By Gangasudhan
Last week, TOC critiqued the Straits Times’ misrepresentation of the 2010 Edelman Trust Barometer report, and soon after managed to get in touch with some Edelman representatives. The localised press release for Singapore was duly furnished and has been attached in full to the end of this report.
As speculated, the press release talks about trust as a factor of corporate reputation – “…trust and transparency are on a par with the quality of products and services as the three most important standout characteristics to a company’s reputation in Singapore.”
It then goes on to discuss ‘Trust in Government’ under which it discusses the high percentage of trust and quotes Bob Grove, Managing Director, Edelman Southeast Asia, as saying, “It is clear that the government has the mandate and ability to influence all aspects of society.” This may be something of a positive statement from a business perspective, but as a citizen, highly worrying.
The comparison of the survey respondents’ response as to who can be trusted more – the government officials (84%) or CEOs (66%) – also paints the context of a business perspective in mind (and not one of citizen opinion). Notably here, the Straits Times’ report conveniently excluded some of the more obvious observations that do not flatter the Singapore government – such as the fact that the pharmaceutical, health care, food and biotech/life sciences sectors which buck the global trend and attract a high level of trust in Singapore, “may also come from the government’s endorsement and promotion of these industries in recent years.”
And most glaring of all was the selective highlighting of the following portion:
“Traditional media, in particular newspapers and business magazines, are the most trusted sources of information in Singapore (equally at 68 per cent). Following close behind are television news and industry analyst reports, both at 66 per cent. Digital channels, including online search engines and free online content from sites such as Wikipedia, also register considerable levels of trust at 43 and 37 per cent respectively. This reflects the shift in media consumption online to complement offline information sources.”
Whilst the Straits Times report gloated about the first half of this, it made no mention of the remaining portion (which was the point) where the conclusion is that there has been a ‘shift in media consumption’. In any case, when respondents can trust Wikipedia at 37% and search engines at 43%, the 68% trust in traditional media does not seem as impressive.
Finally, if at all the Straits Times’ report somehow genuinely took the information in the press release as a reflection of man-in-the-street opinion, then the omission of the last line of the press release is puzzling – where Michael Netzley, Assistant Professor of the Corporate Communication Department at the Singapore Management University says “The Edelman Trust Barometer shows that organisations looking to communicate effectively with stakeholders need to create a multi-channel strategy leveraging mainstream media and online platforms.” If it was truly about Singaporeans trust in the government, would it not be pertinent to mention such advice on how the government can develop its trust better?
The original 2010 Singapore Trust Barometer Press Release can be read here.
I am appalled at the standard of journalism/news reporting by SPH. Their reporters don’t seem to know how to evaluate and analyse data, too lazy to dig deeper/research the topic, are selective with their reporting and are hardly accurate.
I like to applaud Mr Ganga for this writeup.
All truths should be presented.
Let as many people know as possible.
This is the only way.
It is also an opportunity.
Well done!
well done Mr Ganga.
Keep looking out, they have many survey companies of their own to come up with fantastic stats to show things are just perfect in Singapore.
the whole stats are so badly twisted and manipulated just to hide all the ugliness that are happening inside, nothing new anyway.
Thank you for all the kind words. I agree that the only way is to continue pointing out the unsavoury practices of the MSM so that more people will start exercising their own discretion instead of blindly trusting the material printed in our papers. Sincerely, knowing that people appreciate my efforts definitely spurs me on so thank you for taking the time to let me know!
We can also get other survey companies come up another Barometer.
Its very easy.
Statistics and surveys are flexible in nature.
Its limited by your imagination and size of your wallet.