Defense Tech:Hey PMCs: Stop Blaming the Media

[unhappycamper]

Hey PMCs: Stop Blaming the Media

It is getting very tiresome to continue hearing operators in our community complain about how the ’left wing media’ the ’muckrakers’ the ‘liberals’ the ‘the blogosphere’ and their ‘pacifist do-gooder agenda’ are bringing our industry down and giving us a bad name. Anyone who sits around whining about books or articles or blogs or news reports that attack PMCs should stop wasting their breath and start doing something about it.

Yes, it’s true there are dozens of traditional media outlets that say negative things about us. Yes, there are many reporters who wake up every day with a pre-written story in their head about how bad PMCs are. And yes, in the most powerful battle, the battle of words, they are dominating the fight for ‘mindshare’ among politicians and the general citizenry. But guess what, it has been and always will be this way. And if you as an industry professional don’t get engaged it will remain so.

It can be frustrating at times but it does not help to complain about it. It’s akin to complaining about the sun rising every morning. Just get used to it and learn to protect yourself from it. In fact, the media’s perception much like the sun is highly predictable and therefore very easy to diffuse or to counter or to mitigate. We as an industry must learn how to adapt to the environment we live in, not to wish for an environment that will never exist.

When the sun rises each day you can do a whole host of things to continue to operate effectively not only against it but with it. On the one hand you can smear your naked body in butter and layout down on an asphalt parking lot. But don’t bitch and moan about the sun’s power when you get burned to a crisp. It was not the sun’s fault. You made poor choices and took dumb actions. The sun is all powerful, and in many ways sometimes “the media” feels like it is also has monolithic power. But what most fail to see is that if you are smart enough the sun’s raw power can be harnessed and used to great positive effect. With a mirror or a magnifying glass for example it can be used to deflect the harsh rays away from something and focus them onto something else.

“The media” as such is simply a tool. Actually, it is not a tool (singular) it is a whole box of tools (plural). And the beauty of this modern-day toolbox is that no one owns the box itself or the tools inside; they are free-to-use. Today anyone can write an eBook, anyone can write and publish their own paper book, anyone can publish a magazine, anyone can publish an ezine, anyone can write a blog post, anyone can comment on other peoples blogs, anyone can make a speech, anyone can start a podcast, and anyone can start a radio program and broadcast it via the internet or even on satellite channels. The days of limitation put in place by big publishing houses or government control over the airwaves are long gone. It’s time the PMC industry wake up and started using these tools to our advantage. This is the primary reason I started TCO and I have consistently called on the community to contribute. I have reached out to my personal network and to people who I have never met and the response with a few notable exceptions has been, well, disappointing so say the least.


Rest of article and interesting discussion at: http://www.defensetech.org/archives/004679.html?wh=wh

[Fabio]

1. IMHO The issue for PMC's since 2003 has been simple:

Blackwater USA. From their approach to generating business, their ever decreasing standards of hiring, their aggressive marketing of themselves and a culture set by Eric Prince that can only be described as fundamentalist right wing, they have made themselves -- and sadly the PMC industry as a whole -- a target. There are many companies that act like the quiet professionals they hire -- like Triple Canopy and even DynCorp -- and they have been poorly served by the posture of their competition.

The intertwining of companies like heavily political KBR/Halliburton types (yes Dyncorp too) into the public consciousness as Contractors hasnt helped either.