Lead With That: What Threads, X, and Changes in the Tech Industry Can Teach Us About Innovation & Change

Interview Transcript

INTRO:  

Welcome back to CCL’s podcast, Lead With That, where we talk current events in pop culture to look at where leadership is happening and what’s happening with leadership.

Ren:

Allison, it’s here. The first step to the Everything App, and it came from the exact technocrat we thought it would. No, not Zuckerberg, I see you smiling. And not the Metaverse, but Elon and X, the Twitter rebrand that will go even further to transform the global town square and impress the world all over again. That’s their words, not mine. But let’s not count out our friends at Meta yet, as the Metaverse is getting ready for the next crypto boom because it’s coming. They’ve seemed to put their energies into the potential power vacuum that Twitter threatened or promised.

So are you, listener, up on your Threads yet? And yes, another harbinger of Twitter’s doom, Threads is the spinoff app from Instagram that focuses on conversations rather than visual content. You can log in with your Insta account, share text updates, and join the public conversation. And unlike building from the ground up, like other Twitter competitors have been forced to do, Threads gets to tap into the 1.6 billion strong user base of Instagram to get into the fight. And with over a hundred million downloads in the first 5 days, faster to that number than ChatGPT, TikTok, and Instagram itself, the fight looks like it’s on. But as one might suspect, numbers are flagging down 70%, some 13 million active users a day on Threads to Twitter’s 100 million active users. So Twitter’s not done yet.

Today then, we’ll learn a little bit more about Threads, discuss the X rebrand, but really dive a bit deeper into the implications these platforms hold for leaders and leadership. How do leaders leverage these platforms to foster meaningful connections with their audiences? What does this say about innovation? Does any of this actually matter? And a few more things in between.

Welcome back, everyone. I’m Ren Washington and as usual, I’m joined with Allison Barr. Allison, are you on Threads?

Allison:

I technically have a Threads account. The only time I was on Threads was to get my account. I have not been on since.

Ren:

Okay. Are you a Twitter user? Are you active on Twitter?

Allison:

I’m not active on Twitter. I have a Twitter account, but I don’t even know my password. I couldn’t tell you the last time I logged in.

Ren:

Okay then. So I guess the million-dollar question is, and I think I know the answer, do you care about this Insta Threads versus Twitter thing?

Allison:

Personally, I do not. From a business and organizational functioning and trends and market trends, I find it to be interesting. But I’ve found that the social media channels that I use a lot, people simply share threads and tweets on Instagram. So, I don’t even need to go to either place to get what’s on those platforms.

Ren:

And so, you’re saying because of the other places you interact, anything that you’d want to digest on Threads or Instagram, you can see those posts, much like I see TikTok posts on YouTube shorts.

Allison:

Exactly. People repost on various platforms, so I don’t find a need to go there.

Ren:

Well, if you’re not already, follow Allison on TikTok. You can find that on the TikTok app. But okay, so I hear you. So kind of like you have access to the conversation and you alluded to some of the things that we might discuss today. And I do think it probably might help people to get a little bit more understanding of what Threads is. And then talk a little bit around Twitter or, which we’ll not call it that anymore. But I think that’d be an interesting place to start. So, you logged on to get your Threads account and that’s the end of it. But do you know much about how to use Threads? Did they give you a rundown when you logged into your Insta account? What do you know about Threads?

Allison:

They give you an option to “learn more about Threads” when you get your account, and the functioning is very similar to Twitter. So, I did not watch the tutorial. I considered making a post on Threads and then I didn’t because just again, personal preference, I prefer hearing people’s voices and I prefer videos. That’s my preference. So it’s very similar in its functioning, in terms from the user experience that is, to Twitter.

And the ease of Threads, and I think why some people like it, is because when you’re in Threads, you have the option to share to your Instagram account directly. You don’t have to screenshot it or download it to then reshare to a different platform, if you will. And when I joined Threads, it automatically inherited all of my followers. So if you’re looking to join Twitter today, or X, it’s very hard for me to call it X. So, let me just call it Twitter. If you join Twitter today, you cannot pull all your followers from different platforms. So I think that’s part of the appeal for Threads, is that you can just pull all of your followers instantly.

Ren:

Yeah. And I think too, the single platform interaction is advantageous, I guess, maybe as you alluded to. You can do up to 10 photos and 5-minute-long videos on Threads, just so you know.

You could set the curve there, Allison, I guess too, like 500 words versus 280. But I mean, I think what we’ll talk a little bit around too is, what’s the functional difference in these tools, when we explore how they’re all aiming to meet the same kind of market needs, but then they’re all trying to compete for maybe this space with one another, like you said, this X versus Twitter thing. And we’ll talk a lot more around this potential rebrand, but I don’t know if there’s a discernible difference. And I don’t know if I care.

Allison:

Yeah. To me it’s sort of the same as, do you wear Nike or do you wear Adidas? Different product, right?

Ren:

See, now that’s interesting.

Allison:

But people get very attached to their brands and their preferences. And in some ways, I don’t think this is the case yet with X and Threads, some people get royally attached to brands and it becomes part of their identity. So it’s like, “Oh, you’re on Threads? Oh, you use Threads? Oh, you’re sticking with X?” There’s an inherent… assumptions get made about people who are loyal to certain brands. So, I think it’s more about that. A lot of people, at least as I hear it on social media, we’re excited for a new platform because they didn’t necessarily want to be using a platform that Elon Musk is running for personal reasons. So, I think the appeal is more of ownership versus functioning.

Ren:

Yeah. I think, and we’ll explore maybe that dichotomy here in a moment, which I’m interested in. But something too that you highlighted that I want to get in later, especially when you talk maybe about innovation or just some of the leadership lessons to be taken away from here, it’s like identity science that goes along with our attachment to brands or values or what we use and why we use it. And so, I think that’s something that we could probably glean from this conversation. Because really, I couldn’t care less about which one of these mouthpieces for billion dollar organizations and billionaires wins the day. Really, really, I don’t care.

But when you said, Nike or Adidas, I go, “Huh, that’s interesting because there are certain things that I would wear Nike for before I learned about some of their practices. And then there were certain things that I never even considered wearing Adidas.” I would never buy Adidas shoes, maybe some of their gear. But always Nike cleats when I played football. So, I guess I can glean this attachment to these ideas of who’s using it and why they’re using it.

But that’s really interesting because as I started to dig into looking at who was using it and why I was using it, I read this story by the New York Times about the most famous celebrities and how they interacted with the platforms. When did you get your Threads account?

Allison:

When?

Ren:

Yeah. You said you signed up, the first time you used it was when you did it. Do you know when you, like off the top of your head or you have to go back?

Allison:

So, I can tell you, it was whenever it was announced and you could go and go and get your account. I didn’t do it right away. It maybe was 2 weeks later.

Ren:

Yeah, so Ellen DeGeneres was one of the first users on Threads. And in this New York Times study, they looked at, “Okay, what happens with these 15 celebrities, compare their interaction with Twitter.” And by the way, are we calling it X or are we calling it Twitter? You said you’ve been calling it X and you feel super comfortable.

Allison:

No, I don’t.

Ren:

Is that what we’re doing? Is it really called X?

Allison:

I can’t. I had to be very conscious to call it X. So, let’s call it Twitter.

Ren:

When I was reading the first article about it and I saw it, I thought, okay, so they turned the T sideways. So, it’s still Twitter, it’s not a bird, it’s just the sideways T. But it’s called X. That’s what they want us to say out loud?

Allison:

I believe so. And-

Ren:

Okay. Someone thread Elon.

Allison:

We may get into this, but Elon Musk has had a… his cult following has a lot about Elon Musk’s fascination with the letter X. I don’t know if you read about that and how PayPal, he tried to turn PayPal into X. And essentially, he got booted out of that company because he was trying to make crypto a part of that platform and call it X. So, I just changed gears on us rather fast. Maybe we’ll get into that later. But there’s an interesting-

Ren:

Oh, he’s a name attachment.

Allison:

Yeah, there’s a name attachment for him. And there was a Twitter user whose username was X. Did you read about that?

Ren:

No.

Allison:

There was a Twitter user who had been on Twitter since 2011, or around that time. And Elon Musk of course, took his username away from him and they just sent him an email and said, “Your new username is @X12345678987654321”. First of all, it’s a very long username. That’s a very long username.

Ren:

So, they just trolled him. That’s what they did.

Allison:

Yes. Yes.

Ren:

Damn.

Allison:

Anyhow, I just changed gears. Please continue.

Ren:

Nothing like, “Welcome to our new platform. Here’s how I think about your name.”

Allison:

Right. It’s ours now.

Ren:

Well, I’m glad you changed gears because frankly, I don’t remember where we were. Where were we before we diverged into?

Allison:

So, Ellen DeGeneres.

Ren:

Yes. First user on Threads. You’re so good like that. And she posted, the New York Times said, “Okay, we follow her, 14 other celebs, let’s watch their interaction.” Wiz Khalifa was the only person who posted regularly average double-digit posts. It was over a 20-day study they looked at it. I don’t know why. I don’t know what the science of Wiz Khalifa’s posting strategy. But it was most of them, like a lot of new user buy-in, they interact with a little bit upfront on the front end and then not at all towards the latter end. Some of them never at all. Like Kim Kardashian, she downloaded it, never used it. Maybe just like you, Allison. You’d fall into those categories.

And so when we think about some of the user dips, I think at one point Zuckerberg has put in pretty happy about thread’s. Massive uptick in initial use, lower interaction in ongoing use. But the thing that I found most interesting from the New York Times study was that the real winner is Instagram. You said it up top, “We like Threads because I can just transfer it to Instagram.” I think Instagram’s one of the most frequently and commonly used platforms on Earth. And so when I look at that, I was like, “Instagram outdid both Twitter and Threads for daily interaction by these celebrities.” So I don’t know how true of that is that for you?

Allison:

Which part?

Ren:

I don’t know. Do you use Instagram? Or which I guess you prefer video, but do you find your video on Instagram or TikTok, or what do you think?

Allison:

TikTok is my preferred platform. Interestingly enough, last week, TikTok updated a feature and now you can make a post, it’s still a video, but you can make a post that is text. So it essentially now, is offering the same thing. It’s still presented to you as a video, but it’s just text on screen. So if I wanted to tweet essentially, I could do that on TikTok.

So TikTok’s my preference, and a lot of that has to do with the algorithm to me is a lot smarter on TikTok. And so the things that I want to see, I see those and it pushes new content based on what I look at and like. And the reach on TikTok is far superior than Instagram. So, you are just able to reach a broader audience a lot faster. So, that’s why I like TikTok. And I just have a preference for visual.

But what I will say is that I don’t use Instagram as much. I might get on there once or twice a week. But like you said, you can see TikTok videos on YouTube shorts and you can see YouTube videos on Instagram. You can see them all on Instagram, to your point, I think you’re right, that Instagram is the winner here. Because everybody pulls their content and puts it on Instagram, regardless of your preference. And I don’t all the time, but I do maybe once a week, post some of my TikTok content on Instagram.

Ren:

And when you talk about TikTok and then you say, their new plan, what they’re doing, it reminds me of how I think there’s this interesting rush to fill the gap. I think the head of Instagram, Adam, forgive me, Adam, your last name Mosseri? What are you going to do? He’s like, “Twitter’s volatility and unpredictability under Elon is a thing that provided the opening.” And I think TikTok is like, “Well, shoot. I mean, people like Allison Barr who make meaningful content on our platform, they like our platform. Let’s give her access to a way to talk to the people.”

And so I see all these people running into this and rushing into it, and then it’s like, I don’t know, is innovation a thing? I mean, when we look at Twitter and they talk about X as a rebrand, I’m really interested to hear what you think about the CEO’s, Linda Yaccarino. I don’t know. Also another… I’m killing it on the last names today. I’m interested, what do they mean, it’s an app for everything for the future? And is it just Elon’s infatuation with going to Mars? I mean, he’s the owner now, but he’s not the operating officer. So, I don’t know. I mean, all this stuff, it’s just like putting makeup on a pig. It’s redressing the same problem. So is there innovation? Are any of them solving a problem? Or are they just giving me different colored shoes?

Allison:

So, I mean, innovation is certainly a behavior that exists with any organization. What I think we’re talking about here though more specifically, is market dynamics. And so, it’s no secret that market dynamics are constantly evolving. And I think all of the parties that you just mentioned, Ren, are responding to that, as any business should.

Also, they are tech companies, all of the companies that we just mentioned. And technology has rapidly been evolving, especially since the pandemic. And that technology has put a lot of pressure on companies to innovate quickly. So, I’m not so sure that Twitter… I don’t know with the small amount of information that I have, but I’m not so sure that Twitter was one of those companies that needed to react to the general pressure of market trends and technology evolving.

However, I don’t know. Twitter had such a strong brand resonance and such strong brand recognition that it’s surprised me a little bit that Elon Musk rebranded. I mean, how many companies do, Ren, that have such strong brand presence that it quite literally became a verb that most people know? To tweet is a verb, to retweet is a verb. That kind of brand resonance and recognition takes years for companies to develop. What do you think about that?

Ren:

Well, I think, what the hell? I do not understand. Frankly, I’m not even kidding, I’m maybe taking a dig at myself when I read it. I looked at it, I said, “What is it? I don’t even know visually what it’s supposed to mean. Is it a sideways look? I understand maybe the X is filled.” I think that it is really strange and I wonder, who in the hell is going to call it X? When am I going to walk past someone on the street and I’m going to hear about a post they saw on X?

Allison:

Right.

Ren:

I wonder. I am so curious to see if that will ever happen. But I mean, you highlight something really interesting. Tweet, retweet, what do you think they were thinking? Because I don’t know if… Now Elon alone, maybe it’s he’s the owner and he calls the shots, but we read Linda’s memo. She’s saying, “This is a once in a lifetime experience to be at the ground level of a world changing event and this is it.” What do you think about that?

Allison:

Well, a couple of things. Elon Musk, I’m not in his head. I wish I could be, honestly. So, I’m not sure what his driving factor was for making that decision. And I haven’t read that memo. I haven’t read it in full, rather, admittedly. But what I do know is that I read some of the finance industry’s response to this, which I thought was interesting. So, some finance experts that Fortune reported said that, “Musk’s decision wiped out anywhere between 4 billion and $20 billion in value.”

Ren:

Because of the name, Twitter’s gone.

Allison:

Yes. And the perception of Twitter’s brand has changed. And this is a quote from Elon Musk himself, “50% of advertising revenue at Twitter was down since October.” So, I’m not sure if there’s a response to that. I mean, Twitter makes a lot of its money by way of advertising. So because of the revenue being down, I’m not sure if part of this had to do with that and expanding the platform’s usage, if you will, might give people an more of a space to advertise. But I’m not sure. Again, I wish I was in Elon Musk’s head. I’m not sure that that’s why advertisers left in the first place. So I wonder if he’s investigated a little bit deeper, why they left in the first place. Because I don’t believe that it was because there wasn’t enough space for them. There was. They were making millions and millions of dollars in advertising revenue. So, it’s a curious one to me. And you’re right, my sister sends me tweets all the time, and so does one of my friends. My friend sends me tweets.

Ren:

X’s apparently.

Allison:

Yeah. And so I just can’t imagine having a conversation with you or anyone, Ren, being like, “Hey, did you see that X? Did you see that X?” “What?” “Did you see that X post? Did you see…” It just doesn’t roll off the tongue. And like I said, brand recognition, that takes a very, very long time to establish. So, I don’t know, maybe he has enough money that he just sees it as a play toy, and he can just see what happens. I don’t know.

Ren:

Well mean honestly, again, I’m going to cite this article that I kept reading. When I read it said, “Twitter’s replacing its well-known bird logo for this new one.” So, I thought, okay, that small image that’s representative of Twitter is going away. I had no idea that they were changing the name.

But I wonder, does it matter? We often talk about reputation and brand at CCL. Reputation is what you’re known for, brand is what you want to be known for. And I kind of tongue in cheek mentioned this idea of the Everything App up top because that’s what the CEO’s saying, that this is the first step in X representing more than what Twitter was or more than what Twitter could be. And maybe this is the beginning of the neural network that Elon’s going to build. And I could see, if that’s the future of our existence. But right now, it seems volatile, it seems strange, it seems hard to track.

Now I will say, I can imagine Elon might scoff at the moneyed man and say, “Well, the value of Twitter is only existing in the ephemeral market that is perception anyway.” And until people stop sending you X’s, does it functionally matter? I think most people use it the same way. You already mentioned that. Twitter’s or X’s user numbers aren’t really down, despite the rebrand. So, it all seems utterly irrelevant.

Allison:

Yeah. I think it’s utterly irrelevant probably to me. And if we go back to the advertisers for just a moment, Twitter’s source of income, their source of profit, their main source of profit came from advertisers. So, that’s curious to me. If a business rebrands, generally it’s because their consumer base or how they make profit has changed. So, the advertisers that Twitter had, “their needs changed”, which brought revenue down. And that was because of the advertisers.

And the reason why advertisers left in mass, the reason they left is because they were concerned about Elon Musk’s multiple and various and ongoing controversies, and his embrace of users on Twitter who constantly broke the rules, and the rules having a major impact. These were things like bullying, harassment, doxxing, racism, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That’s why they left. And so, he might very well be expanding the platform’s capability. Is that going to matter to advertisers? Advertisers are his source of income, so I’m just curious about his intention there, as it relates to how the company will make money. Because I don’t have to pay to be on Twitter. So-

Ren:

Well-

Allison:

Well, right now, right now.

Ren:

Well, you do, if you want to blue check mark. If you want a blue check mark on X

Allison:

Hey, Instagram… Do you know on Instagram you can also pay to have… So you don’t have to pay, but somebody who’s non-famous like me or you, I could pay right now to have a blue check mark on Instagram.

Ren:

Okay. So they, whoever, they have better branding for that. I think it’s interesting when we start to think about X, and I was reacting to some of your reflections. And it’s so funny thinking about Twitter or thinking about X, and having to pay to use the platform. And I think I was hearing you maybe a little bit more clearly than I did earlier around. So Elon’s premises, “Our advertisers needs shifted. So don’t worry advertisers, I’m bringing you the app of the future.” And it sounds like your premise and some of the smart money out there is like, “Hey, you’re learning the wrong lesson here, my friend. Their needs shifted because you no longer provided what they needed.”

And so it sounds like maybe the ad money’s down, and I don’t even know if Elon really believes that this is a chance to shift his attention to that. I don’t know if he believes he needs their money necessarily. But it does represent something you highlight around what our responsibilities are, when we think of why add money left and about who he’s supporting.

And we can spin back to Threads. And most recently, I think Threads in the news because voting rights groups are reaching out to them. I mean, the CEO of vote.org, Andrea Hailey, reached out to Mark, Meta. I don’t know. Insta? It’s hard to say which of the Cerberus. Is that an apt metaphor? No. What’s the lizard with the many heads?

Allison:

I don’t know.

Ren:

The Hydra, the Hydra. It’s hard to say what head of the Hydra is which. But anyway, Andrea’s talking to and saying, “If you have that many people, Threads, you have a great responsibility to the people that are on that platform. And so we’re asking for a real plan, how you’re going to navigate voting language and misinformation and disinformation on your platform ahead of this voting cycle.” So I think one way or another, people are wanting some accountability, whether it’s Twitter or X or Threads. Maybe Threads will rebrand and it’ll be wise after they fail to meet needs. I don’t know.

Allison:

Well, that’s an interesting talking point as well that we might need to sidebar. But the bigger picture on everything that you just mentioned, and some of the things that I mentioned too about why advertisers left Twitter, a lot of that comes down to regulation. And the internet in general is, technology’s moving faster than regulatory affairs, period. And so, it’s hard to keep up with that. It’s hard to keep up with that. And as I understand it, companies are being encouraged to regulate themselves, when there are literal lobbyists and literal people who work in politics to regulate this kind of thing. And the bigger picture is that who should be regulating tech? And there’s mixed opinions on that.

So if regulation comes from Twitter itself, then it’s limited. But then there are some arguments that if we have government regulating technology that’s overreach from the government. Again, we don’t necessarily need to get into that right now, but there is a bigger picture to look at, for sure.

Ren:

Well, who should be regulating it?

Allison:

I don’t know.

Ren:

You don’t know? You don’t have an opinion?

Allison:

I knew you were going to ask me that. I do. I do. And we’re 26 minutes in, so let’s not go there.

Ren:

We don’t have time.

Allison:

I would be happy to go there with you on a different podcast.

Ren:

We don’t have time. Meet us on our other podcast. It has a different title. There’s a lot of things I think, and some of what you’re reflecting on is, as I observe this from an outsider, especially an outsider who does not care. Sometimes I read about this stuff and I’m just like, “Blah.” Do not care about threads or tweets or X’s. I do not use social. And so if I’m a leader who doesn’t care, but who has people who do care. Or I’m someone on a team who has a leader who cares about this stuff, or who works in an environment where I need to care, what are some of the lessons that I can start to pull out of these conversations that we’ve had, whether it’s innovation or rebranding or stupid new names or tools that we don’t need? Help me make sense of this for a normal person.

Allison:

Sure.

Ren:

Sure. No problem.

Allison:

I think we can broaden this conversation a bit because right now we’re talking about tech companies. And you and I are always keen to give leaders in all types of organizations some takeaways. So for me, where my brain goes is talking about innovation. When’s it time to innovate? Do we need to innovate? How can we keep up with the market trends and market dynamics? And at CCLR, research has found that everyone can and should play a role in the innovation space, regardless of the leader level.

So if you’re leading inovation at your workplace, if you are someone who leads innovation and change and newness, your work really involves championing that process in order to get some traction on a solution. And I think the challenges that come with innovation, again, this is broadly speaking, can be unique. Sometimes the need is to get a solution out to the world quickly. And sometimes the challenge is to really balance the creativity and not over innovate and not change for the sake of change. So I think a takeaway that sticks with me is that CCL’s research has found that innovation can be a process, much to some people who are very innovative, think that it needs to be this off the cuff and all ideation. And that’s not necessarily the case.

So the innovation process itself can happen in 4 stages. The first one is clarification, so understanding the market demands. If you’re a leader, understanding the market demands and framing the challenge that’s specific to your industry in a way that encourages creativity from your people. And then comes the ideation, which involves generating, refining, selecting ideas. From there, you develop the concept. And you might have prototypes. Again, this depends on your industry. But from there, there’s the development of the idea. And then after, that’s the implementation of it.

So I think as an innovation leader, it’s really important to know that there can be a process to it. We don’t often talk about innovation as a process, and that all 4 phases need to happen. And you might bounce back and forth between 2 and 3 and 1 and 4 until you get it right. So innovation’s not necessarily a smooth process, but it can be a process.

Ren:

And something that seems true to me in the innovation process or the change process or whatever process, and we spoke to this a little bit earlier, is what I’m going to call this identity science. It’s like whatever we’re innovating around, you’ve got to help me navigate my attachments to what’s going on. And so maybe attachment science is really what I’m talking about, because I’m attached to the idea of Twitter and tweets. So, what does X even mean to me? Or I’m attached to the idea of using Twitter, therefore I’m going to use it versus threads, because I’ve been using it for 10 years. Or when I have to innovate, I expect innovations around me. But I don’t know if I’m super excited to change my own processes because I’ve grown attached to them.

And so, what do you think about that? Think about the attachments you hold today, TikTok, for instance. What would it take to have you leave TikTok? And even if a tool was out there that gave you exactly what TikTok was, would you go?

Allison:

Let’s use a different example, if you don’t mind, because I have fantasized about leaving social media altogether. But that’s a whole other topic. So maybe, let’s take Starbucks because I go to Starbucks.

Ren:

Okay. We will have to do that next.

Allison:

And some people gasp at that still.

Ren:

Okay.

Allison:

But I go to Starbucks because yeah, it’s down the street. It’s the closest coffee shop to me. Edwin and Heather give the greatest customer experience that I’ve found anywhere, truly. They see me walk in the door and they’ll start making my drink. And they ask how I am, and they know about the dog and everything. So they’re so kind, Edwin and Heather. And it’s a consistent experience.

Ren:

All right. Ed, Heather.

Allison:

So, I think when we’re talking about consumer needs, it really depends on your consumer base. So you are right, human beings have predictable responses to change. That’s true. And that also comes with branding. If you remember when Facebook rebranded, I think they rebranded twice in their life. Does anyone call Facebook, Meta? Anybody?

Ren:

Well, Facebook is still Facebook.

Allison:

Right.

Ren:

It’s just under the meta brand. Facebook, the company-

Allison:

Right. But my point is, nobody refers…

Ren:

Yeah, but do they refer to Meta? Yeah.

Allison:

People just refer to everything under Meta as Facebook, and Meta is bigger than just Facebook. That’s my point. But when we’re talking about Facebook specifically, no, let’s go back to Twitter. When we’re talking about Twitter, if you were an avid user, Ren, nothing actually changes for you. You still have all of your followers. If you’re somebody who is a business or you’re somebody who’s a paid influencer, for example, nothing actually really changes for you because you keep all of your same followers, if they stay on Twitter, X, whatever. So, not that much changes.

Ren:

So for you, you’re not attached to the brand, you’re attached to the experience or the service. So if Edwin or Heather weren’t at Starbucks, but then they went 2 miles down the road to work at Pete’s Coffee Shop, you would go to Pete Coffee.

Allison:

No, I probably wouldn’t because it’s-

Ren:

Damn, Edwin, Heather, stop listening. She didn’t mean it.

Allison:

It’s the product too. The product that I get is the same every time. I also know, because we’ve all been to… Well, I’ll speak for myself. I’ve been to a lot of Starbucks. You travel, you get your coffee, whatever. The experience is generally the same, right? The barista in the airport in Chicago might not know my name, but my experience is the same. It’s almost exactly the same in every single Starbucks I go to, so I know what I’m going to get. Even when the line is 10 people deep, I know that they’re going to be pretty efficient still. I know that. Versus with all the love in my heart, the coffee shop that’s further down the street that’s locally owned, they take between 6 to 8 minutes to pour me a cup of coffee. I’m in a hurry, people, I’m trying to get to work. Give me my coffee. There’s probably a lot of reasons behind that. But regardless, it’s the experience and the consistency in the guest experience that I get.

Ren:

Well, leaders and listeners, as we listen to Allison, part of what I think makes someone effective as a good team member is starting to identify what people care about. And Allison is an efficient human being and she cares about… she’s got stuff to take care of. So it’s not only the consistent experience, but it’s the time. It’s that you value your time a lot.

And so whether or not that’s true, we can explore it. These are the things, what I mean by this attachment science. It’s, how do we then work with people who identify what they really care about and then give them that access? And so I think maybe if I was a leader and I’m listening or watching this fallout between Threads and Twitter, and who’s going to win the battle? And then TikTok’s like, “Ooh, ooh, no, we can do text also.” I think what I’m really starting to learn from them is as you develop products or try to create buy-in in and around you, what are you doing to make sure that you’re aware of the problems that you’re trying to solve?

And so I don’t know if X is trying to solve a problem so much as setting the foundation for it being an app of the future, which I expect it will be. And we might be calling it something different. But I think there’s something to be said around your experience of, “I go to Starbucks not only because of Edwin and Heather, though they’re a nice treat, but for the consistency and for the speed.”

Allison:

Yep. I know what I’m going to get every single time. And Ren, you and I recorded a podcast sometime last year, it actually may have been 2021, so you can correct me if I’m wrong here, where we talked about virtual reality being the wave of the future. And I’m still waiting for that to happen. So Elon Musk, again, he’s a very successful human being. I’m not arguing that. But he might not be right here. He might not be right here. I will also tell you, I went to Whole Foods yesterday, and I’m getting us off track, but this will come full circle. You got an option to pay now with your palm, which I might just date myself here, but that sort of freaked me out a little bit. I just don’t know. I think there are some things that will catch on, and there’s some that won’t. And that speaks to the ability of Elon Musk and some others to be able to take risks. They can take broader risks like this, where most companies don’t have that kind of wealth and power to be able to jeopardize their entire company. So he might have his pulse on what’s coming, but he also might be wrong. Elon Musk, I mean.

Ren:

Yeah, there’s something about that. Because like you’ve been saying, the fact that tweet is a verb goes a long way to say, “Hey, I’m rebranding.” As opposed to you’re some startup and you just got a follower. And then you rebrand and no one can find your website anymore. I don’t even know. They can’t be X, right? Isn’t twitter.com still a thing? I don’t know. I’m not on it. It’s going to be weird when it turns into x.com. And God knows if you’re not already on there, you better buy up all the X and multiple X’s accounts that you can. What a great opportunity to brand for yourself.

Allison:

So, when you go to Twitter dot… It’s still… I just looked to check myself.

It’s still twitter.com, but when the window pops up to sign in, interestingly it says, “Sign into Twitter”, but then right above where it says, “Sign into Twitter” is a big X instead of the bird.

Ren:

Is it an X or is it just a flat T? I think it just might be a flat T.

Allison:

I don’t see the T, but I digress.

Ren:

I think you raise something interesting around what it looks like to test the product when you have a huge consumer base. The hand scan is one of them. And I think I was walking by an Amazon store in the airport the other day, and it was one of those, don’t pay, grab what you want and walk out kind of things. And I think that one even might link your freaking facial recognition to the thing. So, there’s all sorts of features coming our way. So, I mean, the Cybernet is here.

But when I, again, try to zoom this down to something that we can do to today about this is, you said something that’s interesting, “Don’t change for change’s sake.” And it’s hard to investigate what someone like Elon or even Linda is thinking when they rebrand this way. And I do believe they believe it’s the first step in a long set of dominoes. But for those of you who might be trying to change your appearance or be trying to alter your communications to those in and around you, make sure that Allison cares about Edwin and Heather, but also is an efficient person who wants it to show up the same way every single time. I got to know that about the people who I work with, I should know that about you. I’ve got a Starbucks gift card coming your way, my friend.

Allison:

I’m just talking coffee here, Ren, like about my product. Yes.

Ren:

Yeah, I know. I think it’s a great metaphor for life.

Allison:

Fair enough. Fair enough.

Allison:

Okay, so then what’s one tip you’re going to give a leader to navigate all of this?

Ren:

One tip I’m going to give a leader is, identify for yourself what it is and why it is you stay attached to certain things or products. Identify what would make you leave Twitter. Or better yet, if you use Twitter, what would ever make you call it X? And if you don’t, what’s the corresponding thing for you? If you wear sneakers, would anything ever make you change your brand? And if it would identify why. That way you can cultivate a lexicon to use with other people as opposed to exploring like, “Well, let’s change your values, Allison.” Well, that’s a weird conversation. As opposed to, “Hey, I’ve identified a little bit about why I care about this thing. And it made me think a little bit around you, Allison. And I know you like efficiency and I know you consistency. And thirdly, maybe nice people, but only thirdly. So, let’s talk about teaming.” And I think that’s what I’d give a leader. Identify in yourself first, so then you can cast a vision outward.

Allison:

Awesome. That’s great. And I would say I’ll leave leaders with 2 questions you can ask yourself. When it comes to innovation, it’s really important to know that much like Ren was just speaking about values and such, leaders have preferences around the innovation process. So if you are an innovative person, a lot of innovative people really like the ideation part of innovating. But you need to recognize the whole process, the 4 steps of that. So ask yourself, what parts of the process come most easily to you and what needs to happen to bring others in your team or your organization to help you move that process forward.

So again, I’ll remind you, the innovation process is clarification, ideation, then you develop, and then you implement. My guess is that a lot of leaders probably like that ideation phase, but you need to have all 4. So ask yourself what your preference is, get others involved. And then maybe, Ren, next time we can talk about the regulation.

Ren:

Love it.

Allison:

If we want.

Ren:

Yeah, let’s talk about the industrial complexes that exists around the world. That’ll be exciting.

Allison:

Yes. That’ll be fun for everyone, I’m sure.

Allison:

Well, as usual, Ren, great talking to you. I have a coffee sitting upstairs in my office that’s calling my name. I’m not even kidding you. I’ll send you a picture. I’ll tweet it. I’ll tweet about it and I’ll X about it. It’ll be my first tweet in what, like 12 years or something.

Ren:

You should.

Allison:

Regardless, great to talk to you, great to see you. To our listeners, you can find our show notes and all of our podcasts on ccl.org. As always, special thank you to Emily and Ryan who work behind the scenes to make our podcast happen. You can find us on LinkedIn. Let us know what you want us to talk about next and what you think about X slash Twitter. And we’ll look forward to tuning in next time. Thanks, everyone.

Ren:

Thanks, Allison. Thanks, everyone.