Ferg's Blog » Motivation

Mixed Media, Mixed Feelings, Thoughts and Ideas for the (Social) Media Coverage of the Youth Olympic Games

Fergus Bisset — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 22:17:34 +0000

One of the most interesting aspects of being involved in inaugural Youth Olympic Games and the development and promotion of the Culture and Education Programme which was part of it, was the insight my role provided into the relationship of the media to the Olympic Movement. This is a relationship that is integral to the IOC’s ability to fulfil its principle function of event managing the largest multi-sport events in the world in the form of the Summer Olympiad and the Winter Games. The Youth Olympic Games, brainchild of incumbent IOC President Jacques Rogge is part mission to educate and indite the world’s elite sporting youth into the Olympic Movement, and, part mission to attract a younger audience to the Olympic Games through the media with all the commercial benefits such a lucrative market presents.

Tom Degun from insidethegames interviewing Georgie Harland, GB and Modern Pentathlon's Athlete Role Model for the Youth Olympic Games

If this seems a tad cynical, allow me to express both my utmost belief that Rogge’s vision is first and foremost a personal and, for want of a better word, a moralistic one. The origin of the Youth Olympic Games lying in the European Youth Festivals he devised in his previous role as President of the European Olympic Committees, to bridge the Iron Curtain and the disparities it created in access to ‘fair’ sporting competition and education.

This fact, the ‘business model of the IOC’, according to a representative from the Olympic Solidarity department of the IOC (the department that distributes the funds to each National Olympic Committee and to International Sports Federations to ensure their support and participation in The Games), reinforces how integral a part the media play in sustaining the Olympic Movement.

The IOC is justifiably proud of the fact that it distributes 92-93% (I’ve heard both figures used recently) of its commercial revenue “back into sports development” via the Olympic Solidarity and Olympic Scholarship Schemes. The IOC claim that their model is sustainable, despite the average age of an Olympic TV viewer being something in the region of 40+ years old. Its clear that the addition of some younger audience members would do the sustainability of the IOC’s business no harm at all – hence the Youth Olympic Games.

One of the big parts of my role was to act as spokesperson for the media for the Youth Olympic Games in the buildup to The Games this saw me participate in a number of media days principally organised and managed by PR firm Ogilvie who were acting for Visit Singapore – the Singapore Tourism Board (the host nation, also looking to recoup some of the $300-400M investment it made in staging the Youth Olympic Games).

Anyone, who watched the BBC’s weekly highlights programme from The Youth Games, would have noticed that the programme, fronted by Blue Peter presenter Helen Skelton and Newsround presenter Ore Oduba, focussed predominantly on Britain’s 5 key medal prospects for The Games. It was scathing in the idea of the athletes “having to live and eat with 3,000 other people”, described by the athletes themselves as one of the best parts of the experience. The programmes described the Culture and Education Programme, another integral component to the Youth Olympic Games experience as sounding “boring”. Not a sentiment expressed by any of the athletes that I’m aware of.

Hardly, representative coverage then of The Youth Games ambition to be a celebration of the Olympic Values of Friendship, Excellence and Respect, nor representative of the opinions of the athlete’s through whom the BBC team were trying to tell their story. The BBC coverage instead concentrating on the Excellence of little more than a handful of the British team. Not even so much as conversing with many of the athletes on the team who despite being amongst the best in the world and having given most of their youth to reach this point, weren’t fortunate enough on this occasion to stand on the podium or indeed begin their competition on the first day of The Games.

Needless to say, no one was going to bite the hand that feeds them and suggest that the BBC might want to paint a more representative picture of The Games. It was also clear that no press officer was going to advance any story unless it involved talking about shiny bits of metal around athletes neck’s, or bizarrely, shiny bits of metal in the form of pin badges. This doesn’t say much for the BBC’s interpretation of how, in fact, athletes can and do more generally contribute back to society and can offer more practical inspiration to folks back home. Because apparently all we the mere mortal public care about is medals. Incidentally, the IOC were adamant that no official medal account be kept of The Games, was anyone advising or correcting the BBC of this? I highly doubt it. The medals are an important part of The Games, but they are not The Games. Would anyone watching the BBC coverage back home have been reassured of this? Again, I highly doubt it.

“As the Olympic Broadcaster, did the BBC take this unique opportunity to make the wider experience and values of The Games more accessible to the British public who will host the next one, no of course not.”

Model of the Financial and Social Capital of The Olympic Games (c) Fergus Bisset

All of which is a shame of course and something of a wasted opportunity to truly give voice to the stories that all of these remarkable young people can tell and the inspiration they can provide their nation. This might also explain why the IOC is, and should be, seeking to better exploit other channels of communication, that to put it bluntly, enable more representative coverage of the experience of The Games and in the words of Alex Huot, IOC Head of Social Media “connect as many people as we can with athletes“.

Intrinsic and Extrinsic Social Rewards of The Olympic Games (c) Fergus Bisset

Remembering something I’d seen on David Armano’s awesome Logic + Emotion blog, which was exploring the role that social engagement can play as part of a broader PR strategy. I was also interested in how this might integrate with the IOC’s presently ‘sustainable’ business model and using a model I co-created with colleagues at the International Olympic Academy in the summer (thanks guys!) explore what new opportunities social engagement offers in terms of more representative and democratic media coverage of future iterations of the The Games, including of course London 2012 and Innsbruck 2012.

How Social Engagement Fits into a Potential Olympic PR strategy (click to enlarge)

What do you think of the coverage of The Games? Does it make you any more enthusiastic about London hosting The Games? What about the role of social media in sport – do you follow any athletes through social media?

Olympic Day 2010 – An update from the International Olympic Academy

Fergus Bisset — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 18:10:18 +0000

Well first of all, apologies for my recent social media hiatus, particularly from this blog, I’ve been trying to cut back in an attempt to finish writing up my MPhil dissertation on Measuring Motivation and Engagement, there will be more on that once it’s done. For this past week and for the next, I’ve also had the privilege of being able to attend the International Olympic Academy (IOA) in Olympia, Greece, as part of my work as GB’s Young Ambassador for the Youth Olympic Games. Today, the 23rd June is also Olympic Day, so where better a place to celebrate?

Ahead of the Youth Olympic Games in Singapore in August The British Olympic Foundation and The Get Set For London 2012 Team are marking Olympic Day with a challenge to all school age children to blog about five new things they have done for each one of the five Olympic rings, so within that context I thought I’d let you know five of the highlights of International Olympic Academy so far, and hopefully within that, some interesting reflections on the Olympic Movement. Details of the Get Set Competition can be found here.

1. First new thing must be the 200 new people under the age of 30, from 95 different countries that have descended upon Greece for this year’s IOA, just like the inaugural Youth Olympics coming up in the Singapore this summer and London in 2012 – the Olympic Movement and the Olympic Games wouldn’t exist without participants. In fact that was the subject of IOC Member Peter Tallberg‘s presentation yesterday, which gave an overview of the different ways that the IOC is seeking to open itself up as an organisation, become more democratic and better support it’s athletes. This is with a view to increasingly better support and seeking guidance of members of public and the communities that host The Games. This was a frank presentation that acknowledged that the IOC has plenty to learn in this area. The discussions that followed covered some of the controversy over the coverage of both the Beijing Games and Vancouver protests and what the participants feel the IOC can do differently in future in this respect. The great thing about being part of such a diverse and energetic group of people, as I am here, is that there are no shortages of people to challenge your perceptions, whether in discussing the role of sport in resolving tensions in Sudan or in ensuring gender equality and empowerment all over the world there is plenty to learn from this great bunch of people!

2. The second new thing this past week was attending an open air classical music concert and opening ceremony at the top of the hill of Sphyx in Athens for the opening ceremony of the IOA, it was a stunning setting being overlooked by the Parthenon, various awards were bestowed on eminent Greeks for this contribution to the Olympic Movement, with awards also being made to Sir Philip Craven head of the International Paralympic Committee and to Irena Szewińska who also presented to us later on in the week.

3. The third new thing this week has been visiting the site of, and understanding more about, the Ancient Olympics. The ancient site of Olympia, of which I can’t help but admit I am now mayor on Foursquare, is fascinating and helped us all gain a clearer understanding of the inspiration behind the Modern Games, particularly the ideals of the Olympic Truce which called for an end to hostilities between Greek states during the Ancient Games. This truce is something that the IOC campaigns alongside the UN to uphold every time The Modern Games is hosted. The role of sport in creating global peace is the title of the proceedings of this session of the IOA and the focus of most of our discussions.

Bumball from a2activity.dk

4. The fourth new thing this week been playing bumball, this is apparently a Danish game which involves wearing pieces of velcro on your chest and bum and using them to catch and carry a velcro ball – in effect it is a cross between touch rugby, netball and nothing you’ve ever played before but it’s really good fun and made up one of our early morning physical activities before breakfast this week.

Team Scandinavia on the start line at Ancient Olympia

5. The fifth new thing this week is in some respects not a new thing at all, but rather, confirmation that the Olympic Movement, celebrated today on Olympic Day is far more than the Olympic Games. The Olympic Movement headed by the IOC aims to place sport at the service of humanity and thereby to promote peace. This was backed up by a surprising statistic from Peter Tallberg’s presentation that 92% of the IOC’s revenue goes to the development of sport worldwide. It has been inspiring spending time understanding what the Olympics and the Olympic Values of Friendship, Respect and Excellence mean to so many young people from all over the world. Perhaps if we all work together, as we have been over the past week, we can all help make the Olympics that little bit better for everyone. Happy Olympics Day!

Do you value the Olympic Games? How can the Olympic Games be designed better?

Fergus Bisset — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 14:07:35 +0000

The Youth Olympic Games is chiefly a celebration of the Olympic Values of Friendship, Respect and Excellence. In my new role as GB Youth Ambassador for the Games to held for the first time in Singapore this August, I’m really interested to know what you all think about the Olympics and what about it you personally do or do not value?

In chatting to some people in the design world recently I know that many people don’t see the relevance of the Olympics to them personally and admitted to not really understanding the relevance of Olympics to society at large. Do you share this feeling or does the Olympics mean a lot to you?

Really any answer or reflection short or long that you fancy giving would be incredibly welcome here, it will help me understand how best to support the Young Athletes I’ll be working with over the next few months explore their social and environmental responsibilities to you, as it will be you who they are representing at the Youth Olympic Games this summer.

As Young Ambassador for Great Britain what message would you like me to pass on to the British athletes and if you aren’t British what message would you like passed on to the Olympic community at large that might in turn influence how much you value the Olympic Games and its ideals? Let me know via the comments link below or via Twitter (@fergusbisset) – I’m looking forward to hearing from you!

Interview with Dan Pink on Motivation

Fergus Bisset — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 11:38:04 +0000

As part of the ongoing promotion of his new book Drive, Dan Pink gives an interview discussing some of the underlying theories and principles which he has repackaged as a management book. I’m looking forward to reading the book which comes out here in the UK at the end of this month. Dan is also due to speak at the RSA in a couple of weeks time which again I’m very much looking forward to.

I think this publication is very exciting for those of us involved in motivation research and for forward thinking business managers at whom this book seems to be aimed. Based on both this interview and his Ted talk last year Dan seems to be leveraging, at least conceptually, Hullian Drive Theory which allows him utilise the straightforward metaphor and illustrate the important point that motivation is about energisation of human behaviour. This theory whilst hugely influential in the field of motivation and educational psychology is largely discredited now by the more recent interpretation that it does not fully accomdate explanation of Avoidance behaviour. To put more simply, Drive Theory does not explain risk taking or more intrinsic forms of pleasure seeking behaviour. For a discussion on Approach-Avoidance behaviour and freely downloadable research papers see http://www.psych.rochester.edu/research/apav/.

It’s nice though to see Pink make mention of Autonomy as a component of motivation and a factor which forms a big part of Deci and Ryan’s Self Determination Theory which I have been leveraging heavily in my own work on designing motivation. I feel that their Organismic theory of motivation is far more adaptable and useful as an explanation for motivation than Drive Theory mentioned above. The question of how designers can utilise an organismic theory of motivation is the subject of my recent chapter contributed to the This is Service Design Thinking publication. It’s perhaps apt that Self Determination Theory and Service Design Thinking share the same acronym as they are well placed to conceptualise and design for intrinsic, rather than extrinsic forms of motivation.

It’s nice to see the mention of a sports person as a metaphor for motivated behaviour and I would hope that this reoccurs throughout the book, as someone who has myself become so interested in motivation by approaching it (no pun intended ) from a sports psychology and elite performance background.

Davos 15km - P. Vordenberg - teamtoday.org

I agree ultimately with Pink’s sentiment that people generally need more feedback, annual reviews and even biannual reviews are not going to motivate employees in the best possible way. But I’m a bit confused then as towards the end of the above interview he is so quick to dismiss (or avoid) addressing the work on Anticipated Feedback (Bandura) as a motivator. The original research on this can be found here, but it basically suggests that anticipated social feedback (as a feed-forward mechanism) is a major primary motivator in individuals. Again, put more simply, this is the notion that if you can visualise a positive response to your work you are more likely to be motivated towards and successful in accomplishing it. This is also another reason why I think Service Design Thinking with its emphasis on visualising complexity to understand it and adapt it is so well placed to understand and promote motivation. I’d hoped that in the current era of social media and game changing, hierarchy busting, technology and given that he is speaking to a blogger for a video that is being posted on YouTube Pink might have addressed this more fully…

Either way I think this publication signals that 2010 will be the year that Motivation really hits the mainstream, similarly perhaps to how ‘Design Thinking’ hit the mainstream last year off the back of Brown and Martin’s publications. Much like with those two volumes though, one could imagine that the release of Pink’s book signals that there will be an increase in demand amongst senior management for creative and innovative practitioners who not only understand motivation but also who possess the tools to create and facilitate motivating systems, products and services.

What do you think? Do you think 2010 will be the year of motivation or are there other emerging trends and topics that trump motivation in the understanding and design for behavioural change?

(Thanks to @arnoldbeekes for the original link)

Ferg's Blog » Motivation

Mixed Media, Mixed Feelings, Thoughts and Ideas for the (Social) Media Coverage of the Youth Olympic Games

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Olympic Day 2010 – An update from the International Olympic Academy

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Do you value the Olympic Games? How can the Olympic Games be designed better?

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Interview with Dan Pink on Motivation

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