Bridging the communication gap: applying business skills to creative fields

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about bridging the communication gap between social groups, whether they be industries, political parties or social classes. Though in earlier incarnations the internet allowed unprecedented freedom of communication, as tracking software, tech giants, legislation and big business increasingly find ways to get a handle on the web, we’re starting to be slowly corralled into an internet which shows us only what we’ve previously seemed interested in. This encroaching demographic isolation extends to interests, professions, academic specialisms and practically every other area of modern life. It’s easy to blame this on marketing tools which classify demographics to sell targeted advertising, or warn that we’re being run by algorithms, but similar problems of mutual distrust or absence of mutual understanding have existed throughout history. Ultimately, it all comes down to whether the will exists to learn, listen, value and communicate with those unlike ourselves.

Perhaps the clearest recent examples of this have been accusations that Netflix changed its shows’ artwork depending on the user’s demographic, uses of Facebook to deliver targeted political messaging and the Google ads that follow you across platforms and devices. We’re increasingly ringfencing ourselves, too. Thanks to the advent of smartphones, cars, self checkouts and noise-cancelling headphones, we talk to only those we want to talk to these days. If someone’s communication style or message doesn’t suit us, we’re not obliged to listen to them. If we want to look something up on Google, we’re unlikely to see results which challenge our expectations or ways of thinking. In fact, Google now follows our activity so closely that it can often predict our entire intended search entry from only a few entered characters.

This is comfortable, true, but it also prevents us from growing as people or professionally. Comfort is pleasant, but it is also stagnant. Like physical fitness or immune systems, we develop by exposing ourselves to new situations, challenges and ways of thinking, not by living in a bubble. Take, for instance, the women’s movements which have arisen under Trump. The issue was never threatened under Obama, a much more liberal president, and thus didn’t receive the same pressure. Yet under Trump we’ve seen the highest ever number of women and minorities elected to official offices including the strident Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Faced with a truly misogynistic president, women have taken defending their rights into their own hands. Similarly, in the face of not just inaction but active backsliding on climate change, Greta Thunberg has taken unprecedented action and inspired student protests on climate change in several other countries including France and the UK. Despite still being in school, she is now a veteran Davos speaker and sought after for interviews by major media outlets – including an article and podcast by the Financial Times.

After several decades of ultra-specialisation, we’re clearly in need of some lateral thinking. One of the most innovative ways I’ve seen of doing this lately is the application of business and finance skills to creative fields and environmental causes. Creative professionals and activists, like business and finance professionals, tend to stay within their social groups. More than anything, they are usually seen as entirely different politically. One, for instance, may be the free-thinking liberal who earnestly defends their national parks; the other may be the investor or property developer looking to set up a dam or sports resort. The classic recent example is, again, Donald Trump’s Turnberry golf course in Scotland, the construction of which partially destroyed protected Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) and drew passionate protests. In a divide seen across the international political landscape, these two sides typically disagree on whether the overriding priority should be morals or profitability.

Despite the apparent and sometimes vehement differences which exist between the two sides, there’s a lot to be gained from combining their skill sets and communication styles. The roots of the communication issues tend to be that liberal creatives and business types typically base their thinking on very different valuations of the situation, primarily because of the social norms, assumptions and approaches common to their respective demographics. Particular concern tends to derive from the inability of those with liberal values to make their case to business thinkers on moral grounds. The secret, it turns out, is to make that case in terms of profitability, brand management and the bottom line. These are, to say the least, unappealing to those who want to be as far as possible from grey suits and glass towers, but they do meaningfully engage with the mindset of the other side in ways that appealing to one’s conscience does not.

Along with an ability to understand alternative mindsets and how to communicate with them tends to come a certain skill set. Whilst some degree of business and finance skills are necessary to any creative entrepreneur, they are certainly not a priority, much less the driving force. Just as hedge fund managers are unlikely to have started their career at a trade union or environmental lobbying group, creative entrepreneurs and activists are unlikely to have focused on training in banking or an MBA as prerequisites to creating art or community initiatives. It’s no surprise, then, that the ability to develop strengths in both areas tends to make that individual a standout in their field. This is true whether they’re actively giving advice or just surprisingly sustainable due to starting out with a solid business plan.

1. Creative endeavours

In the podcasting world, Amanda McLoughlin has stood out as the business and finance driving force. Having started out with the unassuming responsibility for social media engagement for her team’s podcast, Join the Party, she has quickly emerged as a forward-thinking, talented consultant and adviser for podcasts looking to plan ahead and make ends meet. This has extended to taking part in panels and providing educational resources to fellow creators. Having gained her experience through a career start working in banking, McLoughlin speaks passionately and engagingly to her creative industry counterparts on how to build your social media presence, which funding models are common and achievable and what advertisers expect in terms of download numbers or payment models. McLoughlin has recently been a founding member of Multitude Productions, a podcast collective and consultancy group. The group describes itself as helping clients “produce, edit, market, and monetize great podcasts”. In a world where podcasts are usually haemorrhaging money and left to sort this out on their own, Multitude is a much-needed solution born of this inspired combination between creative and business-oriented thinking.

2. Green business

A similarly impressive use of communication adaptation has been Auden Schendler’s merging of environmentalist perspectives with business needs and language to promote sustainable business. Author of Getting Green Done: Hard Truths from the Front Lines of the Sustainability Movement, Auden is most known for his green initiatives at Aspen ski resort. The idea here is that for businesses to understand how they can engage with environmental ideas, they need to be communicated in terms of profit margins, PR gains and tax rewards for green initiatives. Auden’s focus for Aspen is on areas like clean power generation, emissions reduction, buildings’ energy use, brand management and policy. He focuses on communicating effectively with the right people and putting them in a room with groups they wouldn’t otherwise cross paths with.

This approach of being aware of differing social bubbles and effective communication techniques uses practicality to bridge the gap between business people and environmentalists, both usually found within similarly distinct echo-chamber tribes as those under Brexit Britain. Most outdoor enthusiasts want to be as close to the environment, and as far from urban society, as possible. Business executives are focused on running their business; an occupation not usually associated with undertaking initiatives with seemingly unclear, indirect results on their end. It’s not often that these two groups intersect. For an environmentalist who wants to make an impact on those who actually have the power to change the situation, adapting an environmentalist message to business speak does the hard work for their target audience and makes that message much more successful. Hear Auden explain his technique himself in his interview with outdoor ideas podcast Safety Third or read one of his written interviews in the Atlantic.

3. Voter clarity

More politically, one of the biggest lessons we can learn from the 1906 example set by the Liberals’ landslide win over a crashing Conservative party is the importance of adapting your message to the language of your audience. In that case, the debate was similar to Brexit: Free Trade versus Protectionism; international economic openness or defiant isolation. The argument for Free Trade was successfully made through the ‘Big loaf, little loaf’ campaign. This took an approach similar to the Bible’s use of farming analogies for a largely agricultural congregation. It made it clear that, under Free Trade, people would get the big loaf because it would cost less; under the tariffs of Protectionism, they would get only the small loaf for the same price. The equivalent these days is the rather less attractive, indeed threatening, phrase “the rising cost of living”. The political cartoons in this article show how the argument was being made in ways voters would find personally meaningful and relevant.

Both campaigns are undoubtedly divorced from reality to some degree. However, what they do achieve is to make the debate very clear to voters on both sides through terms meaningful to their lives. They anticipate voters’ concerns and demonstrate ways in which their lives would be impacted by the result. The discussion is being done in terms of everyday needs rather than the unfamiliar, distant and largely hypothetical terms of international relations. Most importantly, the argument for openness was being made equally clearly and on the same terms as the defensive perspective of ‘taking control’ and ‘choosing for yourself’; not normally a strength of Liberal or Left-wing politics.

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It’s clear that doing the hard work of translation and bridging the gap makes communicating your viewpoint far more effective in the long run. Business and finance in particular are legitimate professions in themselves, but they are also valuable skill sets which stand out and make a significant impact in other industries. Much as business and creative thinkers find themselves increasingly at odds in modern times, these examples show the potential progress to be made if we can combine those skill sets to present our ideas in ways meaningful to our intended audience. Conservative pragmatism and liberal awareness for social needs are a powerful combination for the betterment of professions and society more broadly. Rather than being at odds or seeing each group as self-contained and irreparably distinct, we could all do with recognising the progress to be made by combining approaches and working together to achieve our goals, whatever field we find ourselves in.