Troubled times: sound advice from the frog pond.

• Author: Hall, Robert

"Chorusing, the frogs appear as one cohesive unit to such a predator." --The Effect of Low-level Jet Overflights on the Natural Soundscape, Bernie Krause

If you work in a bank these days, you are probably getting it from all sides. The President and the Congress are standing in line to beat you up both for making too many bad mortgages and not making enough credit available. Groups from afar are interested in executive compensation, reward programs and trips for sales and marketing people, the way advertising dollars are spent, and even customer events. In addition, the very brand of "banking" itself has been hit really hard. You may know what your core message was before the "fall," but it may be less clear now. You worry about the strength of your institution, its brand, the number of layoffs that may be in the offing and possibly the decline in your own retirement account. For those who have daily customer contact, the day-to-day is a little like a M.A.S.H. unit as bank staff deal with a steady stream of individual and small-business customers who struggle with job loss, delinquent mortgage payments, struggling businesses, stiffer credit requirements, declining sales, and depleted savings and retirement accounts.

Some insight from the frog pond is instructive. Bernie Krause reports on research that finds a cohesive chorus of frogs vocalizing in a synchronous relationship to one another is a key factor in escaping from predators such as coyotes and great horned owls. So long as the chorus is in sync, these predators are greatly deterred from locating and devouring individual frogs. The plot thickens, however, when low flying jets drown out the frog's voices. The frogs immediately lose both their synchronicity and numbers of vocal members. Predations increased immediately and continued as it took the frogs several minutes to get back on track. The disruption of their relational chorus was life threatening.

Disparaging and predatory sounds coming from all sides can make it difficult for organizations to chorus in synchronicity around a single message. There is no magic wand but challenging times are also times of opportunity--especially if we can get everyone on the same page. Down markets are often where important battles for market share and customer growth take place. The discussions of bailouts and nationalization are issues over which most of our employees have little control. Our controllable opportunities are more likely to come from...