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There are many reasons why we look for new jobs – ambitions to move up, to try a new sector, to leave a bad boss. But, it’s important to be a little selective in what we apply for – job hunting is notoriously time-consuming, often frustrating and for a sure a commitment.
by Darren Caveney
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You know you fit the person spec. You know you can do the job if you get the chance. But you have an interview to navigate and some questions to answer. How can you increase the odds of coming out on top?
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There’s a fascinating jobs market playing out across the UK right now, with opportunities aplenty for those looking to change things up. What’s happening and what does it mean for the communications industry?
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Creativity Lab 2 is going to be a unique opportunity to hear from creative, advertising and branding agencies on their secrets and top tips to delivering your best creative work.
Make sure it’s in your diary…
by Darren Caveney
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Here’s a brand new online event you’ll love - The Power of Social for Good - celebrating, inspiring & conversing with public sector comms stars with a little help from Dr Alex George...
by Jen Morris
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We all felt the challenge of 2020 but for children and young people, last year could mark a generation.
by Rebecca Roberts
It’s always hard to picture your younger years through any perspective other than the one you experienced. It’s what makes speaking with youth audiences a tricky balance of effective audience engagement, ignoring pre-conceived assumptions on “young people today” and the avoidance of parent-dancing (perhaps dad-dancing should be replaced with ‘parent TikToks’ now…)
But whilst many of us want to improve our youth engagement within our work, when it comes to youth audiences it’s the default to ‘tell’ them, group them into a massive audience bracket and hope that some young people checking work will help us achieve a better tone. If anything can be learnt from the messaging to youth audiences during the pandemic it’s that this categorically does not empower young people or influence their behaviour.
Whilst many predicted the exponential impact on young people of stopping then restricting their normal school lives, limiting how they experienced further and higher education, shifting their social environment and then blaming them frequently in the media, COVID-19 has had a very real and widespread impact on every aspect of their lives and future prospects.
Lockdown Life of Young People 2020 – is a paper I’ve just put out drawing on some of the key data being shared about children and young people in the UK. What lockdown meant, the impact on their mental, emotional and physical wellbeing, the widening educational gap and undeniable social inequality that underpins all of this, plus some of the media habits as a result of learning at home and being cut off from wider friends and family.
As one guest on the Hear It Podcast told me recently – we know that young people find it a lot harder than adults to process living life in such a restricted way. They’re returning to school less active and with wider rates of mental health issues. And let’s not even start on how bleak the future economy may look to a graduate hoping to get a job, because youth unemployment rates are the highest they’ve ever been and graduate schemes were some of the first to be trimmed by large companies.
Some of the data coming out on how youth audiences see their future was some of the hardest to read doing this paper. Large proportions of young people are lowering their aspirations and expectations in life because of the pandemic. And younger children have been hardest hit in terms of their overall development at school, often regressing and struggling to cope.
Whilst the data highlights how bleak much of this picture looks, it’s something that is important to be conscious of as we pave a way to broader our conversation with younger audiences, in whatever aspect of our work. Not least due to the changing habits and ways in which their ecosystem has changed, some of which showing immense opportunity and shifts in expectations.
comms2point0 and Thread & Fable’s Youth Matters Workshop has had a refresh for 2021 - we’re really excited to have come up with a three-part virtual programme.
We’ll equip you with the tools, insights and practice needed to better engage young people within your work.
Sound useful? You can book your place HERE.
We’re offering reduced price tickets for public, third, charity and voluntary sector people.
Looking forward to seeing some of you there.
Rebecca Roberts is founder of Thread & Fable. You can say hello on Twitter at @rebecca7roberts
Image via Archivo Historico Sinaloa
by Darren Caveney
It’s clear now that autumn/winter is going to carry on in the same vein as most of the rest of 2020. Long hours, working from home, increased meetings and emails, raised expectations, and a ‘to do’ list which just won’t go away.
It’s a risk to our mental health and wellbeing.
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Granicus recently analysed the data of thousands of emails sent to UK subscribers via the govDelivery platform last year. As Granicus only works with public sector organisations, I can share some interesting stats and reveal the benchmarks for email engagement in the UK public sector. There’s some great news here – especially if you work in the public sector and want to get your important messages out to as many people as possible.
by Matt Johnson
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I saw a tweet recently pointing fun at that classic ‘forced creativity’ teams are sometimes made to do; locked up in an ill-lit office for four hours, perhaps a paid-for light lunch or a packet of biscuits, told to come up with the ‘best ideas you’ve ever had’ for [insert campaign/launch/crisis here].
Sometimes progress is made that way, most likely it’s a little while after, when people have had time to sit with some of the ideas and a moment of clarity comes to them. What’s worse than that forced creative time in an unforgiving office room I hear you ask? ALL OF LOCKDOWN. Well, maybe.
I could have ended the blog right there! But Comms don’t quit…
by Rebecca Roberts
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I have a usually strict rule that I’ll never publicly criticise any other public sector comms people’s work.
So it gives me no pleasure to report that recent public communications from Central Government on COVID-19 have tested this rule to breaking point.
by Ben Capper
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I have a theory that Covid focused the minds of many a management team to the point that some of the daft and less important comms requests went away. And guess what – comms teams across the sectors delivered some outstanding work delivering for their communities, their patients, their residents and their vulnerable citizens. Serious hours have been worked but with a laser-like determination of supporting our communities through the pandemic.
by Darren Caveney
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