Good writing isn’t simply a luxury. It isn’t just an add on for when you’re feeling flush. Good writing can be the difference between launching a successful product and not; connecting with your audience and not; winning a pitch and not. To be able to connect effectively, you need to be able to say what …
Category: Blog
Time to call it as you see it
I’ve spent nearly 15 years working in the creative industries, as journalist, PR, employee and employer. And I’ll tell you this; it’s not getting any more diverse or reflective of us as a society. We need to do more. It isn’t enough to hope it’s going to change. We need to sit on boards, to …
Can’t hold your tongue? Maybe self employment isn’t for you
I actively avoid confrontation. Anyone who knows my family and me might find this surprising. We are sharp, so sharp we could cut ourselves, my brother and I were frequently told. We like having the last word. We are impatient with unfairness. We have high standards. We bicker, have long (LONG) debates about anything from …
Well, that went well.
Five years ago it was cold. Really cold. I had handed in my notice to my sociopathic boss, walked out into a bitter winter armed with nothing but my wits and a commission to make a documentary on Terence Davies for the BBC. 2011 was an uncertain tumult. And it was cold. Bitter. Snow law …
Give the Turner Prize to Granby Four Streets
Assemble’s installation at Glasgow’s Tramways reflects what art is in our modern lives; it’s to be touched, to be brought into our homes, to bind our communities together. Art isn’t behind glass panels anymore, it’s on our streets. This is why Assemble should win next week. It’s quite an emotional journey from Cairns Street to …
Can Corbyn continue with just social media?
Jeremy Corbyn’s strategy to bypass the traditional media in favour of social media is certainly brave, but will it work? His election as Labour leader feels as though it’s a shift; much of the support generated during his campaign was centred online without mainstream media support. But the ongoing 24 hour news cycle and dominance of …
The Photocopy Theory and Labour
Jeremy Corbyn is, a leftie friend told me this week, the Labour membership screaming “I’m mad as hell and I just can’t take it anymore”. People have said that a lot about Labour in the past five years. This is the moment the membership with shake the leadership out of its fugue. This is the …
Impartiality is not weakness
We are so utterly surrounded by bias that we often fail to recognise the importance (and difficulty) of walking the fine line in the middle. The inevitable consequence is that we make no one happy and infuriate everyone. The BBC’s commitment to impartiality is vital, it should be an ambition of the media, instead it’s …
Tweeting isn’t the same as engaging, or why your social media echoes
How do you make people care about what you’re doing? Do you have to? When we talk about brand engagement and going about our daily lives and sharing the experience on social media we assume we’re talking about two different things. Despite feeling as though you have to articulate the fact a brand isn’t as important …
Can’t figure out what to blog? Hire someone else
There’s something quite inspiring about having to develop ideas for blog topics on a weekly basis. OK, I’m well aware that where I’ve written “inspiring” most people would say “terrifying”. The problem is, for those who find coming up with blog topics akin to torture, coming up with ideas, angles, perspectives and fresh content on …