“I was asked to speak at the AIGA National Conference in Chicago about the fact that women make less money than men. It’s an endless, emotional subject colored by centuries of opinions. The follow- ing, nevertheless, is one more point of view. I believe that money and power will not come through legislation, although that may give women the confidence to act. It will come through an understanding of how our behavior has been conditioned by stereotypes, how our expectation levels are set and of the responsibility we share in setting those expectations...”
“When it is said that somebody is ‘getting what they deserve,’ it usually means that they are getting their comeuppance. The implication is that they’ve brought it on themselves, and often a hint of self-righteous satisfaction can be detected on the part of the speaker. Early on in my first job as a creative director at an advertising agency, I heard this expression directed at clients. In context, ‘they’ were responsible for anything that wasn’t brilliant, while ‘we’ were responsible for anything that was. Somehow, if the work wasn’t really very good, it was due to an undeserving, unsophisticated, misbehaving client, and no fault at all of the person doing the work...”
“Who are the companies we think of when it comes to being green? It’s likely they’re those mid-size to small, facile companies (Patagonia, Seventh Generation, etc.), many of which were conceived as green and socially conscious enterprises to begin with. It’s not easy being green, as Kermit famously said, not if you’re honestly trying to create a sustainable company...”
Communication transforms intent into action, and decisions into results. Managers who are willing to challenge the view that corporate communication is merely reporting news and events after the fact face a substantial opportunity to use communication as a defining force for their organizations. Judging by the thousands of corporations who now publish sustainability reports as their standard approach to communicating CSR, many companies still consider communications as simply a means...
“In the Northeastern United States we have problems with deer devouring our tulips in the spring, before we get to enjoy them. In Connecticut where I live, porcupines eat our apples and pears from the trees, just when they’re ready to pick, wild turkeys eat every last blueberry, and once a season or so a black bear raids the bird feeders, bending the steel poles like paper clips to get the seeds. People with gardens spend a lot of energy trying to outsmart the local wildlife. Mostly we fail...”
“Communication Arts. Hmmmm, let me think. Has there ever been a better moment in the history of the universe to ponder the art of communication? Or a time when the fate of life as we know it hangs on our ability not only to communicate but to actually understand each other?...”
“Consumers are taking control of communication, turning the table on corporations, says Cheryl Heller, the award-winning principle of Heller Communication Design in New York. In this context, losing control means that messages can’t be managed, and things that companies prefer not to talk about can’t be hidden as easily as they once were, she says, so the only course of action is to make sure that everything you say is true...”
The No Bullshit Guide to Branding
“There is little argument about what a brand is. The first ones were created when suppliers put their names on the products they sold in order to take both credit and responsibility for their quality.
Two things have made brands more important in the last couple of decades. First, the proliferation of products and the ease with which technology has made it possible for followers to mimic innovators has meant that often the only real difference between a consumer’s alternatives in a given category is the brand name. And second, in the frenzy of mergers and acquisitions, well-known brands increase the value of the company being bought or sold.”