Rachana Shanbhogue, Business Affairs Editor at The Economist

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Welcome to Trusted Journalism Matters, our new series where we chat to World Media Group members about the importance of quality journalism. This episode, Belinda chats to Business Affairs Editor Rachana Shanbhogue about what attracted her to working for The Economist, and the role their organisation plays in helping audiences to make sense of the world around us.

You didn’t train as a journalist so what prompted you to make the move into journalism?

Yes, that’s right. I worked for eight years at the Bank of England as an economist, which was fantastic training and a really interesting place to work, especially as I joined shortly after the financial crisis began. I realised two things: Firstly, that I enjoyed the process of writing down ideas, thinking about the arguments and presenting them in a way that people wanted to read. I gravitated towards the jobs at the bank that were more communications focused, as part of the team that wrote the bank’s inflation report, for example.

The other thing I discovered over that course of my time there was that I was interested in exploring a much wider range of subjects than the ones that a central bank rightly focuses on. If you work in, for example, the monetary policy area of the of the Bank of England, you’re mainly thinking about the prospects for inflation – the types of policies needed to meet the bank’s inflation targets. But there’s a whole universe of interesting subjects out there, so that was the other motivation.

With the Brexit referendum in 2016, I realised there were lots of important economic policy questions that one could be considering and writing about, and that encouraged me to make the leap. My experience is not that unusual. If I look at my colleagues here at The Economist who write about business, economics or finance, quite a few of them have experience in industry or working as economists or analysts in investment banks.

Economics and finance have a bit of a fusty, white middle-aged men image. Has it been a benefit to you being none of those things or has it held you back in any way?

In terms of what it’s been like to be a woman in economics, ever since I went into university to study economics, it’s been clear that there are more men than women in the subject. That follows through to the jobs I’ve done, and perhaps for that reason, I haven’t thought so much about it.

I’m not sure how my career would have been different if economics had been balanced by gender. It’s worrying for the subject that, for whatever reason, there aren’t many women going into it. I’ve been fortunate to work in places where that gender imbalance hasn’t translated into a barrier to women’s careers.

So what attracted you specifically to The Economist.

I’m an economist by training, as we’ve discussed, so I was naturally drawn to an organisation that has The Economist in the name and puts a great emphasis on reporting on economics and finance in a thorough and in-depth way. It seemed like the natural place to apply for a job.

The philosophy behind The Economist is one that I feel most at home with. It was founded on free trade principles, arguing for the abolition of the Corn Laws here in the UK. Its liberal philosophy’s quite attractive. What may be less apparent on the outside – because there are no by-lines for the Economist, and it’s edited to sound like it’s one voice presenting arguments and presenting the news – what really strikes you when you work here is that there are lots of experts, people who care really deeply about their subjects. And there’s a lot of debate internally about what our leader line should be. It’s all guided by the principles of the newspaper. That way of working was also quite attractive as well.

Thinking about your audience, could you kind of describe them for us, and if or how has that changed during the pandemic?

We have a variety of readers spread over the world and I tend to think about two groups. One is the informed professional and one is the curious or informed reader who’s not necessarily a specialist in the areas of finance or economics but wants to know more about the world. Internally, we often joke about that reader being the dentist in Milwaukee who wants to find out more about what’s going on. I read The Economist as a student precisely to know more about the world, so that’s another way of thinking about that group of readers.

And then, as a financial journalist, I also think about some of the readers being CEOs of companies, managers of companies, people who make policy, people who are pretty close to the world or work in the world of finance or business. So, we’re trying to write both for the interested, non-specialist as well as the specialists, and that’s often the trick of financial journalism – being able to write for both groups of people.

We also try and think about two different types of coverage. One is curating what’s happening in the world, so there’s lots of news, breaking all the time. What The Economist does is take the bits of the news that we think are important and that we think that readers should be aware of, and curate that for readers. Wherever you are in the world, and whatever part of the world you’re interested in, we’re telling you in a given week, what the stories you should be aware of are.

The other kind of coverage is something that sets the agenda more. It might not be in the news this week, but there might be a really big shift in how the world’s political order is functioning. We pull various strands together to try and lay out how the world is changing. So that’s a slightly different type of coverage that we think about as well.

In terms of how readers are coming to us, there was a shift that was going on that definitely got a bit of a kick during the pandemic – that is that more people are reading us online. We know digital subscriptions are rising. We also know that more people are coming to our app on a daily basis rather than a weekly basis, even though in print, we’re once a week.

All of that is leading us to think a bit more about how we present our work digitally; what the cadence of that work should be. Should it be that we’re producing stories every day? Should we think about whether to respond to a news event rather than to take a little bit of time to digest the news and analyse it and really add value? So those are the sorts of questions that we’ve been grappling with. And we’re quite a small organisation – we’ve got something in the region of 120 journalists, which is really quite small compared to bigger daily outlets. So that’s an interesting strategic question that we’re thinking about.

You’ve talked about different aspects of international news. Would you say that’s even more important now than it has ever been?

It’s probably always been important to have that international view. It’s really helpful when you see a trend, for example, here in the UK that the healthcare system is under strain to be able to place that trend within a global pattern or context. How different is what’s happening with the NHS, to what’s happening elsewhere in the world? And what does that tell you about what’s driving the problems here as opposed to elsewhere? So, I think that global canvas really helps inform the story and helps add that little bit more context to what’s going on.

Also, being able to understand the thought process, say in Beijing or in Washington DC, is increasingly having more of an impact on the rest of the world. And with the war in Ukraine, we’ve seen that these decisions that were taken in Moscow then led to commodity prices spiking, energy prices spiking, upending the kind of the norms around what countries do. The norm was always you don’t invade your neighbour – ever since the Second World War in Europe, the norm is you don’t invade other countries. So, our international focus is something that we bring to readers, and I’ve had readers in America say that they really appreciate that extra global context.

Is there any one story that you’ve worked on that you’re really proud of?

I’ve been editing for a few years so that’s a very good question. Last year, I took a bit of time out of editing to go off and research what we call a special report on central banks – a 10,000 word series of articles. The way it works is you have five weeks where you’re only reporting on this particular story. It was extremely satisfying figuring out the ways in which central banking is changing, just as the war in Ukraine was breaking out.

It seemed like central banks were going into ever more areas, thinking about not just inflation or keeping the bank safe, but branching out into things like whether they should be tackling inequality and what they should do to counter the effects of climate change. That was immensely satisfying, partly because it was such a huge endeavour.

More recently, I wrote one of our editorials on the turmoil with the Adani empire. This is the world’s third largest businessman and his business conglomerate, which is based in India and a short seller’s report – this was at the end of January and early February – a short seller’s report sent the market valuation of that business empire plummeting.

It was quite a spectacular implosion of this really big empire that had these very vast nation-building ambitions in India. And following that through and the questions that were raised around it, thinking about the ways in which Indian regulators might need to think of how to respond was just immensely satisfying and quite an exciting story.

 

What do you see as the role of journalism going forward now that everybody is a content maker?

It’s an interesting question because, on the one hand, that rise of free content and social media is something to be celebrated. As a journalist, when there’s jitters in the financial markets or there’s worries about the banking system, just being on Twitter and seeing what people have to say, seeing what some of the experts have to say, is really helpful and interesting. At its best, I think social media performs quite a useful function.

What journalism adds over and above that is the trusted nature of the brand and certainly. The Economist adds quality assurance – you’re assured that what you’re going to read has been written by somebody who knows what they’re talking about, who’s done the research, who’s spoken to the people in the know. We don’t often do quotes, but we do speak to a wide variety of people off the record.

It’s that assurance that what you’re getting is something that really has been stress-tested, fact-checked and is high quality. What we found was in times of upheaval, if you think of when the Covid lockdowns began and when the war in Ukraine began, there is a flight to quality journalism. We know that people are interested in coming to us to read the news. They’re paying for subscriptions, which suggests that there is value in having journalism over and above the free content on social media platforms.

Thank you so much for sharing your time with us today when we know the markets are so busy. It’s been fascinating to hear a little bit more about you and The Economist.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

The Future of Work within Advertising

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The Future of Work in Advertising: Key Takeouts

The World Media Group hosted its latest Smart Briefing this week, a discussion around what the future of work looks like for the advertising industry. Chaired by Spriha Srivastava, UK Bureau Chief & International Executive Editor, Insider, the debate covered many of the issues keeping leaders up at night – from balancing new ways of working to how to attract the next generation of talent.

The panel comprised Ally Owen, Founder of ADcademy and the Brixton Finishing School; Alex Wood – Managing Director, Forbes EMEA; and Jim Brown, Founder and Head Coach, Ground + Air. It was clear from the discussion that while some of the new ways of working implemented during the pandemic have had a positive impact on the workforce, there is still work to be done around flexibility, diversity and career development. Here are some of the highlights from the panellists’ conversation. You can watch the full discussion HERE.

The legacy of working from home

The pandemic proved to even the most cynical managers that employees could get just as much done working from home, if not more. Fewer people are now willing to be tied to a 9-5 in-office role, five days a week.

“When we’re hiring for roles and when I’m interviewing candidates,’ Spriha Srivastava noted, “the first question is, ‘How flexible are you?’ People are just no longer willing to go into an office – not five days a week and sometimes not at all.” Brixton Finishing School’s Ally Owen has reaped the benefits of this change in thinking. “We’ve mopped up amazing talent by being flexible,” she said.

Virtual onboarding needs improving

There is a downside though. One of the issues is that we’re not yet good enough at onboarding emerging talent virtually. Jim Brown believes that leaders and managers need to dedicate time to “genuinely contracting with a new member of staff.”

This goes beyond the onboarding process and needs to be specific to the individual: “It’s that personal contract you agree with someone. It’s says: what do you need from me in order to flourish here? Let’s really understand each other. This is what I need from you,” he says. “Be authentic, unapologetic and clear about that, and then manage it through from the day they start”.

The benefits to business

The productivity of the remote workforce does not appear to be an issue. The pandemic was a period of growth for Forbes, and Alex Wood’s team’s productivity didn’t suffer. As an international team, Forbes supported them in travelling back to their home to see their families when they could, and that flexibility has become the norm.

“One of my team members I affectionately refer to as our Madrid correspondent because she just loves Madrid and she likes to work from there,” said Wood. “And why the hell not? This has been really positive for her wellbeing.” By giving people flexibility on the personal side, the business is seeing its own benefits. Team members who choose to spend most of their time in France can meet up with clients who are based there, for example.

Attracting a more diverse workforce

For Owen, the ability to offer a flexible work schedule has allowed her to attract some incredibly talented woman to her team, particularly senior women who, because of family or carer responsibilities, may have been excluded by traditional work structures.

Gender stereotyping still an issue

Nonetheless, gender stereotyping is still apparent. Srivastava moderated a few panels during her maternity leave and was often asked who was looking after her baby. “When I said his dad, there was shock on people’s faces. I’d ask, why are you so shocked? If his dad travelled to work, would you ask him who’s taking care of the baby?” This assumption that the mum is the primary caregiver still exists.

Wood has come across similar issues as a same sex parent. “In a work context, people like to put you in a box,” he said, “A lot of people asked which one of us was going to stay at home.” In fact, Wood and his husband were able to share most of their parental leave, but this is rare. He believes the media industry should be taking the lead on this issue.

How to stay creative

One of the things that Srivastava said she struggled with during isolation was creativity. “When I feel like I’m not able to put my mind into creative ideas, I go for a walk, take a paper and a pen, step away from my laptop, write down notes, and then come back,” she said. The panel had a few of their own hacks to get the creativity flowing.

For Owen, who has an ADHD diagnosis, it’s about leaning into her natural rhythms. “I get up really early and I tend do the creative and the big thinking stuff between 6 and 9am,” she said.

Wood is using the ‘time boxing’ method, blocking out time in his calendar for every single task. He finds Zoom meetings “a suck of your energy” so limits them to two hours and then does something physical.

Find your flow

Brown referenced the science behind Flow, and the Flow Cycle. He describes Flow as that ultimate sense of engagement. “We all know what it feels like when we’re in the zone with something. We’re really focused; the task is at the outer reaches of your capabilities, maybe a bit beyond. Time may stand still, or go really quickly – everything is clicking.”

He says to get into the optimal creative zone, you have to pass through the Flow Cycle, and you can’t short-cut it. The first part of the cycle is Struggle – trying to get into whatever it is you’re doing. “That’s the bit when you’re most likely to check your email or push yourself off-task,” Brown said. It typically takes 12 minutes to go from the Struggle stage to the next phase, Release, before you can get into Flow.

“The Release stage may involve going for a walk or getting your head out of the situation by doing something else before getting into your Flow,” he explained. Taking your mind off the problem is almost always the solution to the problem. “It gives our brain the opportunity to pass learning from conscious to the subconscious mind”. “Then you can get into Flow, always followed by Rest & Recovery (the final part of the cycle)”.

The future of work

The final question for the panel was about what the workplace may look like in 5-10 years’ time. Owen thinks there’s going to be a schism. Employers that are flexible, inclusive and optimise talent will become “like beacons that people want to work at.

“They’ll attract the best people with disabilities; the best people who are older. They’ll get the best talent because they are open to all talent. And then you’ll have employers who want to do things the traditional way – they won’t be optimising talent and they’ll be getting the same people they’ve always got,” she said.

Brown thinks we are going to see a workforce spanning four generations and all the arguments and opportunities that creates. He thinks that despite the post-lockdown enthusiasm for flexible working, it’s going to be a rocky road.

“Everybody can see the opportunities flexible working brings and they know how to navigate that with more measurability around outcomes,” he said. “The problem is that as soon as we realise we can squeeze five days into four, greedy business owners will wonder what they could do if they had five days a week and I think the yo-yo between these two states will continue.”

Nonetheless, our panellists agreed that the flexibility we now enjoy is making for a more successful workplace – for both employees and employers. For more insights into the future of work in advertising, watch the full discussion HERE.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Creativity in media: What makes a winning content campaign?

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Damian Douglas, President of the World Media Group and MD of TIME for EMEA, sat down with this year’s World Media Awards Head Judges, Natasha Byrne Managing Partner at UM media agency, and Jerry Daykin, Head of Global Media at premium spirits company Beam Suntory. The conversation centred around creativity and what makes an award-winning entry. Here’s what our Head Judges had to say on the subject:

Damian: Creativity is the backbone of these awards. What are the most exciting trends you’ve seen adopted within content marketing recently?

Jerry: I absolutely love it when content marketing delivers on both the brand’s mission but also helps the media owner tell stories that they wouldn’t have been able to tell anyway. I’m a Diversity & Inclusion ambassador for the World Federation of Advertisers so I love it when brands create content which talks to new audiences, talk to new communities and funds new voices through sponsorships or partnerships.

Damian: So what makes a great content partnership?

Jerry: Ultimately, you’ve got to look at content partnerships from the creative side and ask is it true to what the brand wants to communicate? It’s relatively easy to make a fantastic piece of content. It’s trickier to make a fantastic piece of content that authentically brings the brand into it.

We’ve had a lot of maturity now in this space. There was a time when brands would just stick a logo on a piece of content. There are times when that can work, but there are better examples when there’s a real joining of what the publication stands for, what its editorial themes are, and what the brand wants to talk about. Not one big advert, but truly communicating and getting much more depth on the brand. I think that’s a great content partnership.

Damian Natasha, how do you approach it from an agency perspective?

Natasha: I say to my clients, “You might be talking the talk, but are you walking the walk?” A big trend is content partnerships delivering on the brand’s ethos, as well as around social issues. But also, if you’re talking about diversity and inclusion, look at the creatives within the brand partnership. Are they inclusive? Do they give options for people who are non-seeing or non-hearing? Are they inclusive creatives? Really thinking about the whole picture – that’s the trend I’m seeing in recent times.

Damian: What’s the media owner’s role in this? Do they have the right to push back on the client and say, if you want to show up in our spaces you have to respect our brand values?

Natasha: The ones that I love to work with are those that really push me and say this might not be the right thing to do, connecting our editorial with what you’re trying to say. Is your message linked up to what your brand is saying? Those are the ones that are going to continuously improve what we do as an agency, but also with our clients.

Damian: Jerry, do you feel the same?

Jerry: As a client, as with an agency, you’re effectively sending the same brief to a bunch of different media owners and if they all just repeat it back to you, there comes a slightly boring conversation of who’s the highest paid reached or cheapest CPM.

What’s really exciting is when someone comes back with a curveball idea or a different interpretation – this is our audience, we know them really well, we get that you want to communicate this, but actually we think this is a better way in.

Those things tend to win briefs and lead to good work. As a client, it’s good to be challenged, being told our audience won’t like that or don’t do that!

Damian: The media owner is bringing in their context and audience together, which is a powerful combination, but it means as a media owner, you need to have some strength in your own purpose and in your own values. And you’re not right for everything.

Jerry: There’s probably a million different ways of buying reach if all you want to do is get content in front of people. You can do that through almost any publication, any network, any social network. It’s definitely about having that voice, having that opinion, and being able to bring that unique lens.

Damian: Are there any clients that stand out for you, Natasha, in terms of doing incredible things with regards to creativity in this space?

Natasha: A lot of clients are doing really creative things. Every year we have Spotify Wrapped, What I love about that is it’s personalised. It is something that is very easily shareable. And it’s something that people look forward to every year and it tells something about that person. Spotify have really capitalised on that.

Another brand that’s worked well in terms of content marketing is Johnson & Johnson. They’ve just done a campaign where Nicorette have capitalised on the insight that people don’t quit smoking on their own. They’ve done a nice content partnership with Gay Times where they had different partners working together to spur each other on to help quit smoking.

It’s a really nice way to capitalise on understanding what the key insight is and bringing that to life and really making change, because a huge amount of people quit smoking as a result.

Damian: And Jerry, any brands that you think are doing amazing things with regards to creativity?

Jerry: One of the things I really like is a brand that sticks with a partner and builds over several years. Skittle have done a really nice job – I’ve seen iterations some of it funding editorial. They did a great Gay Times piece where they were recolouring old images from Pride events, Pride marches and things, but they brought that through to experiential events; they hosted a Eurovision watch-along last year.

That’s come out of a multiyear partnership where you can imagine behind closed doors they’re asking the editorial team, what do you guys wish you could be doing? What stories do you want to be telling that we could help fund with colour the rainbow within them?

From a media owner perspective there are some new contenders – video platforms like Amazon Prime coming into this space, so plenty of competition but hopefully lots of creativity coming out.

Damian: What about from a B2B lens? Do you see B2B brands pushing themselves in these areas?

Natasha: People always ask me why I love working on B2B brands. It’s because B2B brands have to work so much harder in order to be noticed, in order for people to build that brand love.

I think Accenture does very well. We were lucky enough to have highly commended last year in the World Media Awards. That was with a partner – The Financial Times – over a long period of time so that we’re able to survey where we were before the campaign against our audience, and then be able to see tangible results after.

With Accenture it’s about creating new creative formats, so we’re using their Metaverse technology in one of the FT events, continuously evolving in terms of how we work with our partners.

Damian: Now talent is something we’re going to have to think hard about as an industry moving forward, both from an inclusivity perspective and a visibility perspective, which is why we introduced our Rising Star category.

When you’re hiring and you’re looking for young creative talent, what do you look for and where do they come from?

Jerry: We face a double-ended talent challenge across the industry – we don’t seem to have enough people and we also don’t seem to have enough diversity inclusive people. We need to bring those two things together to make sure that we’re having people from different backgrounds join our industry.

There’s work being done by the WFA in the UK to survey where we’re at, and identify some of those boundaries. We work with external organisations like the Brixton Finishing School who are experts in finding people from different backgrounds and giving them that initial media training. Some of the real stars of the industry come through pathways like that.

We also rely on our agencies and our media owners to have different perspectives, different opportunities, some of those young, fresh minds. It’s obviously tricky when you’re junior, but ultimately, you want people who come with a strong personality, a strong opinion and are willing to bring those perspectives to work. But it’s a challenge. We need to get better at marketing ourselves as industry wanting more people to come and work with us.

Damian: I’ve spoken to agency leaders for the last six to 12 months. Every one of them says they’ve had open jobs but can’t find the right people. Is that still the case agency side? And how do you view talent?

Natasha: If I was to apply for a role in an agency today, I don’t know if I’d get it, because the people that I see coming through the door are absolutely incredible! What I look for is curiosity, being brave, and also a little bit of a difference in terms of your thought process behind things, because what I love about people who are new to the industry is that you see things with a fresh set of eyes. You don’t think we’ve always done something this way; you have a fresh perspective on things.

But there are things that we struggle with in terms of getting new people into the industry. And as Jerry said, we have to address the diversity and also the social economic backgrounds of people that are applying to agencies in Central London because working in Central London comes at a cost, so we need to think about that.

At UM we’ve been going back further in terms of the age of the people that we’re talking to about media. We’ve got our Future-Proof Academy where we’re going to different schools and we’re training and talking to young students about careers in media. We’re working with our clients to give them a brief so that we can get fresh perspective, but also, to excite and interest people in joining and thinking about media as a future career. We need to work further back, not just for people who are already in university, to attract new talent within the industry.

Damian: So, moving on to the Awards, what makes an award-winning content marketing campaign?

Natasha: The first thing for me is could this be any brand? When you look at the actual campaign, could you swap the logo for something else, and it would still work? Or is it completely tailored to this brand, and does it make sense in terms of this brand’s values?

Secondly is really strong insight – what is the insight that this campaign hangs off? And what is the strategy that then leads to the activation of that insight? How does it fit into your overall campaign? Does it just standalone? Does it fit into an overall brand campaign? And finally, what are the results beyond media?

Jerry: I think the only thing I’d add is that when you’re a judge, you’re reading 90 similar papers where they’ve all done good things. So, if you’ve done something brilliant, don’t hide it! Make sure you’re flagging what is amazing upfront in the summary, what is great about this work. Why does this deserve an award? Just put it there upfront for us judges to understand. Don’t leave those gems of why it’s a great idea hidden for people to find. Spell out why the campaign worked so well.

Natasha: We also need to remember these are the World Media Awards, not the World Creative Awards and therefore you need to make sure that you’re highlighting the smart media things that you’ve done in this campaign. If it was a brilliant video, but there’s nothing else behind that, then that’s not a World Media Award.

Jerry: You want the great headline to show why this was exciting, but you also want to dig in, why was it great – what did you do? How did you activate? What was unique? What data did you use, what was the insight? We want everything!

Damian: It’s a big commitment from both of you to be judges. What’s in it for you?

Jerry: I find it super inspiring. Awards are one of those rare moments where you spend a bit of time seeing what everybody else is doing. It’s exciting and inspirational. And you take notes and think, oh, maybe we should be leaning into this.

Damian: That’s what the industry’s about – everybody bringing each other up a level and learning from each other.

Natasha: The inspiration, learning from the other awards and seeing something that we can consider, discovering what different partners offer, but also a big part of it is the community. Getting to know the other judges, getting to know the publishers more. I’ve kept in touch with a lot of the judges I met last year, so it’s been a great community and support.

Damian: We remain a people industry and our ability to convene and share ideas is what the industry does and it’s why it’s so important to get together.

Thanks Natasha and Jerry for a great conversation. We hope that’s inspired anyone reading to consider entering your own amazing creative work into this year’s World Media Awards. Natasha and Jerry, you’re going to have a tough job on your hands, so good luck!

The World Media Awards celebrate creativity and effectiveness in cross-platform, cross border, content-driven advertising. Many of the world’s leading brands are amongst the World Media Awards winners and the programme is recognised by WARC. You can find out more about how to enter the World Media Awards here, along with the case studies of previous winners to inspire you.

 

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Dianomi Partners with the World Media Group

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The World Media Group, a strategic alliance of leading international media organisations, welcomes Dianomi as Partner

London, New York and Sydney, 13 February 2023, Dianomi (London Stock Exchange: DNM), a leading provider of native digital advertising services to premium clients in the Financial Services and Business sectors, is delighted to announce their new partnership with the World Media Group, an alliance of international media organisations championing and supporting trusted journalism.

Dianomi has now been approved as one of three partners to the World Media Group whose members include The Atlantic, BBC Global News, The Economist, Forbes, Fortune, Insider, National Geographic, Politico Europe, Reuters, The New York Times Company, The Smithsonian, TIME, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. Members of World Media Group are all considered trusted and premium publishers of journalistic content, and the organisation acts to promote their ethos of innovation, integrity and inclusion in the sector. Dianomi is proud to work in association with the brands of the World Media Group and support their work in furthering the development of high-quality content.

Dianomi has built its reputation as a contextual leader serving ads for the premium segment of the Business and Finance sectors with a client base that includes 7 of the world’s top 10 largest asset management companies, 7 of the top 10 largest wealth management firms in the US and half of the top 10 banks in the US.

“This is an interesting collaboration for Dianomi and one that aligns with our own commercial objectives of focusing on high-quality content for premium clients,” CEO Rupert Hodson says. “The World Media Group represents some of the strongest brands in advertising and journalism, and we are proud to be named as one of their partners. I hope that the partnership furthers our work in collaborating with the most successful names in the industry.”

Belinda Barker, Chief Executive at The World Media Group said, “We are delighted to welcome Dianomi as one of our partners. Our organisations both share a focus on providing high-quality content across media publications throughout the world. We have significant cross-over in terms of our members and Dianomi’s client base, and we look forward to collaborating closely on future campaigns and events.”

Media Enquiries

Novella Communications: Tel:  44 (0)203 151 7008

Tim Robertson/Safia Colebrook

About Dianomi

Dianomi, established in 2003, is a leading provider of native digital advertising services to premium clients in the Financial Services and Business sectors. The Group operates from its offices in London, New York and Sydney. The Group enables premium brands to deliver native advertisements to a targeted audience on the desktop and mobile websites, mobile and tablet applications of premium publishers. It provides over 400 advertisers, including blue chip names such as abrdn, Invesco and Baillie Gifford, with access to an international audience of over 400 million devices per month through its partnerships with over 300 premium publishers of business and finance content, including blue chip names such as Reuters, Bloomberg and WSJ. Adverts served are contextually relevant to the content of the webpages on which they appear and mirror the style of the page, which enhances reader engagement. http://www.dianomi.com.

 

About The World Media Group
The World Media Group is a strategic alliance of leading international media organisations that connects brands with highly engaged, influential audiences in the context of trusted and renowned journalism. Its members include The Atlantic, BBC Global News, The Economist, Forbes, Fortune, Insider, National Geographic, Politico Europe, Reuters, The New York Times Company, The Smithsonian, TIME, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, and partners Brand Metrics, Dianomi and Smartology. To find out more about the World Media Group, please visit www.world-media-group.com.

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INSIDER’S MATTHEW TURNER CHATS TO THE WORLD MEDIA GROUP

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Welcome to Trusted Journalism Matters, a new series where we chat to World Media Group members about the importance of quality journalism. Belinda chats to our guests about what attracted them to working for their news outlet, and the role their organisation plays in helping audiences to make sense of the world around us.

For the first in the series, Belinda is joined by Matthew Turner, Editor in Chief for Business, at Insider. Below are extracts from their conversation. You can read the full interview below or listen to the podcast here.

What attracted you to journalism?

I’m always inspired and somewhat intimidated by colleagues who always knew they wanted to be a journalist. It really didn’t occur to me until I was in my twenties and I met someone by chance in a bar in Wales whose boyfriend worked for MTV. I was at university at the time. I’d grown up watching MTV and thought, “Wow! That sounds like a dream job. “

She gave my number to her boyfriend, and he called me a week later and asked me to come in for a week. I spent a week there, then I spent a summer working for MTV. It was amazing. It was such an experience, and that put me on the path to journalism.

I went and did a postgrad in magazine journalism at City University in London. Even then, I thought I was going to be a magazine journalist and do lifestyle coverage, but I graduated in 2007, and most journalists have an instinct to go to where the story is.

In 2007 and 2008, the story was business. It was the financial crisis so I gravitated towards financial journalism, which was really complex and intimidating. It took me a while to find my bearings, but I started covering the financial crisis and the collapse of the US banks in London in 2008. Everything else has followed on from there.

And what was particularly attractive about Insider?

I need a challenge. Journalism is a profession where you’re learning something new every day. The news cycle moves so quickly and you constantly have to react to that and think about where the story’s going next. I find it really stimulating, but also challenging.

In 2015, I was in the Dow Jones newsroom in New York, surrounded by The Wall Street Journal folks who were super impressive, in a well-established newsroom with incredible history. The opportunity to go somewhere that that was still in the beginnings of its development and to have an imprint on that, to be a part of growing that, was a challenge, but also an opportunity to learn something about myself and to develop and test myself.

That was mid-2015, so I’ve been here eight years this summer, and it’s been an incredible ride. It’s been everything I thought it could be, and more. I’ve learned so much. I’ve worked with incredible colleagues. I’ve been challenged and tested– but I think I’m the editor I am today for having gone through that.

What is the mission or ethos that makes Insider unique?

There are two things I come back to over and over that are linked through everything we do. The first is what we talk about internally as ‘fascinating stories for enterprising people.’

So, what does that mean? Enterprising – we find that they are engaged, they’re leaning in. We’re not just a passive scroll; people take our stories and want to do something with them. It impacts them in some way, or they share it after reading it or watching a video.

The idea of enterprising people who are ambitious – and it can be ambitious in a workplace context, but it can also be ambitious to have a better life, a great holiday; to be a better parent, a better partner; to be healthier, etc. – they come to us with those ambitions and want to take something away from our stories.

The fascinating bit is about what does that mean to you? Take football as an example. At Insider, I don’t think we would typically cover the score line, because that’s everywhere. What we’d be interested in covering is the moment in the game that is most fascinating – that everyone’s going to be talking about after the game.

That’s one example. If it’s corporate earnings, we’re not going to cover X company delivered 11% revenue growth ahead of forecast. We’re going to zone in on where the world is going, where their business is going, what’s fascinating here? Because it’s not the numbers. And it’s not the score line; it’s the much bigger picture.  What we want to do is find the one thing that’s fascinating that will grab readers’ attention and stay with them.

The second thing I think about is around the tone. I tell people, whatever your ambition, whatever your passion, we want to be your insider. I have memories during the financial crisis of friends in different professions who were super smart and interested in the world. After work, we would go for a drink and they would ask me what was going on in finance, because that was the big story. What are credit default swaps? What is Lehman Brothers? I was able to explain what was going on in an accessible way, knowing that they were ambitious and smart and enterprising, but they might not know this like an expert. At that moment, I was their insider.

We have an opportunity to be that insider for lots of people, whatever they’re interested in. Whatever their ambitions are, whatever their passions are, we can be that smart friend, talking to them in a coffee shop or a bar after work. They feel like they’re learning, but they’re not being lectured to. That conversation-dialogue is the best way to describe it.

Who is your audience and how have they changed geographically?

In the US, which is where I’m based and where our biggest single country audience is – it’s in the 80 – 100 million monthly visitors range, one in three millennials. Around the world it’s more like 300 – 500 million. When you’re dealing in those large numbers, it isn’t one single audience. It spans every age group, demographic, race, gender, interest, etc. It’s many different audiences, many different languages, and they come to us from many different places,

International growth has been significant I think stats have shown we’re one of the biggest publishers in the UK and in many other countries also, so we have a huge global audience. What are the through lines? They’re enterprising, they want to know where the world is headed. They’re future focused. They want to take something away from our stories.

The news cycle is always shifting. If we think back to 2021 – boom times – interest rates were low, the economy was booming coming out of the pandemic, stimulus in the US and elsewhere meant people had a lot of cash in their pockets. Crypto was booming. Tech start-ups were having money thrown at them. Then in 2022, suddenly everything changes almost on a dime. It’s a very dramatic shift.

Our audience is the same people but often at different moments in their life. So, for example, we would have a story in late 2021 about how to get hired at a company that was booming and paying very well. Six months later, we’re telling some of those same readers how to navigate being laid off by a company and what they should do next.

What we see, particularly through the last 18 months, are dramatic shifts in what readers are interested in. It’s about trying to be there for them through different moments in their life – in good times, in bad times. We have an opportunity to serve readers in all these different moments and cycles.

How important is it to you personally to be part of an international news gathering organisation?

It’s been a huge focus for us through the last few years. Insider started in New York. and growing within the US took time. Then we launched in the UK around 2015 and in Singapore around 2020 – 2021. There are new markets we’re looking to launch soon. And we have bureaus all around the world.

It’s been a great benefit to Insider to have that international growth for a couple reasons. One, the world is 24/7, so when the US or the UK or Asia is asleep, the news doesn’t stop. It goes right through the weekend, right around the clock.

The other thing I would note, having just come back from Davos, is the world is so interconnected. There are very few stories that are purely domestic stories these days. So much of it is the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, or the geopolitics between China and the US. And what that means for trade, for inflation, for technology, competition.

For us to cover the big storylines today, we have to have that global perspective, because for a company, a news story could be happening anywhere in the world, and it impacts their entire operation. For example, the biggest market in terms of determining Tesla’s success in the near term is China, so we have to have people on the ground in that time zone to deliver great coverage. The stories today demand that global perspective. And for us to do that story justice and to serve our readers, we have to be around the globe

Finally, is there one particular story that you’ve worked on that you are most proud of?

I think there are many examples through the last year where we have just owned a story. One would be the tech layoff story. We were the first, just recently, to break the news that Microsoft staffers were bracing for layoffs. A day later, they announced 10,000 cuts, right when Amazon and Salesforce cut jobs. I think our tech coverage, our coverage of Microsoft and Amazon included, is the best there is anywhere in the world. It’s exceptional.

Another story I’m proud of was from our healthcare team last year. In the US there was a real boom through the pandemic around mental health start-ups often using social media to attract customers. We did important work there, shining a light on some of these companies and some of the harm that was being done to patients, for example, prescribing serious medication without ever meeting the patient because it was all being done online.

We won our first Pulitzer last year for a graphic novel around the experiences of a woman in Xinjiang China. And, more recently, we did a series on trans homicide in the US. We shone a light on homicides that were either not fully investigated or not taken sufficiently seriously by police. Subsequent to that reporting, I think three of those cases have been reopened, and it might be the case that more are, too.

I’m so proud to be part of a newsroom that does that kind of work. And we have lots more of that coming in 2023.

Matt, thank you so much, it’s been amazing chatting to you and hearing more about your work at Insider.

Join us over the next few months as we invite a variety of editors from across the World Media Group brands to share their stories with us. [/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

The State of (Dis) Union – Insights from the WEF in Davos

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]A panel comprising the World Media Group’s top international journalists gathered in London earlier this week to report back on what went on behind closed doors at this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos. Chaired by Jonathan Birdwell, Interim Global head and Regional head of Europe, Middle East and Africa, Economist Impact, speakers included Suzanne Lynch, Chief Brussels Correspondent, POLITICO Europe; Jeremy Kahn, Senior Writer, Fortune; Ayesha Javed, Senior Editor, TIME; and Dharshini David, Global Trade Correspondent, BBC News.

The goal of the session was to provide the audience who didn’t attend Davos with ‘finger on the pulse’ insights into the conversations that took place around business and the economy.

Click here to watch the full discussion and hear the panel’s point of view on the following:

  • The economic climate – recession or no recession?
  • The outlook for the Ukraine war
  • Tech and innovation – the development of Chat GPT and AI
  • The Net Zero transition – are we still on track?
  • Crypto – what is its current standing?
  • Does Davos give a platform for countries with questionable human rights standards?
  • Diversity and profile – is Davos still relevant?

Setting the scene, Suzanne Lynch described Davos as a very ordinary little town in the middle of Switzerland, transformed to the centre of power once a year. Journalists have unfettered access to corporate and political leaders with the boundaries removed as everyone’s ferried around the town together in little cars.

The theme for this year was ‘Co-operation in a fragmented world’. Birdwell asked members of the panel whether that resonated or what their own takeaway headline would be.

According to Jeremy Kahn, there’s still not a lot of cooperation going on. “I think there’s a lot of people talking about the need for cooperation. And yet, this kind of acknowledgement that they are geopolitics coming into play and borders going up between countries, and a lot of highlighting of the difficulty of cooperation given the current environment.

“Governments are competing with each other, both for things like semiconductor production that is considered of geostrategic importance, but also even in clean energy. There’s quite a lot of competition between states about who’s going to offer what subsidies to what companies to get them there. All that was happening even though the highlight was supposed to be about how we all cooperate and work together on some of these problems.”

Although that may be true of the public discussions, Dharshini David believes that what’s going on behind closed doors is more positive. “When you talk to some of the corporate leaders who were there you realise it’s a bit like COP 27 – that when we talk about cooperation, what really matters is what’s going on in those rooms that are tucked away; the things that we don’t really see or hear when we’re there.

“And that progress is being made at that sort of granular level with corporate leaders from different countries coming together or meeting senior government ministers and saying we need to work together on this. That makes me quite hopeful for things that are being achieved at Davos, and also what could be translated into the year ahead.”

Ayesha Javed agrees that it remains a place to network where important conversations happen. “The networking and the closed-door conversation are really where it is most useful,” she says. “I heard Keir Starmer saying on a podcast that he would rather be in Davos than Westminster because he felt the conversations were much more productive!”

Is the WEF in Davos still a key facilitator in driving important discussions around business and the economy? Watch the full video here and decide for yourself.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

The 2023 World Media Awards for International Content-Driven Advertising Now Open for Entry

Organisers call out for ‘Rising Star’ nominations – the young talent making an impact today

London, Wednesday 18th January, 2023: The 2023 World Media Awards (WMAs) are open for entry today, offering ten categories to recognise the very best in cross platform, cross border, content-driven advertising. Hosted by the World Media Group, a strategic alliance of global publishers that promotes award-winning journalism and the role of international media, the WMAs are now in their eighth year.

Nominate your Rising Star!

In addition to the individual sector categories for content, the organisers are encouraging nominations for the Rising Star award, which recognises talented individuals who are making a significant impact to the creativity and effectiveness of content-led advertising strategies, early on in their careers.

 “The World Media Group supports inclusion and engagement across the media industry. The Rising Star Award was added to shine a spotlight on some of the talented young individuals who are pushing the boundaries of content marketing today,” said Damian Douglas, President of the World Media Group and Managing Director, EMEA, at TIME. “We encourage media owners, agencies and brands to put forward their Rising Stars, so we can recognise and reward their hard work and achievements in content-driven advertising.”

The World Media Awards offer a unique prize to each of the sector category winners. The winning entries are amplified in a worldwide advertising campaign valued at more than €750k running across the World Media Group’s leading international media brands. Members comprise The Atlantic, BBC Global News, The Economist, Forbes, Fortune, National Geographic, Insider, Politico Europe, Reuters, The New York Times Company, Smithsonian, TIME, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

Championing international trusted journalism

The WMAs are the only awards to celebrate the collaboration between brands, agencies and media partners to create powerful international content campaigns and are not for profit, with £50 of every £100 entry fee donated to Reporters Without Borders.

“The World Media Group is committed to championing and promoting the very best in trusted global journalism so we’re proud to have Reporters Without Borders as a partner,” said Belinda Barker, Chief Executive of the World Media Group. “The charity protects and supports journalism and freedom of speech around the world, a cause that reflects the ethos of the World Media Group member brands. We’re delighted that the World Media Awards can contribute to supporting this vital cause.”

 A panel of international judges

 To reflect the importance of collaboration in creating successful international, content-driven advertising campaigns, the independent jury is made up of heavy-weight judges from brands, agencies and media owners. Leading this year’s line-up are co-chairs Jerry Daykin, Head of Global Media, Beam Suntory and Natasha Byrne, Managing Partner, UM.

You can find out more about this year’s judges here.

How to enter 

You can enter the WMAs at https://worldmedia.awardsplatform.com/.

Campaigns must have intentionally targeted audiences in at least three countries and 75% of activity needs to have been implemented between January 2022 and March 2023. There is no requirement for campaigns to have run in any of the World Media Group brands. The closing date for entries is 18th May 2023.

Categories 

This year there are ten Award categories open for general entry including ‘Rising Star’ and ‘Social Good’, along with the Content Leadership & Innovation award, which invites nominations from WMG members. The jury will select the Grand Prix from amongst the following category winners:

  • Automotive
  • Brand & Media Owner Partnership
  • Corporate Influencer
  • Financial Services
  • Luxury & Lifestyle
  • Media & Entertainment
  • Technology & Telecoms
  • Travel & Tourism

Awards ceremony

The winners will be announced at an exclusive live ceremony on Thursday 7th September 2023. Shortlisted entrants will receive two free tickets to join the celebration as guests of the World Media Group, and additional tickets will be available for purchase.

** ENDS **

About The World Media Group
The World Media Group is a strategic alliance of leading international media organisations that connects brands with highly engaged, influential audiences in the context of trusted and renowned journalism. Its members include The Atlantic, BBC Global News, The Economist, Forbes, Fortune, Insider, National Geographic, Politico Europe, Reuters, The New York Times Company, The Smithsonian, TIME, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, and partners Brand Metrics, Dianomi and Smartology. To find out more about the World Media Group, please visit www.world-media-group.com.

The Year Ahead in Media and Marketing World Media Group members discuss the priorities for 2023

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]The Year Ahead in Media and Marketing
World Media Group members discuss the priorities for 2023

By Belinda Barker, Chief Executive of the World Media Group

When I sat down this time last year to write about 2022, things were looking up for marketers. Coming out of Covid, consumers were spending the money they’d saved during lockdown and a sense of normality had returned. Fast forward to February when news of Russia’s war in Ukraine hit and it appeared our optimism was short-lived.

After a summer of political unrest, we’re on the brink of another recession. So, what does all that mean for media and marketing? I asked World Media Group members how they think the current economic climate will affect our priorities in the year ahead.  To read the whole article click HERE[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Content? Creative? Context? The battle for consumer engagement

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The World Media Group hosted our first LinkedIn Live event yesterday, a lively debate about whether Content, Creative or Context is the winning factor in delivering a successful content marketing campaign. According to the LinkedIn Poll we ran beforehand, 44% of respondents considered Content to be most important. The battle was on as our three panellists set out to defend their territory!

The Wall Street Journal | Barron’s Group’s Chris Woodall chaired the panel featuring Emma Harrison from The New York Times; Shula Sinclair from M/Six; and Sam Adams from BBC Studios. 

A successful content campaign is like a great first date

Using a dating analogy, Woodall explained how several factors had to come together to make the perfect date. How the person looked or what they were wearing could be described as the Creative. The setting – for example a restaurant on Valentine’s Day – could be the Context. And what the other person said, or their views on life, could equate to the Content. Just as a combination of all three are important for a great date, the right blend of Content, Creative and Context is essential to a successful branded content campaign.

Each of our experts had a chance to present their case to demonstrate why their own area of expertise should be crowned Queen! 

Content should be liquid, contagious and generous

Arguing for Content, Emma Harrison said a good story must be “liquid and contagious, flowing through culture and through different mediums,” to cut through the 10,000+ pieces of content consumers see each day. She described the importance of being generous with the stories, giving the reader something back. “Good content gives more than it receives, otherwise it would just be promotion,” she said. “Being generous with storytelling enriches a reader’s understanding, enhances their day-to-day and create a meaningful connection with our audience.” 

Creative is the route to driving brand growth

That’s all well and good but using content to drive deeper brand engagement and connection can only happen once you have your advertising and creative in place, according to Shula Sinclair. Firstly, Sinclair argued, establishing distinctiveness and brand salience – which are essential to brand growth – without diluting what you want the brand to represent, can only be conveyed through advertising or creative. Next, Sinclair cited the direct correlation between advertising investment and brand growth. Sinclair’s third point was that consumers don’t really care about brands and we instead should be “thinking about how we can creatively and compellingly convey what we have to say in a fraction of a second.” 

Context guarantees brand safety and relevance 

Presenting the case for context, Sam Adams explained that seeing an advertising message in the right environment is essential to success because it offers brand safety, relevance and engagement. Many advertisers now use negative keyword targeting to make sure their ads don’t appear on the wrong pages. “It’s important not to get dragged into the temptation of advertising deemed as insensitive and inappropriate for obvious reasons. Advertising in trusted quality media ensures brand safety, but it also positions your brand as part of the conversation of the larger issues in the world,” she said.

After each of the three panellists had laid out their argument, the debate to find the ideal mix of Content Creative and Context began. Watch the video to see how the discussion panned out and to find out who was crowned Queen!

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My Media Life – Christoph Woermann

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_video link=”https://youtu.be/HTrJv7m8TBo”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]CHRISTOPH WOERMANN IN CONVERSATION WITH THE WORLD MEDIA GROUP’S BELINDA BARKER

Welcome to My Media Life, where we chat with the movers and shakers in the worlds of business and marketing to find out what the media industry means to them. They share their advice for those starting out today and personal insights into their sources of inspiration and motivations.

This month, we’re delighted to be joined by Christoph Woermann, CMO of Corporate Banking for Deutsche Bank.

Below are extracts from our conversation – you can watch the full interview in the video above or listen to the podcast here.

How does marketing for a large bank differ from marketing in other industries?

Banking means different things to different people. Most people usually have a notion of banks in their capacity as a private retail customer. Of course, banks have other facets as they are also conducting capital markets business, or business with larger corporate clients, or in the asset management space, so marketing is multifaceted.

The challenging and fascinating thing about marketing for banks, and in marketing to business audiences, corporates and large multinational institutions, is that you’re not marketing any physical products. You’re marketing the capacity of an institution to foster economic growth by supporting corporates in various aspects of their day-to-day activity by processing their payments or funding their business.

As such, marketing is super inspiring because one day you may be involved in talking about a project in a developing country. Another day you may be talking about how you can support a client in growing into different regions in Asia Pacific and the challenges they may have. And on the third day, you’re involved in issues about supply chain management. Marketing, therefore, is the conveyance of the intellectual capabilities of a financial provider or their expertise, as opposed to pure product and getting rid of something you have on your shelves. That is not disrespectful to anyone who has that – it’s just a different mechanic.

You’ve been within the media industry for a number of years – what does it mean to you?

When you have decades of experience in one industry, you witness how the industry has developed through various cycles, and the same is true for the media industry. Whilst in the past, the media industry had a so-called monopoly on the content creation, nowadays, everybody is their own content creator.

There is information overload – people suffering from information fatigue, from information burnout. In a very fast and easy-consume media world, quality is key. The media that can provide well-researched, balanced quality has a lot to say, for that will be where, in my view, the tendency will go.

You can get confirmation for every weird opinion from left, right, and centre and feel perfectly entitled to continue with that thought. At that time, a balanced media offer can help you navigate on the right path again, and that’s why I feel media has an even more important place in this world that gets increasingly polarized, than ever before.

What’s the one piece of advice that has helped you in your career?

There’s one piece of advice that was given to me before I even started in banking by a banker that I met on a private occasion. At that time, I had no intentions whatsoever to join banking. In fact, I was poised to go into the FMCG business in a marketing role. This person said to me, “Why don’t you join the banking industry?” to which I responded, “Oh, I’m not too sure whether I’m the right person for it.” And he then said, “Look, what you know can come in very handy at some point in life. What you don’t know should be your constant quest. So please venture into unchartered territories. That will make you stronger.”

He went on to say, “If you join our company, at some point your knowledge about marketing can come in very handy because they’re all bankers, not marketeers.” And now I’m sitting here speaking to you as a Chief Marketing Officer of Deutsche Bank’s corporate bank as a trained banker, but also as a marketeer. That is the advice I would give somebody: Always tackle the unknown. The reward is much bigger than the risk!

What’s your favourite thing about your current role?

Banking, in the true sense, is about enabling customers to make a difference to the worlds in which they operate – to their markets, to their customers. You can foster innovation by providing financing, and you can foster innovation by providing the right advice.

That is what I absolutely love in my job because if you have the privilege to sit together with highly intelligent people that are all subject matter experts, then you can draw the knowledge out of them, package this in an unbiased, non-product-led way, and offer the gift of knowledge to your audiences, be it existing customers or the wider market.

It is very rewarding if you see that the responses of those who read your content result in an activity that makes a difference in the market. It sounds very heroic, but at the end of the day, that’s what it boils down to, and that’s why it is a privilege to do what I do.

It sounds like you still get excited about your role?

Absolutely. I mean, I would say the moment you’re losing your passion for something, you have to move on. It’s almost like cancer that eats you up from the inside if you’re not doing what you love. Not every day for me is a day where I say, “Wow! I’ve just moved the world”. There’s a lot of lot of mundane stuff that we all have to do, but in essence, you’ve got to really love what you’re doing. You’ve got to be positive.

What’s your secret talent?

I think the secret, is to see your role as a leader of a team almost like an inverse triangle, that you turn it on its head and you are at the bottom of it, supporting the careers and the success of every single member of your team. You are only as good as the weakest link in your team. And it’s not about identifying weaknesses and giving them the grandfatherly help. It’s about showing good leadership by rolling up your sleeves, not being too precious to do something super mundane; doing things that surprise people.

When we’re at conferences, for example, I’m not just running around having senior meetings. I am reporting from the conference myself on our corporate LinkedIn channel. I write, I produce the videos myself with my own camera, all within the confines of guidance that our company gives us. You’re only a credible leader when you show that you can do everything that your team can do, and you’re curious and helpful to those who do things much better than you to lead the path.

Where do you get your daily news from?

Living in the UK, I wake up and listen to Radio 4. I know there are people who have different views about certain radio shows or news outlets, but I think it’s good enough for me to know what’s currently cooking. I know that there isn’t any such thing as a completely unbiased news provision.

I’m an ardent fan of the Economist. When the very contentious and heated debate on Brexit happened, this magazine made clear where they stood, but they allowed everyone to voice their side of the view. And that is what I feel every adult can expect or can demand from media. Provide them with data points and let them form their own opinion.

What about social media?

I was very active on Twitter a couple of years ago and I know Twitter is here to stay, but I find it increasingly hard to pick out a good gold nugget. It’s a lot of chatter. I feel that LinkedIn is my online supplement to the news and I value the professional approach, generally, that this medium offers.

What media brands do you trust the most?

This is a blatant plug for the World Media Group and I’m very pleased to be involved. I can wholeheartedly say that every single member listed on the World Media Group’s participants – I don’t want to single out anyone – has stood the test of time in terms of their approach to journalism; their approach to research.

Nowadays, it’s so important that there is a collective force for the good, for quality journalism. And we as recipients of that need to willingly pay for it and support it by making sure we cite those quality sources whenever there’s an opportunity to do so. It is important, in my view, that we maintain the integrity of those outlets.

What do you do to switch off?  

As somebody who’s very interested in and passionate about wellbeing, I feel that we shouldn’t dismiss the fact that we are all part of nature and the connectivity with nature via things like the food that we eat. I love cooking for my family, and I love preparing food. Not in the microwave, wait for the ping and take it out. Prepare fresh stuff if you can take the time.

Time is the biggest thing you can gift to members of your family. I also go for walks with my little dog – these are the mundane things that I do. I’m a gardener of a little London garden patch – in two hours I can manicure my garden so that it looks spic and span!

When or where do you get your inspiration?

When my brain is idle. Mowing the lawn doesn’t require a lot of brain attention – the only sensory experience is the wonderful smell of freshly cut grass. This is usually when I get my inspiration, and in the morning in the shower, or sometimes when I’m riding my scooter to work (although increasingly less so because of the traffic).

That’s the source of my creativity, and, as with so many other people, when you talk about gardening or when you talk about London, or mundane things like preparing food, you can have hours of conversation with people who have the same interest.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and time with us today, Christoph. Your thirst for creativity and your ongoing passion in your role is inspirational!  [/vc_column_text][vc_column_text][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]