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New Delhi: Time magazine named President-elect Donald Trump as its Person of the Year for 2024. Tim O’Brien, the artist who created the cover, had previously depicted Trump at the desk amid rising water levels, a metaphor for the turmoil of his first term.
Well, a change of stance is not the only issue here.
Shiv Shivakumar, Operating Partner at Advent International, also brought out the issue of "paid media."
Sharing his thoughts on LinkedIn, he said, “I admire Time magazine and the articles are good, but I was surprised to see close to 20% of the magazine has ‘Content from xyz Indian person/company,’ all obviously paid for.”
Disappointed, Shivakumar feels this is a larger trend from media houses and it is happening across the globe.
Validating Shivakumar’s comments on the situation, Shekhar Iyer, Country Head, Country Head Commercial Vehicles & Construction Equipment Business at Federal Bank, said, “Go through any of the business magazines published in India, and you'll find that the majority of pages are filled with paid advertorials, while the actual reading content is minimal. The newspaper and magazine industry is dying due to the lack of reliable content and the absence of critical analysis. It is losing heavily to free online media, which also fails to add any value to our knowledge.”
Shedding light on why “paid media” has become a global phenomenon, he said, “Media is unprofitable and is declining fast with the digital tsunami. So, they (publications) revert to events, paid articles, awards, etc., to shore up revenues."
Furthermore, he asked if a “magazine like Time is willing to barter its good image for a few dollars” then “is Harvard Business Review next?”
Citing the reasons for this problem, Shivakumar thanked the fragmentation of media by geography and said, “Fragmentation of media by geography, thanks to technology, enables this. You have Andhra businessmen, Punjab industrialists, and actors from Bihar who are paying money for a respectability makeover in the local edition.”
Warning consumers about the awards being given to corporate bosses, he asked them to critically evaluate “the awarding body, the judging criteria, the quality of the Jury, and the industry recognition of the award,” before applauding the person being awarded.
Elaborating his comments further, he said, “We have 30 under 30 and 40 under 40 awards galore in every discipline. Some have entry fees, which serve as a revenue model. The awards events themselves are another revenue model, with sponsors lined up. A few industry stalwarts are called to speak or receive an award. All recipients then post about it on LinkedIn with their utmost 'humility' and 'gratitude.’”
The issue of buying and selling likes on social media is not new because “social media has made likeability a commodity.” With everyone liking everything as it's only a click away and costs nothing, “companies are willing to pay people to just like stuff. A leading hotel chain in India had a social media company asking for paid likes,” he added.
Shivakumar further mentioned that the BFSI CEOs sponsor the awards on TV as it gets them to be part of the jury and also get a “respectability makeover.”
Blaming the company’s marketing budgets at play, he asked board members and shareholders to challenge 'personal image ' sponsorships.
Agreeing with Shivakumar, Hariharan Seetharaman, General Manager (Senior Consultant) at HCLTech commented on the post and said, “Very few people call a spade a spade these days! Authenticity is a very rare commodity now, and this resonates with me well. A professional's respectability is precious. Here's a small story: My father, who was a lineman in the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board, also had an additional charge of the EB Stores, which carried an inventory of copper, consumables, spares, etc.
One day, one of his colleagues came home, and I gave him the store key in my father's absence because it was a customer need at the time. I had to endure a long session with my father, along with some physical reprimands, for giving the key without his permission. Later, I asked him why he did this. His response was, 'I have carried my impeccable honesty and respectability for decades. Trust cannot be broken; it’s precious!”
Collecting his thoughts in one place, he said, “All rankings and awards are playing to the respectability makeover industry for a fee and respectable magazines have become inflight magazines where non-descript industrialists are featured for money.”
Advising senior professionals to distance themselves from these awards, he said, “I can understand industrialists and first-generation entrepreneurs doing this out of desperation, but I cannot understand professionals falling for it. A professional's respectability is precious and should not be bought for a few dollars.”