‘It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it’– Benjamin Franklin
Since its announcement in October, the media has covered – and created – a significant amount of dialogue surrounding the string of scandals set to be uncovered in the upcoming Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety.
Whether it’s the September 2018 Four Corners report nationally scrutinising the stories of those that were victim to improper aged care and health care standards, the coverage on court rulings and prosecutions against carers who have harmed the safety of patients, or the September 2017 article published by the Sydney Morning Herald comparing the reputation of aged care facilities to the human right violating character of Guantanamo Bay, the media has successfully invited fear and distrust in the quality of care aged care services provided across Australia.
Investigations for the Royal Commission are targeted at the entire aged care sector – no aged care facility or governing organisation can be certain how this will affect their reputation, staff, operations or functioning. Being prepared and informed of what media is generated is imperative to stay proactive and primed for how the business could be affected.
So how do you decide if your aged care facility needs to manage your reputation? You need to ask yourself:
Do the Royal Commission’s Terms of Reference cover aspects or issues relevant to my organisation?
• Management systems • Staffing • Organisational development • Instances of abuse, reportable assaults, neglect • Failures of care • Theft of belongings • Hygiene • Quality of food • Sanitary conditions • Restrictions on freedom and movement
Do we want to manage these topics or issues through any of the following?
Mediaportal gives you access to all relevant media data, ensuring you’re ready to deal with, and proactively plan, communications and PR activities amidst the Royal Commission inquiry. Covering all top media and relevant regional outlets, our Mediaportal platform ensures you’re informed of the media landscape before you are hit with a crisis.
Visit www.isentia.com/aged-care for more details and to register for a complimentary 5-day trial of our Aged Care Briefing.
Loren is an experienced marketing professional who translates data and insights using Isentia solutions into trends and research, bringing clients closer to the benefits of audience intelligence. Loren thrives on introducing the groundbreaking ways in which data and insights can help a brand or organisation, enabling them to exceed their strategic objectives and goals.
The Royal Commission is well underway, and it's imperative for aged care organisations to be aware of the media generated, and how it could affect your business or communications.
Keen to stay on top of it all?
Let our team help!
We can provide you with a comprehensive view of the topics and spokespeople through delivering insights to you and your team. We can aid in decision making and help your organisation manage your reputation.
"
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Whitepaper
Snapshot of the aged care industry
The Royal Commission into Aged Care has commenced, and the standards within the aged care sector are now under review. Download our information sheet to gain a better understanding of the aged care sector and how our exclusive aged care media briefing service can benefit your organisation throughout the Royal Commission.
Coverage of the Royal Commission is expected to highlight the failure of aged care institutions and leaders within the sector.
Our Briefing can be tailored to your organisation’s specifications and requirements. Manage your reputation and ensure you are aware of the media generated.
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Whitepaper
Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety
The Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety was established on 8 October 2018 and since its announcement, over 28,000 new stories have been discussed across print, online, radio and broadcast outlets in Australia.
In a post-AI world where misinformation spreads faster than facts, trust in leadership has hit an all-time low. According to the latest Edelman Trust Barometer, we are witnessing a steep decline in how much the public trusts CEOs and institutions. So, how do leaders rebuild that capital?
Prashant Saxena kicked off the session by grounding the abstract concept of trust in a practical framework. He noted that while trust is the ultimate "wealth" a brand possesses—protecting it during crises, authenticity is the daily "currency" one must invest to build that wealth.
Isentia’s data suggests that many leaders suffer from an "Authenticity signal poverty"—posting content that lacks social proof, information credibility, or cultural fit. To combat this, communication must rely on the "Three Ps":
Proof: Is the information accurate and verifiable?
Place: Does it resonate culturally with the specific audience?
People: Is there endorsed trustworthiness?
2. During a crisis, "glossy" narratives fail
One of the most powerful insights came from Malathi Pillay at MRT Corp, who manages the reputation of massive public infrastructure projects, emphasized that trust isn't built in big moments, but through the consistency of day-to-day behavior. Her advice for staying authentic is to avoid the trap of "motherhood statements", words that don't really resonate with the common audiences.
She explained that stating a vision like "transforming mobility" is often lost on the audience. To make the brand promise authenticity, one must provide context.
"We always try to support our messaging with specific examples... We talk about that university student that lives in Kajang, who is now able to get to his university in Kota Damansara in one smooth ride within 45 minutes." — Malathi Pillay.
By grounding the narrative in specific, relatable human benefits, like saving time or creating local jobs, brands can bridge the gap between corporate goals and public reality. She also mentions how misinformation does not always have to be dealt with bold statements. Quiet corrections also go a long way in maintaining consistency in our media comms.
3. The "human compass" in tech and banking
Kim Dy from UnionDigital Bank addressed the challenge of humanising a traditionally cold and intimidating industry: banking. For a digital bank where customers may never speak to a human, the brand voice must do the heavy lifting.
Kim introduced the idea of a "human compass"—a framework ensuring every notification, app interface, and social post is helpful, clear, and optimistic.
"People trust people, not logos. Authenticity means speaking the language of your customers, and staying away from jargon in an industry that is unwelcoming and very intimidating." — Kim Dy
She shared a real-world example where a deepfake of a brand ambassador surfaced promoting gambling. Instead of hiding, the bank acted with speed and transparency, proving that trust isn't built in good times alone, but is earned by how you face problems head-on and when audiences actually see the steps taken to better the brand's reputation and earn back trust.
Both panelists agreed that the role of a leader has shifted. In the past, authority meant firmness. Today, authority requires empathy.
From the public Sector: Malathi noted that when leaders address concerns (like project costs), they must validate the public's anxiety first before diving into technical explanations. "Empathy must always come before explanation," she advised.
From the private Sector: Kim argued that authority doesn't mean being the loudest voice; it means being the most responsible one. She encourages leaders to move away from corporate scripts and share personal reflections to cut through the noise.
4. Balancing AI speed with human sincerity
As the panel concluded, the conversation turned to the role of AI.
Prashant highlighted a "speed vs. sincerity" dilemma facing modern communicators. His solution was to let data provide the authority, but let leadership provide the empathy. Malathi added that while AI is a tool we all use, leaders must have the discipline not to let it replace human judgment.
In her closing remarks, Paik San summarises that the secret to building lasting trust is coherence. It is the alignment of what you say, what you do, and how you make your audience feel over time.
Whether you are managing a digital bank or the infrastructural capabilities of public transport, the rules of engagement have changed. In a noisy world, the most cutting-edge strategy a leader can employ is simply being human.
Interested in viewing the whole recording? Watch our webinar here.
Alternatively contact our team to learn more insights into authenticity, leadership and why trust is on a decline.
"
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Blog
Webinar: how can leaders rebuild eroding public trust through authentic communication?
The webinar explores how leaders can rebuild eroding public trust by treating authenticity as currency through transparent communication.
In leadership meetings across the industry, a single question has become unavoidable: "What is our AI strategy?" Behind this question is often the unspoken hope for an "AI Easy Button": a mythical, one-click solution to our most complex measurement challenges. As someone who spends a large portion of my time designing these new frameworks, I'm infinitely more excited about the blueprints and the foundations than what colour the house is painted.
For the first time in my career, we have the tools to stop using proxies and start building what we've always wanted: true, at-scale, sophisticated measurement.The real opportunity isn't in automation, which lets the AI decide; it's in the architecture and design of systems for the AI to follow. For decades, I’ve been frustrated by proxies. I’ve watched organisations use metrics like Impressions and Share of Voice as proxies for impact and influence. Too many people have been measuring the loudness of their voice, not whether anyone was actually listening.
Much of the history of communications measurement has been a story of 'good enough' data. And in some cases, data that wasn't even good at all (*cough* AVEs).
Why a blueprint still needs an architect
But before we can harness the potential of AI, we have to be honest about the technology and tools we're working with. As anyone who's ever used a "smart" tool knows, they can be... well, confidently wrong.
The new challenge isn't just "Garbage In, Garbage Out." The new challenge is that the AI has become a high-speed, frighteningly convincing echo chamber. When a machine delivers a flawed insight, it does so with the resolute certainty of a supercomputer, laundering that flaw into a "fact."As architects, our job is to audit the blueprints and stress-test the materials before we build the house. When my team and I test these models, we're not just looking for what they do right. We're methodically hunting for where they go wrong.
Where we continue to see a critical need for human intervention and expertise:
Context Blindness: AI is a brilliant pattern-matcher, but it has limited real-world context and struggles to identify the intent of what’s being analysed. It can miss the nuance of language, the authority of a source, or whether something is fact or speculation.
Language Bias: This is my personal favourite and takes a few forms. AI is trained on text, but it isn't (yet) trained on human subtext. This can look like missed nuance for slang used by younger audiences or emerging shifts in the meaning of language. Models are ultimately impacted and biased by their training data, so this can also mean larger systemic biases are amplified and not appropriately interrogated.
Viewpoint Collapse: While AI can sometimes get locked into a perspective based on its training, it can also collapse multiple, distinct viewpoints (like a speaker's sarcastic intent vs. the literal text) into a single, flat monolith. This drastically changes the outcomes of your analysis and ultimately the understanding of your audience.
This is the methodical, behind-the-scenes work that often goes unseen, and it is the crucial due diligence needed. It’s not as flashy as writing a press release faster, but it’s the only way to build a tool you can actually trust to make a strategic decision.
New tools, same bedrock principles
This testing isn't just about finding technical bugs or funny hallucinations. We’re testing these new AI models against the foundational, hard-won principles of communications measurement that our industry has spent years formalising.
AI is an incredibly powerful new tool, but it doesn't get a free pass. It still has to follow the rules of good measurement.
Measure outcomes, not just outputs: This has always been our goal. An AI-driven approach that only counts outputs (like mentions or sentiment) 1,000 times faster is still just a faster measure of noise. It doesn't tell you if a single mind was changed or a single action was taken.
Demand transparency: A metric is useless if you can't explain how it's calculated. This is my biggest critique of the current "plug-and-play" approach to AI. If a vendor provides a proprietary 'Reputation Score' of 7.2, and they can't (or won't) tell you the formula, it's not a metric. It's marketing.
Link activity to business objectives: This is the most important rule of all. The only reason to measure is to inform a strategic decision that ladders up to a business goal. A tool that just produces data, but no clear insight linked to your specific objectives, has failed.
When we stop seeing AI as a magic box and start seeing it as a powerful, scalable engine, one that we must build and steer based on these principles, then it becomes truly transformative.
The payoff: the tools are finally catching up to our ambition
A new frontier of opportunity is here. Such as the capability to move from being reactive to being predictive, and it takes careful design to get this right. Our traditional analysis has been brilliant at explaining what has just happened. Now, as architects of these new systems, we are building and testing AI models that can scan the horizon for the faint signals that precede a major narrative shift.
We can empower movement from broadcasting and the old spray and pray approach; to precision, deliberate engagement of stakeholders and audiences. This is another area where the craft of measurement design is essential. AI gives us the power to see the micro-communities and specific, high-authority voices that actually shape opinion. The work is in designing the models that can identify them accurately.
Finally, we can (at last!) move from quantifying to qualifying at scale. For me, this is the most exciting and complex challenge. For 20 years, I’ve had to choose: a large-scale quantitative study (which missed nuance) or a small-scale qualitative review (which couldn't be scaled). As architects, we can now design frameworks that don't just give a "positive" score but confirm that a specific strategic message landed, with the right audiences, and in the intended context.
That is the opportunity. It's not magic. It's the methodical, patient engineering we've been waiting for. It’s the difference between a "plug-and-play" gimmick and a truly strategic asset. The real payoff isn't just faster reporting, it’s about fundamentally upgrading behaviours and expectations of measurement. This isn't an overnight shift. As any research leader will tell you, a new methodology takes time, testing and refinement to get right.
The future we've been waiting for
For my entire career, we’ve been strategic thinkers working with tools that could only show us the past. We were forced to be historians, meticulously analysing what had already happened to predict future behaviour. The key to using this new, complex technology effectively is; strong communication, articulation and critical human thinking. The power of any AI is unlocked by the quality of the question you ask it. It's a system that rewards clear, precise, and strategic language.
This is a massive homefield advantage for communicators, who have spent their entire careers honing the exact skills required to be the architects of this new era. The AI we are using today is the worst it will ever be. It will only get better, faster, and more capable from here. This is what's so thrilling, and it's just the beginning. This new generation of AI driven approaches doesn't replace our intuition, it amplifies it. As communicators (and researchers!) this is the moment to level up. We get to be the explorers and the strategists who connect communications directly to business, policy and societal outcomes.
We're not just building better measurement and deeper insights; we're leading a more intelligent, more responsive and more impactful profession. What an incredibly exciting time to be in this industry.
Ready to be the architect of your own measurement strategy?
To learn how to build the right KPIs and tell a compelling story with your data, register for our live webinar:
Topic: Making Communications Count: Build your KPI confidence and storytelling"
Date & time: 12 November, 11am AEDT/ 2pm NZT
Hosted by: Ngaire Crawford, Director of Insights for ANZ, Isentia.
