Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: It has been, as you know, we've been saying this
Speaker 1: about a year since the World Health Organization declared that
Speaker 1: the coronavirus outbreak was a global pandemic. So much has
Speaker 1: happened since then. Many have said going back to normal
Speaker 1: is not what happened, since things have changed so much
Speaker 1: as a result of the health crisis. So one way
Speaker 1: to see what is on the minds of individuals is
Speaker 1: the Edelman Trust Barometer, which we have gotten to several
Speaker 1: times over the past twelve months and back with the
Speaker 1: latest and which looks at the past twelve months. Is
Speaker 1: the founder and CE of the Global Communications from Edelman.
Speaker 1: He's Richard Edelman, and he's back with us on the
Speaker 1: phone in New York. Richard, how are you hey, Carol?
Speaker 1: How are you doing? Tell me about it. In some ways,
Speaker 1: it feels like it was yesterday. Some days it feels
Speaker 1: like it was a decade ago. It's just kind of crazy. UM.
Speaker 1: I read through all of the latest Trust Barometer and
Speaker 1: I want to get to the details. But first remind
Speaker 1: our audience, because you guys do this survey several times
Speaker 1: throughout a year. Tell us how you go about it,
Speaker 1: who you talked to, h in a little bit of
Speaker 1: the process. So, UM, last weekend we talked to Americans
Speaker 1: across the economic spectrum, across the geographies, and UM, we
Speaker 1: do it online and we lasted it in uh December.
Speaker 1: And you'll recall that business was the most trusted institution
Speaker 1: in the world for the first time. The deep divide
Speaker 1: between Trump voter and a Biden voter um for example,
Speaker 1: especially about media, where there was a forty point difference
Speaker 1: in terms of trust. Um, the only thing they could
Speaker 1: agree on was that business is trusted, and especially and
Speaker 1: especially my employer, that my employer, the trust is local.
Speaker 1: That you know, I trust my CEO, my colleagues at work,
Speaker 1: and so you know, things near me because I can
Speaker 1: control that relationship. Well, okay, and so that was last
Speaker 1: time around. What's interesting in this time around is there's
Speaker 1: not a lot trust of anything. Yeah. Well, Carol, I
Speaker 1: think the most important thing to say out of this
Speaker 1: is America's in shock. I wrote my essay last week
Speaker 1: about America and trauma, and UM, I think half the
Speaker 1: people we surveyed said they knew someone who had been
Speaker 1: hospitalized or was dead. And um, you know, I had
Speaker 1: gotten sick from COVID, and and uh, the two thirds said,
Speaker 1: I'm still living in a pandemic survival mode. And I
Speaker 1: know the markets are going up and and everybody's optimistic
Speaker 1: about the future, but the markets are not seeing today. Um.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's a real, um, kind of stunning
Speaker 1: thing that more people have died than than in World
Speaker 1: War two, World War One, Vietnam and Korea. And it's
Speaker 1: we are literally the death of the world or something
Speaker 1: like this. It's scary, it's shocking. Well, I can hear
Speaker 1: it in your voice to Richard, and you're right when
Speaker 1: I think at this one, we actually it's not just
Speaker 1: numbers and stats that we roll off here. It's it's individuals.
Speaker 1: And as you said, you know most people either know
Speaker 1: someone or know someone who lost someone because of COVID specifically.
Speaker 1: You know, listen, you have been talking to ceo s
Speaker 1: for so many years. You know, how is this kind
Speaker 1: of changing how they will run their companies going forward,
Speaker 1: especially if if they're seeing these surveys and they're saying
Speaker 1: people are employees don't trust us. So I think they
Speaker 1: feel a special responsibility after this year to do differently
Speaker 1: and I actually feel very inspired by that. You know,
Speaker 1: we have clients new Lever for change the song on
Speaker 1: the ice cream trucks because they found out that it
Speaker 1: was a racist minstrel song from the eighties, and within
Speaker 1: a month they said, Okay, we're gonna be sharing a
Speaker 1: new song with the Rizard from New Wittan Clan. And
Speaker 1: as songs for a World Day are going to be different,
Speaker 1: kids are gonna have a different jingle. That's the kind
Speaker 1: of speed and agility that that American business is doing.
Speaker 1: Or Dan Showman of PayPal saying, I found out that
Speaker 1: half my people were living kind of on a hand
Speaker 1: to mouth way and I had to raise their wages.
Speaker 1: That's amazing, Uh, flexibility like I've never seen before. Carol, Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is really remarkable. You know it's interesting too, Richard,
Speaker 1: like some of the uncomfortable conversations we've been having. And
Speaker 1: one individual said to me and and she's like, you're
Speaker 1: not gonna believe this is going to come out of
Speaker 1: my mouth. And this is from a black American said,
Speaker 1: you know, we need to kind of thank Donald Trump
Speaker 1: in some ways because there are conversations that came out
Speaker 1: over the last year to some extent because of some
Speaker 1: of what he said and the conversations that came out
Speaker 1: of that, and that we're having on a corporate level
Speaker 1: that that we didn't have before. To be fair, well,
Speaker 1: I think one big thing that that really is important though,
Speaker 1: that I want to listeners to processes. We cannot as
Speaker 1: business force our employees to get vaccinated. Of our respondents said, listen,
Speaker 1: I'm prepared to consider it, but don't compel me. Uh.
Speaker 1: And the same thing about only sixty are prepared to
Speaker 1: go back to work, to the workplace, to the city
Speaker 1: because there's still afraid. Only fiftent said that they're ready
Speaker 1: to take the subway, said they're ready to fly, saying
Speaker 1: they're ready to go see Grandma. So again we're still
Speaker 1: in trauma. Small steps will get business to the right place. Richard,
Speaker 1: there's just so many data points when you guys do
Speaker 1: this survey on trust. I thought it was interesting and
Speaker 1: one that caught my attention. Listen, one in three believe
Speaker 1: everything will be back to normal by the end of
Speaker 1: Trump voters versus of Biden voters. So there's still a
Speaker 1: lot of hesitancy about kind of where we are by
Speaker 1: the end of the year. So Carol, I think a
Speaker 1: lot of this reflects a basic problem with information. So
Speaker 1: when you see that belief in major news organizations is
Speaker 1: down twenty one is down by a third um in
Speaker 1: a year. People don't know where to get good facts.
Speaker 1: They go to their doctor, they go to local government, um.
Speaker 1: But they think the media is biased, they think it's politicized. Um.
Speaker 1: Only of Trump voters trust the media at all. And
Speaker 1: so we we have a real crisis of information bankruptcy.
Speaker 1: And our doctors and scientists are definitely the most trusted
Speaker 1: to tell the truth about the vaccine. And you know,
Speaker 1: here's where companies have to be smart and get in
Speaker 1: sort of public health officials and others who have the
Speaker 1: credibility and the m D behind their name. Well, and
Speaker 1: I do wonder, you know, because you've done a series
Speaker 1: of these trust barometers during the pandemic. You know, how
Speaker 1: quickly can things change in terms of who individuals are
Speaker 1: trusting in society? You know, employ yer versus a business,
Speaker 1: versus institutions versus the health you know, institutions, Um, how
Speaker 1: quickly can you remember last You'll remember last May, government
Speaker 1: was the most trusted institution, especially local government. In Andrew
Speaker 1: Cuomo with etcetera. And look with it's going on now,
Speaker 1: I mean the events of the world. Trust is really
Speaker 1: unstable right now. And again, if if you're an employer
Speaker 1: or a small business, you have really to pay attention
Speaker 1: to the needs of your employees who are not getting
Speaker 1: quality effects. I heard from the communications head at Columbia University.
Speaker 1: She's the number one source of information on vaccination and
Speaker 1: access for the fifty employees of that university. That's stunning. Uh.
Speaker 1: It means that you trusting my company's newsletter, for example,
Speaker 1: is the highest thing and that's why you have to
Speaker 1: talk to the employees in our study this this weekend
Speaker 1: said I want to be communicated once a week out
Speaker 1: this so again, a company being an information source is
Speaker 1: kind of a new deal. Yeah. I do feel like
Speaker 1: and I think a lot of people would would agree
Speaker 1: with this, that there is a lot of information that's
Speaker 1: come down and you know, you almost want a clearinghouse,
Speaker 1: one central place where we all go. And I guess
Speaker 1: one would assume it would be something like the c
Speaker 1: d C, but it it hasn't necessarily played out that way.
Speaker 1: And I think in the in the era of seven
Speaker 1: cable news and just NonStop online news. You know, it's
Speaker 1: hard to get get control of this. One data point
Speaker 1: that that did stand out for me along these lines
Speaker 1: of vaccine hesitancy is decreasing. Absolutely. Yeah, so this is
Speaker 1: really a positive. Vaccine hesitancy in fact, um is, you know,
Speaker 1: deeply decreased. At seventy plus percent of people say that
Speaker 1: they'll get a vaccine as soon as possible. That's up
Speaker 1: twenty points. Um. But we still see um that there's
Speaker 1: a sort of lack of information among those who are hesitant.
Speaker 1: It is I don't have enough facts. And but I
Speaker 1: also want to say there's a huge myth about vaccine
Speaker 1: hesitancy about communities of color. This is very important because
Speaker 1: already says, oh, well, blacks and Hispanics, you know that
Speaker 1: they're thinking about history, and no, they can't get to
Speaker 1: appointments of black and Hispanics said, I'm qualified to get vaccinated,
Speaker 1: but I can't get on the website. I can't, I
Speaker 1: can't get registered. That's bad. We have to even if
Speaker 1: we have to go door to door or whatever it is,
Speaker 1: we have to make sure that there's equal opportunity and
Speaker 1: equal access. Yeah. I actually think that's a really important
Speaker 1: distinction because you're right. We've how many times have said
Speaker 1: it's it's a case of UM minorities don't want to
Speaker 1: take the vaccine. But you're right. It has to do
Speaker 1: often with either access to signing up online or just
Speaker 1: having the ability to take off of work and do it.
Speaker 1: And and it's a really big data point in terms
Speaker 1: of demographics. And just got about thirty seconds left. Was
Speaker 1: that the biggest thing that stood out for you. I
Speaker 1: think that there's UM. I think young people have actually
Speaker 1: suffered disproportionately in this especially in terms of economic effect.
Speaker 1: I was shocked one and three said, you know, I've
Speaker 1: had a decrease in my income or or I can't
Speaker 1: get a job. And it's especially true of the eighteen
Speaker 1: to twenty nine And so again we have real work
Speaker 1: to do to get these young people into the workforce
Speaker 1: again and not get frustrated and get them going. And
Speaker 1: also people, um, women, especially women are women are really nervous,
Speaker 1: more nervous about getting vaccinated, and they've had a disproportionate
Speaker 1: job impact, so we have to get them back on
Speaker 1: the on the on the wheel. Well, we always learn
Speaker 1: a bunch and it's really a great kind of snapshot
Speaker 1: of where we are Richard, thank you so much. Richard Edelman,
Speaker 1: CEO AT Edelman, on the phone in New York City,