David and Sadie with Working Word client and M4 Business Network chairman Steve Sulley

It was another early morning for some of the Working Word team as we headed for the Celtic Manor Resort (soon to be home of many a Ryder Cup golfer) for the M4 Business Network event headlined by none other than former Home Secretary David Blunkett.

And boy did the man live up to his reputation. After a thoroughly hearty fry-up (tip for future reference  -  opt for the vegetarian option as it comes with beans) David took to the stage and regaled the audience with tales of his time in Government as well as offering some insight into the current UK political set up and advice on how Welsh businesses can minimise the impact of the public sector spending cuts.

Mr Blunkett discussed the current news sensation, that is the Blair book, and revealed he was extremely surprised yet flattered to be described as ‘a man he adores’ by Blair himself.  He also referred to his fellow Sheffield MP Nick Clegg and suggested he would very much like to go on a tandem parachute jump with the ‘excitable’ man armed with a pair of scissors!

As well as the political and business side of the agenda Mr Blunkett also talked openly about his blindness and how he once had dinner with the Queen who offered to cut up his lamb chops for him.  Apparently she justified this by saying ‘I always cut up the meat for the corgis’. A classic majesty moment no doubt.

Another memorable one was David’s tale of 1960’s MP George Brown who, known for being a bit of a drinker, once asked the Cardinal Archbishop of Lima to dance to the Peruvian national anthem. 

While doing some research on David Blunkett for the pre-event publicity I read many descriptions of him being a true gentleman and this morning certainly confirmed that. What came across was that he is an extremely passionate and capable MP who also happens to be very, very decent. His guide dog Sadie is pretty special too.

The current Battle of Britain celebration is a worthy tribute to ‘the few’, the brave RAF pilots who defended the skies against a potential Nazi invasion.

An unsung hero however, is the flexible and creative thinking shown by the RAF ahead of the war.

According to the RAF Museum the RAF had prepared for the attrition of the battle by planning for high rates of aircraft production, coupled with a comprehensive pilot-training programme, backed by an extensive logistics organisation with an outstanding repair capability.

Thanks to their foresight the RAF got steadily stronger as the battle progressed – unlike their adversary, the Luftwaffe, which became steadily weaker. The resourcefulness of the RAF was critical in winning the day.

So, let us remember and be thankful for the bravery of the pilots along with the creative wisdom of the RAF to scenario plan, and be flexible and responsive – to create optimum resourcefulness – in the dark days of 1940.

When it comes to your future battles you will be facing in your life, will you be as flexible and creative in your thinking to maximise your resourcefulness?

Are you using flexible ands creative thinking to plan ahead of your battles?

I had just dropped off my dissertation at the University at 8:30am Monday September 23 and rushed into town, Cardiff city that is! After successive weeks of perfect insomnia finishing my Uni work, I thought I could make sense winding up my last few weeks in the UK with work experience at Working Word PR.

What I have done in my working life the last 7years is to write press stories and teach. I have been a lecturer in media and communication in Zambia since 2003. It is an adventure telling someone how a feature story should be written in three parts; the intro, the body and the ending – or has it changed now?  The world of communications moves on so quickly.  But going that for seven years I would have gone insane had I not gone on a break so I punctuated work with a few feel-good trips, hopping in and out of Zambia. This brought me bliss as it made me do something I really enjoyed – teaching media relations to people in the Public, NGO and corporate world in Zambia and Botswana. It is a lot of fun but it’s also been going 7 years. My point? I was multi-tasking and this left me burn out, as it were.

Coming to Cardiff University for an MA in PR was for me a way of self development. What? If I had not done that I would be considered antiquated today, I promise you. What else was in my coming to Cardiff? A well deserved break, I was beginning to be good at dozing first thing on my desk at work, so going to school was just in time; a time for refreshing or reinvigorating oneself.

I said earlier that I just handed in my dissertation to the University; my research was on the practice (roles and models) of PR in Zambia. It was interesting doing this research. I learnt much that I hope will be of help to others too. More to that is how I am finding those theories I learnt at school being put in practice here in my work experience at Working Word.

I’ve become an all rounder really; I attend meetings for the different sections or accounts very often and am learning a lot from watching people working. I have done some write ups for a few account directors and managers. I won’t claim to know much about PR agency work. But I think it can be busy, and multi-tasking is a must.

I have learnt that a PR agency runs on cups of tea. I have been offered so many cups I’ve lost count. I am trying to be able to offer some, you know, but I must get round that sugar bit. Tea without sugar!! Try some milk please! By the time I leave here, I will know that I will have forgotten how tea without sugar tastes.  ButI won’t tell that to my Zambian friends. I may not have the answer and would need another blog to explain it fully.. The cultural consumption blend is becoming real to me! 

Seriously though, I am getting the grips of what it is to run a PR agency;it’s on the run all the time. My plans for the future are to set up an agency in Zambia. Have I been encouraged this week? I must grow up; breaks do come to an end, so yes is the answer. PR in Zambia is maturing rather fast, there are a lot of Multi National, local NGO and public and private sector corporates that want PR services there. What I have seen this week is in practical terms how to reach out and work with these sectors from a PR perspective. I have seen and heard of press releases, event management, CSR, pitching and brainstorming, AVE and working days and hours were also in the buzz. It was interesting to see how work is shared and how it comes off desks in this open air friendly team comfy office space. The terms client and bottom line are almost synonymous, I thought it was just theory!

It has been a good experience being at Working Word PR, nice people yes.  There is no doubting how much team work there is here, it’s just great. Should I mention 6Music or Real Radio plays in the back ground, but the keyboards jingle a lot louder? The team is a busy one, but they all smile and answer your questions. 

I intend to make the most of my time here, I have definitely learnt a lot about how PR agencies operate and I hope I can remember that when I leave. It’s a great team and teams are what make PR agencies so way to go Working Word! Am off for another tea – without sugar!

Regardless of the response of Justice Minister Ken Clarke to allegations surrounding the death of Dr. David Kelly, rumours of a conspiracy will still linger on.

We now have a new conspiracy meme about the circumstances surrounding Dr. Kelly and his seemingly untimely and not fully explained death.

We need to include references to the conspiracy meme in any news coverage.

A conspiracy meme is the most powerful form of word of mouth going. I call it a ‘Captain Scarlet meme’ because, like the children’s television character – it is indestructible.

If someone has the belief that Dr. Kelly’s death was not a suicide and refuses to believe the official verdict that he killed himself, no amount of information, views of experts is going to change their mind.

Someone who holds a conspiracy meme will respond to any new facts as: “Well they’re bound to say that aren’t they?”

This response provides the strongest firewall to any new material. It is a self-supporting and crucially self-replenishing belief; any new information merely makes the underlying belief that there is a conspiracy even stronger.

If only there was greater recognition and understanding of how memes work, we can then more adequately deal with conspiracy stories.

I am not saying there should never be investigations if someone feels there has been conspiracies or cover ups.

Rather, that the meme dimension, particularly the ‘Captain Scarlet meme’, needs to be taken into account in any news reporting or consideration of allegations of a conspiracy.

We had a ridiculous situation where more money was spent on the inquest into the circumstances surrounding the death of Princess Diana, than was raised by the Diana Memorial Fund-raising concert.

Did this inquest establish a ‘truth’? Do the Mohammed Al Fayed’s of the world now believe the verdict of such an investigation? Have rumours of conspiracy about Diana’s death disappeared?

Are we going down a similar path with Dr. David Kelly? Will any inquest bring back a much-loved husband and father?

I don’t want to appear as a conspiracy kill-joy. My favourite film of the year was ‘The Ghost’ which deliciously plotted a set of conspiracy theories surrounding a fictitious Prime Minister and circumstances around his decision to go to war in the Middle East.

If more facts need to be explored, so be it. But don’t expect to arrive at a definitive, universally-agreed truth about Dr. Kelly.

Let’s recognise conspiracy memes when we see them – and pass it on.

We’ve been banging on about an away day at Working Word towers for a while now and so this week we finally took ourselves out of the office for an afternoon of team building, mickey taking, canoeing, quizzing and picnicking on the River Wye.

Team Working Word (about to get wet...)

After what seemed like forever our convoy arrived in Glasbury, much to the horror of the preppy young men running the Wye Valley Canoe Centre. Boss man Eoghan seemed slightly underwhelmed by the health and safety briefing, which pretty much consisted of take a canoe and head downstream and doubly horrified at our questions about sinking. It turns out the sinking questions were quite apt but more about that later……

And so we set off on our six mile mission, five two man vessels and one three man, all named after famous pirate ships. The drama started almost immediately when Eoghan showed off his skills to new girl Sophie by getting their vessel stuck in a tree which was worsened when Ellen and I crashed into them and wedged them further into the foliage. At this point, Eoghan was last seen out of the boat and monkey style in the tree – our last team building trip to Go Ape paid off then.

Bar the tree escapade the first couple of miles passed fairly smoothly as we got to grips with the water. Our other new girl Myrrh showed off her seafaring expertise gleaned from her sailing days while Leanne and Rachel managed to ‘beach’ themselves in the shallows a couple of times. Nothing too dramatic though.

We couldn’t let the halfway house point pass without the age-old Working Word tradition of a team quiz and a buffet lunch.

We love a quiz and a buffet- even when boat-based

It was the second half of the journey that was really eventful. After being at the back of the pack while we got to grips with navigating, paddling and steering all at the same time, Ellen and I took off with what I’d call some speed. We now rivalled Steve Redgrave (although not strictly the exact same sport).

Just as Ellen spoke the words “we could be the first two man across the line here” (as let’s face it, we were never going to beat three men in a boat) disaster struck. While looking back to see our colleagues closing in on us we hit a rock in the middle of the river at full pelt. The canoe tipped to the side and we clung on for dear life, for a moment it almost seemed like we’d escaped the worst but then, no, we capsized. Kamikaze style, in full view of everyone bar three men in a boat, who by this time were out of sight.

Because of the unusually fast current in this part of the river, our canoe was pinned to the rock. What then ensued was a valiant recue attempt by the boss man and Sophie who came to help free the canoe. Resident water expert Myrrh and Liz saved our rogue paddle and the Icelandic looking twosome Dan and Nicolle rescued the barrel containing all our worldly possessions that went hurtling down the river as we overturned. No one managed to salvage my one lost flip flop though.

Once safely back in the boat we then once again set off at full steam but quickly mounted an overturned tree (and for this part I completely blame Ellen who was supposed to be steering) at which point she had to disembark once again to drag us free.

Ellen and Caz run into some trouble

But all was not lost, we caught up with the others and regaled those who had missed it with tales of our dramatic capsize, and proceeded to take pole position across the finish line. We were, even ahead of three men and a boat, first back on dry land (though not so dry ourselves).

It’s safe to say we were glad we’d brought spare pants with us and even more relieved to get home and wash the river out of our hair.

So what did we learn from our team building day…….

1)      Eoghan can climb trees

2)      The combination of Leanne, Ellen and Rachel in a car is not a good one when there are navigational requirements (they set off first and arrived 30 minutes after everyone else)

3)      Myrrh will always beat us at water-based activities

4)      Ellen and I should not really be left unsupervised on the water

5)      We like each other enough to abandon ship and wade upstream in a rescue attempt

6)      The upper body stretching programme led by Liz after we’d finished wasn’t enough. We were all in complete agony the next day

7)      The tortoise and the hare story sometimes comes true

All canoed out- back to work

And as a final aside, if anyone reading this happens upon a sole brown flip flop floating down the Wye – send it my way.

You have heard of the Taliban, there is now a new tribe, the Photoban, with Southampton FC of all people leading its charge.

I hope the Plymouth Herald does not charge me for using its cartoon, but I am celebrating its creativity in responding to a ban by Southampton FC on ‘non-official’ photographers.

Comic book stuff for Plymouth Argyle

Faced with the prospect of either paying for ‘official’ photos of the recent Southampton v Plymouth Argyle Division 1 encounter (which Plymouth apparently deservedly won 1-0) or not having any photos in its match report, the Herald chose another route: it got an artist to produce cartoons of the match action.

Underlying this seemingly whimsical encounter is one of the major business questions of our era: how do you make your revenue potential sweat in an era of free information resources?

For Southampton their actions in trying to get additional income by limiting access for photographers to its ground so it can charge for ‘official’ photos may be short-sighted.

As Herald editor Bill Martin responded by arguing that restricting access for photographers was a “serious restriction” for press freedom. If professional sports clubs want to… restrict the press’s access to reporting their matches, little by little the press are going to report their matches less and less”

“The first people to suffer will be the fans… and the next people to suffer after that will be the sponsors…. A decision like this also damages the image of football as a whole.”

Mr Martin encouraged other newspapers faced with the same problem to follow his lead and the newspaper is apparently, now looking at using the artist’s work every week. [Which I hope it does].

For Southampton FC its challenge is how to create as many revenue streams and opportunities as possible. With a tradition of free content of not charging for press photographers at matches, it presumably saw an additional pot of gold.

Instead, it has become the subject of ridicule and ultimately may not get its expected financial dividend.

It’s a big challenge for any media owner and media content creator of how do you migrate what was free of charge to pay for.

Rupert Murdoch is finding it challenging with his pay walls for a number of his titles.  I wonder if there will be an army of cartoonists depicting the content of The Times?

Just a thought….

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-10914863

Media Wales building

Being the latest additions to the Working Word team, means that there’s a lot to catch up on.  Not only do we have new clients to meet and new accounts to work on but we’ve also got some media networking to do.  Meeting journalists and understanding what they need is just one way to be a better PRO and more efficient at what we do.

So, when Matt Withers, assistant head of content at Media Wales asked if we wanted an insider’s view of life at Media Wales we jumped at the chance. 

Entering the news floor we were greeted by ex-Cardiff City and Wales International football star Nathan Blake.  Blake writes a regular column for the Western Mail and was quickly whisked away to another floor to brainstorm some ideas for future columns.

Nathan Blake

As Matt explained the inner workings of Media Wales and the structure of the three papers –The Western Mail, Wales on Sunday and South Wales Echo – a light-hearted argument about which desk has better football knowledge, broke out between the sports desk and a couple of news reporters.  Our money’s on the sports desk but we thought best not to take sides. 

The online team were hard a work as we passed by.  We learnt that they’re developing their social media capacity with a growing number of blogs and interaction with readers via social media.  We even got to spy on someone tweeting on behalf of @WalesOnline.

Next we were introduced to what we’ve dubbed the ‘journalists of the round table’ (despite it being oval). The big, central, table hosts all of the daily editorial meetings and is housed by the editorial, content and design teams desks. This area acts as the hub of the three papers and is where all the big editorial decisions get made.  We like to think it’s where the magic happens.

Features and the business desks were last on our whistle-stop tour and our excellent host introduced us to Margaret O’Reilly and Graham Henry for a quick chat about the types of features the papers covers and the latest business news.

Our tour over, Matt returned us to reception and within minutes we were back at Working Word towers.  Thank you to Matt and Media Wales for taking the time to show us around.  The new girls need all the help they can get and you’ve made us feel very welcome indeed!

So, if the rumours are to be believed, Hollywood legend Robert De Niro is in Cardiff today.

For those of you familiar with the eccentricities of the city’s taxi drivers, you could say the Oscar winner should feel right at home.

With Twitter abuzz with talk of the star of Goodfellas, Raging Bull and..erm…Rocky and Bullwinkle treading the boards of Windsor Place (with Clive  Owen and Jason Statham in tow apparently), talk spread around Working Word Towers of the team’s best ever celebrity spots within the city walls.

I got the ball rolling with Pope John Paul II (joyriding the Popemobile around the civic centre no less), Eddie Izzard on his mega- marathon run speeding up to avoid the smell outside Barfly and 80s screen smoothie Nigel Havers on Queen Street. I also seem to recollect the IRS’s best friend Wesley Snipes being on Clifton Street a few years back.

The office’s very own Three Degrees, Sara, Ellen and Leanne then regaled us with the tale of their karaoke mash-up of Dizzee Rascal’s ‘Dance Wiv Me’ with ‘funnyman’ James Corden (the verdict: Corden knew all the words, Sara didn’t, Ellen shook it like a Polaroid picture, Leanne showed Liam Gallagher-esque tambourine tendencies).

Super Hans from Peep Show got peeped by Dave, Caz spotted Florence (without her Machine) strolling along The Hayes last month, while Ellen’s husband (not technically a Working Worder but near as dammit) grabbed a photo with Catherine Zeta Jones and chewed the fat with Michael Douglas last Friday.

The guvnor Eoghan piped up to try and trump the rest of us with his spot of Nelson Mandela back a fair few years ago, apparently being serenaded by Alistair Campbell, keeping alive the mantra that a good PR man would get in where a draft wouldn’t.

What about your top Cardiff celeb spots? Spied Floella Benjamin tucking in on to half and half on Chippy Lane? Jeremy Paxman queuing for an ice-cream down the Bay? Let us know, we’d love to hear your comments. We’re all off to get a snap of Bobby D…

The news story about TV personality Keith Chegwin allegedly stealing comedians’ jokes highlights the challenge of intellectual property in the online age: as soon as you create an asset you face the danger of the material being widely circulated and repeated under other people’s name.

Keith Chegwin

BBC News reports the example of comedian Dan Antopolski who had to confront this dilemma after one of his one-liners – “Hedgehogs: why can’t they just share the hedge?” - won the best joke award at the 2009 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

The joke went viral across the internet.

Apparently, he then dropped the routine from his set – because his audiences had already heard it, and some might even assume that Antopolski had plagiarised the gag himself.

The story went onto to report how his agents also forced to issue a cease and desist order to a company which produced T-shirts reproducing the joke.

“The thing with jokes is that once audiences have heard them, they’re no longer funny,” he said. “In my Edinburgh Festival comedy world, the ethic is that you write your own material.

“In the traditional Bernard Manning days, it was different because any two comedians might never play to the same audience. But TV changed all that.

“And now the internet means that people post up comedians’ routines, and then they spread with no mention of who the author is – it’s difficult to talk about it seriously because it all seems so silly, but this does affect people’s ability to make a living.”

I face similar challenges: no, I know my jokes are not funny, so protect themselves by not getting repeated. 

Rather, as an author and creator of ideas on creative and flexible thinking you face people using your phrases, insights, and original thoughts -and you may not get any credit for it.

Some key points – yes, another one of Andy’s 7 points schematics – on this debate and issue are:

1. Always credit a source wherever possible.
2. Believe in abundance – there’s lot of wealth in the world out there.

   When the great jazz musician Duke Ellington was told about his agent ripping him off, a friend remonstrated that the Duke should be annoyed and angry about the money he has lost. “I’ll just write another song” was the Duke’s reply. So, for every joke ‘stolen’, there will be another along shortly. If you are a creator of material learn to live with other people use it.

   Indeed, celebrate sharing material. I have had people come up to me and nicely ask me if they could use my talk. My answer was ‘Yes!’. It is far better for as many people as possible to share my legacy to the world, rather than it gathering dust on the hard drive of my computer.

3. Always be one step ahead.

   If you are creating material, rather than rest on your laurels you need to strive and keep going. That is the best defence against plagiarism. As Rudyard Kipling once wrote (note I credit the source): “They tried to copy everything I did. They tried to copy m y mind. But I left them sweating and straining a year and a half behind.”
   

4. Take massive action to seize ownership of what you regard as landmark, and I call ‘Golden Swan’ material: a piece of work that is so good that it will help to define you.

   With the hedgehog joke Dan Antopolski should have had T shirts made, gone to town with the hedgehog theme in as many different ways as possible, take massive action to let people know it is your baby. So people know, that wherever they may hear the joke, the will know it is his: the joke is part of Dan’s brand.

5. Own the meme rather than the material.

   By ‘ownership’ I just don’t mean conventional Intellectual Property rights, but rather make sure you are part of the transmitted message. In the case of Dan Antopolski and the proposed hedgehog T shirt rather than threaten to sue the T-shirt business he should have got them to add his name to the design, to further extend his ownership and attach his name to the meme of the phrase and joke.

   He should also plant the ‘joke’ or phrase with his name linked to it, to inspirational quotes web sites and anywhere which can can take a lead role in circulating the story. Sure the web will circulate the material. The trick will be to circulate the story with his name linked – and therefore manage the meme.

6. Extend the original joke’s constituency by making jokes about the joke: “Has anyone here  got a wheelclamp? I was about to tell the hedgehog joke and I thought I saw Keith Chegwin in the audience!”

   Be an archaeologist with the material and dig within it for new angles.

   Be an imperialist with the material and look to see what ways it can be extended.

7. Also, it does pay to know a bit about Intellectual Protection. And use a good IP lawyer – I can recommend some – if you want to leverage some commercial gain from your asset.

Yes, we creative people do face challenges in the Internet age. But being creative and using flexible thinking is your best protection and guarantee for being in the forefront to survive and succeed.

 Creative people – why can’t they just share the edge?

Senior Account Executive Ellen’s musings on her trip to the Royal Welsh Show with Account Director Dan Tyte

Ask anybody here at Working Word what they love about PR and somewhere in the response will be the cliché “no two days are the same”.  But as I wait in Cardiff Central for account director Dan Tyte at 07:30 am, dressed in hiking boots I realise just how true this is.

Dan and I are travelling to the Royal Welsh Show where our clients from the Welsh Assembly Government are rolling out their Not Spots scheme, allowing frustrated people throughout rural Wales to get vital access to internet broadband.  It’s the fruition of months and months of stupendous hard work with a fantastic team from the Assembly and should be a superb day.  The Deputy First Minister will be speaking and everything.  But we have to get there first.

Cue two PR’s in a smart car, a broken SatNav, inappropriate footwear (Dan) and most unfortunately of all the closure of the A470.  Ah.  It turns out mid-Wales is not a great place to navigate as I’m faced with signs for Cardiff (just came from there) Neath (ummm) and Hirwaun (maybe) while Dan is battling to keep the Smart Car on course through a Welsh monsoon.

Navigating tricky Welsh terrain

We join what we think must be the diverted route and find ourselves atop a mountain behind a long queue of cars, snaking around a bend and out of sight.  We decide there’s nothing we can do about this and get to making our press calls and phoning-in our apologies for tardiness.   Except of course, there’s no reception, we’re helpless and the lethargic sheep that pepper the road side are laughing at us.  It’s a sign of things to come.

A few near-misses later – “Look at that precipice!” we arrive at the park and ride for the Royal Welsh Agricultural Show.  An hour and a half behind schedule.  My foot immediately meets a present from another of our ovine friends and I’m happy in my choice of footwear.  Dan, our resident Armani poster boy, is not so well prepared.  It’s a muddy slog to the bus that will take us to the show and his beautiful black leather shoes are giving up on him. “We can’t go on” they splutter, “Go on without us, tell your Gucci socks we died serving our cause”.

We're relieved to find we're not the biggest cabbages there

Seriously, people are starting to laugh and we begin to wonder if us city folk will last the day.  But last the day we do and what a great day it turns out to be.   We immediately catch up with the team and talk to people and organisations who are struggling to work without a decent internet connection.  There are farmers who want to invoice electronically and file tax returns, people who want to set up local businesses and of course those who just want to feel connected with what’s happening around Wales and beyond.

We head out to spread the word to other exhibitors before heading to back to a Q&A session opened by Deputy First Minister, Ieuan Wyn Jones.  It’s all hands on deck then as we help people sign-up and answer any questions.  I am immediately proud to have any part in this scheme, people are genuinely enthused and even a little surprised at how easy it is to sign-up for.  The team have done a fantastic job and should be proud.

With a job well done we get back to the car and pat ourselves on the back.  I didn’t know what to expect at the RWAS and I found some eye-opening exhibitions (the “Sheep-tacular” show especially), met some wonderful people and saw all that’s best and lovely and unique about Wales.  But it’s time to head back to Cardiff now, where there’s phone reception and Starbucks. 

What’s that Dan?  We’re low on Petrol????

Fish out of water: Welsh Assembly's Simon Lavin with Daniel Tyte