'Dirty Tricks' Campaign: Corporate Transparency and Social Media

‘Dirty Tricks’ Campaign: Corporate Transparency and Social Media

This post was written by regular contributor Chevis English.

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If Twitter would have been up and running 17 years ago, then ‘Dirty Tricks’ would have been a trending topic for sure. I am somewhat obsessed with CNBC Originals and I happened to watch one the other day on Richard Branson. I had never heard of British Airways’ ‘Dirty Tricks’ campaign, but after learning about it, I immediately thought - people would be all over this story today via social media.

For those who aren’t familiar with the ‘Dirty Tricks’ campaign, let me fill you in. In 1990, British Airways (BA) launched a secret campaign with a select number of employees they called ‘Helpliners’ to hack into Virgin Atlantic’s computer system in order to steal Virgin’s passengers. BA ‘Helpliners’ went as far as to call Virgin’s passengers at their homes and hotel rooms to tell them that their flight was cancelled, which was a lie, and that they should re-book their flight on BA. This went on for months before Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Atlantic, started to realize what was going on. To make a long story short, two airlines were forced out of business for lack of funds to go up against BA, and if Branson hadn’t sold Virgin Records for $1 billion then he would not have had the money to put up a fight either. In turn, Virgin Atlantic would have tanked.

Upon hearing this I was appalled to learn that BA got away with such a thing and that they didn’t have to pay more than they did. In my opinion, if a company were to do something like this today, the social media backlash would be so bad that the business that wronged another would struggle for months to come (Not to mention the mainstream media’s backlash!) Corporate Transparency is very important in today’s world, and I think that any company that is not willing to be honest about their practices must have something to hide, which poses the thought – if it is too bad to share with all of your employees and customers then maybe you shouldn’t be doing it at all.

What do you think would have happened to British Airways if this happened today? What kinds of corporate transparency should businesses practice on social mediums?

*Photo copyright of bbc.com.

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Tags: chevis english, contributor, corporate responsibility, transparency

kennethlim

Chevis- To be honest, I don't think this has anything to do with transparency. Instead, the example of BA highlights something that precedes transparency, i.e. ethics.

Ethics asks the question "Is this OK to do?" or in this case even "Is this legal?". If the answer is "Yes", then transparency asks the question "Would we want to share this with other people?". If the answer to the first question was "No", then the answer to the second question is definitely not going to be "Yes" :)

To answer your first question: of course there would be a backlash of epic proportions if this news spread through social media these days. Just consider the outcry around H&M just a few weeks ago and multiply that by umpteen ;)

And as for your second question: the proliferation of social media has increased transparency and this post on Domino's is an interesting read: http://socialmediatoday.com/SMC/168134

However, it's not necessarily a must-do IMO. Transparency should have something to add as well. Organizations should consider how transparency in something is going to benefit them as well as their stakeholders.
chevis

You are exactly right. British Airways' story was about ethics (or lack of ethics!), but I still believe transparency is tied to the story as well. Thank you for sharing the article on Domino's. I think it hit the nail on the head when it comes to corporate transparency. I believe that businesses should practice being a bit more transparent than they have been in the past but they can reach a point when it's too much.

I feel that consumers these days like to feel like they are a part of things and social media allows businesses to connect with customers in a way they never could before. As for negativity, there will always be negative comments out there about your product not matter how good it is but I think it's best just to learn from it and not take it personal!

Thanks for your thoughts and I will now be following the blog you mentioned above!
Giannii

test comment #giannii
Colby Gergen

I would just love to see CNN use someone's tweet @ Branson to ask him, "Hey is this real or BS?", as a source.