Newsletter - January 2023

Welcome to our first newsletter of 2023! I hope you had a great holiday season and are having a good start to the new year.

This month I turned my attention to social media safety.

On New Year's Day, "Meet the Press" devoted their entire program to this topic, and Issue One recently launched the Council for Responsible Social Media. The Council's launch event is posted on YouTube, and I took the time to watch much of it.

There is strong bipartisan agreement that social media reforms are needed, but there is no consensus on what those reforms should be. The right typically focuses on free speech, and the left typically focuses on misinformation.

Key takeaways for me:

• Social media companies are driven by growth, which is measured in large part by number of clicks

• The most extreme posts generate the most clicks

• Algorithms accentuate the prominence of posts that get the most clicks

• Social media companies lie somewhere in-between publishers and a message board, with broad protection and limited regulation

• Although there is no easy solution, inaction is not an option

This issue calls for a shared commitment to problem solving, involving all stakeholders, including social media users, social media executives, technology experts, members of the media, and legislators. I am very pleased to see that the Council for Responsible Social Media has representation from each of these groups, including members of both political parties.

I will continue to remain actively engaged on this topic. I believe that if done correctly, social media reforms can help these platforms be a viable source for accurate and unbiased voter information.

In other news:

• There were technical difficulties that prevented many registrants, including me, from attending Angie Holan's webinar for ASQ's Government Division on "Fact-checking Journalism and Fact-Checking to Improve Information Quality." Fortunately, it has been rescheduled for Wednesday, March 8 at 12 PM ET.

• The Center for Electoral Quality and Integrity is continuing its work to partner with voters, election officials, and good government organizations to establish an objective framework for "easy to vote and hard to cheat" from the voters' perspective. We are establishing strong working relationships with many experts in the field and hope to launch a public facing website and have an associated press release in a manner of weeks.

Have a great month and take care.

Newsletter - December 2022

This month's newsletter will be fairly brief, looking back at 2022 and a look forward to 2023.

I am very pleased with our progress this year. Some key highlights:

• Building a strong relationship with Voice of the People, punctuated by their webinar for ASQ's Government Division

• Attending the World Conference on Quality Improvement and seeing in-person examples of government committing to serve their "customers"

• Releasing a framework proposal for reducing gun violence

• Working with the Center for Electoral Quality and Integrity—with whom we are making tremendous progress, capturing voter expectations and operational standards for our elections

Top priorities for 2023 include:

• Additional content and resources for each of our eight principles

• Working with the Center for Electoral Quality and Integrity to achieve our 2023 goals (more details on this next month)

• Advancing existing relationships and building new ones

• Strongly supporting and promoting public policy consultation

Some brief updates:

• I attended a webinar hosted by the Bipartisan Policy Center featuring the co-chairs of the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress:

  • Well over 100 recommendations by the committee are either implemented or on the path to implementation.

  • Here's a link to their final report.

• On January 12 at noon EST, ASQ's Government Division is hosting a webinar on "Fact-checking Journalism and Fact-checking to Improve Information Quality" presented by Angie Drobnic-Holan, editor-in-chief of PolitiFact. This event is open to the public, and I strongly encourage you to check it out. Register online to attend.

I wish you and your family a happy and safe holiday and a wonderful New Year. Thanks for your continued engagement and support of this work.

Newsletter - November 2022

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.

Although family and friends are first in the list of things I am thankful for, I am also very thankful for the American people and our democracy. The midterm election was a true testament to both!

In the recent election there was robust voter turnout. And although voters indicated greater trust in Republicans to manage most of the issues that were top of mind when they cast their ballots (see NBC news exit poll), much of the electorate rejected Republicans that are "election deniers".

Despite the encouraging news for our democracy, there are continuing threats, and the public remains extremely dissatisfied with both parties.

Third Way, a center-left "national think tank" published an interesting paper that indicates that voters feel that the Democratic party is out-of-touch with their priorities, and both parties are too extreme.

With divided government on the horizon for the next two years, respect for opposing views, a commitment to problem solving, and a true partnership between our lawmakers and their constituents are as important as ever.

Voice of the People continues to prove that there is common ground on divisive issues such as abortion and Social Security. They have recently partnered with ActiVote, a unique app that brings information about elections, issues, and elected officials to your smartphone. I encourage you to download the app and check it out. ActiVote facilitates easy access to valuable information on important issues, and it supports consultation and partnership between our elected officials and their constituents.

I am very excited about the progress the Center for Electoral Quality and Integrity is making. I will share updates on their work in either my December or January newsletter.

Have a safe and happy holiday season.