Governor Gina Raimondo just had her worst week as Governor. Raimondo ran for Governorship as a smart leader who is highly competent and promised to attract the top talent to help transform Rhode Island.
This week’s tourism launch should have been a proof point to this transformation, but instead it raised questions about her leadership and her basic understanding about the people she represents. There appears to be a mammoth gap between the Rhodes Scholar with unlimited opportunity and the tough and opinionated Rhode Islanders.
With her firing (couching as accepting the resignation) of Betsy Wall, Raimondo hopes this is the head on the wall that will satisfy the anger and frustration that Rhode Islanders expressed about the failed and unprofessional launch of the $5 million advertising campaign.
But, the reality is that Rhode Islanders have just a small glimpse about how millions of dollars have been wasted and how a group of out-of-state professionals and out-of-state high profile consultants could be so inept.
Here are five reasons why Raimondo’s tourism problems have just begun.
Related Slideshow: Raimondo’s Tourism Problems Are Far From Over
The story of how three agencies could be hired before the Chief Marketing Officer — Betsy Wall — was engaged is unimaginable in the world of marketing. The fact that anyone in the Raimondo Administration thinks you need to leave Rhode Island to get superior design work is a demonstration of the disconnect between the Raimondo Administration and the talents in Rhode Island.
Rhode Island has many weaknesses, but a lack of fabulously talented designers is not one of them.
Solutions Have the Potential to Create More Problems
In her press conference announcing the firing of Betsy Wall and the assertion that the tagline "warmer-cooler" would be discarded, but the logo would remain was another example of the Governor’s unwillingness to understand the issues being raise. To date, the process, the product and the quality of the work were all flawed.
There is no member of the Raimondo Administration who has significant experience in developing and launching a national brand.
In the interim, Raimondo has announced that Seth Goldenberg, CEO of Jamestown-based Epic Decade will play a key role in the reinvention of the existing work completed by Milton Glaser and Havas. Goldenberg is a talented facilitator, but he is not a Chief Marketing Officer. The legislature trusted you with $5 million this year and you are asking for another $5 million in this coming year's budget -- it is time to recruit the most talented RHODE ISLANDERS. Selling Rhode Island to America and the world is not that complicated.
Rhode Islanders are negative. The press is mean. Talk radio is evil. All may be true and Gina Raimondo was not drafted by the Selective Service Agency to run for Governor. She sought the office.
The best way to engage and build trust with Rhode Islanders is to perform at a high level and produce. Bringing in “experts” from out-of-state who fail to perform is not a way to transform negativism.
Iceland footage, stock photos, false claims — hundreds of errors are not the fault of the negative Rhode Islanders.
In the past few months, Raimondo has demonstrated that she has a lack of understanding of Rhode Islanders. First, the unwillingness to lower the flags to half-mast in recognition of Buddy Cianci's death was a significant miscalculation.
Every Rhode Islander knows that Cianci was flawed and a two-time felon, but they also know that he did interesting things and was maybe the states most famous or most infamous.
Raimondo did not understand that most (not all) Rhode Islanders saw the duality of the flawed, failed and accomplished Cianci.
Similarly, she was tone deaf to the reaction of Rhode Islanders of the logo design by Milton Glaser. Whether is is the most brilliant piece of graphic art or pathetic work overpriced by a New York design shop it does not matter. Rhode Islanders clearly want a logo produced by a Rhode Islander.
Rhode Islanders may be inferior, but the quote of Mark Twain may be applicable about the reflective talent of Rhode Islanders versus the smarter and more talented out-of-staters. The Governor's Chief of Staff, Commerce Corp boss and many other top appointees are from outside of Rhode Island. But, maybe not as superior as perceived. Rhode Islanders know that Iceland is not in Rhode Island, which restaurants have closed, and the importance of the burning of the Gaspee.
Twain said, “When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.”
