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Andrew is a key reason why Water & Wall has become such an extraordinary place to do business and we’re delighted that the industry has taken notice. 

We’d love it if you connected with him on LinkedIn and the agency LinkedIn for some shop talk. 

In the meantime, check out what PRWeek had to say about our co-founder here. 

Recently, one of our client CEOs had a video call with a Barron’s editor. Now, the on-camera conversation is nothing new in modern earned media engagement. In fact, most of our clients have become so adept at the live or taped on-camera interview that when they had to transition to the at-home format, it’s as if they were trained broadcasters themselves. Applause! However, this interview example is different as it could’ve been done by phone. Yet, in this particular case, in these strangest of times, there was a need for the video interview and it goes well beyond just being seen.

Goodbye Media Tours

At the start of NYC shelter-in-place, we thought about what would change about our communications and marketing work. One of the first things that came to mind was the age-old, get-to-know-you media tactic that yields as many meaningful relationships and earned coverage as it does logistical headaches: the media tour. The media tour is the ideal activity for an expert source to develop the relationships with journalists who cover the goings on in their business. It’s also a smart and far more personal way to promote good news.

The media tour is also an opportunity for said sources to establish trust with the journalist who is likely among just a handful of people who produces content for the audience, or customer, that matters most to the source. It’s a press junket or conference that acts more like a one-on-one campaign roadshow. In the best of circumstances, a day of handshakes, excess caffeine and lunches with poor acoustics in New York City restaurants stimulates on-the-record conversations that stoke near- and long-term ideas that lead to compelling coverage for a brand.

Three months ago, we wouldn’t have questioned any of that and now the model is inherently flawed. Who in the next 12-18 months (and likely much longer) would go through what it takes to get to and experience a densely populated city for business meetings? This has to mean the death of the media tour, right? Not exactly.

Long Live Media Tours

This is where we get to what Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called the “reimagining” phase of the workplace and the media tour reimagined could still happen. The obviousness of its future reliant of video interviews aside, here is what the comms pro and the expert source need to consider when doing remote media tours, which are soon to be the thing.

Human Connection Matters More Than Ever

There’s something to be said about that interpersonal connection that happens when people sit around the same table and talk sans tech. If a journalist is willing to reserve the time to talk to a source on camera, something that in most cases could be achieved by a phone call, make sure there’s time for informal conversation whether it’s about the books behind someone, or the bad lighting or what hobbies they developed during shelter-in-place.

Sharing Is, Well – As much as it is a conversation, think of the video interview more as a presentation. Cue the screen share. What information, as a source, are you bringing to the interview and how can you show what’s in front of you to illustrate support of a thesis to a journalist. In financial services that’s often achieved with tables and charts. We used to bring these to meetings with limitations and now there are no limits to what you can share. (Unless compliance says otherwise, of course.)

You’re An Instant Omni-Channel Star – In this way, a video can be no different than a recorded / taped broadcast segment. A journalist has the option to record a full on-camera meeting if the expert source approves the recording. That recording, depending on the outlet, could be repurposed as media coverage later on any number of channels such as LinkedIn, YouTube and Twitter. As always, the interview terms should be discussed in advance.

Off the Record is Now More Sensitive – Acknowledging that forthcoming info is off the record or on background often moves with the flow of an in-person conversation. Now, as in phone calls, terms of use must be made explicitly clear. For now, with the video tools available and in use, we wouldn’t recommend sharing any insight that you wouldn’t want to see broadcast. Oh, and always remember to go back on the record.

Every Interview Could Be as Colorful as a Feature Story – You’ve read the New York Times or Rolling Stone magazine profiles. There are few places in print journalism more conducive to the color coordination of words. Every celebrity interview references, sometimes with picture perfect detail, the setting of the reporter – movie star conversation. That ancillary detail lends itself to the anecdotal style of those types of articles. We’re not accustomed to that detail in financial services and yet we’ve already had clients share and have published seemingly insignificant information about their shelter-in-place surroundings or their at-home workout routine.

None of this is the forever change as we see it and there will be plenty of back-and-forth in the usual modes of communication. For a time, this is how we have to think as we adapt in this particular case, in these strangest of times.

Many of us have the opportunity of regularly working from home, a benefit provided by many companies across a wide swath of industries. But what happens if your profession is reliant on you being present in-person? To understand the trials and tribulations of what it’s like to be a litigator in the Age of COVID-19, we sat down with David Lackowitz, Co-chair of the Litigation Practice at Moses & Singer, LLP. 

An experienced litigator, David shares with us what he thinks the legal profession will look like in the future, as well as client confidentiality, and the resilience of New Yorkers.

So, David, how are you doing in the current environment?

The transition to working remotely was considerably more seamless than I had anticipated.  In terms of remote technology and access to clients and their files, given I’ve largely been paperless for years, so I really didn’t miss a beat. While it has at times been challenging juggling work and the kids, in particular with my wife also working full-time, there have been some silver linings.  I’ve had more meals with my family in the past two-plus months than I probably had in the prior two years.

Many professional businesses can work remotely with little disruption. Is the same true of the legal profession?

We had numerous attorneys working remotely fairly regularly long before COVID-19 and so again, from a technology standpoint, we were pretty well-situated for the adjustment. The firm was well-prepared and has always had a crisis management plan in place, which helped make the transition smooth for everyone. As a litigator, the remote oral arguments required a bit of getting used to but in general, I have found virtually no disruption to my day-to-day (other than my kids who seem to constantly need something).  

As a litigator, working from home must have its own set of challenges. What are they, and how have you overcome them?

I think the most challenging aspect of remote working has been the lack of in-person collaboration. Litigation is by nature a particularly collaborative practice and it’s just not the same communicating remotely. I’ve found oral argument, in particular without video, to be challenging, as a big part of argument is getting a feel for the judge and one’s adversary, which is much tougher to do remotely, and impossible absent video.  But it remains a level playing field and all litigators are dealing with the same constraints.

Do you think the legal profession will go back to its former business model, or are you expecting to see changes in the way business gets done?

I think the industry will largely get back to its pre-COVID-19 days. With that said, I do think we’ll have more lawyers working remotely more often and I suspect law firms will be cognizant of the ability of their lawyers to work remotely fairly effortlessly as they consider what size space to take on going forward.  A lawyer friend of mine with his own firm a bit smaller than ours said to me recently that it’s very unlikely that he renews his lease when it’s up as there’s no need to continue taking on such overhead when he can have half his staff work remotely on any given day.  But for us, having recently renewed our lease, I think we’ll largely revert back to our pre-pandemic mode of operations.

What have you done to assure clients the confidentiality of your work is maintained in a work from home environment?

That’s an interesting question.  Client confidentiality is a priority matter at Moses & Singer.  Pre-COVID, the firm assessed and took measures to ensure that attorneys working remotely would be able to maintain client confidentiality.  As we prepared for the office closure, our IT department was tasked with testing and implementing systems relating to access to client communications, information, and documents. 

What can you tell us about the resilience of your team, and all Americans, in the current environment?

This has been one of the silver linings I mentioned previously.  To see how well our team adapted, and how hard everyone continues to work, has been truly remarkable.  I’m not sure I’m best equipped to opine on all how Americans are dealing with the current environment but what I do know is that we’ve seen how resilient NYC can be and my view is that we’ll be back, and stronger than ever once we’re able put the current pandemic behind us.  

In a recent blog for Business Wire, Matt Kirdahy, Partner at Water & Wall, gives his two cents about the changing tone for how we talk about environmental, social and governance themes and drivers behind the shift. 

In many ways, how we talk about environmental, social and governance themes hasn’t changed in a long time. What has changed in the last decade, though, is we’re discussing it an awful lot more, which means the choices we make in how we communicate on ESG and impact and sustainable business – and the myriad ways we refer to same – are far more critical in the months and years ahead. Because if nothing else, this pandemic has reminded us that people are more interconnected as a global society than they’ve been in human history, never mind the last decade.

In March 2009, the Harvard Business Review published a piece by Mindy Lubber, president of the sustainable investing coalition Ceres. Mindy continues to be a leader and forward thinker on the topic, which is evident in the title to this 11-year-old editorial, “Is ESG Data Going Mainstream?” It certainly was. “Pressure is building for companies to do better,” Lubber wrote just after the Financial Crisis in the same month the markets started an historic 10-year bull run.

Maybe companies felt so much pressure that the ones monitoring them overdid it simply because we’re still having difficulty clearly articulating what is – and isn’t – ESG.

The Financial Times recently published an article about SEC Chairman Jay Clayton’s views on ESG scoring systems and how they’re in danger of being “imprecise.” We’re still talking about data after all this time and it’s reached a point that its use has become so ubiquitous, lines blur between the E, S and G. If it’s confusing to the people who are being paid to discern one from another, what can be said about everyday people and investors’ understanding?

To anyone who’s in the ESG world today: It’s time for considerate thinking and meaningful action in the way we communicate on the matter, whether the focus is social good or climate preservation, because more of us are paying attention.

According to Investopedia’s Editor in Chief Caleb Silver, “reader interest for ESG is up 20% year over year, and our most popular article on the subject has spiked more than 1300%. ESG was one of our top-10 most popular terms in 2019 and 2018.”

What a proof point! Here’s what the path forward on effective ESG communications looks like.  

ESG data will become so commercialized that investors and consumers will be able to look it up on their phones like a Rotten Tomato score. That means a degree of transparency on certain methodologies that is at the moment not yet available. There are various reliable sources that measure a company’s ESG value. The private score keepers might find that they are challenged to produce clear and concise details that helped them arrive at supposed values for a given ESG call. For instance, if an asset manager says Acme Company did or did not meet the criteria to be included in a given ESG investment, the “why” or “why not” will have to be substantiated more thoroughly and publicly beyond just saying yes or no, because the next generation of investors will demand more transparency. We’re seeing this play out now on the social injustice front. People are making it clear how the only path forward is an equitable one for all and they want to know how brands will make that happen. Words matters. Action matters more. 

Accountability will be paramount. It’s not so difficult to believe there are companies who don’t – to use an overused adage – practice what they preach. While “talking the talk” but not “walking the walk” may have worked for a while, investor, media and consumer scrutiny is quickly forcing companies to up their ESG game – and quickly. Producing big content pieces on sustainability but not enacting them within their own organization is a recipe for disaster, or in the least a lawsuit and scathing media coverage. Companies have more constituents who are more engaged and active than ever before, which will force companies to be more accountable and actionable.

Gen-Z and younger Millennials will have a clear understanding of what “ESG” means. One could make a strong case that no one’s talking about ESG as an investment strategy at dinner amongst friends and family. Sure, you might get “sustainability” or “impact” sprinkled into a Thanksgiving tete-a-tete, but most Americans, for starters, regardless of what any survey says, struggle with even the most basic aspects of their finances and 401(k) accounts, let alone specific investment strategies that tied to a particular ESG strategy. The first brand or brands to enrich the youngest of us will embolden that audience to the benefit of their business. Right now, anecdotally speaking, ESG remains a mostly inaccessible term.

US companies, particularly those with no international footprint, will finally grasp how small the world actually is. It took a global pandemic to understand that our neighbors across oceans might as well be just up the street. In financial communications and marketing, we often dispatch messages based on key life events as decision-making drives where money goes and stays. For instance, how families might save for their future college students’ tuition. The scope of that decision often was not limited to where to study close to home, the home now that until recently none of us could leave.

“In Five Oceans, Five Deeps,” Ben Taub of the New Yorker writes, “Waves are local – the brushing of the ocean by the wind. Swells roll for thousands of miles across open water, unaffected by the weather of the moment.”

Throughout the piece, Taub talks about the weather as it factors in any calculated plunge to our blue planet’s depths. His description to an unrelated topic is perhaps the way we could and should think about how we communicate with others on matters of the environment, social good and leadership. That while so seemingly small and insignificant, we are waves interconnected to form something that surrounds us all.

Check out the blog and more from Business Wire here. 

We talked to Jennie on or about the time most of us were thrust into a remote work and learning environment for the first time in our lives. It was an uncertain time. It was strange. It was just a couple months ago. Now, while some U.S. universities have approved Fall semester on-campus learning within new safety guidelines, many students at all levels will continue to learn in a virtual classroom and they will graduate into a professional life where they’re likely to learn how to succeed from a distance.

As an experienced online and in-classroom professor, Jennie shared her thoughts with us on what the future of learning could look like and what advice she has for the graduating class of 2026.

As a professor who is constantly engaged face-to-face with students and peers, what was it like to adapt to new teaching methods in a pandemic?

While I was engaged with students and peers in a primarily face-to-face format at the start of this semester, I’ve been designing and teaching online and multimodal courses for about 14 years now. Switching from one mode to another mid-way through the semester wasn’t as challenging for me as it was for others. However, the time frame in which we had to do it – a few days or week – was another story, particularly with everything else going on. There’s a difference between distance or remote learning, or rather, what many have been doing the past couple of months, versus true online learning. It takes a lot of time and thought to effectively design, teach and participate in an online course; things that were in short supply when the transition to remote learning occurred. But as a communication professional and professor, I find that skills like thinking on your feet and being adaptable serve you well in times like this.

What are your students saying to you about all this? What are their greatest concerns?

I believe we’re feeling similar things regardless of whether we’re communication students or professionals. For example, I find that many students missed the in-person interactions and experiences they have when they’re part of an on-campus community. In addition, many students, particularly the juniors and seniors, are worried about the economy and availability of jobs, just like many pros are.     

Prior to this, in say the last decade, what event or innovation or trend forced a change in the communications industry? What was that like?

Wow – that’s a tough question to answer! It’s hard to narrow it down to one specific event or innovation or trend. In general, though, I believe that technology has had a major impact on our industry. The world is a much smaller place, and the speed in which we communicate, as well as the number of channels or mediums through which we do so, has increased dramatically. With that said, the basics stay the same. We’re in the relationship business, and in order to build effective relationships, we need to know and understand our audience, tailor our message and communicate it in the most relevant way possible. We also need to seek feedback, listen and use insights to create connections.   

While it’s difficult if not impossible to look this far out, what do you think will be the long-term impact on current students who are now learning in, likely, non-traditional ways?

I’ve always believed that communication students, like their professional counterparts, need to be continuous learners. The more open they are to non-traditional ways of learning, the better prepared and able they will be to deal with the uncertainty and change that comes with working in this industry.

Have there been any positive changes recently because of the way you and the students have had to adapt?

I believe we’ve embraced technology to stay connected, but also recognized, and hopefully appreciated, the need for human interaction. It’s funny, because I’ve recently noticed a change in the conversations I was having with others outside the classroom, too, like with various customer service reps. It didn’t feel like they were reading from a script, but rather, were real people. It seemed like we were having actual conversations versus conducting business transactions.

Have you any insight on how the last few months will change the way you think about teaching communications in the next, say, few years, or longer? (more a question about theory than the actual act of teaching on video or in a classroom. Would a lesson plan on how we communicate change? That kind of thing.)

Like many others, I haven’t had much time to pause; to take a step back and reflect on what’s happened and how it will change things in the future. With that said, it has reaffirmed a few things for me, like the importance of clear, consistent and authentic communication.  

What advice would you give to the graduating class of 2026?

You’ve got this! It may be challenging, but stay positive. Be a sponge – soak up every opportunity to learn and grow personally and professionally. Network with your peers and professors, alumni and industry pros. And don’t be afraid. Rather, be curious and embrace the unknown. In the words of Dr. Seuss, “Out there things can happen and frequently do…And when things start to happen, don’t worry. Don’t stew. Just go right along. You’ll start happening too!”

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When we make a mistake at work, it’s common for us to feel anxious or stressed about how our colleagues or clients will react, and in some cases, what sort of consequences might follow. This can be even more stressful as we all work from home because we can’t speak with our colleagues directly about what happened. However, by following a few simple steps, you can handle your mistake with ease, learn from what happened, and bounce back in a way that will help ensure you avoid making the same mistake in the future:

Own It Right Away – Regardless of the error, the only way to begin to fix the problem is to own it. If it should have to do with client work, and it impacts the client directly, work with your supervisor on a plan to reach out to the client directly. Avoid excuses, which can sound an awful lot like reasons to you, and review the facts. Your colleagues and/or clients may not be very happy with you when you initially tell them, but in the long run they will show you more respect if they see you are taking the initiative to fix it. For example, perhaps you sent out a press release prematurely or without confirming with the client first. Rather than desperately trying to recall your email or tell the person/persons you sent it to not to open it, reach out to your client and tell them what happened. Communication is even more important right now since most of us are not in the office, and honesty is always the best policy.

Provide the Solution – This may seem obvious, but when you reach out to your client, come prepared with a solution to fix or begin to address the mistake, rather than simply flagging to them that it happened. A plausible solution shows your client that you are already thinking about overcoming this, and usually what makes or breaks the outcome of the situation. As PR professionals, we are meant to be an extension of the client and their trusted partner, so already having a solution to fix the error is paramount.

Learn and Improve – They say failure isn’t about falling down, but rather how we get back up, and the same is true for making mistakes in the office or when working from home. To move forward, think about what led to your mistake and if applicable, change your habits, processes, or anything else you need to so that you are confident that it won’t happen again. If you need help, try connecting with your manager or trusted mentor to chat through what happened and get a second perspective. Ultimately, you won’t be able to change what already happened, but you can learn from it and ensure you don’t make the same mistake again.

Don’t Dwell – We all beat ourselves up when we make mistakes, but we can’t dwell on them forever. Instead of stressing yourself out or doubting your competence remember that mistakes happen, and this is something you can learn from.

Once you’ve followed the steps above, the last thing to do is simply move forward. At this point you’ve apologized and owned up to your mistake, provided a solution to fix it, analyzed where you went wrong, and taken steps to help you prevent it from happening again. Now, you owe it to yourself and to your clients to put it behind you and not let your day-to-day performance be impacted by one error.

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