Yesterday, a good friend emailed me a two sentence note reminding me that I hadn’t done something that I’d promised I would do. What I had promised is immaterial to this post, but that I had promised to do it, and then failed, is very important. I gave my word to a good friend, and then ignored my promise. And he had the guts to remind me. In fact, he’s laughing at me right now that I even consider his reminder to be a big deal, because to him it would be phony not to remind me. That’s who he is. And he’s a better friend for it. And in no way could what he did be called confrontational. Direct, yes. Honest, yes.

Here’s the striking part that makes me uncomfortable — I only have THREE friends (in addition to my wife, who is my honesty compass) who have the backbone to call me on something like this. And that makes me sad, because I have many friends, and it means that most of the time I’m probably not hearing the whole truth, maybe just a watered down version of what they think I want to hear. And who knows, maybe that is what I want to hear. Worse yet, I’m not sure I would have confronted me like my friend did (even though it was something minor), which means that I’m no better that those I’m condemning as soft.

But I’m condemning you (us) anyway. I spend my entire workday in the world of fraud; how people are conning each other out of money, mostly. I am surrounded by stories of the wickedly, cleverly dishonest. And I have to say, by shutting up and putting up with them, we enable them. Let me share an example.

As you’ll see from previous posts, I’m constantly being asked for my opinion on the negative impact of social networking (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.) in the workplace, especially by the CEOs of companies. When people ask me about this, they are usually asking because they want an answer from a privacy perspective: how information is leaking out of their company through social media. Which it is, and I share that with them. But they ask with such urgency – like they are trying to find a reason to crack down on its use.

But the more honest answer that I rarely mention, an answer they themselves sense and are unwilling to confront, at least person to person, is that the real damage of social networking on the workplace comes from the fact that we are spending our work day in personal conversations (enabled by social media) that seriously and negatively impact our productivity. We say that we tweet for business reasons, but a lion’s share of our surfing is personal. How often are we reminded that we’re not getting paid to get back in touch with high-school buddies. Now, I might write it in an article, but to actually say it to someone’s face (the offender) is an entirely different gravity of backbone.

Do we fear offending people, or not being liked? Are we afraid we might get fired, or lose a friendship? I don’t think so.

I think we have unknowingly created a culture that punishes people for honesty:

• We become social outcasts because we let a neighbor know that their kid was mis-behaving in our home (which he was) and we don’t ask them to stop negatively spinning the story to the rest of our neighbors. And we defend our kid, even when we know that they were mis-behaving.
• We don’t listen to the news unless it is slathered and tainted with our own self-centered political perspective (do you really think you are getting the most honest version of the story from Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann?). We don’t want the actual news, we want yummy confirmation about our vision of how the world should be. In the media, honesty is just too boring. If you don’t have an outrageously provocative opinion (by definition, dishonest), it just won’t sell. How many of us watch The Lehrer Report on PBS? How many of us just dismissed that reference to impartiality based on our political views?
• We ask for 360 Feedback at work and once it is given, go home and complain about how “off” our boss was. But we never tell our boss, we never have the conversation.

The net result of Fearing Honesty is that we become dishonest with ourselves. We drink the Cool-aid, so to speak. We know that no investment returns 15% year, even in bad years, but we continue to give our money to the Bernie Madoffs of the world, hoping. We tell our spouses that the relationship is strong because we can’t bare to tell them the truth. Instead of being direct, we step out on them. We know we need to change, but not as much as the next guy.

Even if you’ve made it this far in the article, you probably won’t see the world differently when you look up from the screen. I’m wondering if I will. If so, it will be thanks to my friend.

No related posts.

On a related note, I recently became involved with the Santa Fe Group which published an excellent white paper informally known as the Identity Theft Bill of Rights. Registering for a download of the paper is well worth your time – it does an excellent job of summarizing the identity theft issues that we, as Americans, face in the coming years. It includes discussions about modifying language in HIPAA to protect against medical identity theft crimes similar to and far more serious than the Huntington Beach case.

As our population grows older on the shoulders of the baby boomers, medical identity theft and its cousins will become ever more prevalent and damaging. Help us fight for our identity rights by getting involved. Start by registering for a webinar put on by the Santa Fe Group called:

Victims’ Rights: Fighting Identity Crime on the Front Lines

Here is the recent press release from the Santa Fe Group announcing the Bill of Rights:

THE SANTA FE GROUP RELEASES IDENTITY THEFT
“BILL OF RIGHTS”
Five basic rights to empower victims and restore identity

February 24, 2009, Santa Fe, NM – The Santa Fe Group, a financial services consulting firm, and The Santa Fe Group Vendor Council, a consortium of leading service providers to the financial services industry, today released the first comprehensive Bill of Rights for victims of identity theft. The Bill of Rights calls for consistent processes for handling identity crime incidents in addition to amendments to privacy legislation and regulation so victims can more easily access and correct their personal information records.

The five basic rights address the need for legislation that enables individual victims of identity theft to access and correct personally identifiable information (PII) records. The Bill of Rights white paper, titled Victims’ Rights: Fighting Identity Crime on the Front Lines, is now available at http://santa-fe-group.com/whitepapers/register.php.

The Identity Crime Victims Bill of Rights advocates improved protection and support for victims and includes:
• Assessment of the nature and extent of the crime that removes the procedural “Catch-22s” when validating identity
• Full restoration of victims’ identities to pre-theft status, including the ability to expunge records
• Freedom from harassment from collection agencies, law enforcement and others
• Prosecution of offenders and accountability for businesses that fail to reasonably secure personal information
• Restitution that includes repayment for financial losses and expenses

The white paper effort was led by the Identity Management Working Group of The Santa Fe Group Vendor Council chaired by Rick Kam, President of ID Experts (www.idexpertscorp.com).

“Despite new additions to the Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act of 2003 (FACT), such as free credit reports and the ability to place fraud alerts after identity theft, victims are still subject to inconsistent and unfair treatment from state and federal agencies, law enforcement and businesses,” said Rick Kam, President of Portland-based ID Experts, a leader in data breach prevention and remediation. “We created the Bill of Rights to empower victims by granting them the same rights as victims of other crimes.”

According to Javelin Strategy and Research, 9.9 million Americans were victimized by identity crimes in 2008, an increase of 22% from 2007, with annual costs to consumers and businesses of more than $49 billion. In their journey to recover their identities, victims face a disjointed maze of privacy laws and information sources. Law enforcement processes are not always in place, and organizations often won’t share evidence with victims. As a result, a victim’s life can be disrupted for years.

“Victim empowerment is key to thwarting identity crime,” said Catherine A. Allen, Chairman and CEO of The Santa Fe Group. “With the Identity Crime Victims Bill of Rights, we’ve launched a national call to action, laying the groundwork for meaningful and much-needed legislation while building awareness of the issue in the media and among consumers and businesses. Our intent is that victims of all types of identity crime be provided with the same rights afforded to them via the FACT Act for resolving credit issues.”

About The Santa Fe Group
The Santa Fe Group (santa-fe-group.com) is a strategic consulting company providing unparalleled expertise to leading financial institutions and other critical infrastructure companies. Drawing from the most advanced thinking in the industry, access to experts in risk management, technology, security, innovation and other critical areas, and our deep knowledge of industry regulatory and legislative issues, we bring outstanding results to our clients. The Santa Fe Group is a strategic partner to BITS (bitsinfo.org), a nonprofit consortium whose members are 100 of the nation’s largest financial institutions.

The Santa Fe Group Vendor Council promotes the development of secure, best-in-class technology solutions for use in the financial services industry and beyond. Established in 2006, The Santa Fe Group Vendor Council brings vendor intellectual capital together with IT strategy at top financial institutions. For more information about The Santa Fe Group Vendor Council, go to http://www.santa-fe-group.com/capabilities_vendor-council.php.

John Sileo, Financial Speaker

Related posts:

1. Javelin Identity Theft & Identity Fraud 2009 Survey
2. Identity Theft Speaker: Red Flags Rule How-To Guide
3. Medical Identity Theft Increasing

Let me boil it down to the Top 5 Identity Theft Findings that impact you (and my comments and opinions in parentheses):

1. Overall Identity Fraud Incidents Increased in the United States (the problem is getting worse as the economy sinks and people turn to crime to pay their bills)
2. Costs to Consumers are Down (businesses are being forced to take greater responsibility for the liabilities and costs of identity theft – in other words, the burden is shifting from the consumer to corporate America)
3. Fraudsters are Moving Much More Quickly (the crime of identity theft is moving from garden variety criminals into the hands of organized crime)
4. Gender Disparity—Women were 26 percent more likely to be victims of identity fraud than men in 2008 (three factors: 1. women’s purses contain more identity; 2. women are less cynical and more trusting of others [a generalization that proves itself anecdotally in my identity theft speeches every week - it is much easier to get a purse from a woman than a wallet from a man]; 3. more women than men are responsible for household finances, putting them at higher risk of losing the data
5. Low-tech Methods Still Most Popular (technology is an enabler of this crime, but not a root cause – see my post on this topic)

Conclusion? Identity theft isn’t going away – until we deal with it personally, in our corporate boardrooms and legislatively, it will continue to be America’s fastest growing crime.

For more information, check out the Javelin Press Release here:

http://www.idsafety.net/Javelin2009IdentityFraudSurveyPressRelease.pdf

You can download the entire Fraud Report 2009 here:

http://www.idsafety.net/report.html

John Sileo, Identity Theft Speaker and Fan of Javelin’s Studies

Related posts:

1. Detection-Fraud: 15 Signs You’re a Victim of Identity Theft!
2. Fraud Report: SMiShing Identity Theft
3. Protect Yourself Against Mail Fraud

Are you an expert at something?

In the world of professional speaking, you are expected to be an expert in your topic (to be taken seriously and to make a living). So speakers begin calling themselves experts, sometimes before they deserve the title. It’s like giving yourself a nickname – it feels a bit self-congratulatory.

I’m no exception. After becoming a two-time victim of identity theft, writing a book on identity theft prevention, and delivering approximately 50 identity theft speeches, I suddenly became an identity theft expert. One day at a speech, someone introduced me as John Sileo, identity theft expert. A local TV station was there filming, so that night on TV I became a local ID theft expert. And that eventually led to some modest national recognition. The name stuck – because it was good for marketing and because, compared to the people in my audience, it was usually true. But compared to a criminal investigator who’d studied financial crime for 20 years, it was untrue. My expertise was really about DELIVERY – distilling and delivering the most important prevention information in a way that inspired people to take action. Which is great… but does it make me an identity theft expert?

Here’s the kicker. Had I not been branded an identity theft expert before it was probably true (if, in fact, it is true even now), I would have never been given the opportunities to BECOME an expert. Once I was branded “the expert” (and it’s later incarnation, “America’s Top Identity Theft Speaker“), I was invited to speak for Fortune 500 companies, participate on boards, contribute to panels and conferences and articles and to meet other experts on the topic. That exposure increased my expertise. But the chicken/egg sensation still troubles me – which came first, the title or the expertise? All too often, I think the title is first. Is that necessarily a bad thing?

Which brings me to my point. How do we become genuine experts in our field? I think that this is the single most important professional question we face as a nation as professional jobs increasingly go to people with greater expertise (sometime in other countries). If my friend Patrick (a pilot for Continental) were to call himself an expert as early in his career as I did, we would all be taking our vacations by car this summer. Ditto for a doctor, teacher or Army general. Expertise obviously varies by what we are applying the term to. But I would like to find the common denominators among these fields (expert pilot, speaker, guitar player, coach, mom, golfer, chess player, etc.). Out of this conversation, I’d like to collect an understanding of some of the common qualities that experts share (if such a list exists). With that knowledge, maybe it will be easier to become an expert. I’ll share my thoughts and learnings once I’ve heard yours.

My fascination with this topic has lead me to read academic papers on the topic. Drawing from those, let me set a common foundation by defining a couple of terms:

1. Expert: “One who is very skillful and well-informed in some special field” or “someone widely recognized as a reliable source of knowledge, technique, or skill whose judgement is accorded authority and status by the public or his or her peers” (Webster’s New World Dictionary, 1968, p. 168).
2. Expertise: “the characteristics, skills, and knowledge that distinguish experts from novices and less experienced people” (The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance, 2006, p. 3).
3. Expert Performance: the ability to consistently reproduce superior performances – to land the airplane safely in a monsoon every time, to win half of the golf tournaments you enter in a year, to play the guitar like Tommy Emmanuel:

Click here to view the embedded video.

So this is the question: How do we become experts? What, exactly, makes you the expert you are?

Is it knowledge? Experience? Coaching? A certain type of practice? Is it in our genes to become an expert? Is it a personality trait? Hard work? Focus? What made Bobby Fischer a better chess player after 9 years than his opponents, some of whom had played competitively for 30 years? They had more knowledge (knew more combinations of moves), more experience (games played), higher IQs, better coaches (according to some), etc. But comparatively, he was the greater expert at age 16. Why? I don’t want to oversimplify, but to find common ground. To explore some universal truths about expertise.

I’m sending this blog post to people that I truly consider experts in their field. I’d love to hear their thoughts on the topic, and yours.

John Sileo
Identity Theft Expert

Related posts:

1. Child Identity Theft Expert – Part II
2. Identity Theft Expert at Pentagon
3. Identity Theft Expert Endorsed by Larry Winget