In this day and age, consumers expect more from the brands they buy and trust than ever before. They expect those leading brands will take a stance on nearly every social issue, and consumers’ expectations are constantly evolving. That means, in many cases, communications experts now sit at the company table, making significant strategic decisions. Join “Can You Hear Me?” podcast co-hosts Eileen Rochford and Rob Johnson as they discuss “Why Communications Expertise is Vital in Setting Strategy.”
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Eileen Rochford [00:00:19] Hello again and welcome to "Can you hear me?" I'm Eileen Rochford, CEO of the marketing and strategy firm The Harbinger Group.
Rob Johnson [00:00:25] And I'm Rob Johnson, president of Rob Johnson Communications. As we know, the role of communications professional has changed dramatically within companies everywhere. Aside from having to be nimble to the ever changing expectations when it comes to taking a stance on nearly every social issue, these company leaders are having their roles expand beyond simply communicating company values. They are now being asked to have a seat at the table where major strategic decisions are being made.
Eileen Rochford [00:00:54] Or they should be if they're not.
Rob Johnson [00:00:56] Right.
Eileen Rochford [00:00:57] That's our opinion and we'll dig into that today. But before we dive in a little deeper on that, let's cover some statistics shared recently by PR firm Weber Shandwick. They recently hosted a communications centric roundtable. It was covered in big PR daily and few other media outlets. When I'm glad, really glad to see that it got covered because it was super thought provoking. So according to their research, which I'll mention, this is also been borne out in similar studies that was done by UCLA, the Edelman Trust barometer, and others that we've talked about here on the show in the past. The vast majority of consumers expect companies to take a stand on human rights. That's 82% climate change. That's 73% racism. That's 72%. And gun violence 70%. In fact, that same research found that 65% of employees feel companies have a responsibility to speak up, even if the issue is sensitive or controversial.
Rob Johnson [00:01:56] This has been the way of the world for the past few years, right? It has nothing to do with us as brand X right? I shouldn't say brand X because there is an 'x' brand, brand Y, let's call it brand y.
Eileen Rochford [00:02:06] Yeah.
Rob Johnson [00:02:07] So brand y doesn't say anything about the big political issue or environmental issue or whatever the case may be, and now they get punished for it. And before they'd say, Well, that's not really that doesn't have anything to do with us. And they could sit on the sidelines. And now the expectations not only from the consumers, but as you mentioned, the people that work there is "where do you stand on this or where do you stand on that?"
Eileen Rochford [00:02:30] Yeah, everything is global, right? And I don't mean in terms of the geographical sense. I mean, there are repercussions that are multidimensional on every single issue to every single company. And it's a question of those that you quite honestly choose to talk about or be associated with and whether you should choose to talk about them because there is a connection to your organization and in some cases, whether it's a direct connection or not, it's meaningful to the constituents or customers or clients you serve. And therefore it is something that you should have a perspective on, you know, at a minimum. So there is no such thing as just burying your head in the sand anymore. For any organization, any entity of any type.
Rob Johnson [00:03:12] Nobody can afford to do that. And the people that used to bury their heads in the sand figured out pretty quickly, "Oh, we better stop doing that, because the world around us has changed." So that's a really good point to make
Eileen Rochford [00:03:22] For sure, and when people come to work, they don't just come to work as, you know, automatons. Not that we ever did, but we sure pretended that we did for decades and decades and decades. When people come literally to work now with the expectation of bringing their whole selves, that has repercussions, ramifications for every entity. So when making decisions about any type of communications, you have to bear in mind the landscape, The as I said, you know, ramifications. And I think in my opinion, communications people are uniquely equipped to sit at that table with the other strategists, the other members of your executive leadership team or whatever strategy setting entity that you have established an organization. And here's why. I think the communications folks are so uniquely equipped in most cases. Many, many of us have had training in journalism. The inquiry that you're taught, that methodology in journalism, how that plays out in a corporate setting or an organizational setting is this We're not afraid to ask why, and we're not afraid to continue asking why or why not. And we have a unique seat. Let's call it point of view, because, you know, many of us as communicators, we're constantly consuming information that's external and really paying attention to what's being talked about, what's important that is inherent in how we think and how we act and how we show up at work every day. So people like us, smart leaders of any entity, any type of organization should want to have that kind of thinker, that kind of analyst, that kind of synthesizer at the table when they're establishing strategy in today's environment. That's my opinion.
Rob Johnson [00:05:03] You said a couple of things that are absolutely spot on that I wanted to comment about. First of all, the expectation people have when they come to work about bringing their whole selves, I think is what you said. That's also very generational. So whereas, you know, maybe for our generation we were a little bit younger, that wasn't as pronounced. But a lot of people and a lot of millennials that are now becoming, you know, they're heading into decision making roles in their companies. They want to work with people that care about making the world a better place. "All right. You're a successful company. You make money, blah, blah, blah, blah. But what are you doing to make the world a better place?" And those questions are being asked now. And the people that are truly in leadership positions better have a good answer. The other thing you mentioned about communications professionals, many with journalism backgrounds, is we also are used to looking around corners a lot of times. So why is it a natural fit to be sitting at that table now? Because, yes, you need to communicate your message. But we're also sitting there. I'm like, I'm thinking and I know you are, too, we all are thinking like 3 or 4 steps ahead. "Well, what if this happens. And what's going on here and here," and that's how our minds work in general. So I think those two things are addendums I would like to make to the very good points you're making.
Eileen Rochford [00:06:09] Very good. Yeah. You know, another thing occurred to me as I was thinking through this show why communicators, you know, should be at the table when strategy is being discussed, pondered, explored, etc. We think communicators and that's whether you've had a journalism training background or not. I believe that we more so than other strategists, so we call them, we think in terms of stories.
Rob Johnson [00:06:34] Yes, tell a good story. What's the story?
Eileen Rochford [00:06:37] What's the story? What is the story that will be told about us if we do this? If we don't do this, you know,
Rob Johnson [00:06:48] The story has to connect. So it's more than just the reputational part. It's the what story you're going to tell that's going to connect with whoever the audience is in this particular case. And can you afford to swing and miss and have it not connect? Yeah, you can't afford that, especially if you don't get do overs. And a lot of times we don't get do overs.
Eileen Rochford [00:07:05] We're the narrators, right? We're the observers of the narrators. And so I could be sitting at that table and listening to, you know, said CEO and said CMO and said chief operations officer, tell the story that they think they're going to tell. And what I'm hearing is the story that's going to be heard. And those are two different things and it's really important to have both of those perspectives in play, not because you should dictate your strategy based on, you know, the whims of the publics you serve. Heck, no, we all know that. But what we can tell you is if you go in that direction, you're going to be confronted with this outcome. And is that the one you want? Right. So it does have really important bearing. I think that the communications mindset being present in all of those conversations and the really smart CEOs, they know that they're they're already doing this. We're not saying anything. They we're not. But if you're not, that's those are the people who we'd really like just to kind of,
Rob Johnson [00:08:04] It feels a little self-serving for us as communications professionals saying, "hey, communications are really important," and it's not our opinion. We're not just elevating this, even though we are by having this podcast discussion, but it's also the way of the world. It's also the way things are happening. And to get back to the roundtable you were referring to earlier, that was attended by comms professionals at big corporate names. And everybody knows like United, Kraft, Heinz, Mars, Bristol-Myers Squibb. And it was how the role of a communications professional has changed, where one executive said they're now being considered an advisor, a builder, a connector. So you might be the advisor that's, you know, that's advising on communications issues. But all of a sudden you're asked to sit there and help build something to build the strategy and then to connect the dots when you are building that strategy. And I think that that's where this evolution is headed.
Eileen Rochford [00:08:51] Yeah. The job has changed even just in the past five years. It's astonishing the rate. And as I've said, the smart companies are elevating the wise, sharp communicators in their organizations to have that seat at the table. And they're thinking through, "how do I embed a communicator, a communications presence in almost every aspect of our business so that we can inject that kind of thinking," and as you put it, Rob, the kind of looking around corners, because that's what they need to do. It's that stay one step ahead and that skill, or those skills, I should say, that we've been describing in the last couple of minutes, those are skills that can't be replaced by, say, artificial intelligence. That is impossible.
Rob Johnson [00:09:35] Thank goodness.
Eileen Rochford [00:09:36] Yeah.
Rob Johnson [00:09:37] "Oh wait my mind matters? Okay, stop the presses."
Eileen Rochford [00:09:41] Right. But it's funny, you think about the biggest issues facing business right here, right now. Of course, artificial intelligence being one of them. The ability to think in the ways that we've just described and bring that, you know, elevation of synthesizing. But to bring that ability to the table, there's just no way, in my opinion, that you would get that at any level other than from really well trained in the classical critical thinking research mindset that frankly used to be part of a typical liberal arts degree. And a lot of that's been kind of swept away in favor of more practical, actionable, take it to a career type of skills, even in marketing. You know, it's fascinating.
Rob Johnson [00:10:31] I have to say too, if I can just veer off just for a second on that point you were making, I found that, I know you went to Marquette. I went to DePauw with a W in Greencastle, Indiana. And it was a liberal arts education, which I really liked having because I was going to learn as I went through my communications degree, I was going to learn about the technical things I needed to learn about. But when I first started in television as a reporter, you had to be an expert on different things. So the fact that I knew something about religion or philosophy or government or various other things would come in handy all the time. And I did learn the technical skills at some point sometimes on the job. But the fact that I had the background of critical thinking and had an understanding about different things that weren't just like how to press a button and how to make a camera go on or something like that. Yeah, they'll teach you that. But do you have those requisite skills that are going to help you be a critical thinker, which will, I think, help you be successful in whatever you do.
Eileen Rochford [00:11:24] Yeah. So as you're looking for that communicator to bring on to your team or several and to kind of plug into those places that we've just described, making sure that they have had, I'm not going to call it training. We're just going to call it preparation, real guidance in critical thinking in particular and things like research. It's fascinating. You know, I keep coming back to many of these folks who are frankly, the best of this came from journalism backgrounds because the ability to research and find information and then pull it together and connect dots, that's, you get that in a traditional journalism program. Did you know that Northwestern University, I heard they're not going to call it a journalism program anymore and they may even like move that to the side. It was in the magazine that my husband gets as an alum. And this is where- the direction that that's going and I mean he was- he went to Medill and he was absolutely aghast like, "what is happening?"
Rob Johnson [00:12:20] So what's the pivot?
Eileen Rochford [00:12:22] You know, I'm going to tell our listeners we'll get back to you on that or I'll put it in the show notes because I didn't actually read the article. I think Mike was even having trouble like forming words after he read this. So I didn't get the whole story. As a consequence, he was just so upset about this.
Rob Johnson [00:12:38] I mean, that's, you think about a noted- a renowned school like that, like Medill and they're like, "yeah, we're going to call it something else." And you're like, "oh, gosh." And, you know.
Eileen Rochford [00:12:50] I'm just predicting that this is going to bounce the other way, you know, soon enough, especially as we realize that artificial intelligence can only get us so far. And those critical thinking skills, those, you know, universities, colleges that still deliver courses that teach philosophy, critical thinking, those kinds of things, they're going to win out in this debate because those are the things that you can't teach a computer. You just simply can't.
Rob Johnson [00:13:16] I hope you are right. Yes.
Eileen Rochford [00:13:19] Yes, I know. Sometimes. I mean, speaking it into reality is maybe what I'm trying to do. But then again, as I piece this together, it just feels to me like those are the gaps. And more and more when conversations are being had. Like I may have mentioned this on one show recently when I was at a ESG panel at Marquette University, it was like, yeah, it was sustainability 2.0 was the conference. And there was a- I don't know what you would call it, like a consortium of different entities all in Milwaukee banding together to submit a really cool idea about delivering power essentially in a different way. So but the thing was this we're listening to all those people at the table talk about how they're pulling this idea together. And I'm sitting next to a person who was a CMO at a publicly traded entity, large company, and we both look at each other like, "where is the communications person?" Because we were having such a hard time understanding the concept that they were stringing together. And, you know, I knew it was a great idea, but they couldn't explain it in a cogent, succinct manner. And that is problematic because, you know, leadership is communications, as a recent guest said, and I cannot stop repeating that statement, but it ties in here again.
Rob Johnson [00:14:33] Do you know that Mark Heisten quote, "I start some of my trainings now." You know how you have like-
Eileen Rochford [00:14:39] And you give him credit, right?
Rob Johnson [00:14:41] Oh, of course I did.
Rob Johnson [00:14:46] I got Mark Twain, I got a Winston Churchill quote to start things off.
Eileen Rochford [00:14:49] And then there's Mark Heisten? Oh, my God, I've got Mark Heisten.
Rob Johnson [00:14:52] He's right at the top. I've done that a couple of times since he was on our podcast because he nailed it. And I remember when both heard it, we went, "Oh!"
Eileen Rochford [00:14:58] Yes, okay, so let's wrap this up in a bow because I think we've been taking this in some pretty interesting directions. Essentially, I think what I took away from the reporting that was done on the panel that was held by Weber Shandwick and completely agree with because, you know, we've been seeing this ourselves in so many places, is that the communications professional, the you, the me, the other consultants who kind of operate at this level, that is our role. We're now a bridge to strategy or connection or even from strategy out. You know it's communications is now corporate affairs. Internal communications may now be better identified as the you called it in this article, strategic Business Communications. And frankly, I love that because as we know and we've said this a lot on this show, let me say this to our clients all the time. When we're doing trainings, there is no such thing as an internal communication, and we've known that for decades. So we can't just do internal communications. That's that kind of mentality of head-in-the-sand we're-going-to-pretend-this-isn't-happening type communications, if you ask me anymore. All communications are subject to external exposure and they're all transparent now. So it's strategic business communications. And I just think that's the most beautiful descriptor.
Rob Johnson [00:16:13] Whether you're dealing with ESG issues, investor relations, sales or like M&A, there is internal communication that goes on, but it's only to get everybody aligned so that you can go externally and make your case to the public and explain hopefully in a uniform kind of way what you stand for and what your company is going to do. So internal communication, we don't want people to think it doesn't exist. It does, but only as a bridge to getting out there in the marketplace and sharing with everybody about what you do and what you stand for.
Eileen Rochford [00:16:43] And you can never create a communications or a communication for an organization with just the lens of the organization for that reason. That's why Internal almost is just a label that, it just doesn't apply anymore.
Rob Johnson [00:16:56] It's just the precursor to- it's like the appetizer before the entree. It's like it does exist. But then you're going to go have the entree and that's external comms. So the tide, I think we've explained a little bit has shifted. So it used to be where the decisions were made on high and the communications professional was then expected to execute those decisions. "Hey, here's the message, go you know, send that out." But now they're helping shape the strategy from within and then making sure it's implemented externally. I think we were just talking about that. And the reason it can be a good fit is because those leaders that are now doing more than just communicating are naturally comfortable asking tough questions, which gets us back to what you were talking about earlier, Eileen, which was the journalism background. And it's no problem for people like us to ask tough questions in a respectful, collaborative kind of way. And they have to be asked and somebody better have a good answer for them, right?
Eileen Rochford [00:17:45] Totally. I think when you start with why it was written, they were thinking about the journalist or the communicator, but for real, like we're the ones always asking, "well, why or why not?" Or what could be done differently.
Rob Johnson [00:17:58] Especially when somebody tells you "this is the way it's been done, this is the way we've done it for 70 years."
Eileen Rochford [00:18:02] Yeah, I hope that's been stripped out of the language of anyone who listens to this show.
Rob Johnson [00:18:07] There's still a few of those people walking around, I think.
Eileen Rochford [00:18:10] Yeah, there's a little bit of that. Even if it's like you don't even realize it, like it's that implicit kind of embeddedness and it just comes out in your behavior. So okey dokey. All right. I don't know. There's a couple of things that I would say when I when I think about this role and I think about the need for communicators to be part of that team that you form to create strategy. There's I mean, I would just say that there's things that you can do and this isn't like a checklist or anything, but maybe when you are considering "oh, should I have those people at the table?" Go through some of these thoughts. So having someone at the table who is embedded in business, you know, processes throughout your organization, who then helps you with setting strategy, is going to enable you to more fully consider expectations that your customers may have or your clients may have, and their perspectives that you're probably not factoring in to the degree that you should. Again, that global point of view that they would bring to the table, having folks like us be part of strategic conversations, those, you know, internal on your teams, I mean, they're going to help you consider reputational impacts from all angles in ways that you very likely are not equipped to do without them. So bear that in mind. And if you haven't already thought through and I alluded to this at least twice now, whether you have enough communications, expertise, representation present throughout your business, you should do an assessment like that because having those folks have enough touches into all the ways that your business works will give you that ability to look around corners in a really unique way that can be highly, highly valuable to you. It can help you identify emerging challenges that you might not be thinking about in terms of negative impact, reputation and lots of other things. So my advice is to find ways to have your communications experts be touching the different business processes so that they can bring that back to you that kind of observation and analysis. And I'll tell you one little story that I thought was kind of interesting because it happened to me very recently. I was talking to a CEO client and they were talking about real excitement over a new process, actually a big kind of transformational program that they're going to be kicking off. And it will be happening over the course of 12 to 18 months or so. And wanting to be able to talk about the outcomes, you know, the story of how we got here when they get there. So again, presumably that's in 12, 18 months, right? And so I asked the question, who's your documentarian as you're going through that? And they I mean, that stopped them dead in their tracks. "Wait a second. We haven't even thought along those lines." I said, "to be able to tell the story, you're going to have to have someone playing that role of documentarian to capture those interactions," those moments when you pivoted and you didn't even know it at that time, that that's when the pivot occurred. But because you have that person playing that role, you'll be able to pinpoint, "that's what happened," and describe it in great detail. Yeah.
Rob Johnson [00:21:13] Should run a company. Oh wait, you already are.
Eileen Rochford [00:21:15] True.
Rob Johnson [00:21:15] Brilliant.
Eileen Rochford [00:21:17] I know. Well, anyway, that's just one example. And that was today. So there you go.
Rob Johnson [00:21:21] It's current events. We love it when we have advice to give everybody. And it's not from, you know, three and a half years ago, even though some of it can be so many of these issues we're talking about, these truly are current events. And it's happening right before our eyes. And to see communications professionals get a real seat at the table is is pretty good.
Eileen Rochford [00:21:40] Yeah. It's a very different profession even from five years ago, the one that we're in and the seat that I sit in. But it's exciting to because it is, it's funny when I think back, oh gosh, when I was say, 25, it's a long time ago. And I was hearing how at Golden Harris and at Ketchum, the smartest people who ran those companies talk about how communicators should be playing the role of strategist. And that felt to me like it was so far away from happening. And it was largely. But right now it's reality. It's actually come to fruition within my professional lifetime.
Rob Johnson [00:22:13] They were forward thinkers even back then. And that's where the world met them.
Eileen Rochford [00:22:19] Really good stuff.
Rob Johnson [00:22:20] Well that was very interesting and enlightening. And I think it's fascinating how the world is change for communications professionals. And some of them aren't even called that anymore because of the names that we have already thrown out there for you. But that's going to do it for another edition of Can you Hear Me? I'm Rob Johnson. You know, we love to hear from our listeners. And if you have any thoughts on today's topic or any other topic you'd like us to cover in future episodes, please reach out to us on social media. We now have a Can You Hear Me podcast page on LinkedIn.
Eileen Rochford [00:22:48] Yes. And every time we post a show, we're really hoping that you guys will tell us what you think of it, as well as give us your views wherever you get your Can You Hear Me podcast. I'm Eileen Rochford. Thanks again everybody for listening today. And remember, you can find Can You Hear Me? wherever you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, Google podcasts and more. Until next time, thank you.