Gather, Assemble, Act
The Unmet Need
Many stakeholder groups feel powerless. e.g. Uber/Lyft drivers or students. They lack a modern mechanism to coordinate, coalesce around issues and use the leverage they have to effect the change they want.
Social media is great for discussion. However, it is not great for action. It lacks the tools, structure, and hierarchy to effectively coordinate.
Social media's main form of leverage is "public shaming". This can work but requires large scale and is hit-and-miss.
Mostly, social media yields "slacktivism" and "oh dear-ism". Also, it's common that individuals "speaking out of turn" face retribution from their employers.
Change.org allows people to define issues and show their support for them but it's essentially a slightly more organized form of public shaming.
Any company or institution's reaction to public shaming can also be hollow and focus on minimizing damage versus actual change - "green-washing", "window dressing", etc.
There are many other levers that stakeholders have at their disposal; they just need a mechanism to bring them to bear, including:
- the power of the consumer wallet (see our business #Ethically)
- shareholder voting rights
- labor organization
- direct contributions (donations)
