BackBBC Radio 4’s When It Hits The Fan
Lower Value Humans, yep, that’s us folks, in the eyes of our technocrat overlords punch-drunk on AI
Does AI have a PR problem or does PR have an AI problem? Probably both. The PR industry has always struggled to invest in R&D compared to other sectors, a bit incongruous really considering how dynamic our industry is and how quickly channels rise, fall and morph. PR is sometimes a bit like strategy surfing on wild currents of waves of channels.
I tuned into one of my favourite PR podcasts whilst walking my woof, Dante, and caught an episode of Communication Breakdown hosted by Steve Dowling and Craig Carroll. Craig is based in NYC and a serious academic in Corp Comms and Steve formerly headed comms for OpenAI and Apple. Quite the double act. Do have a listen to their episode on AI chiefs delivering commencement speeches to US students to be roundly booed as Gen Alpha are waking up to the fact that for some, the rug has been pulled from beneath them as AI has gobbled up entry-level roles in the great AI displacement.
In other news, Pope Leo is working with Anthropic (the mother ship of Claude AI) to centre humanity and not just the blind pursuit of ROI, a much needed echo of stakeholder capitalism invented decades ago. The Pope leading the way on AI was not on my bingo card for 2026, I am a little obsessed with Vatican comms.
BBC Radio 4 | 3 Fan-Hitters We Covered This Week
1. When You Say The Quiet Thing Out Loud
Ever felt like your boss doesn’t quite hold you in the highest esteem?
Pity then, workers at Standard Chartered Bank. CEO Bill Winters described some of them as ‘lower value human capital’ during a speech to investors. His words came at a time when the bank announced around 8,000 job losses linked to the development of AI.
David Yelland and I look at what happens when you say the quiet thing out loud, and what the repercussions are if you get your PR response all kinds of wrong.
2. The Late Queen’s Reputation
Are ‘dark forces’ really trying to tarnish the late Queen’s reputation? Recent revelations about how she lobbied for Andrew Mountbatten Windsor to get a trade envoy job could be just the start of an attempt to gradually unpick her legacy.
3. When Politics Meet Influencer Culture
Also, big shout out to the GC. That’s Gemma Collins, mega-influencer and former star of The Only Way is Essex. The Department for Education is facing a huge backlash for using her to try and persuade young people to stay in education. David and I explain that the use of influencers in politics is a growing thing – but just chasing their millions of followers doesn’t guarantee success. There’s an art to getting it right.
Please do have a listen on BBC Radio 4 every Wednesday at 4 pm and Thursday at 8 pm and let me know your thoughts.
👉 Catch the extended version on BBC Sounds, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
Does the world need another podcast? YES!
One of my favourite ways to switch off is listening to podcasts while taking Dante for a walk. I spend so much of my working life thinking about communications that I probably should listen to something completely unrelated, but I always end up drifting back to PR.
Two new PR podcasts caught my attention this week.
The first is PRWeek UK‘s new podcast Are You The PR A**hole?* from John Harrington, Shayoni Lynn FCIPR FPRCA and Richard Fogg. The format is clever because it taps into those awkward ethical grey areas that most communicators eventually find themselves navigating at some point in their careers. It also feels like I am having a coffee with three of my PR mates, and I do happen to know all three. Definitely worth a listen.
I have also been enjoying The Fame Formula from Mark Borkowski. Mark has always understood that fame is not just about celebrity, but about power and attention. The podcast explores how reputation is shaped in public, and what visibility does to people once the spotlight turns on them. Mark started off his career in theatre land so he totally gets entertainment grade comms.
Corporate PR Is Entering Influencer Era
The panel at the CIPR Corporate and Financial Group event
This week, I attended the CIPR Corporate & Financial Group (CFG)’s brilliant panel event on Rethinking Paid Media in Corporate and Financial PR, hosted at MONY Group plc‘s offices, with Christine Perry, Sam Cooper, Maddie Soper and Emma Young on the panel and Laura Price as moderator.
It got me thinking about how corporate and financial communications is no longer just borrowing from consumer playbooks. In some cases, it’s bypassing consumer grade altogether and reaching for entertainment grade.
Which led me to think about paid influencers in corporate and financial PR. Marianna Spring and Matt Shea’s BBC Radio 4 podcast Top Comment recently unpacked Palantir’s relationship with influencers and the orchestrated NHS narratives forming around the company as its NHS contract is increasingly under the spotlight. A useful listen on how reputation is increasingly being shaped in spaces that corporate communications teams have historically ignored.
An interesting area to watch.
Istanbul Calling
Whirling Dervishes CREDIT: Suat Eracar | Shutterstock
Next week I am heading to Istanbul for the 3rd Global Islamic Economy Summit, taking place at the Istanbul Financial Center as part of the AlBaraka Summit Series. I will be speaking at a client conference on Islamic finance, in essence how to communicate complex financial systems so they are accessible.
Istanbul always feels like a city where worlds meet. East and West, old and new, commerce and spirituality all layered on top of each other. Whenever I think about Türkiye, I also think about Rumi, the 13th-century Persian poet and scholar who eventually settled in Konya, where his followers later established the Mevlevi Order, better known around the world as the Whirling Dervishes.
One of his lines has stayed with me for years:
“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”
There is something grounding about that perspective in a world that often feels very noisy and performative.
I will be writing next week’s newsletter munching away on rose-flavoured Turkish delight. YUM.
Originally featured in Substack
