Yesterday I came across Stephen Waddington’s blog post introducing the findings of the 2013 Ketchum Leadership Communication Monitor (KLCM) and I found them quite interesting and worthwhile discussing, so I decided to share them. (Oh and by the way, Brandzeichen (the agency I work at) is now officially part of the Ketchum network).

Some background first: the annual research explored the perceptions of 6,000 people in 12 countries on five continents “regarding effective leadership, effective communication and the intrinsic link between the two.”

Here’s what got my attention:

• Only 24% of people around the globe believe leaders overall are providing effective leadership.
• Last year astonishing 60% of people boycotted or bought less from a company due to poor leadership behavior.
• For the second year in a row open, transparent communication is the No. 1 characteristic of an effective leader.
• However, 29% point a gap between expectation and delivery on communicating in an open and transparent way and only 16% believe leaders are effective communicators.
• In the rank of credible information sources on a company employees are at the top, CEOs are placed sixth.

Since the emergence of online and social media there has been a steady decline in the use of traditional media – newspapers, TV, radio. It’s no surprise that this ‘revolution’ has mainly been driven by the younger generation, namely those who have grown up with social – the so called ‘digital natives.’ These new channels have massively gained in importance and have now become trusted sources for various types of information and news among consumers.

A new research of how Generation Y (or millennials, i.e. those aged 14-30) substantiates exactly this shift in social news sources:

• 68% of millennials rely on social media for news, only 33% on newspapers;
• however, millennials place great importance on the accuracy of information and currently 66% are not confident the news they receive is accurate (so brands transparency is crucial!).

What these figures and the ones below in the infographic show is that there has been a fundamental shift in trust in news sources – social media has surpassed traditional media.

To be totally honest with you I cannot wait to graduate! September is quickly approaching and I'll be incredibly happy to finally have a full-time job. I have so far had the study and the practical experience and I must say I do like work life a lot more than being a student. Which is why I am utterly excited about the next few months so that when I came across Arianna Huffington’s commencement speech at Smith College I made sure I got myself a nice cup of tea and sat down to carefully listen to her talk.

I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed her speech! It was so honest and also so, so funny, but it most importantly provided some great advice based on the personal experiences of Arianna Huffington. For those of you who do not know much about her, she is one of the most influential people in media and is best known as the creator of the very successful Huffington Post. Her career is a true inspiration to me because as a foreigner living abroad it gives me hope that I too am going to have a stellar career regardless of my origin.

In her speech Arianna urges us

I am in a desperate need of a real summer – sun, high temperatures, sea and tan. Unfortunately, I currently live in Germany, where the winter this year has been endless! Just last week I was wearing my winter jacket... So, because the reality doesn’t include summer any time soon, I have to dream of it and the campaign below I saw recently certainly facilitated some nice sunny thoughts.

7up came up with a brilliant idea to promote its products in a fun and engaging way. The company created the first ever melting vending machine. Yes, that’s right – melting! For the ice to melt, you need of course hot weather, which is why the stunt took place in Argentina and obviously not Germany.

So, in the middle of a busy square in Buenos Aires

Last week Social Media Examiner published the results of their fifth annual social media marketing report. This year more than 3,000 marketers took part in the study and revealed some interesting facts about their activities and use of social media for marketing purposes as well as their efforts for the future and investment plans. The report basically covers the “who, what, where, when and why” of social media marketing. And there are some truly fascinating findings this year, which I am going to show you below.

Top social media questions marketers want answered:

• 90% of marketers: What social tactics are most effective?
• 88% of marketers: What are the best ways to engage my audience with social media?
• 87% of marketers: How do I measure the return on my social media investment?