The PRovoke Media Podcast

Ruder Finn CEO Kathy Bloomgarden joins the Echo Chamber to discuss her learnings from this year's World Economic Forum. After attending the event for two decades, Bloomgarden is a genuine WEF veteran, and has plenty of advice for the public relations industry. 

Ketchum CEO Barri Rafferty joins us in Davos to discuss the mood at this year's World Economic Forum, how the event has changed over the years, how she survives such an intense week, and why more PR people should attend. 

To mark the 200th Echo Chamber podcast (and the 20th anniversary of the Holmes Report) Arun Sudhaman and Paul Holmes talk about the remarkable professional legacy and personal impact of Burson-Marsteller founder Harold Burson – coincidentally, the first ever interviewee on the Echo Chamber – who died last week, aged 98.

Jenny Scott is one of the founding partners of Apella Advisors, the strategic communications consultancy launched in London in April this year. Scott, who was executive director of communications at the Bank of England and a previous BBC Politics Show presenter, joins Maja Pawinska Sims in the Echo Chamber to talk about the agency's first report on how brands can prepare for the impact of "the swi...

Jennifer Risi  recently launched  her own communications agency after nearly a decade at Ogilvy. The agency, called the Sway Effect, speaks to the impact Risi hopes to have on the industry. In particular, she is looking to make a difference around the way agencies collaborate. She and industry veteran Bonin Bough join the Echo Chamber to talk about the Sway Effect and how they are thinking about w...

Egami Group founder/CEO Teneshia Jackson Warner is the first African-American woman to pick up a Cannes Lions Grand Prix. At PRovoke19's Entrepreneurs' Forum, she was interviewed onstage about how the industry needs to rethink its approach toward multicultural marketing.  

Producer Tony Hollingsworth has worked with companies, governments and charitable foundations on campaigns that sit at the intersection of comms, media and popular culture, including Nelson Mandela’s 70th Birthday Tribute and The Wall — Live in Berlin. Hollingsworth joins Diana Marszalek in the Echo Chamber to discuss the intricacies and challenges of orchestrating his latest project, the Global L...

In a discussion on diversity, Dr. Michael Lomax, the president of the United Negro College Fund, said people of color still faced enormous obstacles to inclusion. This session, recorded at PRovoke19, is brought to you in partnership with W2O Group. 

Enero Group non-executive director David Brain joins the Echo Chamber to examine Prince Andrew's car-crash of an interview on BBC Newsnight. In conversation with Arun Sudhaman, Brain discusses the PR challenges faced by the Royal Family and why Prince Andrew must learn the basics of crisis management. 

Maxim Behar, the CEO of M3 Communications in Bulgaria, joins Maja Pawinska Sims in the Echo Chamber on the publication of his new book, The Global PR Revolution. The ICCO past president talks about how PR has changed not only during his 25-year career, but more dramatically over the past couple of years, as social media has become a dominant force in the media and communications industries.

TK Kanchana is board member and head of the Organisation of Pharmaceutical Producers of India (OPPI), representing India's pharma industry at a time of considerable change across the country. Kanchana joins the Echo Chamber to discuss how she has overhauled OPPI's approach to communications, and how this has helped the pharma body build a more successful engagement platform. 

In this episode, Aarti Shah and the W2O Group's Aaron Strout reflect on key takeaways from #PRovoke19 , which took place in Washington, DC from October 21 to 23. Among the topics they touch on: how empathetic brands allow employees to be themselves at work, the urgency for the PR industry to speak the language of business, and how Generation Z will accelerate change in unprecedented ways. To read...

As organisations and companies such as the NBA, Apple and Blizzard face the dilemma of standing up for their values or staying quiet on events in Hong Kong to protect their interests in China, Arun Sudhaman and Paul Holmes talk through the challenges of doing business in China for brands. They also preview the themes and sessions at the Holmes Report’s PRovoke Global PR Summit, being held from Oct...

André Labadie, Brands2Life’s managing director of business and technology, has written a new white paper on the communications landscape around artificial intelligence. He joins Maja Pawinska Sims in the Echo Chamber to talk through the challenges of bringing AI stories to life in a crowded market, including ethics, education and “AI-washing."

PR industry veterans Richard Houghton and Crispin Manners, who have run agencies including Shandwick, Ketchum, FleishmanHillard and Kaizo, are the co-authors of a new book for PR agency leaders: 'Grow, Build, Sell, Live.' They join Maja Pawinska Sims in the Echo Chamber to talk about the new book – a PRCA practice guide – and the biggest mistakes that owner-managers make when building their own fi...

Mary Pollard has led on purpose at corporate communications consultancy Portland since the start of 2019. She joins Maja Pawinska Sims in the Echo Chamber to talk about the agency's first Total Value Index, which shows the true value of a business when purpose and profit are evaluated together, including the 'opportunity gap' – where companies are not telling their purposeful stories clearly enoug...

As vice president of marketing for Panasonic North America, Brian Rowley is charged with changing the perception of Panasonic in the US from a TV and radio company into an operation creating 21st century technology for businesses. He joins Diana Marszalek in the Echo Chamber to talk about the evolution of the brand over the past 100 years, and its shift in focus from consumer to B2B.

When Cindy Krupp, founder of the boutique fashion communications agency Krupp Group, couldn’t find college-age influencers to work with her clients, she created 28 Row, a network of young women well-versed in working with brands. Krupp and one of those influencers, Madison Krause (known as gaptoothginger on Instagram) join Diana Marszalek in the Echo Chamber to talk about why influencers in this d...

Jamie McLaughlin, president of Capstone Hill Search, joins Diana Marszalek in the Echo Chamber to share his insights on the expectations of job seekers in the communications industry and the people who hire PR talent, as well as where those expectations are — and aren’t — in sync.

In the wake of the Holmes Report breaking the news that the Hong Kong leadership had failed to attract any PR agencies to pitch for a reputation management campaign, Arun Sudhaman, who is based in Hong Kong, talks to Maja Pawinska Sims about why the brief has proved so toxic, including employee activism, ethics, communications around "One Country Two Systems" and the reputation challenges that Hon...

Paul Holmes examines the Business Roundtable's recent announcement that shareholder interests do not outweigh the broader concerns of society and employees. It is a seminal proposal for the industry group that represents America's top CEOs, coming after decades in which Milton Friedman's orthodoxy on shareholder returns above all else went unchallenged. But there is plenty to suggest that the Busi...

NewsWhip CEO Paul Quigley joins the Echo Chamber to talk about how content spreads online. In a conversation with Aarti Shah, Quigley explains how understanding the way content moves online can help the PR industry evolve its approach to predictive analytics and also fight misinformation. NewsWhip has also partnered with the Holmes Report on a multipart series exploring these topics that can be ac...

Holmes Report CEO and editor-in-chief Arun Sudhaman, who is based in Hong Kong, talks to EMEA editor Maja Pawinska Sims about the increasingly turbulent political situation in the city, and assesses whether the Hong Kong leadership or the protestors are winning from a crisis management, communications and PR perspective, as well as looking at the role of technology and the media in the ongoing con...

Generation Alpha is described as children of Millennials — or those born after 2010, notably the year the iPad and Instagram launched. In this episode of the Echo Chamber, Hotwire's Laura MacDonald talks about how these technological inventions are changing kids’ minds and what that ultimately means for communications. She also draws upon research  that Hotwire conducted (in partnership with Wired...

FleishmanHillard Fishburn's corporate managing director Steph Bailey joins the Echo Chamber to talk through the agency's latest Authenticity Gap report. Now in its seventh year, the research looks at the issues that consumers are now expecting brands to take a stand on, from data privacy and security to the climate emergency.