In this episode of Let's Hear It, Eric sits down with two public interest comms powerhouses—Ann Searight Christiano and Angela Bradbery—who’ve just dropped what might be the most anticipated textbook in our field: Public Interest Communications Strategy for Change Makers.
Ann and Angela share how their years in the trenches at places like the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Public Citizen shaped this groundbreaking resource—and why storytelling, systems thinking, and listening (really listening) are the keys to actually making change. They discuss their “six spheres of influence,” the “back-of-the-envelope” strategy tool, and why being strategic isn’t the same as shouting into the void (no offense to your latest TikTok brainstorm).
It’s a lively, insightful conversation filled with warmth, humility, and a generous dose of “finally, someone wrote this down.” If you’ve ever had a boss say, “just make it go viral,” this one’s for you.
Enjoy the episode—and if you love it, don’t forget to follow, rate, and review. Your support helps others find the show (and helps keep us off TikTok, which we would suck at).
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to, let's Hear It.
Let's Hear.
It is a podcast for and about thefield of foundation and nonprofit
communications produced by its twoco-hosts, Eric Brown and Kirk Brown.
No relation
who well said Eric.
And I'm Kirk.
And I'm Eric.
The podcast is sponsored by the CollegeFutures Foundation, which envisions a
California where post-secondary educationadvances equity and unlocks upward
(00:23):
mobility now and for generations to come.
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(00:45):
so that more people can find us.
Let's
get onto the show.
Welcome in.
Hey there.
You know what?
It's a head up.
It's good to use.
So.
I really think you oweme an apology, but, but I
You're right, but I didn't, I issuea blanket apology on January 1st for
(01:06):
all of the things that I was going
to do.
Can we assert, can we acceptthat Ann C. Wright Christiano
is an expert, is brilliant andknows what she's talking about?
Can we, can we, can wesay those things are true?
Duly stipulated.
So at the end of this interview.
I'm gonna jump way to the,too long didn't read part.
(01:29):
Anne said, thank you forcreating this podcast.
It's an important part of creatingthe capacity for this field.
Thank you very much, Anne.
Thank you for joining us here, Kirk.
I have very bad news for you.
She was just being nice.
She was nice.
And I'm smitten.
No, no she didn't.
She didn't mean it.
She just was just being nice.
But listen
to this, she actually listened tothe interview that you did with me.
(01:52):
Refer to it in the interview.
So now I'm smitten.
So, no, that
was Angela who listened.
Oh,
Angela listened to that interview.
Okay, well, so Angela and Ann wereboth just incredibly gracious,
so you've gotta set this upbecause like this is so wonderful.
I'm also, I'm trying to decide 'causeI'm incredibly thrilled by this
conversation and I'm also mortified by it.
Excellent.
(02:13):
So set it up and then we'll comeback and we'll talk about it.
But it's really awesome.
This,
this is what, you know, in, inpsychology, it's a, a clash of, of,
of psychological situations for you.
That's exactly what it's All right.
I, uh, I interviewed Ann C. WrightChristiano, who's the founder
and director of the Center forPublic Interest Communications
(02:35):
at the University of Florida.
And Angela Bradbury is theCarell Chair in public in.
Interest communications in the Departmentof Public Relations at the University
of Florida College of Journalism.
So they both are at uf.
Where the Gators are, where Gatoradewas made and where Pete Alonzo, the Met
Slugger went to, uh, went to college.
(02:56):
So there's that.
Anne used to work at the, uh, atthe Robert Wood Johnson Foundation,
where I knew her a million millionyears ago, and then she went down
to Florida to be the Carere chair.
Frank Carrell.
I'm sorry.
This is a lot more, this isa lot more, uh, ex It's worth
going through than you wanted.
It's worth going through.
Frank Carrell is the Godhead and theGodfather of Foundation Communications.
(03:20):
So Anne went down to Floridato be the Carell chair.
Frank's widow set up a, an endowedchair at the University of Florida.
Mm-hmm.
At.
After which point, Anne started theCenter for Public Interest Communications,
where she became the director.
And now Angela is the Carell chair.
That's, that's who thefolks are that I spoke with.
And they have a new tech,it's, it's a textbook book.
(03:42):
Book, mm-hmm.
Whatever you wanna call it.
Guide called Public InterestCommunications Strategy for
Change Makers, a textbook that.
I'd never had when I was going,growing up in communications.
But now all of you people who arelistening to our voices can have,
and we talked about her, theirbook, we talked about communications
(04:04):
and a whole bunch of other things,and you know, that's what it was.
It's an enormously important conversation.
So re Christiano Angela Bradbury, bothfrom the University of Florida College
of Journalism and Communicationshere, talking about their textbook
that was published on April 30th.
The public interest communicationstrategy for change makers.
So well spoken, so thoughtful, sodialed into everything we need to
(04:27):
know and talk about in this field.
Let's listen, then we'll come back.
So this is Ann andAngela and let's hear it.
Welcome to, let's Hear It.
My guests today are an oldfriend of the show and Christiano
and a new friend of the show.
Angela Bradbury.
Now, Ann Searight Christiano is thefounder and director of the Center
(04:47):
for Public Interest Communicationsand a clinical professor in the
Department of Public Relations atthe University of Florida College
of Journalism and Communications.
Go Gators or something with theGator people say, and Angela Bradbury
is the Carell Chair in public.
Interest communications at theDepartment of Public Relations.
Woo.
This is fun.
How I get to say this so many timesat the University of Florida College
(05:09):
of Journalism and Communications, butbefore that, before joining in 2020,
Angela was the communications directorat Public Citizen, a Washington DC based
public interest advocacy organization.
So you guys know what you're talkingabout, and you have this new book
out that I have a feeling is goingto be of astonishing value to
many, if not all of our listeners.
(05:31):
It's called Public InterestCommunications Strategy for Change Makers.
Thanks to you both very muchfor coming on to Let's hear it.
Thank you.
For starters, at this moment, at thisphenomenally fraught moment, it feels
to me like navigating the challengingtimes that we're living in is gonna
take a lot more than just energy.
(05:51):
It's going to take strategy,and so it feels to me like your
book is particularly timely.
Maybe I'll just start in with you, Angela.
Why did you and Anne write this book?
We, a number of reasons.
We wrote this book in part becausewhen we were both practicing, we
would've loved to have had this book.
(06:12):
We would've loved to have hadall this, all this information
and this great research aboutcommunications at our fingertips.
Um, we also wrote it becausepart of what we want to do is to.
Grow the academic discipline ofpublic interest communications.
People have been using communications forsocial change for a very long time, but
(06:37):
there's now science behind communications.
We have cognitive linguisticsand behavioral sciences, social
sciences, psychology, and soforth that can really help us help
better inform the communicationsand how we approach problems.
In a way that will help ensure thatwe are as effective as possible,
(06:58):
rather than guessing about what thebest messages are, the best strategy.
We have these tools.
So we really are eager to, toput these things in one place
and get them out into the world.
So now when Anne came to wentto the University of Florida.
And you had come out of your PRpractitioner, you had worked at Robert
(07:22):
Wood Johnson Foundation and other places,and then you were kind of thrust into the
world of academia and you have taken toit like a school of fish to water clearly.
But Angela did.
Had you taught before,before you came to Florida?
No,
never.
Never.
And I was, I was really, I had neverplanned to lead my job at public Citizen.
(07:45):
I absolutely loved what I did.
I was very fortunate.
Because I got up everyday, very mission driven.
When I saw this job descriptionthat happened to, to cross my desk,
I thought, that sounds amazing.
I get to you get to grow a program,a public communications program.
It was a program that Ann startedbecause she had this role before I did.
(08:06):
And I thought, but I'venever taught before.
I don't know how I would like teaching.
So as part of the interview process,you teach a class and see how it goes.
I. I loved it.
I loved interacting with the students.
I found them so insightful, andwhen I came, I started teaching
(08:27):
and I just, I absolutely love it.
That's one of my favorite partsabout the job now is, is working with
students, is mentoring them, is providingopportunities and opening doors for them.
Um, so it's, it's tremendous.
And I wonder
if now that you are.
A seasoned educator, if having somebodywho is coming right out of this work as
(08:53):
a practitioner, if it harkened you backto your old, your previous days, if, if,
if, what that dynamic was like for youto bring somebody else into academia who
was, you know, the day before, just apractitioner, how did you work on that
and how did, how did you introduce andwelcome Angela into, uh, into the field?
(09:14):
I think, um, a couple of things.
One, Angela was actually qualified forthe job, so that made a huge difference.
And um, you know, I think also Ijust wanna acknowledge that Angela
started at a really rough time.
She started in 20.
In 2020.
August of 20.
Oh, what was going on then?
(09:34):
Just, you know, just, yeah.
And so, you know, I'vealways sort of been.
Awed by the ways in which Angela wasable to do so much when with people she
didn't get to meet in person for yearsand, and the challenges that that faced.
So she had a much rougher start.
You know, I got to be the first one.
(09:56):
I got the parties and the cakesand the welcome receptions, and
Angela got an empty building.
And COVID.
Let's get into the, let's get intothis, the book, why, obviously it is.
A textbook, but it is alsoa textbook by practitioners.
And how do you think about, howdo you think about academia?
(10:18):
You know, clearly communicationsdepartments across the country are
going to want to use this as a way toteach public interest communications.
And I love the idea that you'reexpanding this discipline,
which for many of us, I didn't.
Know anything about communicationswhen I got my first communications
job, which was scary for everybody,but I would've loved to have resources
(10:39):
like this or a class to take, frankly.
How do you think about takingthe practitioner work, turning it
into an academic en environmentwithout denuding it, of the
action that the practice brings?
So sometimes you'll read a, anacademic, you know, you read a textbook
for class and it feels academic.
(11:01):
And so how, how do you tryand bridge those two things?
The action and the teaching orthe practice or the whatever
goes into teaching a class.
All right.
I'm sure Anne has some thoughts as well.
Really through case studies, right.
And telling stories is what we doas public interest communicators.
Telling stories is whatwe do throughout the book.
(11:21):
Telling stories is what we do inthe classroom to illustrate the
theories and the, and the science.
And I think that's.
How we've always, that's how I'vealways operated and, and thought, and
so it's, it's possible to provide alot of examples and, and include and
weave into that the theories and theresearch and make it all digestible
(11:46):
and understandable and accessible.
And Anne, I would think that writinga textbook is actually almost as much
for the writer as it is for the reader.
What would, what have you learned?
Putting together this, this project
I that it's really one of the thingsthat's been really interesting
is that I think the space betweenpractice and academia is much more
(12:09):
permeable than we might assume it is.
Particularly in a field like publicinterest communications, that's still
kind of new and because a lot of peoplewho are in practice came from academia,
a lot of people who are teaching inacademia like Angela and like me.
Came from practice.
So there's a lot of permeability there.
(12:32):
It's also true that wehave a lot to draw on.
You know, the center is, uh, we'renot, we operate kind of more like
a startup company within academia.
We're working with realpartners every day, applying
these brain marks in theories.
And we also have the IncredibleReservoir of Great ideas coming
out of 10 years of doing Frankand, and all those practitioners.
(12:55):
Standing on stage, sharing theirsecret sauce, um, being so willing
to explain exactly how they did it.
And all of that goes into the book.
And we tried to bring it tolife as much as we could.
On the pages, we have this phrasethat we use on our team in the center
when we're talking about research.
And, you know, we'll, we'll havesome finding or some new report or
(13:18):
something that has come up in someof the research that we're doing.
And it's like, gosh,that's really interesting.
And then we'll go on and we say, well.
How do I play with this toy?
What does this mean?
How do I use this toactually drive strategy?
And so I think that ethos of it's gotta beuseful above and beyond everything else.
(13:39):
It has to be useful, whether you'rea student, whether you're a scholar,
whether you're a practitioner.
It has to be something that you can openup and find something that you can apply
to the work that you're doing that day.
So when you decided to start on this,like how did you think about what
to include if you were to ask me towrite a textbook on communications
or strategy or something like that?
(14:00):
I don't know if I could, but Idon't know where I would start.
So what was your process, Anne?
Why don't you take that firstand then we'll talk to Angela.
Okay, sure.
We have a couple of frameworksthat we have been using in
the center with our partners.
Um, one is.
One with the, we call thesix spheres of influence.
The other is back of the envelopestrategy, and we created these
(14:22):
because the problems that oursector works on are wicked problems.
We, they don't have a clear definition.
They don't have an agreed upon answer.
There are perceptions of being awinner or a loser when we actually
do get to discussing a solution.
And so I think that we need some toolsto navigate those big messy challenges.
And so the the six fears were thinkwere tools that we came up with to help
(14:46):
practitioners figure out where to start.
Let's map the spaces through which wecan communicate to drive change, and
then let's get as specific as we canabout what we're working toward and
who can make that change and what isgonna really engage them that connects
to what's already important to them.
We were able to take these frameworksthat evolved from the work that
(15:09):
we were doing with our partners.
And, and, and I think oncewe had that, it, I think we
had a lot of back and forth.
We had a lot of debate about the sequenceand, and what some of these ideas meant,
but having the frameworks in place madeit a little bit easier to figure out.
Okay, this is chapter one.
Let's go from there,
Angela.
(15:30):
I'd like to hear from you about how you,it feels like you are writing this book
for a variety of audiences and I'll,I'll guess at a few educators for sure.
Practitioners, students.
How do you think about how to helppeople use it as effectively as possible?
Are you working directly with professorswho are setting up a curriculum, for
(15:53):
example, or students who are trying totake this work and apply it to their own?
You know, their own workas students and so on.
So can you think, can you talk usthrough about how different people
use the work in different ways?
Well, we kinda, all of the above really.
So for educators, we have a, um, launcheda public interest communications educators
(16:16):
network, which includes academics andsome practitioners who also are adjuncts,
um, around the country who are interestedin building the academic discipline.
They all know about the book.
And, um, and we've, we'vegotten it out to them.
It's, and we say this is a publicinter communications course in a box.
It's all you need to teach publiccommunications to make it as
(16:38):
easy as possible for students.
We tried to make it as accessible aspossible, so it has all the concepts
and frameworks that students would need.
And as an aside, it's not justfor communications students.
We have public health studentsin anthropology and political
science and sustainability.
(16:59):
We have students from a variety ofdisciplines who take the Public Interest
communications course because theconcepts are so relevant and helpful.
Um, we've had businessstudents as well take it.
So, so the idea really is to, wemade it as accessible and clear as
possible so that anybody can pick itup and read it and understand it, and.
(17:20):
Learn about the conceptsand put them into practice.
Yeah, I, like I said, I would'veloved to have had such a
resource when I was coming up.
'cause there just weren't that many.
What do you draw from, andI'll, I'll turn to you, Ann.
What did you draw fromto, to pull this together?
There are so many resources inhere, like the bibliography is.
(17:44):
Off the charts.
How did, like, how do you gatherall this material together?
How do you, to bring it together?
You have lots and lots and lots ofresearch clearly, but so many resources.
Like how do you begin tocall through all that stuff?
Yeah, I mean, I think that that'sreflective of the fact that
there's a lot of really fantasticwork happening in the field.
(18:05):
A lot of people have done a lot ofreally good work and one of the things.
When Angela and I sat down before westarted writing and talked about what was
important to us, uh, there were a coupleof things that we, that we did that I
think really guided those kinds of things.
One was that we wanted to celebrateas much work that was already
happening in the field as we couldand, and draw people toward that work.
(18:27):
I think we both kind of feel like wewish that those lists could have been
10 times as long as they were, 'causethere is so much great work going on.
The other thing that we did is we satdown with students and we brought in
some pizzas and we sat down for, I don'tknow, three hours or something, and,
and we just had this really long, greatconversation about what are the books
(18:49):
that you've been assigned to read, uh,in your courses that they really stayed
with you, that were meaningful to you?
What do you want from your textbooks?
What do you want fromyour course materials and.
They said, you know, we wantstories, we want resources.
We want the opportunity to be able toscan a, a chapter and get the big points,
but when something really fascinatesus, we wanna be able to go deeper.
(19:12):
And so those kinds of, um,insights, I think really helped
us to find the resources and.
Again, I just mentioning too, again, thatfrank community that has been so generous
over the years and being able to drawon all of those resources that have been
shared is just incredible and, and whatAngela has done through the educators
(19:34):
network is similarly just vibrant androbust and, and so that is all to say.
We had a lot to work withand we did the best we could.
We're gonna take a very quick break andwe'll be right back with Anne Christiano
and Angela Bradbury right after this.
You're listening to, let's HearIt, a podcast about foundation and
(19:54):
nonprofit communications hostedby Eric Brown and Kirk Brown.
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(20:16):
Fake rules, drop monthly.
Check them out whereveryou get your podcasts.
And now back to the show.
And we are back with AnneChristiano and Angela Bradbury.
They have just written a reallyamazing new book called Public Interest
Communications Strategy for Change Makers.
(20:36):
Alright, so, so Anne, let's just talk,let's back up for just a second and
talk a little bit about the Center forPublic Interest Communications 'cause
you do a little bit of everything.
You do writing, you're obviously helpingto lead academics and the, and the, the
practice of public interest communication.
So can you just kind of giveus the Tencent tour of the
center for folks who don't know?
Sure.
(20:57):
Yeah.
Well, back in 2018, after Annie and Iwrote a couple articles for Stanford
Social Innovation Review, we startedgetting these calls and emails from
people saying, Hey, could we maybehire you to help us take this public
interest communications approach to.
A really big problem that we'refacing and we're like, I guess
(21:18):
so I think, yeah, that'd be fun.
And um, and we started getting moreand more of those calls and we quickly
realized that we needed to establish acenter so that we could hire colleagues
and actually begin to work in thisreally concentrated way on projects.
And now here it is, 2025.
Uh, we've been aroundsince 2018 and we are.
Working with partners all overthe world to apply these public
(21:41):
interest communications frameworksto these really messy problems.
So some of the things that we'reworking on right now are how do we
find common ground around what weshould do about affordable housing?
How can we help the charitablesector tell authentic, meaningful
stories of how change happens?
How do we talk about thingslike guaranteed income in a way
(22:01):
that helps people make senseof it and understand its value?
What's really cool about thatis that we have just incredible
resources available to us.
Being in an R one university.
We have nearly every journalarticle ever written.
We have a fantastic partnership with theAtlas Lab, which is using data science and
AI to really find the conversations thatare happening on these profound social
(22:26):
issues and figure out instead of how we.
Push messages out into the world, uh,how we join the existing conversations
and offer value and meaning.
So it's really great work and, andI get to do, I get to work with some
pretty amazing people on some prettyamazing partners on those projects.
And one of the other things that we do alot of is, is training and professional
(22:48):
development to help practitioners takesome of the frameworks that you're
seeing in the book and apply them tothe challenges that they're facing.
So it's like almost a high poweredconsulting firm with the all of
the resource riches you couldpossibly imagine at your fingertips.
Absolutely, absolutely.
I will say though, that one thingthat is important to note is that, is
(23:10):
that we have sort of a unique fundingstructure for universities and that.
We're not funded by the state of Florida.
All of our funding comes fromthose external partnerships,
which makes it a lot more funand also a little bit more scary.
But I think that's how theworld works in most places too.
And these days, maybe you sleepslightly better, but enough of that.
(23:30):
Let's get into the book a little bit.
Angela.
Can you kind of walk us throughthe structure of this book?
What's in it?
How can, like what are the key.
Functions of it.
How is it set up and what aresome of the big lessons that
you, that folks can get from it?
Sure.
Well, as, as Ann mentioned earlier, we,we structured the format of the book
around the frameworks, these two mainframeworks, the six spheres of influence,
(23:54):
which are some of the levers of changethat we use as as public interest
communicators and strategists, and theback of the envelope Four questions,
strategy, the four questions that.
If you answer those questions, youhave the outline of a strategic
communications plan and we, it's funnybecause we kinda went back and forth
as far as which should come first whenwe, we did several outlines for this.
(24:16):
I think
I thought about that when Iwas reading it, but keep going.
'cause I'd love to know, knowhow that conversation went.
Right, exactly.
It isn't necessarily linear, right?
It depends on where you are inthe process and on the project.
Sometimes you have to loop back again,and when we do that in classes, but
we start out with the six spheres andtalk about the various approaches that
(24:38):
you can use to affect change, whichinclude things like activism, because
activism is a communications tool.
Policy media, the financial markets,social norms, communities of influence.
That's where a lot of thepowerful messengers come in.
And, and we lead people through analyzingcases, through those, uh, spheres.
(25:01):
Then we go to the actual, here's how youcreate a strategic communications plan.
Walking through each of those questionsand delving into them in depth, um, as
far as you know, what do you want tobe true that isn't true now and which
goes into what makes an effective.
Goal, who must act to make it happen?
(25:21):
Those are your actors.
And we talk about having coreactors, the kind of the only people
who can make the change happen.
And then who influences those core actors?
I know all this is familiar, I'm sureto, to your, to your listeners, um, what
must they believe to act, and this iswhen we really delve into the importance
of understanding the worldviews andvalues of the people you're messaging to.
(25:44):
And, and this is where publicinterest communications can really
help us with the, the polarizationand help us bridge divides.
Because if we understand and taketime to listen to and understand where
people are coming from and what theirconcerns are, we can craft messages.
(26:05):
Will resonate with them ratherthan crafting messages that make
sense to us, but not necessarilythe people we're trying to reach.
And then finally, howdo we connect with them?
Literally where are they?
What conversations can we join and how canwe get our information in front of them?
What are their information sources?
And, and then we talk about measurementand evaluation and, and I have to say,
(26:28):
Anne wrote what is probably, she didthe measurement evaluation chapter.
Hands down the best measurement andevaluation content I have ever seen.
Um, so if, if folks get thebook only for that, they should.
Um, and then so we, so we walk peoplethrough the, and walk students through
the, the process of putting the wholething together at, uh, at the end.
(26:51):
I have to say that the four questionsmade it feel like a Passover
Seder for communications people.
Let's get into some ofthese specifics of this.
So for example, the, the back backof the envelope strategy, Ann is like
the sort of thing, everybody wantsan easy way to think about anything.
Mm-hmm.
The back of the envelopestrategy caught my eye.
(27:12):
Can you talk about it?
Yeah.
So, um, we weren't doing, uh, thiswas way back in, I think 2012.
Um, we were doing a workshop fornonprofits who were gonna come up to the
University of Florida, and I knew thatthey didn't have communications teams, but
they needed communications in their work.
And so I was just kind of agonizingover how can we make this as
(27:35):
simple as possible for them?
How can we make communicationsand the thinking behind strategic
communications accessible and useful topeople who don't have training in it?
And for sure we've, we've, those questionshave evolved over time, but they've.
Held up really well, and, and, um, we'vehad the opportunity to check them with
(27:55):
lots of different people and, and, uh,they've, they've found it really helpful.
I think one of the things that I'mexcited about, one of the things that
I'm most excited about in the book istrans, going from analyzing these six
spheres and really looking at the sixspheres as systems, and so connecting
(28:16):
the, the discipline of systems thinking.
To strategic communications andreally thinking about how those
systems can help us create a theoryof change for our communications work.
There's not a single person who'slistening to this podcast who has worked
in communications, who hasn't had somebodystride into their office and asked for
(28:37):
a one minute video, or like some veryspecific deliverable that's gonna solve
all of the organization's communicationschallenges like we have all been there.
I thought about the back of theenvelope strategy is like these are
four questions that you can pullout when you're in that moment.
So instead of just being like annoyedthat this person's like asking you to
(28:58):
make a video, and you know the videois not gonna be the thing that's gonna
solve the problem, that together youcan start to say, well, what is it
we're actually trying to do here?
And who can make that happen?
And now you're on the same team andyou've helped your colleagues think about
communications in a much more focused way.
So you have the opportunity to kindof upskill the people around you
(29:22):
as well and really offer somethingthat's useful to your colleagues in
your organization who may not haveyour experience in communications.
Uh, we, I believe it or not, we justhave a couple of minutes left to, so
I'm gonna, I'm gonna start with you,Anne, with, with this set of questions.
Well, like what do you think thepublic interest communicators they need
to be doing that they're not doing,and what do they need to stop doing?
(29:45):
That they are doing.
One of the things that's happeningright now is that we're sort of getting
really mixed up between strategiccommunication and self-expression,
and they are not the same.
Strategic effective communication isnot a form of self-expression, and I
think that it's really hard becauseyou don't come into this field without
(30:09):
caring desperately about these issues.
So getting really pragmaticabout how you are gonna achieve
change is so hard, right?
Because how do you separateyourself from that?
And I think we, I think in thismoment that feels so fraught.
I think we, we do needto be more pragmatic.
(30:31):
We really need to think about wherewe have resources, where we have
relationships, where we have power,can build power and apply that.
The most specific dose possible toleverage the, the most change that we can.
And that's hard when all of theseother thoughts are in your mind, and,
(30:55):
and it can be hard to separate that.
But I do think that, that, thatkind of thinking is, is what we
all need to kind of hold ourselvesaccountable to doing right now.
Well, it, it, it really comes from this.
What you've talked about in thebook about listening, about really
understanding what your audiences,what your audiences care about, rather
than the thing that you need to say.
So I really take that, I take thatpoint, especially today, just pick
(31:18):
up any newspaper and people feelthe need to express, but we also
understand that as a movement, we haveto figure out how to create change.
And those two things don'tnecessarily always go together.
That's such a really important lesson.
Angela, what?
What would you send ourlisteners away with?
About, about your book and aboutthe work and about the kind of the
(31:40):
practice of communications of socialimpact communications these days.
Well, I second what Anne said, andI think if communicators can listen
to people outside their circles whencoming up with messaging, it'll be
very helpful and much more effective.
I think it's, it's easy and I know,'cause I've certainly been in the world.
(32:05):
It's easy to, because of timepressures and other reasons
to just come up with messages.
That sound good in theoffice focus group, right?
Because that's all you have time for.
But really kind of understandingpeople outside the UDel suspects
outside your supporters and.
Working with local organizations andempowering local folks for change.
(32:30):
In your, towards the end of the, the showyou did with Kirk, when you interviewed
Kirk, you had a, a wonderful commentabout the importance of local communities
and local organizing, and I thinkthat's where a lot of important work
happens, because that's where people.
Can reach across divides andcan come together on issues
(32:53):
and, um, and create communities.
And change comes reallyfrom the bottom up.
It's increasingly more difficultto have change from the top
positive, change from the top.
So, so I think kind of listeningoutside and, and working with local
organizations and empowering those localorganizations is really, is really key.
(33:14):
Going forward.
Yeah.
And as you say that, it occurs tome that the only way to ensure a
lasting, lasting change is to dothat kind of work rather than to
pummel your e your enemy into dust.
'cause you know they'll be back.
Well, this has been a great conversation.
I really deeply appreciatethe work that you both do.
I, I appreciate the contribution thatyou've made to our field and our craft.
(33:38):
It is growing.
It is something that did not existwhen I got started in communications.
And thanks to you both and to yourcolleagues and to your students.
I think that the future isreally bright for this work.
And so just thank you again, AnnSeawright Christiano and Angela Bradbury.
Their new book is called Public InterestCommunications Strategy for Change Makers.
(34:02):
Uh, just thanks to you both.
Again,
thank you so much for having us.
It's been fun.
Thank you,
Eric, and thank you for everything you'vedone to build this field, and this podcast
is a really important part of that.
Ah, shucks.
Hello.
Thanks to you both.
Here's where I'm excited and mortified.
(34:24):
Oh good.
This is the first textbook ever,the Public Interest Communication
Strategy for Change Makers.
It's the first textbook.
For bringing people into this field,and I was hearing you talk about
all the topics and concepts and it'sso cool what Anne has done here.
And also I'm sure it's difficult, right?
Because she's working at the, um,center, it's pub, it's externally funded,
(34:48):
it's not using funds from the state.
I'm trying to wrap my mind around thiswork being done in Florida because
of all the Mike Freaks conceivednotions about Florida, you know.
But here, here's this great workthat Ann's doing in Florida.
She's actually enlisting peoplethis incredible asset, the range
of assets she's developed as she'sdone her work over the years.
Here we are in 2025, finally producingthe first textbook ever on how to deliver
(35:13):
public interest communications programs.
And that concept is both so exciting andso welcome and it's clearly so necessary.
But also, Eric, isn't it just astonishingthat it's 2025 and we're getting the first
textbook in this field on this topic now?
There may be another textbook.
Kirk, I hate to tell you
this.
Well, so I, I don't think I have it.
(35:35):
That's, so if there's that, it maynot be one that anyone has heard of.
There are books.
There are books, right?
There are books and people have, and,and it's like, it's a thing for firms
even and people and practitioners.
You write your book.
But are there really textbooks thatyou can use in an academic setting that
you can build course curricular around?
'cause that's, that's how they're pro,that's how they're, they're promoting.
(35:55):
This is the first textbook of its kind.
I actually dunno.
Yeah.
But all I know is that this is atextbook and it's really good and it,
it, it is written both because Ann andAngela are so-called practitioners,
people who actually do stuff.
Yeah.
As opposed to the old Woody Allen thing.
Like, you know, people who don'tknow teach and people who can't
teach, teach gym, they actuallycan do and they can teach.
(36:20):
And so if you can do, and you canteach and you create a resource
for people to both do and learn.
You're in good shape.
And so I think that's whatmakes this thing so useful
for so many kinds of folks.
And as I think it was Angela who saidthat it's not just communications people,
it's advocates and other folks who areinterested in learning about how to use
(36:42):
communications to advance their work.
And I think that's what's, it has justlots and lots and lots of applications
and that's what's really cool.
Yeah, and it's, you know, I reallylike Angela and Ann, both of
their kind of origin stories forhow they come into this work and.
I think about Angela doing this journeywhere she's coming from public citizen.
She, of course, by the way,another former journalist, right?
(37:03):
Coming into the Silman journalism ranks,goes to public citizen and then decides,
Hey, I'm going to, I'm gonna try this out.
I'm gonna go teach.
Have you ever had a job interview whereone of your first tasks was to actually,
in the interview process, teach a class?
I. That thought of not being ateacher and then standing in front
of a group of students being like,okay, let's give this, try this out.
Let me just take what I've learnedin my life and see if I can bring
(37:24):
this into a classroom settingas part of an interview process.
I mean that, that alone, Angela,I think, gets you the job that
you could even walk into the roomand get outta the room alive.
I think that that alonefeels, can catch you the job.
I think everybody had toteach a class who was.
Who was interviewing for that job.
Sure, man.
But seeing as how it's like a teachingjob, but still, I've never had to do that.
And I'm, you know, I'm nota teacher, so that's why.
(37:48):
Well, actually I was at the,you know, I taught, uh, junior
high school in, in Japan.
Mm-hmm.
Which required absolutely,uh, no training whatsoever.
Uh, the only requirement Ihad was to speak, uh, English.
Mm.
So, because I was, I taught English.
So, can you speak English?
Can you, can you speak?
You have the job.
(38:09):
That's great.
That's great.
Well, so they talked through howthey've organized these two key
aspects of the work and how theyhelp center people's thinking.
First by, by talking through thisnotion of spheres of influence, which
they've published about and they'vewritten, and you know, so these are the
spheres of policy, media, communitiesof influence, the market and industry
activism, social norms, and just,just as you, as you skip through the
(38:33):
tulips of those different spheres, I.
Tiptoe, you tiptoe through the tulips.
Each of them tiptoethrough the tulips, right?
Tiptoe through the spheres.
And then what does Andrew abouthave that we actually need to bring
a systems thinking sensibilityto how we think about activating
those spheres in support of change.
And just at that notion there, the idea ofneeding a textbook to ground our thinking
(39:00):
and help introduce people to this work,this thinking, how it works, the practice.
How important it would be to havea resource like that is just lands
for me because I think about, andby the way, thank you for your
true confessions on this podcast.
Your first, you're welcome job,your first job at communications.
I knew nothing about communications.
I wish I had something like this.
(39:20):
So I think about this, um, this, someme, some people may say that I still
know nothing about communications.
Do you think it's possible thatnone of us know anything about
communications even today, I'm.
No, I'm serious.
Well, I'm just, because again,I think about these fears of
influence and how difficult it is.
So this is what we need, right?
We need, we need textbooks, resources,and then teachers, thank you Anna,
(39:41):
Angela, for helping bring us throughthis thinking, because guess what?
It's really complicated, like how youapproach any one of these fears and then
think about how they relate to each other.
This is complicated stuff.
Yes.
No, I agree.
The, the cool thing is that rather than.
Most of the time when we start thinkingthrough a communication strategy, there
(40:02):
are a lot of folks out there who willthink through a com, a so-called strategy.
You will say, well, what do you wanna do?
And they say, oh, I wanna raisetheir awareness about this thing.
Or, we wanna start using social media,or Should we switch to Blue Sky?
Like all these mm-hmm.
Very random questions about howwe're going to communicate with
(40:24):
a great big C in the front of itwithout thinking about where is my.
Organization, where does itexist in the context of others?
What kind of work are we trying to do?
What sort of persuasion are we into?
And what they give you are some toolsto start thinking through who are
we, what are we trying to achieve,and what context does our work occur?
(40:46):
And I think that's justreally, really helpful.
It's the basic kind of.
Building blocks of actual strategy,and they give you the tools to do that.
And then you have to ask awhole bunch of other questions.
What kind of things have to happenin order for us to be able to
succeed and that kind of thing.
So, you know, the, the buildingblocks of strategy, which.
(41:07):
Everybody should do no matter what.
You have to ask all the assumptions,and you have to figure out your role
in helping to achieve these kindsof changes that you're looking for,
and that's really a great way tohelp people think about strategy.
Well, I wish we could enlist one of our.
Foundation supporters to purchase thisbook and ensure that it gets sent out
(41:28):
and delivered to every communicationsdepartment for every organization
of concern in the entire country.
And here's the reason why, becauseI think about, you know, as, as you
point out in your current mind too,like these communications jobs, they
all have their entry level components.
And there's a lot of folks thatcome into their, into the field.
They kind, this is their first job.
Their, you know, whatever theireducation or whatever their experience
has been, that's brought them tothat organization, that position.
(41:51):
And I think about intoday's media landscape.
Poor 20 something.
Maybe sitting at a desk, maybesitting in the other side of a zoom
call if they're in a hybrid settingand somebody pops in, it's a senior
executive, tired under stress, greatpressure, budget constraints, and
they look at that communicationsperson and they say, get me on TikTok.
(42:13):
Right.
And, and rolling, rolling the tape all theway back decades and decades and decades.
It used to be get me on the New YorkTimes and roll Me all the way back
decades and decades and decades.
It used to be, uh, get me at the NationalPress Club, you know, but, but like, so
there's gonna be that one tactic, right?
That just grabs our attention.
It's like, oh, that iswhat communications is.
And so when I see this concept ofspheres and influence, this really simple
(42:37):
way to walk people through it and howcomplicated and what, what a laden into
a system's thinking it needs to be.
It only helps that 20 something in thatmoment say, you know, can we actually
think about the why here a little bit?
It gives them some resources tosay, Hey, can I, can we kind of
a larger thinking about this?
I feel like we've done an incredible,tremendous service to the whole field.
If we just equip that person with, inthat moment around that conversation,
(43:00):
yeah, your boss walks in or comes on Zoom.
It's harder a little, it's harderto hand them a book on Zoom.
Explain.
Your boss walks into your officeand says, Hey, can we do it, Dick?
I was like, here, read this book, boss,and then asked me about your TikTok.
That reminds me of the time whenI was working at a, a nonprofit
organization and the developmentdirector came in and said, Hey, Eric,
by the way, we need to do a video.
(43:21):
Oh, just, oh, okay.
You want me to do a video?
All right.
Alright.
We did the video.
It was fun.
What do we do with this?
I don't know.
It's a video.
So they also talk about the back ofthe envelope guide to Setting strategy.
And I love this notion.
So you, you know, you start with yourspheres of what you're trying to do,
(43:43):
and now you're in your questions.
So the first question is, what isyour organization trying to make
true that isn't true now, right?
And what a great pausepoint for your organization.
Like, okay, yeah, what is it?
What are we trying to make?
True?
Second, who has to do somethingthat they're not doing now or stop
doing for you to achieve that goal?
And isn't that a gnarly,complicated nuance moment?
Third, what would they believe thatwould motivate them to take action?
(44:07):
Right?
So this is like what are wedriving towards, you know?
And then finally, how will we getthat message in front of them?
And again, back to the get me onTikTok, it seems like still so much
of our communication stuff is reallyabout that fourth question, right?
What are the tactics?
Where do I have to go?
And we just assume we know the messages.
'cause we have itintuitively in our minds.
That first question, what are we actuallytrying to make sure that isn't true?
(44:28):
What's our goal?
Then who to actually haveto, has to act on that goal
first to make progress for it.
So I love how this back of theenvelope notion really just
gets to the heart of the matter.
And again, thinking about that poor 20something, who's in that pressure moment?
Just having four key questions thatcan help somebody walk through to
get oriented in their thinking.
Again, it's just like making this stuffsimple, digestible, but then using that
(44:49):
as a way to start the conversation.
It just feels so crucially importantfor people to have these resources.
It's like it's Passoverquestions for comms people.
Yeah.
I love how you said that.
What, what makes this TikTokdifferent from any other TikTok?
No, it's, it really is true.
They, they are excellent questions thatare very difficult to answer sometimes,
and that's why you have to go back to thedrawing board and figure out how you can
(45:13):
answer those questions with confidence.
'cause, 'cause those things, thoseassumptions that you make when you launch
into some kind of communications activity.
Often go unchallenged.
Mm-hmm.
And you really have to ask yourself thosequestions and answer them with fidelity
and with authenticity because people,they just like, oh, this is gonna work.
(45:34):
I know.
Well, how do you know it's gonna work?
Just 'cause it's gonna work.
And this is the kind of thing thatapplies a discipline that you need to,
to apply Also, given that resourcesand time are phenomenally valuable.
Mm. Any time spent or any money spent.
Making an assumption that youcannot prove or that you don't have
(45:54):
confidence about is wasted and we donot have time to, or money to waste.
You know, on that count, the only thingthat I didn't hear you guys talk about,
and I was wondering as you were goingthrough this, you know, this text, right?
So we need this textbook.
We need to orient people tohow to approach this thinking.
But in reality, there's another aspectof this, which is you can do the
(46:15):
work, you can be clear, you can do it.
Try to get as clear as you can.
There is a concept around budgetthat holds all of this too.
Right?
And I, and I think about that interms of like, how do we help our
leaders understand that part too?
Because, 'cause even if we, even thatnotion that you just talked about,
like the time it takes to actuallyslow down and ask these questions with
rigor and to be thoughtful about it,you know, I was, I was like, it's an
(46:39):
upsetting day in the United States.
We won't say specifically why, but there'sa lot of stuff happening on the federal
policy front that's so upsetting and, and,and just, just really challenging and.
I'm sitting here thinking about our entirefield and, and have, we in our own minds
deconstructed the communications thinkingthat went into the moment we're in now.
Like the, in terms of, in terms of thepeople that brought us to this point
(46:59):
and like, what did their rooms looklike and what were their theories,
their theories of change, and howwould they have answered the question?
What are the six spheres?
And, you know, you know, whatdid people need to believe
to support what's being done?
And, and you can kind of use thesequestions and tease out wow, like they're.
If there are people who will sit inrooms and come up with some pretty
awful answers, but actually becorrect in their, at least from the
(47:21):
standpoint of like, oh wow, if wecognitively trigger these responses and
people, we can create these outcomes.
Oh my gosh, we're gonna do that.
That kind of a thing.
But, but it still blows down toalso I think, what is the budget?
What's the resource we'regonna apply to do this work?
And I, and I wonder aboutthat sometimes in our current
information landscape because.
This is where I go back to,do we any of us know anything
(47:43):
about communications these days?
Because I don't think weeven know clearly anymore.
What are the tactics being used at us?
How are those tactics being framed?
Exactly.
Like we have some sneakingsuspicions, but then what's the
price tag that's going along with it?
You know?
Is all this horribleness beingcreated for a million dollars
a year or a billion dollars peryear of spending pointed at us?
(48:03):
I mean, what do you think about thaton just the spending and budget side?
Alright.
That was the, sorry, Cory a Cory Booker.
Lang, sorry.
Sorry.
This is novel stuff.
Filibuster.
Come on.
So there was, get your thinking therewas, there was a question in there
somewhere into a little bit of, of a
(48:23):
soliloquy.
Yeah.
Ha.
Hand ringing.
Uh, it, let me unpack your phenomenallycircum, circum ally challenged
question statement, filibuster thing.
It's like in improv, you just listenfor the thing, the word you liked
(48:43):
best and try and riff off that.
I just
went into it.
There you go.
Great.
So there was
a question about budgeting.
And budgeting was always a guess.
You're always trying to try tryingto decide what things are gonna
cost, and sometimes you do it basedon what things cost last time, and
sometimes you're guessing about whatthings are gonna cost in the future.
And I don't know the answerto that other than that.
Try and be as specific about yourassumptions as possible, and then
(49:05):
record it and figure out what thingsgo, you know, how, how much time and
how much money did anything cost.
Mm-hmm.
Now, the other that, that otherbit in the middle there that create
the rant in the middle about theother side and what they're doing.
Yeah.
They're just trying to disrupt andthey're trying to like, how many
lives can I make miserable today?
Mm-hmm.
And creating mayhem.
Is probably faster and cheaperthan building anything of value.
(49:27):
I mean, for sure.
So I don't know exactlyhow you combat that.
Other than that we are all going tohave to build new movements that are
enduring, that reach across traditionalUS versus them kind of things.
And so like, what's that look like?
I don't, I don't know.
I don't think anybody really,really knows, but we're gonna
(49:49):
have to start trying some thingsthat, that undo that because.
This is sucks.
Well, look, you got to the heart ofsome really important stuff though when
you were closing things up with Angelaand Ann because you had that, just that
back and forth about listening and howimportant it's to listen and to listen,
to hear what our audiences care about.
And I really thought it was poignant,their feedback saying, you know,
(50:11):
you need to listen to people whoare outside of your circles when
you're developing your messaging.
You know?
Yeah.
That's for sure that your listeningcannot just be the focus group in
the office, and I do think there's.
And again, you know, back to thenotion of doing this work in Florida,
what a great place to be locatedto be doing this work for sure.
You wanna be in these places where youactually get to hear conversations that
maybe land differently than, than theysit, let's say, for instance, within
(50:35):
a stones throw of San Francisco, whichis where you and I both sit today.
Yeah.
You know, so a bubble.
Yeah, that's right.
It's
foggy.
It's foggy and, but
it's a nice bubble.
It's
foggy and cold on a day whenit's bitterly, brutally hot
in other parts of the country.
Right.
Uh, come, come to SanFrancisco people, it's chill.
Yeah, right.
That's exactly right.
(50:55):
I also liked the reference to thework that Ann did in the measurement
and evaluation chapter, becausethat's the other piece of this too.
Right.
I think it's really, we strugglewith how to measure and evaluate.
We struggle how to, right.
And so just to have some clarityand guidance for people on how
to approach that, that alsojust seems super important.
I'm a huge fan of measurement evaluation,and I had a very interesting conversation
(51:17):
with a colleague the other day whosaid, everything can be measured.
Everything can be measured.
And so just measure things.
And now it doesn't mean that everything isgoing to be measured equally or that a lot
of things are qualitative measurements.
I rate this an X, you know,a seven or a 10 or something.
But we are always try anything.
(51:37):
You can put a number tothings that gives you a, a.
I don't know what you wanna call it.
A place to, something to hang on to.
Mm-hmm.
Something that gives, thatyou can refer back to.
Everything can be measured and nowthat doesn't mean that the thing that
you measured, the measurement you comeup with is the end all and be all.
It can't be, but that the practiceof trying to figure out what
(52:02):
is this thing that I'm doing?
How can I measure it?
It can be measured in feeling,it can me be measured in numbers.
But the act of it is really valuable,is really helpful to you because again,
you state your assumptions, you see whathappens, and then you look back and say,
how did I do relative to my assumptions?
You can do that with almost anythingand I think that that's really important
(52:23):
that just the act of it is good for you.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, so, so much content anddid you really read it, Eric?
I was so proud of you and you'relike, when I read the book I did.
That's incredible.
I. I mean, that's, I did, that'sSo how did it feel reading
a textbook on communicationsat this point in your career?
I, it, I felt like I was a little late.
(52:45):
This is my point.
I felt a little late.
This is needed.
It's necessary.
It too late.
It's too late for me, Kirk.
Oh, it's just in time.
This is just in time.
So this is the Public InterestCommunication Strategy for Change
Makers was published in April.
Please go check it out and find it.
Written by Ann C.
Wright, Christian and AngelaBradbury, both from the University
of Florida College of Journalismand Communications, the Center for
(53:07):
Public Interest Communications.
There it.
What a treat.
And Eric, this is Ann'ssecond trip to the podcast.
Yeah, that's right.
We've now, we're startingto get second, second timers
and that's so exciting becausethis is such great work.
So man, uh, Ann and Angela, thankyou for all the work you're doing.
Thank you for.
Forging new paths in this fieldfor publishing and writing.
(53:27):
I, I also loved by the way, Ann'sside about how this practice group
that around the, um, center for PublicInterest Communications that she just
started publishing on some stuff andthe phone started ringing and people
started saying, Hey, can I hire you?
I'm like, that's just pretty cool, huh?
It's very cool.
It's very cool.
So Eric, that was awesome.
And Anna, Angela, my gosh.
So generous of you to comejoin us and let's hear it.
That was really, really cool.
(53:48):
And Kirk, may I just say something?
Yeah,
you, you do a very good job at this.
This is so great.
You're very good at this.
Look, come on, this work is important.
These folks need a big, fat,positive spotlight on them because
they're doing important work.
And guess what?
This is the kind of good newsthat I don't know, I don't
know about you and your world.
I need it.
I need to hear from people like this.
(54:08):
This is, I'm so glad there arepeople out here doing this work.
'cause man, we need it.
We need it.
But thank you for that.
I appreciate it.
You're very welcome.
Well, thank you everybody.
Thanks for let's coming tojoin us and let's hear it and
uh, we will see you next time.
Okay, everybody.
That's it for this episode.
Please let us know if you have anythoughts about what you heard today
or people we should have on this show,and that definitely includes yourself.
(54:31):
And we'd like to thank JohnAli, the tuneful and inspiring
composer of our theme music,
our sponsor,
the Lumina Foundation, and pleasecheck out Lumina's Terrific podcast.
Today's students tomorrow's talent, andyou can find that@luminafoundation.org.
We
certainly thank today's guestand of course, all of you,
and most importantly, thank you, Mr.
(54:51):
Brown.
Oh, no, no, no, no.
Thank you, Mr. Brown.
Okay, everybody, till next time.
Welcome to, let's Hear It.
Let's Hear.
It is a podcast for and about thefield of foundation and nonprofit
communications produced by its twoco-hosts, Eric Brown and Kirk Brown.
No relation
who well said Eric.
And I'm Kirk.
And I'm Eric.
The podcast is sponsored by the CollegeFutures Foundation, which envisions a
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(00:23):
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Let's
get onto the show.
Welcome in.
Hey there.
You know what?
It's a head up.
It's good to use.
So.
I really think you oweme an apology, but, but I
You're right, but I didn't, I issuea blanket apology on January 1st for
(01:06):
all of the things that I was going
to do.
Can we assert, can we acceptthat Ann C. Wright Christiano
is an expert, is brilliant andknows what she's talking about?
Can we, can we, can wesay those things are true?
Duly stipulated.
So at the end of this interview.
I'm gonna jump way to the,too long didn't read part.
(01:29):
Anne said, thank you forcreating this podcast.
It's an important part of creatingthe capacity for this field.
Thank you very much, Anne.
Thank you for joining us here, Kirk.
I have very bad news for you.
She was just being nice.
She was nice.
And I'm smitten.
No, no she didn't.
She didn't mean it.
She just was just being nice.
But listen
to this, she actually listened tothe interview that you did with me.
(01:52):
Refer to it in the interview.
So now I'm smitten.
So, no, that
was Angela who listened.
Oh,
Angela listened to that interview.
Okay, well, so Angela and Ann wereboth just incredibly gracious,
so you've gotta set this upbecause like this is so wonderful.
I'm also, I'm trying to decide 'causeI'm incredibly thrilled by this
conversation and I'm also mortified by it.
Excellent.
(02:13):
So set it up and then we'll comeback and we'll talk about it.
But it's really awesome.
This,
this is what, you know, in, inpsychology, it's a, a clash of, of,
of psychological situations for you.
That's exactly what it's All right.
I, uh, I interviewed Ann C. WrightChristiano, who's the founder
and director of the Center forPublic Interest Communications
(02:35):
at the University of Florida.
And Angela Bradbury is theCarell Chair in public in.
Interest communications in the Departmentof Public Relations at the University
of Florida College of Journalism.
So they both are at uf.
Where the Gators are, where Gatoradewas made and where Pete Alonzo, the Met
Slugger went to, uh, went to college.
(02:56):
So there's that.
Anne used to work at the, uh, atthe Robert Wood Johnson Foundation,
where I knew her a million millionyears ago, and then she went down
to Florida to be the Carere chair.
Frank Carrell.
I'm sorry.
This is a lot more, this isa lot more, uh, ex It's worth
going through than you wanted.
It's worth going through.
Frank Carrell is the Godhead and theGodfather of Foundation Communications.
(03:20):
So Anne went down to Floridato be the Carell chair.
Frank's widow set up a, an endowedchair at the University of Florida.
Mm-hmm.
At.
After which point, Anne started theCenter for Public Interest Communications,
where she became the director.
And now Angela is the Carell chair.
That's, that's who thefolks are that I spoke with.
And they have a new tech,it's, it's a textbook book.
(03:42):
Book, mm-hmm.
Whatever you wanna call it.
Guide called Public InterestCommunications Strategy for
Change Makers, a textbook that.
I'd never had when I was going,growing up in communications.
But now all of you people who arelistening to our voices can have,
and we talked about her, theirbook, we talked about communications
(04:04):
and a whole bunch of other things,and you know, that's what it was.
It's an enormously important conversation.
So re Christiano Angela Bradbury, bothfrom the University of Florida College
of Journalism and Communicationshere, talking about their textbook
that was published on April 30th.
The public interest communicationstrategy for change makers.
So well spoken, so thoughtful, sodialed into everything we need to
(04:27):
know and talk about in this field.
Let's listen, then we'll come back.
So this is Ann andAngela and let's hear it.
Welcome to, let's Hear It.
My guests today are an oldfriend of the show and Christiano
and a new friend of the show.
Angela Bradbury.
Now, Ann Searight Christiano is thefounder and director of the Center
(04:47):
for Public Interest Communicationsand a clinical professor in the
Department of Public Relations atthe University of Florida College
of Journalism and Communications.
Go Gators or something with theGator people say, and Angela Bradbury
is the Carell Chair in public.
Interest communications at theDepartment of Public Relations.
Woo.
This is fun.
How I get to say this so many timesat the University of Florida College
(05:09):
of Journalism and Communications, butbefore that, before joining in 2020,
Angela was the communications directorat Public Citizen, a Washington DC based
public interest advocacy organization.
So you guys know what you're talkingabout, and you have this new book
out that I have a feeling is goingto be of astonishing value to
many, if not all of our listeners.
(05:31):
It's called Public InterestCommunications Strategy for Change Makers.
Thanks to you both very muchfor coming on to Let's hear it.
Thank you.
For starters, at this moment, at thisphenomenally fraught moment, it feels
to me like navigating the challengingtimes that we're living in is gonna
take a lot more than just energy.
(05:51):
It's going to take strategy,and so it feels to me like your
book is particularly timely.
Maybe I'll just start in with you, Angela.
Why did you and Anne write this book?
We, a number of reasons.
We wrote this book in part becausewhen we were both practicing, we
would've loved to have had this book.
(06:12):
We would've loved to have hadall this, all this information
and this great research aboutcommunications at our fingertips.
Um, we also wrote it becausepart of what we want to do is to.
Grow the academic discipline ofpublic interest communications.
People have been using communications forsocial change for a very long time, but
(06:37):
there's now science behind communications.
We have cognitive linguisticsand behavioral sciences, social
sciences, psychology, and soforth that can really help us help
better inform the communicationsand how we approach problems.
In a way that will help ensure thatwe are as effective as possible,
(06:58):
rather than guessing about what thebest messages are, the best strategy.
We have these tools.
So we really are eager to, toput these things in one place
and get them out into the world.
So now when Anne came to wentto the University of Florida.
And you had come out of your PRpractitioner, you had worked at Robert
(07:22):
Wood Johnson Foundation and other places,and then you were kind of thrust into the
world of academia and you have taken toit like a school of fish to water clearly.
But Angela did.
Had you taught before,before you came to Florida?
No,
never.
Never.
And I was, I was really, I had neverplanned to lead my job at public Citizen.
(07:45):
I absolutely loved what I did.
I was very fortunate.
Because I got up everyday, very mission driven.
When I saw this job descriptionthat happened to, to cross my desk,
I thought, that sounds amazing.
I get to you get to grow a program,a public communications program.
It was a program that Ann startedbecause she had this role before I did.
(08:06):
And I thought, but I'venever taught before.
I don't know how I would like teaching.
So as part of the interview process,you teach a class and see how it goes.
I. I loved it.
I loved interacting with the students.
I found them so insightful, andwhen I came, I started teaching
(08:27):
and I just, I absolutely love it.
That's one of my favorite partsabout the job now is, is working with
students, is mentoring them, is providingopportunities and opening doors for them.
Um, so it's, it's tremendous.
And I wonder
if now that you are.
A seasoned educator, if having somebodywho is coming right out of this work as
(08:53):
a practitioner, if it harkened you backto your old, your previous days, if, if,
if, what that dynamic was like for youto bring somebody else into academia who
was, you know, the day before, just apractitioner, how did you work on that
and how did, how did you introduce andwelcome Angela into, uh, into the field?
(09:14):
I think, um, a couple of things.
One, Angela was actually qualified forthe job, so that made a huge difference.
And um, you know, I think also Ijust wanna acknowledge that Angela
started at a really rough time.
She started in 20.
In 2020.
August of 20.
Oh, what was going on then?
(09:34):
Just, you know, just, yeah.
And so, you know, I'vealways sort of been.
Awed by the ways in which Angela wasable to do so much when with people she
didn't get to meet in person for yearsand, and the challenges that that faced.
So she had a much rougher start.
You know, I got to be the first one.
(09:56):
I got the parties and the cakesand the welcome receptions, and
Angela got an empty building.
And COVID.
Let's get into the, let's get intothis, the book, why, obviously it is.
A textbook, but it is alsoa textbook by practitioners.
And how do you think about, howdo you think about academia?
(10:18):
You know, clearly communicationsdepartments across the country are
going to want to use this as a way toteach public interest communications.
And I love the idea that you'reexpanding this discipline,
which for many of us, I didn't.
Know anything about communicationswhen I got my first communications
job, which was scary for everybody,but I would've loved to have resources
(10:39):
like this or a class to take, frankly.
How do you think about takingthe practitioner work, turning it
into an academic en environmentwithout denuding it, of the
action that the practice brings?
So sometimes you'll read a, anacademic, you know, you read a textbook
for class and it feels academic.
(11:01):
And so how, how do you tryand bridge those two things?
The action and the teaching orthe practice or the whatever
goes into teaching a class.
All right.
I'm sure Anne has some thoughts as well.
Really through case studies, right.
And telling stories is what we doas public interest communicators.
Telling stories is whatwe do throughout the book.
(11:21):
Telling stories is what we do inthe classroom to illustrate the
theories and the, and the science.
And I think that's.
How we've always, that's how I'vealways operated and, and thought, and
so it's, it's possible to provide alot of examples and, and include and
weave into that the theories and theresearch and make it all digestible
(11:46):
and understandable and accessible.
And Anne, I would think that writinga textbook is actually almost as much
for the writer as it is for the reader.
What would, what have you learned?
Putting together this, this project
I that it's really one of the thingsthat's been really interesting
is that I think the space betweenpractice and academia is much more
(12:09):
permeable than we might assume it is.
Particularly in a field like publicinterest communications, that's still
kind of new and because a lot of peoplewho are in practice came from academia,
a lot of people who are teaching inacademia like Angela and like me.
Came from practice.
So there's a lot of permeability there.
(12:32):
It's also true that wehave a lot to draw on.
You know, the center is, uh, we'renot, we operate kind of more like
a startup company within academia.
We're working with realpartners every day, applying
these brain marks in theories.
And we also have the IncredibleReservoir of Great ideas coming
out of 10 years of doing Frankand, and all those practitioners.
(12:55):
Standing on stage, sharing theirsecret sauce, um, being so willing
to explain exactly how they did it.
And all of that goes into the book.
And we tried to bring it tolife as much as we could.
On the pages, we have this phrasethat we use on our team in the center
when we're talking about research.
And, you know, we'll, we'll havesome finding or some new report or
(13:18):
something that has come up in someof the research that we're doing.
And it's like, gosh,that's really interesting.
And then we'll go on and we say, well.
How do I play with this toy?
What does this mean?
How do I use this toactually drive strategy?
And so I think that ethos of it's gotta beuseful above and beyond everything else.
(13:39):
It has to be useful, whether you'rea student, whether you're a scholar,
whether you're a practitioner.
It has to be something that you can openup and find something that you can apply
to the work that you're doing that day.
So when you decided to start on this,like how did you think about what
to include if you were to ask me towrite a textbook on communications
or strategy or something like that?
(14:00):
I don't know if I could, but Idon't know where I would start.
So what was your process, Anne?
Why don't you take that firstand then we'll talk to Angela.
Okay, sure.
We have a couple of frameworksthat we have been using in
the center with our partners.
Um, one is.
One with the, we call thesix spheres of influence.
The other is back of the envelopestrategy, and we created these
(14:22):
because the problems that oursector works on are wicked problems.
We, they don't have a clear definition.
They don't have an agreed upon answer.
There are perceptions of being awinner or a loser when we actually
do get to discussing a solution.
And so I think that we need some toolsto navigate those big messy challenges.
And so the the six fears were thinkwere tools that we came up with to help
(14:46):
practitioners figure out where to start.
Let's map the spaces through which wecan communicate to drive change, and
then let's get as specific as we canabout what we're working toward and
who can make that change and what isgonna really engage them that connects
to what's already important to them.
We were able to take these frameworksthat evolved from the work that
(15:09):
we were doing with our partners.
And, and, and I think oncewe had that, it, I think we
had a lot of back and forth.
We had a lot of debate about the sequenceand, and what some of these ideas meant,
but having the frameworks in place madeit a little bit easier to figure out.
Okay, this is chapter one.
Let's go from there,
Angela.
(15:30):
I'd like to hear from you about how you,it feels like you are writing this book
for a variety of audiences and I'll,I'll guess at a few educators for sure.
Practitioners, students.
How do you think about how to helppeople use it as effectively as possible?
Are you working directly with professorswho are setting up a curriculum, for
(15:53):
example, or students who are trying totake this work and apply it to their own?
You know, their own workas students and so on.
So can you think, can you talk usthrough about how different people
use the work in different ways?
Well, we kinda, all of the above really.
So for educators, we have a, um, launcheda public interest communications educators
(16:16):
network, which includes academics andsome practitioners who also are adjuncts,
um, around the country who are interestedin building the academic discipline.
They all know about the book.
And, um, and we've, we'vegotten it out to them.
It's, and we say this is a publicinter communications course in a box.
It's all you need to teach publiccommunications to make it as
(16:38):
easy as possible for students.
We tried to make it as accessible aspossible, so it has all the concepts
and frameworks that students would need.
And as an aside, it's not justfor communications students.
We have public health studentsin anthropology and political
science and sustainability.
(16:59):
We have students from a variety ofdisciplines who take the Public Interest
communications course because theconcepts are so relevant and helpful.
Um, we've had businessstudents as well take it.
So, so the idea really is to, wemade it as accessible and clear as
possible so that anybody can pick itup and read it and understand it, and.
(17:20):
Learn about the conceptsand put them into practice.
Yeah, I, like I said, I would'veloved to have had such a
resource when I was coming up.
'cause there just weren't that many.
What do you draw from, andI'll, I'll turn to you, Ann.
What did you draw fromto, to pull this together?
There are so many resources inhere, like the bibliography is.
(17:44):
Off the charts.
How did, like, how do you gatherall this material together?
How do you, to bring it together?
You have lots and lots and lots ofresearch clearly, but so many resources.
Like how do you begin tocall through all that stuff?
Yeah, I mean, I think that that'sreflective of the fact that
there's a lot of really fantasticwork happening in the field.
(18:05):
A lot of people have done a lot ofreally good work and one of the things.
When Angela and I sat down before westarted writing and talked about what was
important to us, uh, there were a coupleof things that we, that we did that I
think really guided those kinds of things.
One was that we wanted to celebrateas much work that was already
happening in the field as we couldand, and draw people toward that work.
(18:27):
I think we both kind of feel like wewish that those lists could have been
10 times as long as they were, 'causethere is so much great work going on.
The other thing that we did is we satdown with students and we brought in
some pizzas and we sat down for, I don'tknow, three hours or something, and,
and we just had this really long, greatconversation about what are the books
(18:49):
that you've been assigned to read, uh,in your courses that they really stayed
with you, that were meaningful to you?
What do you want from your textbooks?
What do you want fromyour course materials and.
They said, you know, we wantstories, we want resources.
We want the opportunity to be able toscan a, a chapter and get the big points,
but when something really fascinatesus, we wanna be able to go deeper.
(19:12):
And so those kinds of, um,insights, I think really helped
us to find the resources and.
Again, I just mentioning too, again, thatfrank community that has been so generous
over the years and being able to drawon all of those resources that have been
shared is just incredible and, and whatAngela has done through the educators
(19:34):
network is similarly just vibrant androbust and, and so that is all to say.
We had a lot to work withand we did the best we could.
We're gonna take a very quick break andwe'll be right back with Anne Christiano
and Angela Bradbury right after this.
You're listening to, let's HearIt, a podcast about foundation and
(19:54):
nonprofit communications hostedby Eric Brown and Kirk Brown.
If you're enjoying this episode,you may just be a rule breaker.
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(20:16):
Fake rules, drop monthly.
Check them out whereveryou get your podcasts.
And now back to the show.
And we are back with AnneChristiano and Angela Bradbury.
They have just written a reallyamazing new book called Public Interest
Communications Strategy for Change Makers.
(20:36):
Alright, so, so Anne, let's just talk,let's back up for just a second and
talk a little bit about the Center forPublic Interest Communications 'cause
you do a little bit of everything.
You do writing, you're obviously helpingto lead academics and the, and the, the
practice of public interest communication.
So can you just kind of giveus the Tencent tour of the
center for folks who don't know?
Sure.
(20:57):
Yeah.
Well, back in 2018, after Annie and Iwrote a couple articles for Stanford
Social Innovation Review, we startedgetting these calls and emails from
people saying, Hey, could we maybehire you to help us take this public
interest communications approach to.
A really big problem that we'refacing and we're like, I guess
(21:18):
so I think, yeah, that'd be fun.
And um, and we started getting moreand more of those calls and we quickly
realized that we needed to establish acenter so that we could hire colleagues
and actually begin to work in thisreally concentrated way on projects.
And now here it is, 2025.
Uh, we've been aroundsince 2018 and we are.
Working with partners all overthe world to apply these public
(21:41):
interest communications frameworksto these really messy problems.
So some of the things that we'reworking on right now are how do we
find common ground around what weshould do about affordable housing?
How can we help the charitablesector tell authentic, meaningful
stories of how change happens?
How do we talk about thingslike guaranteed income in a way
(22:01):
that helps people make senseof it and understand its value?
What's really cool about thatis that we have just incredible
resources available to us.
Being in an R one university.
We have nearly every journalarticle ever written.
We have a fantastic partnership with theAtlas Lab, which is using data science and
AI to really find the conversations thatare happening on these profound social
(22:26):
issues and figure out instead of how we.
Push messages out into the world, uh,how we join the existing conversations
and offer value and meaning.
So it's really great work and, andI get to do, I get to work with some
pretty amazing people on some prettyamazing partners on those projects.
And one of the other things that we do alot of is, is training and professional
(22:48):
development to help practitioners takesome of the frameworks that you're
seeing in the book and apply them tothe challenges that they're facing.
So it's like almost a high poweredconsulting firm with the all of
the resource riches you couldpossibly imagine at your fingertips.
Absolutely, absolutely.
I will say though, that one thingthat is important to note is that, is
(23:10):
that we have sort of a unique fundingstructure for universities and that.
We're not funded by the state of Florida.
All of our funding comes fromthose external partnerships,
which makes it a lot more funand also a little bit more scary.
But I think that's how theworld works in most places too.
And these days, maybe you sleepslightly better, but enough of that.
(23:30):
Let's get into the book a little bit.
Angela.
Can you kind of walk us throughthe structure of this book?
What's in it?
How can, like what are the key.
Functions of it.
How is it set up and what aresome of the big lessons that
you, that folks can get from it?
Sure.
Well, as, as Ann mentioned earlier, we,we structured the format of the book
around the frameworks, these two mainframeworks, the six spheres of influence,
(23:54):
which are some of the levers of changethat we use as as public interest
communicators and strategists, and theback of the envelope Four questions,
strategy, the four questions that.
If you answer those questions, youhave the outline of a strategic
communications plan and we, it's funnybecause we kinda went back and forth
as far as which should come first whenwe, we did several outlines for this.
(24:16):
I think
I thought about that when Iwas reading it, but keep going.
'cause I'd love to know, knowhow that conversation went.
Right, exactly.
It isn't necessarily linear, right?
It depends on where you are inthe process and on the project.
Sometimes you have to loop back again,and when we do that in classes, but
we start out with the six spheres andtalk about the various approaches that
(24:38):
you can use to affect change, whichinclude things like activism, because
activism is a communications tool.
Policy media, the financial markets,social norms, communities of influence.
That's where a lot of thepowerful messengers come in.
And, and we lead people through analyzingcases, through those, uh, spheres.
(25:01):
Then we go to the actual, here's how youcreate a strategic communications plan.
Walking through each of those questionsand delving into them in depth, um, as
far as you know, what do you want tobe true that isn't true now and which
goes into what makes an effective.
Goal, who must act to make it happen?
(25:21):
Those are your actors.
And we talk about having coreactors, the kind of the only people
who can make the change happen.
And then who influences those core actors?
I know all this is familiar, I'm sureto, to your, to your listeners, um, what
must they believe to act, and this iswhen we really delve into the importance
of understanding the worldviews andvalues of the people you're messaging to.
(25:44):
And, and this is where publicinterest communications can really
help us with the, the polarizationand help us bridge divides.
Because if we understand and taketime to listen to and understand where
people are coming from and what theirconcerns are, we can craft messages.
(26:05):
Will resonate with them ratherthan crafting messages that make
sense to us, but not necessarilythe people we're trying to reach.
And then finally, howdo we connect with them?
Literally where are they?
What conversations can we join and how canwe get our information in front of them?
What are their information sources?
And, and then we talk about measurementand evaluation and, and I have to say,
(26:28):
Anne wrote what is probably, she didthe measurement evaluation chapter.
Hands down the best measurement andevaluation content I have ever seen.
Um, so if, if folks get thebook only for that, they should.
Um, and then so we, so we walk peoplethrough the, and walk students through
the, the process of putting the wholething together at, uh, at the end.
(26:51):
I have to say that the four questionsmade it feel like a Passover
Seder for communications people.
Let's get into some ofthese specifics of this.
So for example, the, the back backof the envelope strategy, Ann is like
the sort of thing, everybody wantsan easy way to think about anything.
Mm-hmm.
The back of the envelopestrategy caught my eye.
(27:12):
Can you talk about it?
Yeah.
So, um, we weren't doing, uh, thiswas way back in, I think 2012.
Um, we were doing a workshop fornonprofits who were gonna come up to the
University of Florida, and I knew thatthey didn't have communications teams, but
they needed communications in their work.
And so I was just kind of agonizingover how can we make this as
(27:35):
simple as possible for them?
How can we make communicationsand the thinking behind strategic
communications accessible and useful topeople who don't have training in it?
And for sure we've, we've, those questionshave evolved over time, but they've.
Held up really well, and, and, um, we'vehad the opportunity to check them with
(27:55):
lots of different people and, and, uh,they've, they've found it really helpful.
I think one of the things that I'mexcited about, one of the things that
I'm most excited about in the book istrans, going from analyzing these six
spheres and really looking at the sixspheres as systems, and so connecting
(28:16):
the, the discipline of systems thinking.
To strategic communications andreally thinking about how those
systems can help us create a theoryof change for our communications work.
There's not a single person who'slistening to this podcast who has worked
in communications, who hasn't had somebodystride into their office and asked for
(28:37):
a one minute video, or like some veryspecific deliverable that's gonna solve
all of the organization's communicationschallenges like we have all been there.
I thought about the back of theenvelope strategy is like these are
four questions that you can pullout when you're in that moment.
So instead of just being like annoyedthat this person's like asking you to
(28:58):
make a video, and you know the videois not gonna be the thing that's gonna
solve the problem, that together youcan start to say, well, what is it
we're actually trying to do here?
And who can make that happen?
And now you're on the same team andyou've helped your colleagues think about
communications in a much more focused way.
So you have the opportunity to kindof upskill the people around you
(29:22):
as well and really offer somethingthat's useful to your colleagues in
your organization who may not haveyour experience in communications.
Uh, we, I believe it or not, we justhave a couple of minutes left to, so
I'm gonna, I'm gonna start with you,Anne, with, with this set of questions.
Well, like what do you think thepublic interest communicators they need
to be doing that they're not doing,and what do they need to stop doing?
(29:45):
That they are doing.
One of the things that's happeningright now is that we're sort of getting
really mixed up between strategiccommunication and self-expression,
and they are not the same.
Strategic effective communication isnot a form of self-expression, and I
think that it's really hard becauseyou don't come into this field without
(30:09):
caring desperately about these issues.
So getting really pragmaticabout how you are gonna achieve
change is so hard, right?
Because how do you separateyourself from that?
And I think we, I think in thismoment that feels so fraught.
I think we, we do needto be more pragmatic.
(30:31):
We really need to think about wherewe have resources, where we have
relationships, where we have power,can build power and apply that.
The most specific dose possible toleverage the, the most change that we can.
And that's hard when all of theseother thoughts are in your mind, and,
(30:55):
and it can be hard to separate that.
But I do think that, that, thatkind of thinking is, is what we
all need to kind of hold ourselvesaccountable to doing right now.
Well, it, it, it really comes from this.
What you've talked about in thebook about listening, about really
understanding what your audiences,what your audiences care about, rather
than the thing that you need to say.
So I really take that, I take thatpoint, especially today, just pick
(31:18):
up any newspaper and people feelthe need to express, but we also
understand that as a movement, we haveto figure out how to create change.
And those two things don'tnecessarily always go together.
That's such a really important lesson.
Angela, what?
What would you send ourlisteners away with?
About, about your book and aboutthe work and about the kind of the
(31:40):
practice of communications of socialimpact communications these days.
Well, I second what Anne said, andI think if communicators can listen
to people outside their circles whencoming up with messaging, it'll be
very helpful and much more effective.
I think it's, it's easy and I know,'cause I've certainly been in the world.
(32:05):
It's easy to, because of timepressures and other reasons
to just come up with messages.
That sound good in theoffice focus group, right?
Because that's all you have time for.
But really kind of understandingpeople outside the UDel suspects
outside your supporters and.
Working with local organizations andempowering local folks for change.
(32:30):
In your, towards the end of the, the showyou did with Kirk, when you interviewed
Kirk, you had a, a wonderful commentabout the importance of local communities
and local organizing, and I thinkthat's where a lot of important work
happens, because that's where people.
Can reach across divides andcan come together on issues
(32:53):
and, um, and create communities.
And change comes reallyfrom the bottom up.
It's increasingly more difficultto have change from the top
positive, change from the top.
So, so I think kind of listeningoutside and, and working with local
organizations and empowering those localorganizations is really, is really key.
(33:14):
Going forward.
Yeah.
And as you say that, it occurs tome that the only way to ensure a
lasting, lasting change is to dothat kind of work rather than to
pummel your e your enemy into dust.
'cause you know they'll be back.
Well, this has been a great conversation.
I really deeply appreciatethe work that you both do.
I, I appreciate the contribution thatyou've made to our field and our craft.
(33:38):
It is growing.
It is something that did not existwhen I got started in communications.
And thanks to you both and to yourcolleagues and to your students.
I think that the future isreally bright for this work.
And so just thank you again, AnnSeawright Christiano and Angela Bradbury.
Their new book is called Public InterestCommunications Strategy for Change Makers.
(34:02):
Uh, just thanks to you both.
Again,
thank you so much for having us.
It's been fun.
Thank you,
Eric, and thank you for everything you'vedone to build this field, and this podcast
is a really important part of that.
Ah, shucks.
Hello.
Thanks to you both.
Here's where I'm excited and mortified.
(34:24):
Oh good.
This is the first textbook ever,the Public Interest Communication
Strategy for Change Makers.
It's the first textbook.
For bringing people into this field,and I was hearing you talk about
all the topics and concepts and it'sso cool what Anne has done here.
And also I'm sure it's difficult, right?
Because she's working at the, um,center, it's pub, it's externally funded,
(34:48):
it's not using funds from the state.
I'm trying to wrap my mind around thiswork being done in Florida because
of all the Mike Freaks conceivednotions about Florida, you know.
But here, here's this great workthat Ann's doing in Florida.
She's actually enlisting peoplethis incredible asset, the range
of assets she's developed as she'sdone her work over the years.
Here we are in 2025, finally producingthe first textbook ever on how to deliver
(35:13):
public interest communications programs.
And that concept is both so exciting andso welcome and it's clearly so necessary.
But also, Eric, isn't it just astonishingthat it's 2025 and we're getting the first
textbook in this field on this topic now?
There may be another textbook.
Kirk, I hate to tell you
this.
Well, so I, I don't think I have it.
(35:35):
That's, so if there's that, it maynot be one that anyone has heard of.
There are books.
There are books, right?
There are books and people have, and,and it's like, it's a thing for firms
even and people and practitioners.
You write your book.
But are there really textbooks thatyou can use in an academic setting that
you can build course curricular around?
'cause that's, that's how they're pro,that's how they're, they're promoting.
(35:55):
This is the first textbook of its kind.
I actually dunno.
Yeah.
But all I know is that this is atextbook and it's really good and it,
it, it is written both because Ann andAngela are so-called practitioners,
people who actually do stuff.
Yeah.
As opposed to the old Woody Allen thing.
Like, you know, people who don'tknow teach and people who can't
teach, teach gym, they actuallycan do and they can teach.
(36:20):
And so if you can do, and you canteach and you create a resource
for people to both do and learn.
You're in good shape.
And so I think that's whatmakes this thing so useful
for so many kinds of folks.
And as I think it was Angela who saidthat it's not just communications people,
it's advocates and other folks who areinterested in learning about how to use
(36:42):
communications to advance their work.
And I think that's what's, it has justlots and lots and lots of applications
and that's what's really cool.
Yeah, and it's, you know, I reallylike Angela and Ann, both of
their kind of origin stories forhow they come into this work and.
I think about Angela doing this journeywhere she's coming from public citizen.
She, of course, by the way,another former journalist, right?
(37:03):
Coming into the Silman journalism ranks,goes to public citizen and then decides,
Hey, I'm going to, I'm gonna try this out.
I'm gonna go teach.
Have you ever had a job interview whereone of your first tasks was to actually,
in the interview process, teach a class?
I. That thought of not being ateacher and then standing in front
of a group of students being like,okay, let's give this, try this out.
Let me just take what I've learnedin my life and see if I can bring
(37:24):
this into a classroom settingas part of an interview process.
I mean that, that alone, Angela,I think, gets you the job that
you could even walk into the roomand get outta the room alive.
I think that that alonefeels, can catch you the job.
I think everybody had toteach a class who was.
Who was interviewing for that job.
Sure, man.
But seeing as how it's like a teachingjob, but still, I've never had to do that.
And I'm, you know, I'm nota teacher, so that's why.
(37:48):
Well, actually I was at the,you know, I taught, uh, junior
high school in, in Japan.
Mm-hmm.
Which required absolutely,uh, no training whatsoever.
Uh, the only requirement Ihad was to speak, uh, English.
Mm.
So, because I was, I taught English.
So, can you speak English?
Can you, can you speak?
You have the job.
(38:09):
That's great.
That's great.
Well, so they talked through howthey've organized these two key
aspects of the work and how theyhelp center people's thinking.
First by, by talking through thisnotion of spheres of influence, which
they've published about and they'vewritten, and you know, so these are the
spheres of policy, media, communitiesof influence, the market and industry
activism, social norms, and just,just as you, as you skip through the
(38:33):
tulips of those different spheres, I.
Tiptoe, you tiptoe through the tulips.
Each of them tiptoethrough the tulips, right?
Tiptoe through the spheres.
And then what does Andrew abouthave that we actually need to bring
a systems thinking sensibilityto how we think about activating
those spheres in support of change.
And just at that notion there, the idea ofneeding a textbook to ground our thinking
(39:00):
and help introduce people to this work,this thinking, how it works, the practice.
How important it would be to havea resource like that is just lands
for me because I think about, andby the way, thank you for your
true confessions on this podcast.
Your first, you're welcome job,your first job at communications.
I knew nothing about communications.
I wish I had something like this.
(39:20):
So I think about this, um, this, someme, some people may say that I still
know nothing about communications.
Do you think it's possible thatnone of us know anything about
communications even today, I'm.
No, I'm serious.
Well, I'm just, because again,I think about these fears of
influence and how difficult it is.
So this is what we need, right?
We need, we need textbooks, resources,and then teachers, thank you Anna,
(39:41):
Angela, for helping bring us throughthis thinking, because guess what?
It's really complicated, like how youapproach any one of these fears and then
think about how they relate to each other.
This is complicated stuff.
Yes.
No, I agree.
The, the cool thing is that rather than.
Most of the time when we start thinkingthrough a communication strategy, there
(40:02):
are a lot of folks out there who willthink through a com, a so-called strategy.
You will say, well, what do you wanna do?
And they say, oh, I wanna raisetheir awareness about this thing.
Or, we wanna start using social media,or Should we switch to Blue Sky?
Like all these mm-hmm.
Very random questions about howwe're going to communicate with
(40:24):
a great big C in the front of itwithout thinking about where is my.
Organization, where does itexist in the context of others?
What kind of work are we trying to do?
What sort of persuasion are we into?
And what they give you are some toolsto start thinking through who are
we, what are we trying to achieve,and what context does our work occur?
(40:46):
And I think that's justreally, really helpful.
It's the basic kind of.
Building blocks of actual strategy,and they give you the tools to do that.
And then you have to ask awhole bunch of other questions.
What kind of things have to happenin order for us to be able to
succeed and that kind of thing.
So, you know, the, the buildingblocks of strategy, which.
(41:07):
Everybody should do no matter what.
You have to ask all the assumptions,and you have to figure out your role
in helping to achieve these kindsof changes that you're looking for,
and that's really a great way tohelp people think about strategy.
Well, I wish we could enlist one of our.
Foundation supporters to purchase thisbook and ensure that it gets sent out
(41:28):
and delivered to every communicationsdepartment for every organization
of concern in the entire country.
And here's the reason why, becauseI think about, you know, as, as you
point out in your current mind too,like these communications jobs, they
all have their entry level components.
And there's a lot of folks thatcome into their, into the field.
They kind, this is their first job.
Their, you know, whatever theireducation or whatever their experience
has been, that's brought them tothat organization, that position.
(41:51):
And I think about intoday's media landscape.
Poor 20 something.
Maybe sitting at a desk, maybesitting in the other side of a zoom
call if they're in a hybrid settingand somebody pops in, it's a senior
executive, tired under stress, greatpressure, budget constraints, and
they look at that communicationsperson and they say, get me on TikTok.
(42:13):
Right.
And, and rolling, rolling the tape all theway back decades and decades and decades.
It used to be get me on the New YorkTimes and roll Me all the way back
decades and decades and decades.
It used to be, uh, get me at the NationalPress Club, you know, but, but like, so
there's gonna be that one tactic, right?
That just grabs our attention.
It's like, oh, that iswhat communications is.
And so when I see this concept ofspheres and influence, this really simple
(42:37):
way to walk people through it and howcomplicated and what, what a laden into
a system's thinking it needs to be.
It only helps that 20 something in thatmoment say, you know, can we actually
think about the why here a little bit?
It gives them some resources tosay, Hey, can I, can we kind of
a larger thinking about this?
I feel like we've done an incredible,tremendous service to the whole field.
If we just equip that person with, inthat moment around that conversation,
(43:00):
yeah, your boss walks in or comes on Zoom.
It's harder a little, it's harderto hand them a book on Zoom.
Explain.
Your boss walks into your officeand says, Hey, can we do it, Dick?
I was like, here, read this book, boss,and then asked me about your TikTok.
That reminds me of the time whenI was working at a, a nonprofit
organization and the developmentdirector came in and said, Hey, Eric,
by the way, we need to do a video.
(43:21):
Oh, just, oh, okay.
You want me to do a video?
All right.
Alright.
We did the video.
It was fun.
What do we do with this?
I don't know.
It's a video.
So they also talk about the back ofthe envelope guide to Setting strategy.
And I love this notion.
So you, you know, you start with yourspheres of what you're trying to do,
(43:43):
and now you're in your questions.
So the first question is, what isyour organization trying to make
true that isn't true now, right?
And what a great pausepoint for your organization.
Like, okay, yeah, what is it?
What are we trying to make?
True?
Second, who has to do somethingthat they're not doing now or stop
doing for you to achieve that goal?
And isn't that a gnarly,complicated nuance moment?
Third, what would they believe thatwould motivate them to take action?
(44:07):
Right?
So this is like what are wedriving towards, you know?
And then finally, how will we getthat message in front of them?
And again, back to the get me onTikTok, it seems like still so much
of our communication stuff is reallyabout that fourth question, right?
What are the tactics?
Where do I have to go?
And we just assume we know the messages.
'cause we have itintuitively in our minds.
That first question, what are we actuallytrying to make sure that isn't true?
(44:28):
What's our goal?
Then who to actually haveto, has to act on that goal
first to make progress for it.
So I love how this back of theenvelope notion really just
gets to the heart of the matter.
And again, thinking about that poor 20something, who's in that pressure moment?
Just having four key questions thatcan help somebody walk through to
get oriented in their thinking.
Again, it's just like making this stuffsimple, digestible, but then using that
(44:49):
as a way to start the conversation.
It just feels so crucially importantfor people to have these resources.
It's like it's Passoverquestions for comms people.
Yeah.
I love how you said that.
What, what makes this TikTokdifferent from any other TikTok?
No, it's, it really is true.
They, they are excellent questions thatare very difficult to answer sometimes,
and that's why you have to go back to thedrawing board and figure out how you can
(45:13):
answer those questions with confidence.
'cause, 'cause those things, thoseassumptions that you make when you launch
into some kind of communications activity.
Often go unchallenged.
Mm-hmm.
And you really have to ask yourself thosequestions and answer them with fidelity
and with authenticity because people,they just like, oh, this is gonna work.
(45:34):
I know.
Well, how do you know it's gonna work?
Just 'cause it's gonna work.
And this is the kind of thing thatapplies a discipline that you need to,
to apply Also, given that resourcesand time are phenomenally valuable.
Mm. Any time spent or any money spent.
Making an assumption that youcannot prove or that you don't have
(45:54):
confidence about is wasted and we donot have time to, or money to waste.
You know, on that count, the only thingthat I didn't hear you guys talk about,
and I was wondering as you were goingthrough this, you know, this text, right?
So we need this textbook.
We need to orient people tohow to approach this thinking.
But in reality, there's another aspectof this, which is you can do the
(46:15):
work, you can be clear, you can do it.
Try to get as clear as you can.
There is a concept around budgetthat holds all of this too.
Right?
And I, and I think about that interms of like, how do we help our
leaders understand that part too?
Because, 'cause even if we, even thatnotion that you just talked about,
like the time it takes to actuallyslow down and ask these questions with
rigor and to be thoughtful about it,you know, I was, I was like, it's an
(46:39):
upsetting day in the United States.
We won't say specifically why, but there'sa lot of stuff happening on the federal
policy front that's so upsetting and, and,and just, just really challenging and.
I'm sitting here thinking about our entirefield and, and have, we in our own minds
deconstructed the communications thinkingthat went into the moment we're in now.
Like the, in terms of, in terms of thepeople that brought us to this point
(46:59):
and like, what did their rooms looklike and what were their theories,
their theories of change, and howwould they have answered the question?
What are the six spheres?
And, you know, you know, whatdid people need to believe
to support what's being done?
And, and you can kind of use thesequestions and tease out wow, like they're.
If there are people who will sit inrooms and come up with some pretty
awful answers, but actually becorrect in their, at least from the
(47:21):
standpoint of like, oh wow, if wecognitively trigger these responses and
people, we can create these outcomes.
Oh my gosh, we're gonna do that.
That kind of a thing.
But, but it still blows down toalso I think, what is the budget?
What's the resource we'regonna apply to do this work?
And I, and I wonder aboutthat sometimes in our current
information landscape because.
This is where I go back to,do we any of us know anything
(47:43):
about communications these days?
Because I don't think weeven know clearly anymore.
What are the tactics being used at us?
How are those tactics being framed?
Exactly.
Like we have some sneakingsuspicions, but then what's the
price tag that's going along with it?
You know?
Is all this horribleness beingcreated for a million dollars
a year or a billion dollars peryear of spending pointed at us?
(48:03):
I mean, what do you think about thaton just the spending and budget side?
Alright.
That was the, sorry, Cory a Cory Booker.
Lang, sorry.
Sorry.
This is novel stuff.
Filibuster.
Come on.
So there was, get your thinking therewas, there was a question in there
somewhere into a little bit of, of a
(48:23):
soliloquy.
Yeah.
Ha.
Hand ringing.
Uh, it, let me unpack your phenomenallycircum, circum ally challenged
question statement, filibuster thing.
It's like in improv, you just listenfor the thing, the word you liked
(48:43):
best and try and riff off that.
I just
went into it.
There you go.
Great.
So there was
a question about budgeting.
And budgeting was always a guess.
You're always trying to try tryingto decide what things are gonna
cost, and sometimes you do it basedon what things cost last time, and
sometimes you're guessing about whatthings are gonna cost in the future.
And I don't know the answerto that other than that.
Try and be as specific about yourassumptions as possible, and then
(49:05):
record it and figure out what thingsgo, you know, how, how much time and
how much money did anything cost.
Mm-hmm.
Now, the other that, that otherbit in the middle there that create
the rant in the middle about theother side and what they're doing.
Yeah.
They're just trying to disrupt andthey're trying to like, how many
lives can I make miserable today?
Mm-hmm.
And creating mayhem.
Is probably faster and cheaperthan building anything of value.
(49:27):
I mean, for sure.
So I don't know exactlyhow you combat that.
Other than that we are all going tohave to build new movements that are
enduring, that reach across traditionalUS versus them kind of things.
And so like, what's that look like?
I don't, I don't know.
I don't think anybody really,really knows, but we're gonna
(49:49):
have to start trying some thingsthat, that undo that because.
This is sucks.
Well, look, you got to the heart ofsome really important stuff though when
you were closing things up with Angelaand Ann because you had that, just that
back and forth about listening and howimportant it's to listen and to listen,
to hear what our audiences care about.
And I really thought it was poignant,their feedback saying, you know,
(50:11):
you need to listen to people whoare outside of your circles when
you're developing your messaging.
You know?
Yeah.
That's for sure that your listeningcannot just be the focus group in
the office, and I do think there's.
And again, you know, back to thenotion of doing this work in Florida,
what a great place to be locatedto be doing this work for sure.
You wanna be in these places where youactually get to hear conversations that
maybe land differently than, than theysit, let's say, for instance, within
(50:35):
a stones throw of San Francisco, whichis where you and I both sit today.
Yeah.
You know, so a bubble.
Yeah, that's right.
It's
foggy.
It's foggy and, but
it's a nice bubble.
It's
foggy and cold on a day whenit's bitterly, brutally hot
in other parts of the country.
Right.
Uh, come, come to SanFrancisco people, it's chill.
Yeah, right.
That's exactly right.
(50:55):
I also liked the reference to thework that Ann did in the measurement
and evaluation chapter, becausethat's the other piece of this too.
Right.
I think it's really, we strugglewith how to measure and evaluate.
We struggle how to, right.
And so just to have some clarityand guidance for people on how
to approach that, that alsojust seems super important.
I'm a huge fan of measurement evaluation,and I had a very interesting conversation
(51:17):
with a colleague the other day whosaid, everything can be measured.
Everything can be measured.
And so just measure things.
And now it doesn't mean that everything isgoing to be measured equally or that a lot
of things are qualitative measurements.
I rate this an X, you know,a seven or a 10 or something.
But we are always try anything.
(51:37):
You can put a number tothings that gives you a, a.
I don't know what you wanna call it.
A place to, something to hang on to.
Mm-hmm.
Something that gives, thatyou can refer back to.
Everything can be measured and nowthat doesn't mean that the thing that
you measured, the measurement you comeup with is the end all and be all.
It can't be, but that the practiceof trying to figure out what
(52:02):
is this thing that I'm doing?
How can I measure it?
It can be measured in feeling,it can me be measured in numbers.
But the act of it is really valuable,is really helpful to you because again,
you state your assumptions, you see whathappens, and then you look back and say,
how did I do relative to my assumptions?
You can do that with almost anythingand I think that that's really important
(52:23):
that just the act of it is good for you.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, so, so much content anddid you really read it, Eric?
I was so proud of you and you'relike, when I read the book I did.
That's incredible.
I. I mean, that's, I did, that'sSo how did it feel reading
a textbook on communicationsat this point in your career?
I, it, I felt like I was a little late.
(52:45):
This is my point.
I felt a little late.
This is needed.
It's necessary.
It too late.
It's too late for me, Kirk.
Oh, it's just in time.
This is just in time.
So this is the Public InterestCommunication Strategy for Change
Makers was published in April.
Please go check it out and find it.
Written by Ann C.
Wright, Christian and AngelaBradbury, both from the University
of Florida College of Journalismand Communications, the Center for
(53:07):
Public Interest Communications.
There it.
What a treat.
And Eric, this is Ann'ssecond trip to the podcast.
Yeah, that's right.
We've now, we're startingto get second, second timers
and that's so exciting becausethis is such great work.
So man, uh, Ann and Angela, thankyou for all the work you're doing.
Thank you for.
Forging new paths in this fieldfor publishing and writing.
(53:27):
I, I also loved by the way, Ann'sside about how this practice group
that around the, um, center for PublicInterest Communications that she just
started publishing on some stuff andthe phone started ringing and people
started saying, Hey, can I hire you?
I'm like, that's just pretty cool, huh?
It's very cool.
It's very cool.
So Eric, that was awesome.
And Anna, Angela, my gosh.
So generous of you to comejoin us and let's hear it.
That was really, really cool.
(53:48):
And Kirk, may I just say something?
Yeah,
you, you do a very good job at this.
This is so great.
You're very good at this.
Look, come on, this work is important.
These folks need a big, fat,positive spotlight on them because
they're doing important work.
And guess what?
This is the kind of good newsthat I don't know, I don't
know about you and your world.
I need it.
I need to hear from people like this.
(54:08):
This is, I'm so glad there arepeople out here doing this work.
'cause man, we need it.
We need it.
But thank you for that.
I appreciate it.
You're very welcome.
Well, thank you everybody.
Thanks for let's coming tojoin us and let's hear it and
uh, we will see you next time.
Okay, everybody.
That's it for this episode.
Please let us know if you have anythoughts about what you heard today
or people we should have on this show,and that definitely includes yourself.
(54:31):
And we'd like to thank JohnAli, the tuneful and inspiring
composer of our theme music,
our sponsor,
the Lumina Foundation, and pleasecheck out Lumina's Terrific podcast.
Today's students tomorrow's talent, andyou can find that@luminafoundation.org.
We
certainly thank today's guestand of course, all of you,
and most importantly, thank you, Mr.
(54:51):
Brown.
Oh, no, no, no, no.
Thank you, Mr. Brown.
Okay, everybody, till next time.
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