August 16, 2019—As protests in Hong Kong intensify, they are having a growing impact on the city’s businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Here are some business continuity planning (BCP) and communication strategies for SMEs dealing with civil unrest. People first Your business won’t survive a major interruption without the support of your staff. […]
August 14, 2019—For my friends outside Hong Kong: These are difficult times in the special administrative region. Despite the violence you’ve seen on TV, life continues. We’re not cowering in fear (and clouds of tear gas) in our homes. We’re going to work, some of us are scuba diving, and today is the first day […]
October 9, 2018—The Hong Kong government rejected an application by Victor Mallet, a British journalist working for the Financial Times and vice president of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club, to have his work permit extended. The story broke on Friday, October 5, and Hong Kong authorities have declined to explain the decision, despite expressions of concern […]
October 2, 2018—In China, many topics—including independence movements, criticism of senior officials and references to Winnie the Pooh—are banned from social and conventional media. Now, as trade frictions between China and the United States intensify, the New York Times reports there is a new list of topics that must be “managed”: ■ Worse-than-expected data that […]
I have a soft spot for radio. I grew up listening to clear channel radio stations at night in Canada, worked for a time as a DJ, and there’s usually an internet radio station like KEXP, KUVO or the BBC (or one of a dozen more) playing rock, jazz, ambient or news in the background […]
June 9, 2016—With the recent relaunch of the Dillon Communications website, I’m also reviving my blog. In the process, I’m updating some of the old blog posts from Beneath the Peak about media, media relations, writing, presentations and communications, and writing new posts about these topics. I will also highlight resources—including books, websites and software—that […]
May 25, 2016 — On Tuesday night, I had a pleasant surprise when I received the following email from the letters editor of the South China Morning Post. I’ve redacted the author’s name, but the letter is otherwise complete. Dear letter writers, I am writing to tell you that this is my last week as […]
May 25, 2016 — Yesterday’s South China Morning Post featured a front-page story about passengers on the Queen Mary 2 being shown a video by British archaeologist John Reich. In the video, Reich reportedly described Hong Kong as an “extremely polluted city,” with “inferior museums” where there was no point in dining-out because passengers, “would […]
May 24, 2016 — Communications problems—including a failure to manage expectations—is one reason for the growing sense of disappointment in Hong Kong’s government. 1. We’re spoiled. Compared to the kleptocratic thugs in Mugabe’s Zimbabwe, the bureaucracy of India, or the brutal repression of North Korea, we have it good. But it’s easy to lose sight […]
May 24, 2016 — I spent Christmas 1990 in Ho Chi Minh City. One of the trip’s highlights was an afternoon at what was then known as The Museum of Imperialist Aggressive American War Crimes, which also cataloged the Vietnamese experience under the French. It’s now known as the War Remnants Museum The museum was, […]