Marco Leeuwerink as a Public Relations Officer in the Hague - Assignment Example

Lectures reviews Marco Leeuwerink Marco Leeuwerink works as a public relations officer and is also in charge of social media integration within the police force in The Hague. His passion lies in social media integration in the works of governments and companies and also in online security. He tries to show how media and social media are being utilized by the police in the Netherlands. An exercise was organized by Mr. Leeuwerink: he asked the students to assist the police in finding and identifying the bank robbers in an imaginary setting. He presented a set of pictures and information from which students were supposed to find suspicion and links to contact desirable media for assistance. The suggestion that were made to contact people and groups were really amazing because they would rarely cross one’s mind. The suggestions included the social media group page for Star Trek fan conference or rare car owners club. Twitter is the main social media site that is being used by the police to instantly communicate with the public. However, a few of police officers make use of other social media platforms such as Google+ to ensure efficient and service to the neighbourhoods they are offering security. Other than using social media as a tool for communication, police are also monitoring it for criminal of offensive activity. In my view, social media can be a very effective tool in law enforcement if not misused by the police workers. The administrators of law enforcement must establish proper controls over the use of social media to increase the benefits and reduce incidents of misuse by their staff. In doing so, the potential of social media in police force may fully be realized. Toin Pijnenburg Toin Pijnenburg works as a manager for change also coaches a number social media sites such as Prezi. Mr. Pijnenburg is the owner of Toin XXL. He is always startled by change and constantly seeks it mainly through putting himself in situations that are inconvenient and assisting others in overcoming change. He made an introduction on the media in the past few decades and its shift to the internet in class. According to him, the present day objectives are changing in their aims. In the past they had to be relevant and achievable, but today, these qualities have been taken for granted. While lecturing, he suggested that the pace of modern society can be reflected better by ambitious and revolutionary. He used Wikipedia as an example on how the audience can assist in creating and developing a web site. Wikipedia unlike other mediums or emails that may require extra services and therefore extra costs, it is cloud based and therefore can allow the users to edit it where necessary. It was so inspiring for me to see the project started in Estonia. Cleaning trashes from huge areas was its main purpose. As implausible as it appears, the objective was to finish it in 24 hours time. Through sound planning and cooperation with individuals from different professions, we managed to congregate about 5% of Estonian population to take part in this project and finish work that could take them several in just five hours. Mr. Pijneneburg made an introduction on steps of change and common reactions to it. Last but not least he explained colours of change agents. Six different colours symbolize different emotional and coherent drives that can play a major in change implementation. One has to take into account the cultural, rational as well as emotional considerations before pressing on for change. Mischa Coster Mischa coster is a social media platforms and online persuasion expert. While doing his presentation, he addressed the issue of social influence the forces behind it and how it is used. Emotions play a major role in human behavior. However, for an impressionable product/service to be produced, specific emotions have to be taken into account. This is what was referred to as ‘Social Generations’ by Mr. Coster. He gave those numbers from zero to three, meaning the transformation from individuals being influenced by persuasion in an authority format, to seeking for social evidence among peers. Mr coster made the principles of social proof more clear. Among the fundamental principles is liking and why people seek similarities in others. This is the base for many of the current social media platforms such as Trip Advisor or Pinterest. Other crucial factor is the need for commitment and consistency. People have the tendency of regarding themselves as coherent beings that are consistent with what they say and do. Thus, they have a sense of stability, trust and confidence. As a matter of fact, one is much more likely to stick to his/her statements if he/she is made to commit to them. People will always turn to experts for advice on things they are not sure about. It is interestingly enough to appear expert for people to attribute superior power. Stanley Milgram a notorious experiment of obedience. He found out that, other than the incredible obedience shown to him, it was clear that in case of conflicting requests, an individual will try to understand which requester has superior authority and stick on him. He introduced loss aversion as a stronger stimulus then fear of consequence. He played an anti-smoking advert, where a little boy losses his mother in a train station for a few minutes. This was the related the fact that only in one minute the child was so shocked. Many revolutions around the world relates to this aversion. When people receive certain rights or freedoms they never had before then stripped of them soon, creates a much bigger disturbance than not receiving them initially. Jan Mudler Jan Mudler is the General Director of “Hug your client.” This is a development that sets to assist businesses serve better their clients through delivering incredible services at touch points. Mr. Mudler began his lecture by addressing social media and then talked about different already familiar terms such as authority, social proof and likeability. Nevertheless, new terms from sociological perspective were also introduced in the lecture. He elaborated on the concept of six degrees of separation. With the aid of several experiments and computer models of social networking, it was shown that in a society that is socially organized, every individual knows each other through a maximum of four conciliators, adding up to six individuals separating even the furthest associates. However, it would be wrong to assume that personal relations are so well-known, as 150 is the average number of people one can be tied to. Nonetheless, others argue that people who have same associates have a likelihood of being tied together as well. Bearing in mind that only a small percentage of internet users are the initiators of events and discussions, it leaves huge for business to enter. Mr. Mudler enthusiastically puts emphasis on the need to come up with a brand story and ‘embrace’ it in a manner that all aspects of organizational work must incorporate it. Reference Kaplan, A. (2010). "Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media: Business Horizons Read More