Three huge institutions are facing enormous challenges in America today. Network TV, GM and the Catholic Church have all experienced huge market declines. All three are struggling to put together a set of solutions to their daunting circumstances. Each solution is an outgrowth of an underlying "theory of the case"
about how to reverse the trend, and reflects an analysis of how much time they have to stem the tide.
Let's look at TV first. Maureen Dowd makes some interesting observations in today's NY Times op-ed (sub. req's). She says:
So media big shots are moving away from patriarchal, authoritarian voice-of-God figures, even as the Catholic Church and politics are moving toward patriarchal, authoritarian voice-of-God figures.
Network news is attempting to shore up its numbers by becoming more "hip." With Ted Koppel soon to depart ABC's Nightline, the network recently started looking for fresh approaches.
One show tested recently, according to reports, was set in a nightclub. It had white tablecloths, candles, a jazz quintet, a live audience at little tables and - this is not a joke - faux fog.
We've gone from the fog of war to the fog of news.
The nightclub segments that were tested had Gen X hosts and guests, and red-blue debates on Michael Jackson, the Olsen twins' "dumpster chic" and "mad as hell" rants.
OK, well, what about GM? Yesterday's news of their $1.1 billion loss for the first quarter of this year was a stark reminder of their loss of market share, which fell to 27% in 2004, an all time low. GM's response? Tweak the model.
Every so often, we all have to do a bit of a sense check, just to make sure that the sun will indeed rise tomorrow. And, amidst all of the gloom and doom surrounding GM lately, I'd like to give yet another alternative viewpoint.
No, it's not all bad; indeed, I'm seeing some good signs.
That's Bob Lutz on his blog, seeing some signs of change and telling faithful that changes take root and bring things around.
Meanwhile, attendance at Catholic mass is plummeting worldwide (the exception being Third World countries, in which local "adaptations" of doctrine are becoming increasingly worrisome). In response, the Church elected its staunchest public defender of tradition as its new leader. The message: stay the course. From Dowd,
The white smoke yesterday signaled that the Vatican thinks what it needs to bring it into modernity is the oldest pope since the 18th century: Joseph Ratzinger, a 78-year-old hidebound archconservative who ran the office that used to be called the Inquisition and who once belonged to Hitler Youth. For American Catholics - especially women and Democratic pro-choice Catholic pols - the cafeteria is officially closed. After all, Cardinal Ratzinger, nicknamed "God's Rottweiler" and "the Enforcer," helped deny Communion rights to John Kerry and other Catholic politicians in the 2004 election.
What's the major difference in these three approaches? Their orientation toward time.
If you are an executive at ABC, what is your time horizon for change? Do you have a year to "get the numbers up?" Maybe, maybe not. The future, as somebody once said, is now!
GM? Well, the company clearly has a solid balance sheet, with over $300 million in cash. So, while Rick Waggoner is undoubtedly feeling heat, he's asking, as these guys once did, for just a little more time.
The Church? As someone else once said, they've got all kinds of time. Benedict XVI can afford to wait out this "cafeteria" era, prune the tree of the Church back to its healthy roots (as one TV pudit put it last night) and then flourish once again.
Now, we can argue with any of these theories of change. But the fact remains that the decisions being made by these leaders are deeply contextual: each has to calculate the pace at which their organizations and markets will permit them to work the models they've put in place. And each has to answer according to (mostly) his sense of how much time he has.
Each also has to heed the warning a flight enthusiast friend of mine gave me years ago: "It doesn't matter whether or not you're pulling out of a dive, if your aircraft intersects with the ground."
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