All communication consultancies periodically encounter Procurement before contract sign-off and embarking on the fun stuff with a client. I am not a fan of Procurement. They always claim to be there to help the agency and make sure everyone — both the agency and the in-house PR department — enjoy a “happily ever after.” Yet, …more
That was the headline in a Wall Street Journal article back in 2012. The piece made the point that the word “innovation” (and its derivatives) was being used so much by companies to tout incremental improvement — or worse — that the word lost meaning. Raking through earnings calls from the previous 12 months, The Journal …more
Most companies want to be known as innovative. To bastardize the Wallace Simpson line, “you can never be too rich, too thin or too innovative.” The problem is those same companies often depend on adjectives to tout their breakthroughs. The Wall Street Journal challenged the use of the “i” word over ten years ago: “Businesses …more
We tend to correlate experience with stronger leadership. The common Steve Jobs narrative swings from impetuous youth to lessons learned. It stands to reason that people who have been tested when things didn’t go according to plan expand their leadership game. Yet, there’s a downside to experience when it comes to leadership. We can gain …more
On a charitable day, I would characterize most company videos as dreadful. Consider what happens when you go to an event, meet a new person and that person launches into a soliloquy of “me, me and in case you missed it, here’s more about me.” Right. You walk away. Why would a company video be …more
I moved to Silicon Valley during the summer of 1981. I had no clue that IBM would introduce the personal computer a few weeks later and the microprocessor was on its way to rock-star status. Rewinding the tape to the early days, I’ve created a name game that pulls from all aspects of the …more
The internet has commoditized news announcements, particularly product news from B2B tech companies. This isn’t to say that journalists will never write about a new SaaS offering, a denser storage product, etc., but the why-should-I-care bar sits in the stratosphere. I was reminded of this when our European MD Mark Pinsent scooted the OOO message …more
Our company’s rescheduled holiday celebration looms later this week, prompting a look back on 2021. While the pandemic delivered the ultimate stress test for PR agencies in 2020, it’s not like everything returned to normal in 2021. Between variants like Omicron, political turmoil — hello, Jan. 6 — and continued calls for social justice, the …more
I’ve always viewed Intel as the gold standard when it comes to communications in the electronics sector. They know how to translate technology into narratives that land. They know how to leverage owned media to fling warning shots to the chosen few. And they’re always striving to put a face on the company, whether that’s …more
