Each of these books was thought provoking, surprising, entertaining and sometimes all three. Maybe you’ll find one that tickles your fancy. Enjoy.

Geopolitics

The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future by Stephen Marche

This book is a bleak forecast of the future of America, exploring the divisions and conflicts that threaten to tear the nation apart. Stephen Marche looks at a range of issues including politics, religion, and social media, and how these are fueling the divisions and tensions within the country. He argues that America is at a tipping point, and unless something is done to address these issues, the country is headed for a new civil war. (Link)

Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia by Peter Pomerantsev

I actually read two books by Peter Pomerantsev last year; this was my favourite of the two. Pomerantsev explores the bizarre and surreal world of contemporary Russia, where nothing is as it seems and anything is seemingly possible. He delves into the world of propaganda, media manipulation, and political corruption, and how these are shaping the country’s future. (Link)

Digital and Crisis Communications

Active Measures: The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare by Thomas Rid

While disinformation and misinformation are probably the hottest those topics have ever been, they aren’t by any means a new phenomenon. In this book, Thomas Rid examines the history and tactics of disinformation campaigns and political warfare, and how they have been used to manipulate public opinion and shape global events. He traces the evolution of these tactics over the years, and explores how they are being used today in the digital age. (Link)

True or False: A CIA Analyst’s Guide to Spotting Fake News by Cindy Otis

Written by former CIA analyst Cindy Otis, this book is a primer on identifying and combating fake news. Otis uses her expertise and experience to provide practical tips and strategies for spotting misinformation, and explains how to verify information and protect yourself. Along the way she looks at how fake news has spread around events as diverse as Jack the Ripper, the French Revolution and of course within today’s landscape. (Link)

Social Warming: The Dangerous and Polarising Effects of Social Media by Charles Arthur

Over the last year I think I’ve cited this book more than any other in myriad conversations about social media. Charles Arthur does an excellent, plain-language job of exploring the negative effects of social media on society, notably the unexpected ones, and how platforms have systematically failed to address them. Arthur looks at how social media is creating echo chambers and polarizing people, and how it is contributing to the spread of misinformation and hate speech. He also attempts to offer solutions for how to combat these negative trends. (Link)

Biographies

The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music by Dave Grohl

I’m a huge Foo Fighters fan. I’ve seen the live more times than I can count and I’ve fanboyed (is that a word?) over everything the band has done back to around 1996. So, Dave Grohl’s autobiography was like catnip for me. In this wonderful, humble collection of stories from his life and career. Grohl shares tales of his childhood, his time in the band Nirvana, and his work with the Foo Fighters, as well as his experiences with music and the music industry. If you don’t come out of this book wanting Dave Grohl as your dad, there’s something wrong with you. (Link)

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life: A Sortabiography by Eric Idle

Monty Python comedian Eric Idle reflects on his life and career. He shares stories from his childhood, his time with the Monty Python troupe, and his solo work, and provides insights into the world of comedy and entertainment. Funny, interesting, at times tragic. This is a snapshot of a life I can’t begin to imagine and which has had an immeasurable impact on the comedy landscape as we know it. (Link)

Just Ride: Racing 2,725 Miles to Mexico by Ty Hopkins

Amateur cyclist Ty Hopkins recount his experience racing his bike on the 2,000+ mile 2018 Tour Divide race from Canada to Mexico. He shares the challenges and adventures he faced along the way, and the lessons he learned about perseverance, determination, and the power of the human spirit. If you’re a cyclist like me, you’ll love this and might be tempted (maybe) to try doing something similar. If you’re not, like my wife, you’ll wonder what the hell is wrong with cyclists. (Link)

Life

How to Be Perfect: The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question by Michael Schur

My wife and I are currently on our fourth or fifth watching of The Good Place, the TV show created by the author of this book – Michael Schur. This book is a humorous guide to living a moral and fulfilling life, with an emphasis on the humour which it uses to good effect (especially during the cameos by actors from the show). Schur uses his expertise in ethics and philosophy to provide practical advice on how to make good choices and live a good life, with an entertaiing twist. (Link)

Work Stronger: Habits for More Energy, Less Stress, and Higher Performance at Work by Pete Leibman

This book by Pete Leibman is a guide to improving productivity and work-life balance. Leibman provides practical tips and strategies for managing your time, energy, and stress, and offers advice on how to boost your performance at work. I read this as I was feeling that my stamina was struggling to keep up with the pace of work and life. Just like Tiny Habits, which I read a couple of years ago, I found a number of small, practical takeaways I could put into practice immediately. (Link)

There you have it. Ten of my favourite non-fiction books from my literary adventures last year. I’m always on the look-out for books to add to my reading list, so if you have any recommendations, let me know!

The post Top ten non-fiction book recommendations from 2022 first appeared on Dave Fleet.

Traditional crisis management principles dictate that in order to mitigate the impact of a crisis, it is generally important to avoid amplifying the issue or giving it more attention than it deserves. This is based on the idea that the more attention an issue receives, the more influential it becomes, the further it spreads and the more damage it can do to an organization’s reputation.

The traditional approach to dealing with disinformation has therefore been to debunk it after the fact, by pointing out the factual errors and correcting the record. However, recent research has shown that this approach can be less effective than prebunking, which involves inoculating against false information by sharing and refuting it before it is disseminated by the spreader.

The idea behind prebunking is simple: if you can get the truth out there before the disinformation is spread, you can limit the reach and impact of the false information. One of the main reasons for this shift in approach is the fact that disinformation is often designed to go viral, and can spread rapidly through social networks. By the time traditional crisis management techniques are deployed reactively, the damage may already have been done.

Problems with debunking

A 2022 study in the journal Science Advances summarized five key challenges that research has identified with debunking:

1. Establishing what counts as factual information is difficult, particularly in some complex or contentious contexts.
2. Fact-checks are unlikely to reach everyone who was exposed to the initial misinformation, as fake news travels farther and faster online than factual information.
3. Debunking misinformation does not always nullify its effects (known as the continued influence effect).
4. Getting people to believe fact-checks is challenging.
5. Effective interventions are hard to scale.

Research supports a prebunking approach

In contrast, prebunking allows organizations to get ahead of the curve, proactively refuting false information before it has a chance to spread and do damage.

The effectiveness of prebunking as a strategy has been supported by several academic studies. The study above found that prebunking can be more effective than debunking in reducing the influence of misinformation. When people are exposed to a prebunk message before being presented with a false claim, they are more likely to reject the false claim than if they are presented with a debunk message after being exposed to the false claim.

Other studies have also found that prebunking can be more effective than debunking in reducing the spread of misinformation, particularly when it is combined with other strategies such as emphasizing the source of the information and providing clear, concise explanations.

Navigating the challenges

This approach is not without its risks, however. By actively engaging with and refuting disinformation, organizations do risk giving it more attention and potentially amplifying it further. This is especially true when it comes to highly controversial or divisive issues, where any action taken by an organization is likely to be met with backlash from one side or the other.

To mitigate this risk, it is important for organizations to carefully consider the implications of their actions and to be transparent about their intentions. For example, rather than simply refuting false information, organizations can provide context and explain why the information is false, while (when possible) also highlighting the sources of the potential disinformation and the motivations behind it.

Another key factor to consider is the credibility of the sources used to refute disinformation. In order to effectively prebunk false information, it is important to use reliable sources that are trusted by the public. This could include reputable news outlets, academic institutions, or independent fact-checking organizations. By using these types of sources, organizations can help to build trust with their audiences and demonstrate that they are committed to providing accurate and reliable information.

Additionally, prebunking may not always be appropriate in every situation. In some cases, it may be more effective to simply ignore the disinformation and let it fade away on its own.

There’s one more aspect here that I was just discussing with a colleague yesterday. Alongside targeted anti-mis/disinformation efforts, organizations need to be mapping out their areas of vulnerability, how those intersect from a ‘level of trust’ perspective with key stakeholders, and working proactively in parallel to build trust through the company’s actions in those areas.

Incorporating prebunking into anti-disinformation efforts

I’m not sure that any one of these things in isolation is sufficient. But for organizations who recognize they are at risk from mis- and disinformation, this three-layered approach on the back of a thorough risk assessment should lower risk much more effectively than debunking alone:

1. Take proactive action to build trust in areas of high risk
2. Prebunk high-risk narratives with key audiences to minimize their potential impact
3. Debunk misinformation that still breaks through

The tension between traditional crisis management principles and the emerging research on prebunking is a complex issue and it requires nuance in navigating the right approach. There’s no ‘one size fits all’ approach to be applied here. The fact remains, though, that it’s time to reconsider the blanket assumption that you simply shouldn’t repeat a negative.

Despite the challenges, prebunking is an important tool in the fight against disinformation and one that organizations should consider as part of their crisis management strategy. It’s not always easy to get the truth out there, but by being proactive and getting ahead of misinformation, organizations can protect their reputation and minimize the impact of a crisis.

The post The Power of Prebunking: Managing Disinformation in the Social Media Age first appeared on Dave Fleet.

Privacy. And trust.

As I wrote last week, there is an ongoing dearth of trust in the digital marketing industry. This wound is mostly self-inflicted and the outcome of many compounding activities, but can be distilled to this: Marketers took advantage of the near-limitless data available as people spent more and more time online, but didn’t always stop to think about how people would feel about it.

We are in the midst of seeing a privacy-first digital marketing landscape emerge which is going to have a big impact on our ability to reach and influence audiences, and the need for that landscape is – mostly – our fault.

Privacy is mainstream.

Privacy-related topics have never been more mainstream in society than they are now.

Social media usage has surged while wide-reaching lockdowns have accelerated digital transformation for businesses over the last six months. However, there is an ever-widening trust gap between the number of people using social media and their trust in what they see on those platforms – a fact reinforced in the latest Edelman Trust Barometer.

This trust gap is fueled by years of challenges. The privacy issues related to social are myriad and layered (see: The Social Dilemma), and have been further compounded recently by COVID-19 misinformation, the weaponisation of social media by state actors, domestic political pot-shots and by the ongoing whiplash-inducing saga that is TikTok.

Social media issues just scratch the surface. Personalized ads, location tracking, facial recognition, smart home devices, data aggregators, COVID-19 contact tracing apps and data breaches have all raised mainstream awareness of privacy issues.

Unfortunately, the industry kept pushing harder and harder in search of the holy grail of one-to-one advertising without thinking about peoples’ reactions to that level of data collection. Regulators and tech companies have made some progress to create better transparency but it’s a drop in the bucket. People aren’t happy. What’s more, they’re increasingly doing something about it.

The result: More than a quarter of US internet users are predicted to use an ad blocker by the end of 2021, and 70 per cent take some kind of action to avoid advertising. Third-party data and web cookies – which have powered digital marketing and analytics for over 20 years – are facing an existential threat. The prevalence of data brokers and third-party data suppliers is becoming challenged, and programmatic media in particular is going to get hard for companies relying primarily on third-party data.

Meanwhile, regulators are increasingly redefining privacy as a basic human right and some tech companies are turning privacy into a differentiator.

Marketing in a Privacy-First World

So, what does all of this mean for senior marketers?

1. Data with empathy

We have an opportunity to bring a new approach to collecting first-party data – one grounded in trust. This requires pairing an understanding of culture and human insight with robust science and quantitative techniques. Edelman’s global chief data & analytics officer Yannis Kotziagkiaouridis calls this “data with empathy.”

This starts with identifying insights into who people really are, beyond a superficial or transactional level. This understanding enables companies to connect with people by creating emotive, meaningful experiences fueled with empathy, ultimately leading to a mutual data value exchange in which trust is the foundation.  And when it is done right, data is the gift of empathy.

2. Targeting (as we know it) will evolve

As the supply of third-party data falls, it will become more expensive.As the supply of data goes down and demand remains high, we are likely to see the price of this data increase.

The acceleration of data-driven audience targeting we’ve seen in recent years will be balanced with increased interest in contextual advertising as access to third-party targeting data becomes more limited. We’re also likely to see some innovation in this area as the focus shifts, and to see more focus on content and creative as drivers of advertising effectiveness.

3. Tracking and attribution will get harder

We’ve already started to see an impact on measurement and attribution as the backlash against cookies has solidified. Marketers looking to determine detailed attribution are going to find that getting harder without digging beyond surface-level numbers, and those seeking to sequence content or implement frequency caps will find themselves similarly challenged. We are also encouraging marketers to evolve their scorecards to include longer term tangible business outcomes and reputational metrics to measure how effective campaigns are in driving trust with consumers.

4. Social media is not homogenous – and it’s not going away

There is an important difference in impact between peer-to-peer conversation on social media, and the impact of brand activities in those channels. We know this from our own research, which also tells us that there are things that brands can do to build trust in their own activities.

Companies must think carefully about social content strategy to ensure that voice, topic, look and feel all work together to build trust in brands’ content, versus damaging it. And it’s time to stop applying myopic one-way mindsets to two-way channels.

5. Shifting towards a privacy-first stance

Canada’s anti-spam legislation put the cat among the pigeons a few years ago, and the proposed Canadian Digital Charter Implementation Act will likely spark a new wave of attention on his topic. Heavily inspired by the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and California’s Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) with responsible data management at its core, businesses that haven’t already amended their practices in line with those regulations would be well-served to pay attention as this works its way through the system. (Check out Edelman’s view on the Digital Charter Implementation Act if you’re interested in learning more)

As regulations evolve, compliance is going to become increasingly complicated and essential. With regulators pushing for greater enforcement powers and the ability to audit without evidence of any violation, putting privacy at the centre is likely to become the only alternative to hefty legal bills.

It’s time to rebuild trust

Trust can’t be bought – it must be earned, and marketers for years have failed to heed that imperative. Businesses need to serve the needs of all stakeholders, and that includes communicating how you collect, use and process data in a consumer-friendly way. As a result, companies need to be prepared to shift and approach this with a reputational – not just regulatory – focus.

Legal privacy policies are no longer sufficient. The fine print is what got us into this mess to start with.

The post A Privacy-First Digital Marketing Landscape first appeared on Dave Fleet.

Over the last year we’ve seen a series of events fundamentally shake and undermine peoples’ confidence in a variety of facets of our society.

The global pandemic has redefined day-to-day life for people around the world – with almost two million lives lost and most peoples’ lives looking significantly different to how they did just one year ago. Widespread protests around systemic racism and racial justice led to a long-overdue wave of focus on diversity, equality and inclusion not only relating to the justice system but more broadly in society and the workplace. Most recently, events south of the border in the wake of the US election have shaken both the trust of many US residents in the ‘system’, and views of that system by people around the world.

These are just the headline events – each of these major events along with others on a smaller scale have rippled across our lives at a very personal and individual level.

A trust crisis

In this context, the global 2021 Edelman Trust Barometer finds the world in a trust crisis.

Richard Edelman refers to information bankruptcy, noting that in the face of an epidemic of misinformation, the institutions that we expect to guide the way in these moments – government and media – “have both failed to meet the test”.

“The 2021 Edelman Trust Barometer finds a new era of information bankruptcy and a trust ecosystem unable to confront it. The pandemic and infodemic are two strands of a Rambo DNA, inextricably linked in their destructive force. Government and media, the usual sources of quality information in a crisis, have both failed to meet the test.”

Richard Edelman

While the report itself is always immensely valuable in telling a macro picture, I’ve always found that the trust power of the report comes in the intersections of different threads of data and their implications. This year is no different. Amidst the gloomy outlook from this year’s Trust Barometer report, there are four significant implications for digital marketers and communicators:

1. Digital is facing a trust crisis
2. Brands need to build trust into their digital communications
3. Now is the time for CEOs to speak out online
4. A new mindset is needed in the face of rampant misinformation

Digital is facing a trust crisis

The Trust Barometer focuses on broader societal issues, but this year’s data touches on something I’ve been speaking about with our clients for several years now: There is an ongoing dearth of trust in the digital marketing field, and especially – but not only – in the social media space.

As this year’s report highlights, trust in all information sources is at record lows. Even search engines, which in the past have seemed remarkably resilient to some of the shifts faced by other channels, dipped below 60% for the first time since 2013.

But none have sunk as low as social media.

While social media usage surged over the last six months during the pandemic, and people continue to use it as a news source, there is an ever-widening trust gap between the number of people using social media and their trust in what they see on those platforms.

Social networks themselves are in the crosshairs, with a trust problem fueled by years of challenges. The privacy issues related to social are myriad and layered (see: The Social Dilemma), but I’d argue that events surrounding the 2016 US election – where privacy abuse in the Cambridge Analytica scandal played a significant role – proved a tipping point in trust and public awareness from which social networks have never truly recovered. COVID-19 misinformation, political conflict most recently capped by the de-platforming of President Trump, the ongoing whiplash-inducing saga that is TikTok and multiple mis-steps and self-inflicted wounds by the platforms have all compounded this of late.

The trust crisis in digital marketing goes beyond social media though, and to a great extent it is a crisis not just faced by – but caused by – the digital marketing field.

Myriad topics have chipped away at trust in the field over years, whether it’s creepy programmatic ad targeting, the market for peoples’ data, voice assistant privacy concerns, location-based tracking, facial-recognition tools or any of the other things that have made their way into the zeitgeist.

These issues have compounded over time, and as a result we are in the midst of seeing a privacy-first marketing landscape emerge through regulatory, technical and societal spheres. These will have a big impact on our ability to reach and influence audiences in the coming years.

Brands need to build trust into their digital communications

In the face of the trust deficit that digital marketing is facing, the implications are clear: in the absence of channels that are inherently trusted by the people we’re trying to reach, we need to start to more consciously and deliberately place trust as a key element of how we communicate with people.

This doesn’t mean every campaign has to be boring, earnest and beige, with talking-head videos staring people in the eye and slowly sapping our will to live. Some of this can manifest behind the scenes… raising the bar in influencer marketing by weeding out bad actors who have just bought their ‘followers’, implementing greater transparency around programmatic media or providing more value in return from the data we’re asking people to give us.

However, in a world where nearly 70% of people take at least some measures to avoid ads, there’s also an opportunity – perhaps an imperative – for us to think more carefully about how we approach our audiences directly.

Research shows that brand safety, values and purpose matter more as buying factors than ever before.  – from the people involved, to the way we make content from a brand recognizable by its audiences, to the causes that companies align themselves to along the way.

Critically, it is time to stop thinking with an inside-out perspective and start thinking about problems from the outside-in (here’s what they need to hear, vs here’s what we want to say to them).

Now is the time for CEOs to speak out online

It has never been more important for CEOs to speak out publicly.

Two years ago the 2019 Trust Barometer identified the central importance of the role of the workplace in the trust landscape. It noted that, “People have low confidence that societal institutions will help them navigate a turbulent world, so they are turning to a critical relationship: their employer.”

This trend has only increased in importance over the last two years, and it has reached a clear inflection point in this year’s report, as highlighted by three key data points.

1. Events of the last year have left businesses as the one institution seen as both ethical and competent, despite the massive impact of the pandemic on jobs and the economy. The success that businesses have seen in shifting their operations, contributing to vaccine development and rollout, and the stances we’ve seen companies take in the face of other major events led to a lift in perceptions around ethics, while mostly retaining its status as the most competent of the institutions.
2. While trust in businesses broadly has declined, “my employer” has remained a mainstay of trust across every one of the markets the report considered, and trust in this area is either flat or up in two thirds of the markets.
3. There is an expectation that CEOs speak out publicly. This expectation exists both internally and externally for companies. Employees see their CEOs as more credible than other sources, and the general population by an overwhelming margin expects CEOs to speak out on societal issues.

We’ve seen a significant shift towards CEOs finding their voice online over the last couple of years. This year’s report is a clear signal that for those who aren’t, now is the time.

A new mindset is needed in the face of rampant misinformation

The 2021 Trust Barometer highlights the epidemic of misinformation that we are all facing nowadays. An epidemic most clearly and recently highlighted by ongoing attempts to change the results of the US election based on fringe conspiracy theories which have been amplified and thrust into the mainstream by a combination of opportunistic politicians, far-right news networks and foreign state actors. At a societal level we’ve seen it manifest in discussions around the pandemic – most recently around vaccines – and racial justice protests. The level of disinformation activity around the UK’s Brexit vote has been similarly well-documented.

In fact, last year’s Trust Barometer highlighted that 76% of people worry about false information or fake news being used as a weapon.

This disinformation landscape isn’t limited to the societal level, nor is it just about conflicts between governments. There’s another level to this – one that plays out more directly for companies that find themselves as the subjects of this misinformation.

Recall the conspiracy theories last July around Wayfair and false allegations of human trafficking? This wasn’t just an isolated moment, nor is it only emerging now. In 2015, fake Twitter accounts associated with Russia’s Internet Research Agency attempted to spread false rumours of Walmart selling turkeys with salmonella a week before Thanksgiving. In 2017, Starbucks was forced to respond when fake stories originating on 4chan claiming it would give out free frappuccinos to undocumented immigrants in the US spread via Twitter.

It’s not enough to simply expect the tech companies – Facebook, Twitter, Google and others – to combat this situation in isolation. Companies need to start to prepare themselves. As Barron’s noted, “It is critical that companies have a response plan and capability in place and ready to go that includes communications, legal, and security elements for when they inevitably become a target.”

But even that is only the start. Our traditional crisis playbook is obsolete in the face of disinformation attacks. In a world where fringe outlets (and, yes, some politicians) work with a playbook that centres on overwhelming their targets with a sheer volume of misinformation, merely responding once misinformation becomes public is insufficient. Not only is it hard – perhaps impossible – to keep up with relentless misinformation, but fake news travels faster and farther than the truth (six times faster, it turns out).

In the face of this landscape, a reactive posture is insufficient. Brands must also be proactive in identifying risks, identifying misinformation before it breaks into the mainstream, and getting ahead of it.

Guardians of information quality

There’s no question that this year’s Trust Barometer paints a bleak picture of today’s trust landscape – and in the case of digital communication, this is just the latest data point in a number of long-standing trends.

But the data paints an equally vivid picture of the need for businesses to step up – in how they build and promote themselves and in how they protect their brands but also in being a voice of truth – a guardian of information quality amidst society’s information bankruptcy. The data is clear – at a time when other institutions are falling short, people expect brands to fill the void. And if we’re going to do that, we need to do it where people are spending their time: online.

(This post is based on the global 2021 Edelman Trust Barometer report. The Canadian report will be released on Feb 17, 2021. If you’re interested in attending the virtual launch event, head over here and register)

The post Digital is facing a Trust Crisis first appeared on Dave Fleet.

As I was reflecting on the tumultuous week over the last few days, I couldn’t help but be struck by a reminder that we as digital communicators should take from recent events – one that harkens back to narratives from a decade or so ago.

If you rent your house, you risk losing it.

Politics aside, the de-platforming of Donald Trump over the last few days was a reminder that building your house on a property you don’t own can be risky business.

This is a lesson that industry veterans learned back in the early days of social, when social networks would regularly make changes that caused seismic shifts for brands, and one that Christopher S. Penn reminded me of in his latest newsletter (which is always excellent and worth subscribing to).

Setting aside your personal opinion on whether tech CEOs should have that much influence over public discourse, it is a reminder that you don’t ‘own’ your social media presence.

Brands aren’t likely to run into the kind of issues that #45 has, but the underlying point remains. Facebook killed a billion-dollar industry overnight when it ceased to allow brands to set custom-built tabs on their Facebook Pages as their default landing experience. Then not too long after, they pulled the rug out from under brands who spent millions of dollars building their audiences on their platform when they decided to apply an algorithm to the Facebook timeline.

And they’re going to keep evolving. Brands who continue to invest in their rented channels while neglecting the very properties they own are missing an opportunity.

Turbulence ahead for digital marketing

2021 is likely to be a turbulent year in the digital marketing space. Multiple shifts – underpinned by a trust deficit in the marketing space – are combining to force a shift in some of the technologies that have formed the foundation of digital marketing for years:

• The death throes of the third-party cookie;
• The tightening of data through legislation in Europe, the US and soon Canada;
• The moves by Apple to allow people to opt-out of sharing their mobile device IDs with app developers and to remind people when apps use their location data.

All of these things, along with heightened cultural sensitivity to privacy (think: The Social Dilemma, Cambridge Analytica, TikTok controversy, Clearview) will combine to force a reckoning around marketers who rent vs own. First-party data isn’t short of its own challenges (legislative requirements around portability, deletion rights etc. all present challenges), but the benefits are significant.

None of these things can or should live in a silo. Social media activity isn’t an end unto itself – and ideally it can help to drive that data collection. So ask yourselves:

How are you building your email database – and are you building it with quality data?

How are you providing enough value to the user that they are willing to exchange their information in return for what you are offering?

How are you building your long tail of content on your own platforms?

Now is the time for brands to invest in their own properties. This doesn’t mean stepping back from social media, but it does mean ensuring that that activity drives some kind of long-term benefit.

Build on your own land.

The post The risk of building your social media house on someone else’s land first appeared on Dave Fleet.

I’m not usually one for new year’s resolutions but after the last year and amidst the turkey coma, tobogganing and frantically catching up on The Mandalorian over the holidays, I found myself reflecting on what I’ve learned and what I can do better.

I don’t have a nice neat list of ten things because, well, that’s not how it shook out. But here’s what I’ve got.

In many ways I was incredibly privileged and fortunate in how 2020 panned out for me. My family remained healthy and I was able to retain my job. I was able to take an unusual but rewarding paternity leave – something that I think is incredibly important for all parents (moms and dads) to do.

At work, while we went through a tough and painful period early in the pandemic, I was floored and so proud of how my team pulled together, showed immense resilience and delivered some truly outstanding work for our clients despite everything thrown in our way.

I was fortunate to be able to approach the widespread protests around societal racism as a learning opportunity. I had a massive blind spot in this area – one born of an ignorance that was fully in my control, and I resolved to address this and took a number of steps to do so – an education I plan to continue in the coming year.

I also had a few personal reflections on how I hope to approach the coming year differently. Here we go…

#1: Put family first.

This sounds obvious, but events of last year made me realize just how central my family is in my life. I’ve always perceived myself as pretty self-sufficient and generally have looked inward for answers in tough moments.

This year though, I faced a series of challenges that I wasn’t prepared to weather solo and while other connections loosened in the face of this, my family became the one place felt I could safely confide and share with no fear of judgment.

My wife and kids really are – of course – the centre of my little world, and I derive more joy from them than anything else. Meanwhile, despite being forced to remain thousands of miles away from my parents, the frequency of our contact over the last year also made me feel closer to them than I have in a long time.

These strengthened connections with family were driven by other events, but I plan to focus more deliberately on them this year.

#2: Ground decisions in values.

I’ve always been goal-focused, but one of my realizations in recent months is the goals I’ve set for myself have mostly been finite and often arbitrary – and once achieved, they left a hollow that was hard to fill. Focusing on my values more recently has given me new-found clarity in what matters and who I want to be, and just as critically, the reverse.

This year I’ll still set goals, but I plan to consciously ground more of my decisions throughout the year in my values than I have in the past. (I have two physical reminders of lessons from last year on my desk; this is one of them).

#3: Focus on experiences over things.

The stripping away of the majority of the experiences that nourish and sustain me mentally (travel, camping, exercise, etc.) provided a reminder of how important experiences are versus physical “things.” It rapidly became clear that the latter does not and cannot replace the former.

Once the opportunity for a broader range of experiences returns, I plan to focus more on them. For now, I want to become more ‘present’ in the everyday moments that happen all the time.

#4: Better personal care.

When I’m in good shape physically, it supports my mental health. I feel better, I work better and I’m just generally more pleasant to be around. When I threw out my back last year and was suddenly unable to do the most menial things, my mental health plummeted.

Unfortunately I can’t wave a wand and fix my back… but I can focus on more broadly taking better care of myself overall, physically and mentally. That means making space for my own needs alongside those of others.

#5: Read more.

I rediscovered reading in 2020, with a vengence. In recent years I’ve found that I rarely just have time to sit down and read and always found that I allowed other things to take up the limited free time I did have, but audiobooks let me dive in whether I’m on my commute (RIP… for now), exercising or even just doing the dishes.

I read a slew of books to better educated myself on the racial issues that came to the fore last year (a huge blind spot for me that I’m working hard to address), I read a number of biographies, books on parenting, novels and more. I learned more, decompressed more and – I think – became a better person last year as a result of it.

I plan to continue 2021 the way I left off in 2020 on this one.

#6: Work smarter.

For most of my career, my deep mental stamina has been my resource in tough career moments and has sustained me through some periods of insane workloads. But with kids in the picture, that’s insufficient. Working harder just means less time with them, so if I really mean to focus more on them then I need to work smarter and let go of the things that don’t matter.

This will mean breaking some habits and redefining expectations – both of others and of myself.

#7: Let go more.

I realized last year that I was failing to heed the counsel I give many of team members. Specifically: Control what you can control, influence what you can influence, and don’t sweat (or bank on) what’s out of your control.

I’m going to focus more on this in 2021.

#8: Keep learning.

People often ask me what has kept me in my job at a single agency for over a decade, in an industry where turnover averages 25-30%. My answer is always the same: I’ve never felt comfortable and as a result I’ve never stopped learning.

Challenges and discomfort have never been hard to find in my role, and I plan to keep on searching out discomfort in the year ahead.

#9: Make a difference.

Last year, in a year in which so many things in the world felt like they were spinning out of control, I found myself compelled to start to do more to make a difference – something that has become a core value for me as a result. As a result I started educating myself more on some of my social blind spots, diversifying my network, volunteering more and mentoring a number of people in the industry.

I plan to continue on all of these fronts in the year ahead.

YMMV

When people ask me about my own career path I often talk about the central role of this blog early on in my career, noting that it started as a place that let me figure out my own thoughts, throw them out there and see what people thought in turn.

This post really fits that mold. I don’t pretend – or necessarily even aspire – that these lessons will have any resonance for anyone other than myself, but forcing myself to put them down on paper is itself both useful and cathartic. Perhaps that reflection itself could be lesson number 10: get back to writing more. We’ll see.

The post (Nearly) 10 Reflections and Lessons from 2020 first appeared on Dave Fleet.

This time things were… different… in some hugely obvious ways and some less apparent to those not in my immediate circle. And while last time around I learned a huge amount about being a parent during my leave as I was encountering every aspect of paternity leave for the first time, this time I learned a few different life lessons.

Lesson 1: Roll with the punches

Paternity leave in 2020 looked nothing like what I thought it would be. Not that anyone’s 2020 is what they imagined. The COVID-19 pandemic obviously threw all of our plans out of the window, so rather than traveling with our kids as we planned,  we bubbled with my in-laws and hunkered down for most of my leave. But everyone is dealing with that, so our family tried not to dwell on it. I was taking time off to spend time with my son – I figured the place I would do that ultimately didn’t matter.

Then, on my second day of leave, I threw my back out at perhaps the worst time. As any parent of a nine-month-old will tell you, the ‘learning to walk’ phase is tough on the back, and our youngest was just getting ready to start. There was very little I could do with the kids for quite a while. It was more than a month before one of our kids could even sit on my lap, and almost two months before I was able to pick either of them up again. Two days ago, I lifted one of our kids into bed for the first time since the first day of my paternity leave.

The effect of a parent having to withdraw from many daily activities on young kids can be tough. They started to heavily prefer their mom, or their grandparents. Our youngest would push away from me if I tried to give him a hug. Not fun.

I certainly spent periods of time grieving for what I thought paternity leave would be. But eventually – with the help of others – I forced myself to focus on the positives and to make the most of what I could do. I could sit and play with our youngest for short periods. I spent lots of time with our eldest – playing outside, helping him to learn to ride his new balance bike. Now that I’m somewhat on the mend, I try to make the most of the moments I can get. And I appreciate what I have.

I also reminded myself that with everything else going on in the world, others have it much tougher and ultimately I remained in a very privileged position. We’re healthy, I still have work, and I have little to complain about in the big picture. This is a useful mindset at the best of times but was made all the more powerful as I educated myself on some of the important issues in play at the moment.

As I return to the home office, I’m resolute in staying focused on that silver lining, and on taking control of my own mindset and actions when things aren’t going the way I’d like.

Lesson 2: Take care of yourself so you can take care of others

Parenting is tiring at the best of times. It’s non-stop and there are few moments of downtime. As an introvert, it is incredibly draining and I genuinely find it more tiring than working in my job. Being a dad brings me more moments of joy than I ever could have imagined, but there are times that it just feels like your stamina is getting chipped away bit by bit.

What’s more, as plenty of people have pointed out, parenting during a pandemic is even more exhausting – while we would normally have some kind of major outing each day, we were instead stuck in the same setting day after day.

Self-care is something that I have a bad habit of neglecting. You know how airplane safety videos tell you to put your own mask on first, before helping others? That’s never really been my thing. I throw myself into whatever is in front of me, to the exclusion of everything else. My (incredibly patient) wife has learned to recognize the signs that I’m falling short and knows how to gently let me know when I need “Dave time” lest I become a third baby in the house.

But over the last few months I’ve learned a lot about the importance of taking care of myself first.

Suffice to say, it didn’t take long during this paternity leave to get worn down, especially with everything going on. Before long I could feel my fuse getting shorter and shorter – and if there’s one thing a toddler can pick up on (and by “pick up on” I mean “see as a bright red button to push”), it’s a short fuse. This time I fortunately recognized relatively early that I needed to do a better job of looking after myself in order to do a better job of being a dad.

Over the last little while I’ve learned to maximize the moments of downtime that do exist. I started going for a walk each day during the kids’ afternoon naps. Once I got the all-clear from the chiropractor to ride my bike again, I managed to get out for a few rides too. I used time in the evenings to recharge, introvert-style (i.e. away from everyone ). I pinged people I hadn’t spoken with in years, and set up video chats to catch up. These things together helped me to weather the wear-and-tear.

I’m now also paying more attention to my wellness as I return to work. Before I left on leave, I successfully argued that we should support employees in establishing a healthy home-office setup. However, I didn’t do so for myself – I worked long hours sitting on a folding chair in front of a folding card table for two months, and I paid the price (metaphorically and literally). I’m not making the same mistake twice.

Lesson 3: Make time for the things that make you smile

Alongside taking time to recharge, I also recognized the importance of making time for my own interests, and not to lose the things that bring me happiness and satisfaction.

People who know me know that if I’m not feeling challenged, I get bored quickly. So, I decided to spend time each day brushing up on a long-lost skillset and dove into online courses on coding (I started my career as a developer). Nowadays there’s little practical application in my role, but it felt good to keep the cobwebs at bay and to be learning again.

I also started reading again – I’ve long been a bit of a bookworm, but my reading fell off a cliff after we had kids. I‘d almost forgotten how much I enjoyed books. This time I started listening to audiobooks which I listened to on my walks. Along the way I took the time to begin to better educate myself on some important topics. The Black Lives Matter protests of recent months helped me realize that I had a huge blind spot in this area, so I dove into books on this topic. I also worked through books on topics like climate change and how to be a better parent, along with some lighter material. All told, I finished 15 books in my three-month leave.

Being a parent has brought me so much joy over the last few years – moments of laughing to the point of tears, and of wonderful, touching experiences that I would never trade for anything. But it’s also easy as a parent – especially at the moment – to completely neglect yourself, and for parenting to just feel like a long tunnel with no light at the end. Over the last few months I think I’ve reached a better balance on this, and I plan to focus hard on maintaining this as I return to work.

Lesson 4: Be present

With everything going on in the world at the moment, it is easy to just get sucked into doomscrolling and to lose yourself in the barrage of never-ending news. Before paternity leave, it was easier to set boundaries while working full-time, but with the structure removed it’s easy to just get buried. We were constantly taking pictures of the kids, so I constantly had my phone out, so I’d constantly flip between apps.

Mid-way through my leave, I realized that this was distracting me from my kids – given that I couldn’t participate in many activities with them, it was all too easy to get sucked into the latest NYT story or to just scroll down one more time on Reddit. I thought my phone was a useful tool that was helping me to capture moments with the kids, but it was actually leading me to miss them.

So I stopped bringing my phone with me a lot of the time. And guess what? I didn’t miss it. Sure, I may have missed out on some cute pics (not that there’s a shortage). But that was more than offset by the joy from being truly present and focused on spending time with my kids. You can bet I’ll be leaving the phone at home more going forward.

Silver linings

Paternity leave wasn’t what I thought it would be this time around. There’s still a portion of me that mourns what it could have been, and mourns the plans we’d been making for this time since we found out in late 2018 that we would have a second child.

But I’ve also been able to witness a slew of moments that I would have missed if I’d been working – our son’s first steps, the first time he ran to his brother for a hug, his first words and many, many more special moments.

In recent weeks I’ve also started to see things come back together. As my back has improved and I’ve been able to do more and more with the kids, they’ve started to react more positively to me in turn.

Yesterday, for the first time, our one year-old walked over to me and sat in my lap on the floor to read a book. It was a small thing, but after months of being able to do little with him and of him pushing me away as a result, it felt like both a new beginning and a perfect end to a rollercoaster paternity leave. One that has left me with a slew of happy memories and taught me a few lessons that – I hope – will serve me well into the future.

The post Paternity Leave in a Pandemic first appeared on Dave Fleet.

One of my favourite ways to pay it forward each year is to help to support students in Seneca College’s post-grad Social Media Marketing program who are preparing to present their final culminating group assignments – real-world social media strategies for real companies (full disclosure: I also sit on the program advisory committee for post-grad programs at the Seneca College School of Marketing).

When Bill Doern asked if I would participate once again this year I readily said yes, and on a Friday afternoon this Spring I listened and provided feedback on social media strategy presentations by 10 teams of aspiring digital marketing professionals.

I noticed some common themes that emerged as I reflected on the feedback I provided to the students. At first I thought typing them up might provide some insights for other young pros who are starting out in this field, but as I reviewed them I realized I’ve had conversations about each of these things with clients within the last few months, so maybe they’re not so ‘beginner’ after all (or maybe I just am…).

1. Question the brief.

Sometimes you will get a fantastic brief from a client that is right on the money and sets you up to succeed. More often there will be holes, and sometimes it will be straight-up off the mark. The brief becomes a document of record – something the client may look back on to determine success or failure in a project, so failing to challenge the brief at the outset will make things difficult for you down the road. If something seems off or if there’s a gap in understanding, push. Sometimes you’ll get new information that helps you to understand the rationale for things. Other times the brief might change as a result. Either way, your life gets easier.

2. Make sure the objectives matter.

Despite the collective efforts of many of us in the industry, we continue to encounter occasional briefs that call for increased follower numbers as an objective, or ask for increased awareness when really the client’s problem is in a different part of the sales/buying process. You want to know your efforts are wel-spent, and the client wants their budget to be well-spent, so sweat the objectives and sweat the KPIs.

3. Ground everything in your objectives.

It’s really easy to get caught up in all the things you could do. It’s much harder to make difficult decisions about what you should do. Strategy is just as much about deciding what not to do as it is about deciding what to do. So as you’re developing and reviewing digital marketing strategies, frequently refer back to the objectives to make sure you stay on track.

4. Sometimes less is more.

Continuing the thought about what not to do… resources are finite. Especially time and budget. Sadly that means that there will be times the recommendations you’ve just developed are all on-strategy, but the resources just won’t stretch enough to do everything effectively. In those moments, choose to do less. In today’s cluttered digital landscape (especially with COVID-19 forcing everyone to go big on digital), spreading yourself thin will just mean getting lost in the noise. If resources are tight, do a few things. Well.

5. Pull the thread through.

The most frequent piece of feedback I provided to the Seneca teams was to make sure they pulled a thread through their presentation from start to finish. Everything in a strategy should connect back to a bigger picture. You can still be creative and unexpected, but if it isn’t in service of that original business objective then it is all for nothing.

I always emerge from these sessions exhausted by the marathon schedule but inspired by the next wave of talent coming into our industry and happy to play some small part in helping them to succeed. Hopefully these pointers can help a few other people too.

(Shout out to Seneca grads Mike Klose, Julia Clements and Parminder Sarna for taking valuable time out of their days in these dry-run sessions, too.)

(Image credit: Jon Tyson on Unsplash)

The post (Social Media) Strategy: Lessons from the Trenches first appeared on Dave Fleet.

When our son was born I made the decision to take some time off this summer. As I quickly learned, it’s not something that a lot of dads in our industry do however from the time we knew we were having a baby, I assumed that I would take this time. I saw a chance to build a bond with my son that will hopefully last forever, to gain some unforgettable experiences and to finally be there for those “first” moments for our son that until that point I would only hear about from the office.

With that said, as I prepared to go on leave, I wrestled with a number of fears and questions. After all, I’d never taken this much time away from work before. Would things change?

• Would I still belong? Would things fall apart without me… or conversely, would anyone even notice I was gone?
• What’s my worth? As someone who for long time defined myself by my work, how would that change when it was no longer a factor? Would I get rusty in my work?
• Would it be worthwhile? Would I actually be able to step away from the work? Would I be any good at being a stay-at-home dad, albeit short-term? Would I go crazy cooped up at home?

Fortunately for me, the financial side of things was made easier by the 12 weeks of top-up pay that Edelman Canada offers for both moms and dads on parental leave.

Now that I’ve been back for a week, I’ve had a little time to reflect on some of these fears. (A side note: I was on paternity leave for three months – a fraction of the time many Canadian moms are away on leave. I can only imagine how the fears I faced must be magnified for them, and I have a whole new respect for moms on the back of my own experiences.)

On Belonging…

I’ve spent the last eight years at Edelman, building a team that at this point was hired almost exclusively by me. It feels in many ways like a second home. Given that, I was confident that the team would do well in my absence. In fact, my biggest fear was that it would do so well no-one would really notice my absence or, frankly, that the organization would notice that my absence wasn’t felt.

This really gets to the core of a key tension in any leadership role. My belief is that for a leader to do their job well, you need to build a team that doesn’t hinge on any one person – including you. That in turn creates its own insecurity, as you realize the world doesn’t revolve around you. Preparing for paternity leave, for me, just put a microscope on that insecurity.

True to form, the team rocked it while I was out. Business grew, accounts were won, projects moved forward and the world didn’t end. Far from it. The team performed as well as I could have possibly hoped.

It was perversely gratifying, though, to see the number of notes and conversations with colleagues when I returned to the office reflecting that they were glad I was back. My inbox quickly filled up with requests for input and it was comforting to know that this high-performing team still felt at least a little discomfort while I was away.

One unexpected benefit (so far) from my leave – I feel like I look at situations very differently nowadays. I’ve always been very logical (my Myers-Briggs profile is ISTJ, with a heavy dose of the last three) but I think that being around a little person who only responds with emotional extremes has helped me to bring a tiny bit of new-found EQ back to work. Maybe. I’m pretty sure the team will tell me if that’s not true.

On Self-Worth…

For a long time many people would have described me as a workaholic. That (I’d like to think) changed when our son was born, but either way my career and my work has been part of my self-identify and self-worth for as long as I can remember. I worried: what would happen to that once work was – albeit temporarily – not part of that equation?

Was relieved that the transition turned out to be seamless. Really the transition began when we found out that Caralin was pregnant and accelerated when our son was born; paternity leave just gave it another solid kick. Far from creating a void, I found that being on leave led me to reprioritize the things that made me feel worthwhile, in a very positive way.

I don’t really know how to frame the transition, other than through an example. Two years ago, if you asked me how things were going I would almost certainly have led with a work-related story. Something about a project, or a challenge at work. Nowadays, I’m going to lead with something about my family. That doesn’t mean I’m not fulfilled at work or that I’m not going to continue to hustle, but it’s no longer so central to my sense of self-worth. I think that’s a very healthy thing.

On the Value of Paternity Leave…

As I wrote earlier, going on paternity leave was an incredible experience for me. I went cold turkey on work – I uninstalled work apps, handed in my laptop, and stepped away from my inbox. This was certainly made easier by my colleagues, who essentially banished me from everything (I sent an email to my manager with a quick thought on something early on, and his reply was a tongue-in-cheek “Sorry, who is this?”).

More importantly though, I found that taking care of our son was all-consuming – in the most rewarding way. I’d never really appreciated how much work it is to raise a child, but I certainly do now. From first thing in the morning through to our son’s bedtime (and sometimes beyond), the day was packed to the brim and there was no room for anything else, let alone boredom.

Someone once warned me that my leave would be, “All joy and no fun.” In a way, they were on to something. Paternity leave was exhausting, challenging and overwhelming. However, it was also irreplaceable and full of wonderful experiences I will never forget. I have an infinitely closer relationship with my son than before I went away, and I return to work energized and with a renewed sense of purpose for my own career.

To all the dads who are considering taking paternity leave, my advice: grasp this opportunity with both hands, and don’t second-guess it for a second. It will be one of the best experiences of your life.

The post The Fear, Self-Doubt and Infinite Rewards of Paternity Leave first appeared on Dave Fleet.

Lesson #1: Have a vision

I saw a video recently that resonated with me. In it, Arnold Schwarzenegger talked about the importance of having a vision for what you wanted to do. For him it was moving to the US and being a movie star. For me, it’s evolved over time… but it really started with social media.

I started my career in the early heyday of the Internet. I was lucky that my first internship – back in 2000 – turned into an opportunity to take on the role of webmaster for a division of Hitachi in Europe, and I parlayed that into a second internship doing web development for a bank in the UK. I loved the idea that companies could use these new online technologies to anticipate and serve the needs of their customers. I remember writing a report in university on the potential for an early eCommerce retailer to better optimize their journey planning to anticipate customers’ purchasing behavior based on their past activities, and serve products to them accordingly. Essentially the type of thing that, a few years later, Amazon started doing through its product recommendations.

When social media first emerged, I found it absolutely compelling. Its roots back in the mid-2000s – and the early business use-cases – centred around building communities and solving problems. I loved the idea that this two-way technology could help to narrow the gap between companies and their customers.

That became my passion. I didn’t want to just ‘do’ this stuff, I wanted to be amongst the best in the world at it. For years I’d work a full day in the office, then go home, read up on trends for a couple of hours and then write for a couple more. I’d write about whatever was going on with social media – new tools, new platforms, new developments… and as I did, people started to listen. I got to the point where I had thousands of readers of my site, where I was on a first-name basis with the thought leaders of this space, and was going toe-to-toe with them online, and where I was flying around North America talking about this stuff.

That vision drove me. As social media evolved, I found that my passion for that specific thing waned, but I still get excited about using data and technology to connect faceless corporations with the people who care about them, and in doing so make them more relevant. For the last few years, I’ve focused on evolving my team to focus on this challenge and find creative solutions for it.

Find the vision that motivates you, and work relentlessly at achieving it.

Lesson #2: You need to create your own luck

I’ve used this quote so many times over the years that I’ve lost count:

“I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more of it I seem to have.”

This is often attributed to Mark Twain or Thomas Jefferson, but as far as I can tell it actually came from an author named Coleman Cox, who wrote this in 1922. Nearly a hundred years later, it has been the foundation of my career.

I’m rarely the smartest person in the room. I’ll get to that more later. What success I’ve had has come from hard work, from keeping my eye on the horizon and from recognizing opportunities as they arise.

I moved to Canada in 2003 and soon after landed a temp gig with the Government of Ontario. That was supposed to just be for a few weeks, but a week or so in, something went sideways on a project. I was still new, but – as I’ve heard it recounted to me – while everyone else was panicking, I figured out what needed to be done and just started doing it. As a result I was recommended for a contract in another department, and eventually I landed a permanent gig. I worked my way up in the government for nearly five years.

I talked about social media earlier. When I got into that space, there were no college or university courses on it. Twitter was new. Facebook was an emerging thing. Foursquare didn’t exist yet. Blogs were still emerging. When social media was getting big, I was still working for the government, but I thought there was really interesting potential there, and I grabbed onto it. No-one handed me a career in the social media space; in fact, there weren’t that many careers in it at that point. Few companies were throwing serious money at it at that time, but I could see there was something there. I spent hours – every day – working to learn about it and build some kind of profile for myself.

Eventually it paid off and I landed a job focused on social media at an agency named Thornley Fallis Communications. The work didn’t end there; it began there. I worked my ass off ensuring everything was as good as I knew it could be. Over my next two years there, we won clients including Rogers, Atlantic Lottery Corp, Allstate and more. Terry Fallis – whose name is on that agency’s door – remains a good friend and mentor to me, and I look back fondly at my time there and with gratitude at the opportunities that Terry and his business partner Joe Thornley provided to me.

Now, I take Coleman Cox’s comments with a pinch of salt. If you’re working 70 hours every week – and I’ve been there – it’s not good for you, your family or your colleagues. Don’t do that. But when you ARE working, be present. Be attentive, and focus. Your career will benefit from it. Leave your title at the door, and come to every meeting with a learning attitude. Ask smart questions. Raise your hand for opportunities, and earn a place at the table. When opportunities are offered to you, take them. Lean in.

Lesson #3: Life is like a box of chocolates

I’ve spent the last two lessons focused on the early days of my career. This lesson spans from day one, to this day.

Your career isn’t likely to be a straight line. I went through University sure that I would be a management consultant – which was ‘the thing to do’ back then.

Then I discovered the internet, and that moment started me in a new career trajectory which brought me to Canada and to a gig in communications, and that turned into five fulfilling years learning about social media.

Enter Edelman. I joined the agency  in 2010 and that’s when things got really interesting. My eight years – so far – at Edelman have been a roller-coaster of change. Three months into my stint leading the Digital team in our Toronto office, I was asked to join an account full-time to help address some instability on that file. That turned into another role, and then another, and eventually I found myself leading a global project on a high-profile tech product launch, with a team of 140 people. I didn’t ‘sign up’ for any of that when I joined Edelman, but when the opportunity arose I took it.

The moral of the story is that you never know what is going to come your way. Don’t shy away from unexpected opportunities… and don’t shy away from challenges, either.

My current boss – who I have worked with for nearly eight years – talks about there being two types of people – those who jump off the train when it starts to veer out of control, and those who jump onto it. I’ve made my career on the back of moments when I’ve jumped onto that train. When things go south, stop, think through what needs to be done and get to it.

You’ll be amazed at the opportunities that emerge when you throw yourself into being part of the solution, rather than dodging the problem.

Lesson #4: Follow leaders, not jobs

Over the course of your career, you will have a lot of career choices to make and – if you’re good – opportunities presented to you. Some may have big dollars or big titles attached to them. Some may be more high-profile.

I offer one piece of advice here: follow the leader. I have yet to regret following a strong leader, versus a shiny new role or a big paycheck.

I talked just now about my time at Edelman. When the big global tech client left us in 2013, I had a number of potential paths in front of me.

One put me onto another global client, in a more senior role, over in England. The person I would have reported to had a reputation as being difficult, but the role was another step up the career ladder.

Another potential role had me working full-time on a video gaming client – as a big nerd, this was pretty attractive. However, on meeting the account lead, I could tell we wouldn’t click.

The final opportunity involved staying in Canada, and leading a part of the regional team. It was relatively close to what I’d been doing before the big account, and involved less ‘adventure’, but it had one clear leg up over the others: a person I’d worked with for several years and who I respected greatly, who had recently taken on the role to which I would report, and which I now hold – that of National Practice Lead.

In the end, I chose to remain in Canada and instead follow a leader. Five years later, we’re still working together and I haven’t regretted that choice once.

Lots of things may get your attention, but beyond the initial attraction, it’s pretty hard to get out of bed every day knowing that you aren’t going to enjoy the day. If you like and respect your leader, though, everything is different. I won’t pretend every day is full of roses, but I look forward to coming to work more often than I don’t.

Lesson #5: Never stop being a sponge

I mentioned earlier that I am rarely the smartest person in the room. A lot of people scoff when I say that (those who know me would likely agree…), but I genuinely believe that it’s true.

Michael Dell once said, “Try never to be the smartest person in the room. And if you are, I suggest you invite smarter people… or find a different room.”

When you’re first starting out, my best advice to you is to be a sponge. Listen more than you talk, and when you do talk, ask smart questions.

That doesn’t mean that you can’t have a point of view or add value – you absolutely can. However, far too many people see graduation as the end of their learning, not the latest step on a long path of growth.

I got my first ‘adult job’ 18 years ago. Since then I’ve risen to the top digital role in Canada, at the world’s largest communications marketing firm, with a team of more than 60 people. I’m still not done learning.

I see my most important job nowadays as being that of continuously surrounding myself with people who are smarter than me. Doing so means I’m always learning, and maintaining a constant feeling of being “new”.

To this end, I have three final pointers for you:

1. Constantly search out alternative points of view. Don’t just seek to validate your thinking.
2. Hire people that are smarter than you to keep you on your toes, even if they make you uncomfortable.
3. Once you’re the boss, ask your team what they think is the right approach before you tell them what you think it is.

Lastly, I’ll leave you with advice I consistently hear my friend and manager Tristan Roy give to teams at Edelman:

Work hard and be nice to people.

What lessons would you add to this list?

The post Lessons along the road: 5 career pointers for new graduates first appeared on Dave Fleet.