30 years and counting…Part 2

In part 1 of my post, I talked about diversity as part of a team using my colleague Alice Turnbull as a great example of how having a real mix of people in a team can be chaotic but invariably rewarding.

In this part, I wanted to talk about the story teller and wordsmith in the team. This is such an important member of any communications or public affairs team; someone who is often overlooked when discussing what a great team looks like. In the case of the Bayer team in Cambridge, this role is taken up by the inimitable Mike Abram. He came to the company over 8 years ago from the editorial team at Farmers Weekly, and rapidly transformed our ability to communicate with the trade press. He also took our social media activity, that I’d initiated a few years earlier, by the scruff of the neck and put it on its current professional pedestal.

But the thing that makes Mike stand out from so many people that I know in communication circles is his ability as a storyteller, the one with a nose for a story and the nous to understand that not all stories that we think are amazing, are actually amazing to others. I am also very jealous of his ability as a wordsmith to take a story, be it a press release, something for the website, a blog, a vlog, or other social media piece, and give it a gentle polish, changing a few words or moving a paragraph, here and there and transforming the piece into something worth reading.

My learning from all of this:

1. Do not neglect the importance of having people in your team who really think about what makes a good piece of communication – they are gold dust.
2. Beg, borrow or steal their time when you are starting a new project or communications channel – they can make the difference between success and failure
3. Do try and select someone who supports a reasonable football team. Supporting a club like Norwich FC does mean that a team member can be pretty miserable on a Monday morning.