I’m not a wealthy man but even I managed to lose a generous amount of money in the recent and ongoing market meltdown. Whatever notion I may have had about retiring while I was still mobile and largely in control of my marbles has vanished as fast as the value of my mutual funds. What really irks me, as someone who communicates for a living, is that none of the financial services companies I do business with seems even remotely aware that I might be a bit ticked at the turn of events. They aren’t alone, of course, as pretty much every financial services company in the country joins in a hesitant chorus of whistling through the graveyard.
Don’t get me wrong here. I’m not after a bleak televised apology from a pale CEO promising to figure out what went wrong and vowing to get it right the next time. It’s clear now that pretty much every financial services company got caught in the mania surrounding mortgages for people who couldn’t afford them. It’s also clear that all of us lost money when the markets came crashing back to earth. No one Canadian company has to take any more blame than the others (though I stand to be corrected on this point).
No, what I’m after here is some clear-eyed, frank, honest and forthright recognition from these companies that this sudden disappearance of my money hurts. I want a financial services company that has the guts to admit they could have done better and that maybe - just maybe - their advice wasn’t as solid as it might have been. Better yet, I want a financial services company that has the courage to tell me now how it’s changing to learn from this mess. I want to know they have a plan and the discipline to implement that plan.
What I don’t want - and what I’m seeing every day in the newspaper, on television and in my stack of mail — is a colourful brochure or cheerful ad celebrating their “second opinions,” their “valuable advice” and their readiness to help me “create my future” and make it “this easy.” The notion that I’m richer than I think is not only laughable, it borders on the insensitive and insulting. The jolly plasticine man in the bowler hat is particularly irritating and perhaps deserves the same fate as SNL’s Mr. Bill.
As I wrote in a recent PR Clinic column for the newsletter of the Ottawa-Gatineau chapter of the Canadian Society of Association Executives, successful communication in anxious times calls for a consistent display of empathy, the clear articulation of a value proposition (what exactly am I getting for these management fees?) and a demonstration of planning and leadership.
At this point, I haven’t come across this kind of communication from any of the major financial services companies in this country. Sounds to me like there’s a real opportunity here for a gutsy company to really set itself apart from the competition and earn the respect of suffering investors everywhere.
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