In the Washington Post recently, Democratic strategist Tad Devine described three television ads he thinks could win the Republican nomination for Mitt Romney. Stripping away the personalities and the politics, we suggest these are three excellent “campaign” strategies for any superintendent or principal who has an important message to get out.

Supposing you are proposing a boundary change or a new bell schedule or having to reduce the number of bus runs in your community. Consider this three-pronged approach:

1. Find a spokesperson of integrity to attest to your plan—someone who is outside your office, but closely enough connected to the schools to have credibility on education issues, someone who can make a “simple but powerful argument” to counter the “outrageous statements” about you and your schools being floated in the press or online. See to it that this person is heard clearly by your stakeholders.
2. Be sure that the stakeholders who will be impacted by the plan have the opportunity to understand the plan thoroughly and respond to it. In today’s climate, peer-to-peer communication carries far more weight than anything that comes from central office. Don’t underestimate impact of consumer comments on your Facebook page or your Twitter account.
3. Make use of “candidate to camera” time. (This doesn’t have to be video, though it could be short spot on your website.) You, as leader, need to connect with your stakeholders on this issue. You need to make “honest and compelling” statements about the need for, and benefits of, your plan. Your community needs to be constantly reassured about its relationship with you. Bottom line, they want to believe in you. Help them to do so. Don’t be silent.

An outside expert, peer-to-peer experience and a strong relationship with the leader—winning tools all. Use them.

• 24 percent of Hispanic adults perform online search via cell phone, 71 percent more than 14 percent of non-Hispanic adults and 50 percent more than 12 percent of overall adults.

• Hispanic adults are much less likely than non-Hispanic adults to own a desktop computer but somewhat more likely to own a wireless laptop or netbook, Droid or iPad, and much more likely to own an iPod or iPhone.

Source: Marketing Charts

Almost immediately, we confirmed that the rumbling was, in fact, an earthquake, not a terrorist attack as some of us had feared. We texted our mothers, our children, our friends—trying to be sure that everyone were safe. And then we began sharing our own stories. Tweets, emails and, occasionally, even a completed phone call moved the news around the country with amazing speed.

If there was ever a demonstration of the power of mobile communication, that was it!

http://wapo.st/qMCKjs

It is our contention that social media tools—while admittedly imperfect—are the tools we need to meet the demands of today’s school community. Just as rows of desks nailed to the floor and September to June school calendars are remnants of a nineteenth century agrarian society, the six-panel, four-color, two-fold brochure and the monthly newsletter are the remnants of a twentieth century view of adequate school communication.

We live in an age where connections and information-sharing go hand-in-hand and have become the currency of the land. The reason to have more “friends” is so that you can
• extend your influence in the worlds that matter to you most,
• pass on knowledge that you think is important, and
• learn from others.
(Mmmmm, doesn’t that sound suspiciously like the goals of school leadership?)

Our new book, Why Social Media Mattters, And How School Leaders Can Harness Its Energy, is scheduled for publication by Solution Tree Press later this year.  In the meantime, we’ll be writing here about social media and schools,.  We’d love to hear from you. All anecdotes and questions, challenges and successes are welcome through comments  on the blog or directly to us via e-mail. Let us hear your voice!

But listen to Disney talk about a trip to Disneyland.  Listen to the makers of Mercedes Benz.  Even listen to Walmart.  They are not talking about barbecues or carburetors or rollercoasters.  They are all talking about “the experience.”  They are talking about how you will feel when you visit the park, drive car, or cook in your own backyard.

In schools, we are asking our parents and community friends to choose—and support—public education based on the facts we provide them.   But our stakeholders are asking us a much more fundamental question:  “What is the experience you offer our children?  How will they (and we, their parents) feel when they attend your school?”

We rarely answer that question directly.  So people in the community are forced to make these judgments based on how the school phones are answered (or not), how they are treated in the main office, how well the campus is maintained, and what kind of people they perceive us (and their children’s teachers) to be.

Wouldn’t it be better if we talked about the question out loud?  Shouldn’t we ask parents and prospective parents what kinds of experiences they are seeking?  A respectful, nurturing, safe environment?  Intellectual excitement and curiosity?  An environment that can be personalized to meet an individual child’s needs?

“We spend a lot of time listening to our customers,” Amy Lester of Wal-Mart says in a recent New York Times article on what makes people happy.

We all like to be listened to.  We all seek out satisfying experiences, whether we are in the library, at work, or at the grocery store, and we often judge the success of our day by how we feel at the end of it.  Maybe we should think about, and fundamentally change, the way we describe what goes on in school.  Maybe that one step alone could help us start to make our schools more inviting.

It’s tempting to approach a social media plan with a Nike Just do it mindset. Facebook, Twitter and other platforms offer plug-and-play interfaces that make it easy and quick to create a Web 2.0 presence.  Blogspot, WordPress and other technologies make setting up a blog fuss-free.  However, creating a social media presence does not mean succeeding at connecting with your audience.  Just showing up doesn’t count for anything.

A real social media strategy requires a deliberate process in three phases:  listening, participating and influencing.  Each step yields the information that will result in an avenue to engage in real two-way conversation:

• Listening:  Who is your online community, where do they go, what do they talk about, how do they frame school issues?
• Participate:  What channels match your community and provide a functional medium to achieve your communication goals (e.g. create video, tell stories, answer questions)?
• Influence:  What action do you want to result from your social media efforts (e.g. build confidence, create pride, develop trust)?

Social media is where the conversation takes place.  Use the real tools—listening, participating and influencing—to figure out whom you’re going to be before you show up.  Then, you can start a conversation that matches your goals to your community’s needs.

Each story recounts how, somewhere along the way, a few meaningful words spoken by the right person at the right time, had a profound influence on the writer’s life.  These are moments, contends Thomas, when “words made all the difference.”

The book is a great reminder of the very individual and personal ways in which the words we choose can make that difference.  Even we, for whom words are the tools of the trade, forget the power we hold.

Thomas begins the forward to the book with an Indian proverb:

Tell me a fact and I’ll learn.  Tell me a truth and I’ll believe.

But tell me a story and it will live in my heart forever.

BP is not the only one with an outdated plan; four other oil and gas executives appearing before a congressional committee admitted similar flaws. Exxon Mobil revealed its emergency response plan includes 40 pages on dealing with the media and only nine on dealing with an oil spill.

Ridicule of these plans and their CEOs dominated the headlines and added to doubts concerning the motives of oil companies.  How could they show such a reckless disregard for safety?

What about your crisis plan?  Your community has the same expectations for thoughtful crisis planning as the citizens affected by the spill. While many elements of a crisis are out of a leader’s control, planning is not. Take some time this summer to review your plan.  Any walruses?