The Telco industry globally is trusted by a strong majority ahead of Consumer Packaged Goods, Energy and Banks. In APAC, all countries except Australia scored the highest in trust rankings. Australia, with a 47 per cent score, was below the global average which shows that general Australians are vastly more skeptical of the Telco industry.

However, it is interesting to note that informed public had comparatively more faith in the Australian Telco industry with Trust rising from 38 per cent in 2011 to 57 per cent in 2012.

So what could be the reasons of varying degrees of trust between informed public and general public? I think these could be some possible reasons:

• General public still rely on traditional means of contact such as calling customer service centres to resolve their issues which sometime could be frustrating because of hold times. Informed public are more dynamic and can get a faster response by contacting Telcos through social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook
• The increase in smartphone adoption among general public has meant that sometime issues related to devices might be construed as network issues. This could lead to a decline in trust among general public. Informed public tend to find their answers to their problems by posting questions in Tech community forums such as Whirlpool
• Whilst the NBN is the biggest telecom infrastructure project that is being rolled out in Australia, general public might not be fully aware of the benefits that NBN offers as compared to informed publics who are better aware of how they can utilise high-speed broadband connectivity. A recent survey has found that Australian’s support NBN

Telcos still have a long way to go in building trust with general public. When we asked the general public about the top three attributes that are key to building their trust, they listed them as:

• Listens to customer needs and feedback
• Offers high quality products or services
• Places customers ahead of profits

It is loud and clear that customers want to be heard! Launching new products and innovations to add value to customers is definitely needed, however they can’t afford to do it at the cost of servicing their customers. We have already seen Telcos take steps towards improving their customer service by launching new tools to assist customers to manage issues such as ‘Bill Shock’. Customer expectations are also changing. They no longer expect Telcos to just meet their performance and operational metrics  but they also want them to meet societal needs. Transparent/ethical business practices and placing customers ahead of profits is key to building trust.

From a communications point of view, consumers are looking for open, frequent and honest communications. Here are some tips:

• People trust ‘a person like me’, therefore it is important to use tools to monitor what is being said about their brand in social networks and quell any customer concerns as soon as they can. Listening and engagement is vital.
• Consumers don’t mind hearing the bad news, what they don’t like is sugar coated corporate speak. Even if you make a mistake, they want you to own up for it and tell them how do you plan to fix it. Be pro-active and transparent
• Senior Management might not always be the best source deliver a message, leverage other employees within the organisation who are passionate and come across as more believable (could be the product manager who is working on a prevent ‘bill shock’ application)
• People also believe messages heard overtime from multiple sources. Traditional media is important however, they need to invest in creating interesting content that helps customers discover new ways of using their service and share it across social and owned media channels

The Telecom industry is going to face some tougher times. Frost and Sullivan has predicted that Telcos will face increased revenue pressure in future in the mobile arena as the market is getting saturated and investment in renewing and acquiring new spectrum for 4G is needed. A renewed emphasis on customer retention and ensuring they are meeting customer expectations is essential for their future growth.

Shiva Kumar, Associate Director

Listening to customer needs and feedback

As the above graphic highlights, listening to customer needs and providing feedback is the best way to build trust among the general public in Australia. Social media is one of the most effective ways to do this. If you are not listening and responding to the conversations occurring in the social space around your brand you may be missing one of the most effective ways to grow your brand’s or organisation’s trust.

CEOs are least trusted company spokespeople 

Trust in CEOs as a company spokesperson has fallen, whilst ‘a person like me’ has risen. This is an ongoing trend that the Trust Barometer has been highlighting for some years. Community managers and normal employees speaking on behalf of organisations in social media are an effective way of building trust in your brand, especially in times of crisis.

Limiting your spokespeople to handful of very senior people is not the most effective way to build trust.  The days of control communication are over. Open up your communication channels so a wide range of ordinary employees can speak on behalf of your your brand within social media. Of course that is not to say training and governance for people commenting on your brand/organisation in social media is not necessary.

Trust in social media as a credible source of information has doubled

Social media as a trusted source of information about a company has consistently risen over recent years. The 13% above are people that listed the fact they trust information they find about a company on social media ‘a great deal’. It does not mean that 87% of people don’t trust information they read about a company within social media.

If you haven’t already the time to take the jump is here. People are on social media researching your company and are trusting what they read. If you aren’t present you are missing an opportunity to influence and grow trust.

Repetition overcomes skepticism 

Australians need to be exposed to the same message multiple times before they will trust the information. If you are simply relying on traditional channels you are missing opportunities to repeat your message.

Social media is one of the most cost effective means of communicating frequently. Take advantage of it.

What are your thoughts?

Does the above make sense, does it align with your experience of implementing social media and growing trust within your organisation?

- Matthew Gain

One of the stories shared by our panel was that of the reinvigoration of North Melbourne Football Club, as told by CEO Eugene Arocca. From an uncertain future in 2007, the club is now once again an integral part of its local community.

In the past week, two critically insightful occurrences have sharpened focus on this idea – that businesses can earn a license to lead and shape the national agenda.

First of these was the announcement last Friday by ANZ Bank that it would raise interest rates, out of step with the Reserve Bank. While Westpac followed suit shortly afterwards, ANZ captured public attention by doing it first. And very publicly. Since then, the rest of Australia’s “big four” banks have taken similar steps.

The second key event of the past week is Monday’s special feature in The Australian, listing its 50 most influential leaders in business.

Occupying top spot is Qantas CEO, Alan Joyce. Back in November Mr Joyce was pilloried for daring to ground the airline amidst ongoing union negotiations.

While not a week goes by without someone asking me whether I think it was a “PR disaster” (quite what that is I’ve never really understood), the truth of the matter is that it was a defining step in re-evaluating Australia’s industrial relations landscape.

For proof, look no further than the recent declaration from Toyota’s local head that productivity issues are doing Australia’s manufacturing landscape no favours.

Regardless of whether you think a fleet grounding, an interest rate rise or an “occupy” protest movement are good ideas, the reality is that the decision to take action in each instance has been a definitive statement of leadership.

The idea of a license to lead has been central to some of my thinking about the practice of public relations for some time, and the decisions of Mr Joyce and ANZ CEO, Mike Smith, approximate loosely to the idea of “throwing an elbow” (see here and here for references). In a turbulent, tumultuous market like the one we’re currently living in, true leadership continues to demand drastic measures. Frequently, leadership flies in the face of popular opinion and there’s a good example of that going on right now in Greece.

There’s a reason we talk about “earning” a license to lead. It’s not gifted to us either by market share, market capitalisation or market dynamics. It’s not bestowed by an independent arbiter. A license to lead is granted by like-minded organisations that see merit in an idea, an action, a vision. A license to lead is granted by a discerning customer base and challenging market conditions. A quick glance at The Australian’s Top 50 shows it to be littered with visionary, strategic leaders, whom regularly make front-page news with the power of their decisions. The question now is…who will be the next?

Disclosure: Edelman Australia has worked with a number of banks in the past, including current client PlanBig.com.au (Bendigo & Adelaide Bank). This blogger also flies quite a lot and was a little bit put out by the 2011 grounding of the Qantas fleet, however he also enjoys the Qantas butter chicken on those Melbourne-Sydney commuter shuttles. He also hopes to one day have a home loan.

But, why do we survey trust? Why does trust matter and what is the true connection between trust and reputation?

At Edelman, it is our point of view that trust and reputation aren’t the same thing; however, they are intrinsically interrelated.  Think of it this way:

• Reputation is an aggregate analysis of past behaviour and a company’s conduct over time.
• Trust is the expectation of future behaviour based on past performance.

In other words, Reputation is what’s in the rear-view mirror, whereas Trust is what people expect a company will do in the future, based on their understanding of its past.

There is no doubt companies must be vigilant to earn, nurture and protect a positive reputation among stakeholders. However, there is danger in building reputation alone. A company may have a good reputation based on product/service, financial or operational excellence, but this doesn’t inherently inoculate from risk or fuel forward momentum.  When Reputation is not matched with Trust, growth barriers can arise.  This is when we see companies lose public support for acquisitions, struggle for forgiveness after missteps, or undergo acrimonious union actions.

Trust, however, is a license to operate and permission for the business to act, do, manufacture, offer services, etc. in the future.  Trust allows you to bring stakeholders along as active participants and advocates because of the depth and confidence inherent in the relationship.

Therefore, the management of trust is emerging as one of the most critical core competencies of the 21st century corporation.  Trust will help ease stakeholders through moments of uncertainty and change because of beliefs their longer term expectations will be met.  This gives business the breathing room it needs to act.

For example Trust will keep shareholders from dumping their stock when a company makes a long-term investment at the risk of short-term earnings. Trust will help employees get behind difficult challenges to make their employer more competitive. Trust is essential to create and maintain an advantageous regulatory environment. And, of course, trust will keep customers loyal, confident that, at least in large measure, the brand is meeting their expectations and values.

An authentic balance of reputation and trust, built upon both operational and societal performance, is the clear mandate for optimal business success. Companies must work to close the gap between stakeholder expectations and perceived performance. This will be done through committing to business decisions to meet or exceed expectations and through transparent and open communications about performance against these initiatives.

Our team at Edelman looks forward to discussing trust with you and sharing our new TrustED diagnostic tool which helps assess your current levels of trust, stakeholder expectations and company performance.

Kate Ferguson

Every year, technology has consistently been voted as the world’s most trusted industry in Edelman’s Trust Barometer survey.

Having worked in technology communications for over 10 years, I’m not surprised by this phenomenon.  But when I began articulating a hypothesis for ‘why’, I realised the bigger question was ‘how’ Technology can retain its top position.  Because, as we all know, when you’re #1, the only way is down!

An investigation into ‘why’

As with many things in life, there is no one clear reason.  But I’ve tried to distil it down to one overarching premise, which is:

Technology has had a radical and positive impact on our daily lives but hasn’t been around long enough to have the baggage of other industries

Let me break this down.

Technology as an industry is young, relative to others surveyed in Edelman’s Trust Barometer (e.g. food & beverage or financial services).  But despite its infancy, technology has had a radical impact on every aspect of our lives – both business and personal.

The most significant of which is that Technology enabled the birth of the Internet.  Since Edelman started measuring Trust back in 2001, the Internet has revolutionised technology itself – making it more mobile and consumerised.  Gone are the days when technology was the domain of the IT manager.  Innovative, high-quality tech products now enhance our lives and enable almost everything we aspire to do and be.

Technology has also had a halo effect on other industries – enabling them to innovate and grow faster than ever before.    Also due to the relative youth of the Technology industry, it doesn’t have the baggage of others, which invariably has impacted negatively on their trust equity. For example:

• Banking & Finance: multiple crisis’ (1920’s, 1980’s and the current GFC)
• Pharmaceuticals: negative side effects (thalidomide being an obvious example)
• Energy – environmental disasters (Chernobyl, Fukushima)

But as I said earlier, when you’re on top, the only way is down.

This may be a little over dramatic but my point is that the trust equity Technology has built up over the last decade or two can easily evaporate as the industry matures.

All it will take is one poorly-managed catastrophic event and its ripples will be felt throughout our entire industry – turning the current positive halo effect of Technology into a negative one.

Already we can see where one of these events may come from:

• Massive data privacy breech
• Country-wide network crash resulting from big data or cyber attacks
• Environmental disaster stemming from toxic componentry – e.g. batteries

God forbid someone proves there’s a link between mobile phones and cancer.

These are only hypothetical examples but it’s inevitable that the Technology industry will experience an event of this magnitude that will threaten its trust equity.  The difference being that the Technology industry can benefit from the learnings of others.

And this brings us to the bigger questions of ‘how’ Technology can maintain its trust equity.

Maintaining Technology’s trust equity

Edelman’s 2012 Trust Barometer tells us that trust can be maintained in the future by transitioning from a licence to operate to a licence to lead.  In layman’s terms, organisations must complement their operational performance with customer/employee engagement and a social conscious to drive incremental trust.

Our 2012 Trust Barometer data indicates that 47 percent of people will trust an organisation if they successfully deliver on attributes such as financial performance or product innovation.  To drive that number up to 70+ percent, organisations must engage customers and employees with authenticity and transparency.  This obviously has significant implications for use of social media – and arguably the Technology industry has significant room for improvement in this area.

Additionally, the results suggest corporate social responsibility/ethical business practices or ‘marrying profit with purpose’ will drive trust scores higher again.  However, this must be contextually relevant and not just a corporate box at the Chairman’s favourite sporting event.

These points are best highlighted through the below data:

Technology organisations can also accelerate this process by using their most credible spokespeople.  Our 2012 Trust Barometer data reveals that peers (‘a person like yourself’) and regular employees are now considered more credible than CEOs, who now rank amongst the least most credible sources of information about a company.

Technical experts within the company are also considered one of the most credible sources of information and should be used more often.  But the overall message is that they days of the CEO being the primary and often sole spokesperson are gone.

As always, it’s not as black and white as that. But transparency and customer/employee engagement is critical for retaining trust.  If Technology brands can marry these attributes with a strong social conscious, then they will continue to be the world’s most trusted industry regardless of what growing pains they will invariably experience in the decade to come.

Grant Thomas, Director, Technology

Since 2009, trust in Australian banks by informed publics (those with tertiary education and in the upper income level) has risen by 21% since 2009 and by 17% since 2011. In the UK, trust in the banking industry sits at 27%, down from 46% in 2009 while in Germany it’s 19%, France 23% and Spain 17%.

In Asia banks enjoy a healthy level of trust: 78% of Chinese, 86% of Indonesians and 90% of Indians have faith in the industry.

But there’s a flip side to all this heart-warming news for bankers in Australia. While banks are trusted, they still remain at the bottom of the pile as being the least trusted out of a range of eleven major industry sectors that include food and beverage, technology, media and automotive sectors.

So there’s work to be done. And as Australians continue to face up to the pressure of global uncertainty and an economy with a patchy path forward, banks that reflect an understanding of their customers’ positions and difficulties may do better. And how they handle bad news in the current environment of reduced financial sector jobs is a key challenge.

Treating both customers and their people with sensitivity (and communicating the good and the bad news) might show bankers have a real heart beating under that finely-tailored pin-stripe suit.

Nic Jarvis, Director Corporate

Under the consumer friendly label of ‘The Australian Medicines Industry’, the program was driven out of a need identified by the pharmaceutical industry to increase recognition of the exceptional work conducted by people in the industry and address research which had suggested that understanding and acceptance of the industry was well below par.

This research, conducted in 2009 and 2010 found that Australians had little or no opinion of the Australian Medicines Industry and their main concerns about health were waiting times in hospitals, access to doctors and government funding of health facilities and services in Australia. The pharmaceutical industry in fact didn’t really rate a mention on people’s lists of health priorities which prompted the Industry to take action.

Just over 12 months later, the program has now been seen in various news media around the country, a consumer focused website has been developed, an advertising campaign has been rolled out to the masses and happily, a measurement campaign has been put in place that has found that in the twelve months since the Australian Medicines Industry project kicked off, Australian consumers’ perception of the medicines industry has increased!

At this point, we have to keep in mind that was the first time the industry had united like this to really focus on making noise in the ears of Australian consumers and it came with a reasonable budget and a significant effort from member companies as well as third party suppliers and of course Medicines Australia itself. In an industry as highly regulated as pharma, it’s easy to understand why they had been shy in the past to engage with the general public.

So looking now at the 2012 Edelman Trust Barometer results and reflecting on what we now know about the industry’s efforts in 2010 and 2011, one set of data stands out more than any other for me.

When the researchers looked at Trust in industries, the following results came back:

• Technology = 83% trust representing an increase of 15 percent
• Food & Beverage = 75% trust representing an increase of 10 percent
• Brewing & Spirits = 70% trust representing an increase of 18 percent
• Pharmaceuticals = 66% trust representing an increase of 10 percent
• Automotive = 65% trust representing an increase of 10 percent
• Consumer Packaged Goods = 65% trust representing an increase of 18 percent

Now, I am not overly acquainted with all of these industries, however I am in tune with the broader Australian media landscape and I cannot recall any consumer communication or public relations campaigns from these other sectors of industry, which prompts me to ask – why did pharma only increase its level of trust by ten per cent?

How is it that the alcohol and consumer packaged goods industries, had an increase of 18 per cent in trust, yet, the medicines industry, despite all its efforts, could only manage ten per cent?

In the year where Medicines Australia and its member companies made their largest investment ever in driving consumer engagement and trust in an industry that invests up to 1 billion dollars in Australian medical research and development, contributes around 4 billion dollars in exports, and provides over 14,000 skilled jobs – why did trust not sky rocket?

I don’t actually know the answer to my question. I’m biased because I really believe in the work of the pharmaceutical industry, but I do think that there is a warning that should be considered around this story and that is that trust must be measured in context.

In isolation, the ten per cent jump in trust is a great result for pharma in Australia. However, for this result to truly move Australian consumers from being bystanders to advocates who will take action on behalf of the industry, the industry needs to recognize where this result sits in context to other industries and build upon it.

I congratulate the Australian Medicines Industry for what has so far been a bold public initiative to address one of its biggest issues. For too long, pharmaceutical companies have been happy to quietly go about their business with their heads below the parapet.

Unfortunately, the risk in this strategy is that before long the proverbial hits the fan and it is at these times that companies and industries need to be able to call on their trusting supporters. Long term investment in transparent trust initiatives like the Australian Medicines Industry project will go a long way to help address this. It seems that this is a great example of where a sustained external communications and public relations program, rather than a big bang theory will lead to success.

Will Collie

Emeritus Professor Lloyd Sansom, Immediate past chair of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee.

These are the words I have been waiting to hear since I started thinking about the role of patients in the reimbursement process and they were in response to a question I posed to Professor Sansom this week, during the Baker IDI’s Perspectives Forum, themed ‘where your medicines come from and why are they important’.

In a really important step for the medicines industry, the session was co-hosted by Medicines Australia CEO Dr Brendan Shaw, and Professor Sansom. A sort of devil’s advocate show if you will.

Both men gave their own perspective on the medicines industry, including some great debate over the current model for R&D in new drug discovery and the high costs associated with bringing new medicines to market.

Both Dr Shaw and Professor Sansom agreed that in order for the pharmaceutical industry to survive in a climate of economic downturn, it needed to evolve and find more efficient ways to deliver new medicines which in turn will deliver better health outcomes for patients.

Both men also agreed that in order for these new medicines to be brought to market, patients and their representative organizations must mobilize to exert their influence on not only the government and key health decision makers, but the broader public as well.

They agreed that right now, patient organisations around the country had the power to drive behavioural change at the most senior levels and that if they did not take this step, they would be at risk of being left behind.

At this point it is important to note that not all disease states were made equal and as a result, not all patient groups are either. This then, poses a key risk for patient groups who may not have the same level of sophistication as some of their more – dare I say it – ‘sexy’ and consumer friendly cousins, but an issue that Professor Sansom told me he was also quite aware of, and focusing on with a number of industry working parties.

If you have ever been involved with a PBAC submission in Australia, or if you have worked near a team that has engaged with the Committee, or maybe even if you are married to, or partner of a person that has ever been involved in a PBAC submission in the last ten years you would have heard of Professor Sansom.

Professor Sansom has advised both Coalition and Labor Governments through a time of major policy challenges. He continues to provide advice to the Australian Government on Medicines Policy. He is is an international champion for the cost effectiveness evaluation of medicines that are proposed for public subsidy, an area in which Australia leads the world. He has spoken widely on the current and future issues for the fast growing PBS which now accounts for more than $9 billion (Aust.) in annual expenditure by Australian tax payers.

So basically he’s the most influential person the pharmaceutical industry has had to deal with over the last decade.

So do I need to say much more? If patient organisation engagement is not on your list of priorities, you’re going to miss the boat. And if you don’t trust me, trust Lloyd.

Will Collie

For more than two decades, Edelman has been at the vanguard of helping leading brands and corporations create lasting connections between business and social issues from Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty to Starbucks’ Shared Planet and GE’s ecomagination. This year’s Edelman Trust Barometer clearly demonstrates that combining business and social purpose is the clear path forward to building trust and engagement. Corporate social responsibility programs, like those mentioned above which become part of the company’s DNA, help achieve more prosperous communities, increased trust, behaviour change, employee engagement and commercial success.

Globalisation, the power of social media, and priorities ranging from the environment to human health are forcing corporations, brands and non-profit organisations to reexamine their businesses and how they engage consumers, partners and stakeholders. The longstanding concept of “giving back” is being supplanted by the perspective that business is driven by purpose as much as by profit.

We define Purpose as a higher goal for an organisation or brand that goes beyond profit to inspire a greater commitment among stakeholders.  In this year’s Trust Barometer, 73% of Australians said it is important for companies to address society’s needs without sacrificing shareholder returns.

Purpose looks necessarily different for each company, industry and market: its greatest impact is achieved when led by the “C” suite and when institutional will, creativity, multi-stakeholder engagement and a long-term commitment are demonstrated.

Reflecting the current debate about the nature of responsible capitalism, this year’s Trust Barometer survey found that to be trusted, business needs to do more than succeed commercially. 74 per cent of Australians say companies should be involved in solving social and environmental problems.

The Study also examined various factors that will build trust in a company which reflect this desired role for business. Top of the list of trust-building attributes for Australians:

• Listening to customer needs and feedback (70 per cent)
• Having ethical business practices (69 per cent), along with delivering quality products (69 per cent)
• Placing the customer ahead of profits (68 per cent)
• Treat its employees well (67 per cent).

The public expects business to do more than just make money and create jobs. They expect business to improve the world it operates in, act ethically, treat employees well and help local communities. Trust, built upon both operational and societal performance, is the clear mandate for optimal business success.  It’s a shift that business must make from a license to operate – to a license to lead.

We look forward to guiding our clients on this path toward enhanced trust and leadership.

-Kate Ferguson

Professor John Toohey from RMIT’s Graduate School of Business & Law refers to it as ‘default trust’ and upon reflection on this year’s Edelman Trust Barometer data, I believe that it is one of the most critical risks that Australian not for profits, and their business world partners face over the coming years.

It’s a philosophical concept, but essentially, default trust is that innate need by humans to ‘want’ to trust or in religious cases, the ‘want’ to believe. It is our ability to seek out the goodness in other humans or organisations without questioning it. We’ve all met (perhaps you are?) the kind of person that says to you ‘When I meet a person, they have to lose my trust, not earn it.’

So let’s set the scene.

We’re currently experiencing one of our most turbulent political climates in years and as a result, this year’s Edelman Trust Barometer has shown that government and government officials, perhaps not surprisingly, has taken a trust tumble of 5 per cent down to 47 per cent.

Alongside this drop in trust of Government, trust in business (57 per cent) and media (43 per cent) are on the increase, with NGOs sitting steady at the top of the pops on 65 per cent.

Importantly, when it comes to trusted individuals, the big winners this year were ‘people like me’, NGO representatives and ‘regular employees’ with increases of 31 per cent, 18 per cent and 17 per cent respectively. So essentially the data is telling us that in 2012 we trust our mates, those people who are most like us, and those organisations who exist to do good things for no profit.

But what does this mean for the pharma sector?

Well for one, it means that the role of Health Consumer Organisation (HCO) engagement is more important than ever.

Remember in September 2011 when Carol Bennett from the Consumer Health Forum proudly announced that following discussions between the Prime Minister, the CHF and industry representatives, the Government had agreed that all the medicines deferred by Cabinet would be listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme? If not, here’s the release.

Anyone who has worked in the pharma space for more than a week will tell you that rule number one, when building your communications strategy around medicines new or old is effective stakeholder management.

During a period where the Government has rejected the reimbursement proposals for more medicines than many in the pharma sector would like to remember, with this year’s rise in trust of ‘people like me’ or similarly ‘patients like me’ and steady levels of trust in HCOs, stakeholder engagement has never been more vital.

What is also means is that for pharma companies to be truly effective in delivering health products and services, they need to review their engagement strategies for HCOs and the vehicles they choose to engage through.

If you’ve taken a close look at the Trust Barometer data you may have also been surprised to hear that trust in media has increased.  We’ve put this down to an increasing diversification in media options, so where people may have not previously trusted media, the simple fact that they can now choose more freely where they get their news from, has resulted in an increase of Trust.

This is really nicely demonstrated in almost a doubling of the level of trust in social media from 7 per cent to 13 per cent over the last 12 months. It is also an area that Australian pharma has traditionally shied away from.

Australian HCOs have already cottoned on to this trend and are mobilising to use social media to communicate with their members and other stakeholders and now we see Facebook, Twitter and online forums blossoming in key disease areas such as diabetes, cancer, multiple sclerosis, cardiovascular disease – the list goes on.

Australian patients in various disease states trust their HCO to deliver them credible and relevant information pertaining to their disease. They also trust one another to discuss key issues in these forums.

The challenge for pharma is recognising how to engage in this space, building a framework for engagement, and using this framework to deliver mutually beneficial results for all parties. This has been done quite successfully over the last five years through the Working Together document developed by Medicines Australia and the Consumer Health Forum, however this document is just the start of the journey. With the advent of digital patient engagement through social media channels, the game has changed and to survive the entire health sector needs to closely review this option.

Getting back to default trust…

While reduced trust in government is in contrast to steadily increasing trust in NGOs, it is quite possible that through the concept of ‘default trust’, Australians’ disillusionment with Government has contributed trust of NGOs. That being, Australians are so disappointed with government that they are just begging to trust anyone with the most suitable candidate for this trust currently being is NGOs.

With trust comes responsibility. It’s the whole bigger they are, harder they fall issue.  While they trust and love you now, if you abuse that trust by disappointing your members and stakeholders, they will take that trust away. As Australian HCOs increase their levels of sophistication and build on their relationships with corporates and especially the pharma sector, they must keep this front of mind.

Similarly, as pharma and the corporate sector continue to build their relationships with HCOs, recognition of the fine trust line must be at the foundation of partnerships and while it might sound  like community engagement 101, it’s those ‘people like me’ who make up the majority of those HCO members that will make the difference between success and failure.

- Will Collie, Director Healthcare