Cut Through!

Frontier AI may or may not represent a threat to humanity. But there are more immediate risks for corporate affairs directors. Those include the risk of falling behind on AI adoption, the risk that AI misrepresents your business, and the risk you’re not involved in decisions about how to deploy AI across your organisation. Those risks are ones I expect most companies to encounter in the next three...

In this series, I have argued that good communications leadership involves bringing clarity, capability, and confidence. Yet, there is one other important source of advantage. The best teams do not simply execute the original plan: they look for a better route. Continuous improvement is about creating a mindset in which everyone is thinking about how the team can do better. This is a public episod...

In this third part of my series on the ‘four Cs’ of leadership, we look at how to build team confidence. How can you create a workplace where people are willing to give discretionary effort and support each other? How can you build the belief to keep going when things get difficult? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes,...

This is the second part of my series on communications leadership. This episode is about 'capability': how to identify what the function must be good at to deliver its strategy, assessing whether it can do those things well today, and closing any gap. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonbaugh.substack.com

Over the next four weeks, I am sharing my thinking on the fundamentals of communications leadership. What is your job as a communications leader, be it of a small team or a major function? My 'four Cs' of communications leadership are clarity, capability, confidence, and continuous improvement. This week: clarity. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers o...

Far from having had enough of experts, it seems that we are in thrall to the idea that deep specialist expertise is what’s needed to succeed today. But I’m starting to wonder: is everyone right ? Do we really need more deep expertise, or, in a rapidly changing world, might the ability to operate across multiple domains actually be a good thing? Should the next generation of communicators be narrow...

When I was in government, we studied the data from thousands of social media posts and found that people tended to watch for only three seconds when content featured a government minister. So is Andy Burnham rewriting the rules of social media? Should every CEO now front their company’s digital content and spend their Fridays rating pub snacks with their Chief Financial Officer? Well, no. Here's h...

COM-B is a behavioural change approach that helps you identify the real barriers preventing your audience from taking action. It stands for Capability + Opportunity + Motivation = Behaviour. This episode is about why it matters and how to use it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonbaugh.substack.com

There’s a famous parable in Daoist thought. A rock sits in a river with water rushing around it. Which is stronger? The rock or the water? It’s the rock, right? It stays completely unmoved. Well, no. At least, not in this parable. The parable is intended to illustrate the Daoist concept of Wu Wei or “ action through inactio n”. Properly understood, I think it is a massively overlooked approach to...

These are the questions that I hear most often about AI. Listen now to hear my answers. 1. Where should I start with AI? 2. Why do so many AI adoption programmes disappoint? 3. Why is the output I’m getting still so generic? 4. What AI tool should I use? 5. What is an AI agent? 6. How do I persuade sceptical colleagues? 7. What governance really matters? 8. What is GEO and how is it different from...

How does the Government's emergency response committee, COBR, work? What can communications leaders learn from it? And what did I decide was the most important element of crisis response after attending countless meetings? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonbaugh.substack.com

One of the most superficially attractive arguments in corporate affairs is: “ Don’t put your head above the parapet. ” For most organisations, it is bad advice. Keeping your head down does not only reduce attention. It also reduces the relationships, trust and visible backing you can draw on when you need them. Those who favour this approach miss three important things about how support works. Thi...

Who do people support and why? To answer that question we asked people to describe, in their own words, why they supported the companies they admire and what action they would be willing to take on their behalf. The key drivers of support were straightforward. But the drivers of opposition were different. And there were some other unexpected findings too. This is a public episode. If you would lik...

Saturday marks the 250th anniversary of the United States. There will be many essays written about Washington, Jefferson and Franklin. Communications leaders may learn more from Samuel Adams. I’ve had an interest in Adams since I worked in Washington DC back in 1997. The only half decent beer available at the time bore his name, and every bottle carried the insignia “Brewer. Patriot”. He was both...

SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound) is a poor starting point for setting communications objectives. It distracts people from asking the most important question of all: why are we communicating in the first place? So what does a smarter way of approaching communications objectives look like? A technique borrowed from Toyota may form part of the answer. This is a public...

Why did humans start to communicate? The obvious answer is: ‘to exchange information’. Yet this may not be why language was so important to our ancestors. And the real reason might tell us something we often forget when communicating today. Thinking about communication as a social act changes our view on what good communication looks like today. This is a public episode. If you would like to discu...

Can a Japanese secret to long life help you live past 100? Probably not. But it might help you to identify what kind of communications roles are going to give you energy, be worth periods of strain and be a good fit for your skills. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonbaugh.substack.com

“Germany calling. This is Germany calling.” Throughout the Second World War those words echoed through the static of Britain’s airwaves. The clipped tones of William Joyce, better known as Lord Haw-Haw, were broadcast daily from Nazi Germany with the aim of weakening Allied morale. But in a conflict today, would we spot enemy influence so easily? What do foreign influence operations look like in a...

People are REALLY ANGRY because Gemma Collins appeared in a social media clip for the Department for Education. " Bizarre ”, “ tone-deaf” , “ sickening ” and “ ridiculous ”, said the critics. Communications teams spend a great deal of time asking what they should say. They spend much less time asking who should say it. So what does this row reveal about the importance of the messenger? Is it worth...

If you’re not measuring communications, you don’t know it’s working. Yet our profession has an evaluation problem: we’re counting the wrong things for the wrong reasons. So what does good communications evaluation look like? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit simonbaugh.substack.com

Why would giving a train passenger a quiz question make them more likely to accept an excess fare? And what can that teach us about how to communicate bad news more effectively? Procedural justice is the ideas that the process - how decisions are made and how people are treated - is more important to public trust than the actual outcome. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this...

What can a traditional Chinese painting, an Austrian psychologist, and a Roman Emperor teach communications leaders about how to manage personal resilience? Recognising you have more power to choose your response to events than you might think can be a powerful and liberating insight that boosts personal resilience and performance. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with o...

Leaders generally want to communicate inside-to-out. They begin with the messages they want to tell people. Then wonder why nobody seems especially interested. A narrative is different. It is a carefully structured argument rooted in what your audience cares about. It helps people understand you and the world differently. Here's how to build one. This is a public episode. If you would like to disc...

At one level it's straightforward. We recently invented a technology that creates language at almost zero cost. We employ people who write for us. Therefore, the new technology will replace those workers. I have no doubt that AI is going to profoundly change communication roles. But replace us altogether? The more I work with AI the more I doubt this will be the case. At least, not for a while yet...

Writing created the modern world. But today do we overestimate the importance of writing and overuse it. It's worth remembering the limits of writing and the extraordinary power of speech. And it’s worth considering that in a world of abundant text, in-person persuasion may have become more valuable still. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get ac...