, architectures and business processes that empower user centered interoperability between users, providers, institutions, governance, communities and content creators.

User centricity in existing paradigms does not go hand in hand with top down siloed approaches that claim to be focused on the user, but confuse users with consumers from a corporate/institutional point of view. It is due to hegemony wars and business dominance of corporates and service providers, that do all they can to cultivate approaches that put constraints on customers’ disengagement, as they try to keep their customers captive for corporate profit building plans. It is in complete contradiction to the open, free and transparent spirit and culture of the web and of us, its users.

User centricity is not just about commercial offerings. It is about users’ control over their data, transparency mechanisms that are based on the principles of free choice, portability, simple and free disengagement…..

Whereas user centered takes a systemic view of user centered systems and scenarios, Icentered takes a prismatic view of the individual as the hard core nucleus of any user centered system. It represents the individual in the conceptualization of a user centered blueprint. How the world, interactions and relations should be seen through this lens, once the user is really at the center, with the reins of control in her hands.

The I in icentered focuses on the individuality of each user, as an Itom, the granular entity of the icentered world. An Itom is the smallest comprehensive unit that describes me, the individual user, as a whole, as a unique individual, through all my interactions, across all sites, platforms and media. Each and every one of us is an individual, unique, distinct, non divisible Itom.

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. The systemic concepts and blueprints that will empower this vision of the web,  are at the heart of user centricity paradigms.

The  2011 Edelman trust barometer main findings show a shift to new and different pillars of trust that make us trust companies.

In the past a company was trustworthy if it had a stable and firm business control- a top-down grip on its business and markets, a reliable marketing flow, financial stability and growth.

The trust crises in the last decade strengthened skepticism and shook traditional trust pillars. Corporations can no longer adopt a hard management style through rigid goal seeking and build trust just by making money, protecting the brand and the information flow.

The new trust barometer transcends board room valuation charts. It puts transparency first. Trust is invoked by seeing shared values, a new level of transparency, authenticity, connectivity and connectedness everywhere. It calls for reframing corporate goals in terms of engagement, purpose, and involvement in the good of the larger public as part of a greater social responsibility as trust invokers.

Gaining trust, according to this trust barometer, is a protective measure for corporations today,  as corporates no longer control conversations, good or bad are exposed, condemned or praised instantly and virally evangelized. Therefore corporates’ sustainability lies in practicing what it preaches. Its test lies in its transparency, and its credibility is achieved by the involvement and representation of the corporation through its highest officials as committed to these goals.

This 21^st century spirit and state of public sentiment towards corporates, calls for new management paradigms, new sets of values, new pacts with all parties involved in the food and value chains, more humanizing business culture and ethics.  

The survival of the fittest definitely will take a softer approach, as corporates’ sustainability will be translated in humanizing their business.

Adapting to 21st century emerging business culture means embracing softer attitudes that evoke trust, authenticity and humanization of corporate identity – feminine qualities. This observation is not a feminist declaration or an editorial in an Elle edition.  The new reality is that the business world needs to reframe its discourse to a softer, more fluid one, that usually is not associated with traditional masculine management archetypes.  

The internet is forcing a new marketing discourse. As users increasingly own conversations and the death of customer loyalty is a click away, companies need to replace transaction based policies and devise a deeper relationship with their clients, have to be more attentive, flexible and open.   It means embracing ethical accelerators: transparency, openness, and accountability. It requires a change of mindset to softer more collaborative, conversational, attentive, trust building mechanisms.

Men and women speak different languages and symbolize different archetypes. Men need all the assessments tangible before they start building business processes based on top down hierarchical trees of conditions, risks, time lines and  effort invested,  men like single tasking or defined parallel tasking.  

John Hagel, in a Ted Bay area speech  talked about differentiating between male and female management archetypes. He claims that technology has opened up opportunities but created an increasing competitive pressure that demanded a hard, closed fist management style, semantics of war,  based on  masculine metaphors , rational analysis, aggressive and ruthless conquering of markets, with no room for any vulnerability. As long as this mindset prevailed, there was no room for an alternative semantic discourse.

Feminine archetypes are based on notions of long term, sustained relationships, not transactions, on story like communications style, around expressiveness, images, telling and learning. A style that is not analytic by nature, but based on emotions, vulnerability, and sharing.  Women tend to flourish in chaotic situations; their chaotic patterns and intuitive thinking frame an archetype much more suitable for the conversational nature of the web and the mindset of the social web. Women build their assessments on aggregated information gathering patterns in all sorts of informal distributed ways. Such adaptivity has become a redefining business strategy trait.

Therefore, as environments became more dynamic, siloed rigid attitudes are being reshaped by adaptivity, agility, crowdsourcing, grssrooting, coopetition…. These new  business world dynamics call for a different set of archetypes, more fluid and adaptive.

Blurring gender defined arenas exceeds management skills archetypes and becomes a dominant trend that will influence and reshape many gender based dichotomies.  Faith Popcorn, the trend predictions futurist, predicts a new revolution for 2011-  the end of gender –En-Gen. EnGen era which is neither male nor female. Women are becoming more influential and men are turning more sensitive. Mars and Venus are coming closer. Emotional needs, gender based values and stereotypical behaviors are becoming more blurred. This will influence all levels of interactions, brand building and marketing discourse.

Therefore as businesses are required to adapt to new business cultures that  foster corporate ecology of open, more transparent, authentic  and humane business practices to assure a 21^st century competitive edge, the  feminine archetype will prevail as part of the semiotics of a reshaping business new world.

How can I track down old information about me that floats out there in the digital Ether? Whether I’m just  privacy sensitive and don’t want scraps of data around me dispersed all over without my knowing or control, wish to minimize places I registered to but did not deactivate, hate to think that companies out there manipulate my data, feel abused by the goldmine of my data that makes marketers and advertisers happy but leaves me out of the food chains, or wish to make old hunchbacks  that can be dug by search engines,  fade away – I can now have a personal privacy cleaner at my disposal.

A  US privacy company, Abine, launched DeleteMe - a “delete button for the Internet.”   It  tracks down, on users’ behalf,  traces of personal identity and information from data, passwords, profiles, and up to search results that make people unhappy, and erases them. Price is between 10$-100$, depending on  how much one wants to remove and from where.

I haven’t tried it, so I have no way of telling how thorough and efficient it is, and maybe in the distributed internet there can’t be a seal proof guarantee.

Regardless, the initiative deserves  praise for several grounds:

To start with – it’s a universal service that exceeds the boundaries of specific siloed sites. As such it takes a harmonized approach for my digital residues from a holistic point of view and caters for my privacy needs all across.

In the current state of web related privacy policies, where as a user I’m helpless in front of opaque data gathering in sites, can’t really keep track or notice data manipulation and have to deal with a plethora of privacy policies, it’s good to have a privacy policeman directly protecting my side, working on my behalf.

The business plan based on profit generated from direct provisioning for my privacy demands, is a trust enhancer because it assures no need or ulterior motives for my data manipulation as part of the company’s business plan . I pay – I’m the customer – they cater for my needs.

 Straight. Simple. Clean.

Also the cart of services they offer answers any need from any prism a user may wish for.

The company offers data removal methods activated through both automated tools and manual data manipulation in sites, that in itself promises a more thorough and systemic cleaning.

User side services such as DeleteMe that empower me, the individual, to take active control through outsourcing expert based is yet another step towards enhancing user centered paradigms and shift control over web interaction from providers to us users – an  important step towards a transparency culture and a cleaner web ecology.