The Conscious Communicator with Kim Clark
angela_r_howard (00:02.643)
All right, welcome Kim to the podcast. It is, this has been a long time in the making, so I am so very excited. And I know you're cozied up in that room. It's cold where you're at. And remind us where you call, where you joining us from.
kim_clark (00:07.416)
and get you
kim_clark (00:16.398)
I'm on the unceded territory of the Almamutsen in the south of Bay Area, south of San Francisco.
angela_r_howard (00:25.651)
Oh my goodness, well, yeah, it's the winter is coming, right? In all corners of the world, I feel like, I know I'm watching the, what is it? The House of Dragons or the, the spinoff. And so winter is coming is at top of mind for me.
kim_clark (00:31.995)
I've seen that show.
kim_clark (00:36.458)
Yeah. Yep. Yep.
kim_clark (00:43.84)
And that's true for businesses as well as it relates to DEI. Winter's coming.
angela_r_howard (00:49.295)
Yes, yes, that is, I think it's like an ongoing year round theme. And Kim, you know, I know you do a ton of just fantastic work in the DE&I and conscious communication space. So I would love to hear just an introduction, who you are, what you do, and the impact you're looking to make on the world.
kim_clark (01:10.086)
Angela, thanks for doing this and having this conversation and making it accessible to so many to help people understand the work that needs to be done. And the part that I play in the overall diversity, equity and inclusion space is specifically in the lane of communications. What is the role of language? So some of the problems that we're seeing with the efforts around DEI within organizations
angela_r_howard (01:32.084)
Mm.
kim_clark (01:39.386)
is actually self-sabotage by communicators. We have not done a very good job in telling the story around the why. We have not been urgent. We have been performative rather than transformative in our communications. And so I have spent over a decade running internal communication teams.
angela_r_howard (01:49.76)
Mm.
kim_clark (02:08.106)
So that means that I would work with the C-suite, the CEO, I'd put together the company all hands. I would run the internal intranets. So all kind of communications with employees, that was what I ran. And I used to work at places like GoDaddy. You know, these are global teams, PayPal, GitHub, for example. And I had also...
angela_r_howard (02:29.861)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (02:33.278)
I'm a perpetual student, Angela, so I'm always taking classes, I'm always learning, I'm always on webinars, I'm always listening to podcasts. And so I love this stuff. And so I started working with a mentor almost 20 years ago now, who's been a diversity trainer in the corporate space and in the academic space for over 40 years. She grew up in LA, she's been a part of every
rights movement since the civil rights in the mid 60s, she's been through it all. And so having her as a mentor, learning about diversity, equity, inclusion and the role of language, she loves language and hates English, you know, that kind of thing, because, you know, we only have one word for love, for example. So there's ways that we need to be taking our language very seriously in creating the reality.
angela_r_howard (03:07.847)
Mm.
angela_r_howard (03:18.913)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (03:23.331)
Hmm.
kim_clark (03:29.302)
Bishop Desmond Tutu has a quote saying, language is very powerful and not only describes reality, it creates the reality it describes. So these are the kind of conversations that I have with my mentor. Her name is Deborah L. Johnson. And the more and more I worked with her, the more I started incorporating what I was learning from her into my communication strategy. So I didn't realize how much
angela_r_howard (03:39.478)
Hmm.
kim_clark (03:58.238)
we were missing as internal communicators by not doing this. And then I was tested and the Pulse shooting in Orlando, Florida, 2016, I had established an infrastructure at GoDaddy with employee resource groups and the executive sponsors. I had solid channels of distribution of content, et cetera. And when...
angela_r_howard (04:12.972)
Mm.
kim_clark (04:26.454)
the Pulse tragedy occurred. There was a flood of emails to me, the head of internal comms to say, we don't know what to do. We're distracted, there's employees who are grieving. We have to do something. And so I wasn't sure why they came to me, but I was sure glad they did and that we've had such a good infrastructure in place that we were able to move very quickly into virtual vigils.
angela_r_howard (04:37.473)
Mm.
kim_clark (04:55.254)
Book a bunch of conference rooms, this is pre-COVID, so everyone's in the offices. And we got a message out from the executive sponsor. I had my mentor on speed dial. Everybody should have somebody on speed dial. And I should be on people speed dial. Angela needs to be on people speed. So I had my mentor on speed dial. She shows up, we have a virtual vigil and we allow that space for people to, and they were supported in the workplace.
angela_r_howard (04:59.757)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (05:08.582)
Yes!
angela_r_howard (05:12.544)
Yes.
angela_r_howard (05:20.372)
Mm.
kim_clark (05:24.79)
They had a safe place. And so not that I was ever thinking anything, we can't make that up. We didn't know anything like that was gonna happen. But the fact that what I had been learning from my mentor, I was putting into practice, we were able to respond, not react, not knee jerk and not be performative. We were actually to meaningfully respond to a need where communications, social justice crisis,
employee health and well-being all came together and we were actually ready for something that we couldn't have anticipated. And so ever since then I've been going around speaking at conferences, on webinars, everywhere I possibly can to teach communicators our role in diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in our organization because we play a critical role.
angela_r_howard (06:23.159)
Hmm. Yeah, and I think a lot of people might be listening to this and feeling the urgency around what you... I mean, this was years ago, but we are faced with current events, global events that are impacting us kind of on a weekly basis at this point, right? Where we are as...
kim_clark (06:38.606)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (06:46.238)
Unfortunately, yeah.
angela_r_howard (06:50.435)
communicators, as conscious communicators, we have to respond and be that source of, you know, I truly believe kind of a source of truth almost, given that we have so many different information sources as well. There's a, I don't know if you're familiar with, oh my gosh, I just forgot the name of it, but there's research, there's an annual report that talks about kind of this like truss barometer.
kim_clark (07:00.994)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (07:17.428)
Edelman Trespirometer, that's it. Yep.
angela_r_howard (07:20.423)
I don't know why I forgot it, because I've mentioned it so many times. Edelman Trust Barometer, yes, where we are seeing the shift happen, where people are trusting their organizations and even business more than, let's say, government or the media. And so we have such a critical responsibility, to your point, to integrate those different, those messages and those communications to impact the humans who are working for us.
kim_clark (07:32.673)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (07:48.566)
Mm-hmm. And that's something we have to remember is that they're humans, they're people. There's, you know, people talk about organizations, companies, blah, blah, blah. But what is a company or an organization except for a whole bunch of people?
angela_r_howard (08:04.375)
just human beings working together towards a similar goal. And I would love to kind of, because you mentioned a really good example of what, you know, you talk about conscious communications and I would love to hear what your definition of that is. And then I would love to talk about a really bad example, a really harmful example of how communications and dealing.
kim_clark (08:26.53)
Sure.
angela_r_howard (08:30.64)
with that internal narrative can really be harmful. So first tell us what conscious communication is and then we're gonna talk about Twitter and Elon Musk.
kim_clark (08:37.786)
Ah, yes, yes, yes, yes. And I have a whole deck where I collect examples of what not to do. It's harder to find examples of what to do. Okay, so conscious communications is about adopting a DEI lens on all of our work. So first we have to understand.
angela_r_howard (08:46.594)
Mm.
kim_clark (09:02.902)
that we all have bias, unconscious bias, and our unconscious bias, unless it goes, you know, unless it goes checked, it typically goes unchecked and will seep into our work. We will unintentionally leave out entire populations in our messaging, in our content. We will, what's called tone deaf, which is I'm sure there's more inclusive ways of saying that term.
where we are putting out messaging around social justice communications and crisis situations, and we're missing the mark. Because we don't understand the historical and social context that we're in. We don't understand the perspective of the most impacted audience. And so understanding that we have our own experiences and understanding and accepting that it's limited. That's the beauty of a diverse team.
It's just like we get this beautiful opportunity to learn from other people's experiences. So really truly embracing that everyone has bias and it influences our work. And then our responsibility is to be that ally for the colleagues who are not in the room. And then how do we open up the opportunities to hand the mic over and defer to people who should be.
angela_r_howard (10:01.897)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (10:30.002)
running the content. So for example, cultural moments such as Pride Month in the US is in June. So traditionally communicators will work with folks to change the logo to a rainbow version of the logo. They'll work with brand on that. And...
They will have some sort of love is love, hand out t-shirts, some sort of social posts around love is love. So that's a great step. Is the visibility, thank you, yeah. However, is it from the lens actually of the impacted audience? Do we understand why there's a pride in the first place?
So understanding what is that social and historical context? Do we understand, are we listening and handing the microphone to, pardon me, people who are LGBTQ plus to hear from them about how they are in crisis depending on the state they're in, for example, there's over 300 legislative bills that are anti-LGBTQ plus, particularly transgender and transgender of youth. Over 30 people,
have been murdered just in 2022, who are transgender people of color, for example. Do you understand that we are under safety concerns from our health and wellbeing, as well as just being in the world, just being ourselves is a threat to legislators and to other folks. Do you understand what is, are you listening?
angela_r_howard (12:04.079)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (12:14.654)
You know, so there's the crisis. So these are the three C's that I talk about that kind of make up the basic foundation of conscious communications. First, that celebration, that visibility I was talking about. Secondly, crisis, understand the social and historical context of crisis. So you can't, it's not okay to go out and do the rainbow logo and put together a playlist on Spotify during Pride and just completely ignore.
angela_r_howard (12:24.404)
Mm.
kim_clark (12:44.482)
the oppression and the physical threats that the community is at the same time experiencing. We have to acknowledge that and we have to participate towards solutions to remove those barriers and create more safety for the community that we're celebrating. And then the third C is consistency, making sure that we're not just doing flavor of the day, that we're not just talking about LGBTQ plus folks in June.
but there's a consistency to it. So you are building proof points and you're working towards being a part of the solution and not participating in the legislation that's causing oppression, for example. So the conscious communicator, conscious communications is adopting this lens of being that ally and making sure that we understand other people are having different experiences and investing and understanding
Inclusive communications. Inclusive communications is not being politically correct. I just, Angela, let me kind of, let me break that down for a second here. Cause people are gonna like, yeah, people are gonna be like, oh, you're talking about being woke. And it's like, well, first of all, stop stealing a term that the black community has had for decades and decades. Don't use it as a derogatory term. You don't get, you don't have the right to steal somebody else's, you know, cultural term.
angela_r_howard (13:51.843)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (13:55.244)
Yes, unpack it.
angela_r_howard (14:05.481)
Mm.
kim_clark (14:13.17)
and then use it against them, you know, and make yourself the hero. That's not okay, first of all. So, but I am talking about how political correctness is this, it feels gross. It feels external. It feels like it's forced upon these rules and regulations. And I'm not talking about that. Like, oh, you can't say that anymore. And it's like, you know, well, people can't tell me what to say. It's like, no, let's grow up.
angela_r_howard (14:15.86)
Mm.
kim_clark (14:41.726)
Okay, inclusive communications. We need to mature out of the playground folks and be adults. When it comes to communications, how can we be more inclusive in the way that we are writing this communication, putting together this social campaign, this advertising, this marketing campaign? Who needs to be at the table that's not here? What else do we need to learn about what's going on with the community to truly accurately represent them?
You know, they drive the content. I should not be speaking on their behalf. There was in the disabilities movement in the sixties, they had this fantastic motto that actually, uh, covers a lot of every, every community's experiences, nothing about us without us. So we should not be going out talking about, you know, marginalized experiences without the voice in the face, driving the content of the people who are impacted.
angela_r_howard (15:29.611)
Yes, love that.
kim_clark (15:39.662)
So there's this whole piece of work that we are responsible for the tone, the personality, the language that we use that we are seeking through inclusive communications to go not from the outside in like it says force rules and regulations it's from the inside out. I want to honor you. I want to respect your dignity.
as a human being. So you're transgender, your pronouns are they, them? Great, great, that's part of that DEI lens. Somebody else is having a different experience than me. I am not to question it. I am to validate it and I am to respect it. And I need to do that in my communications. And, because I want you to respect my experience.
You know, because it's my experience and it's very, very real to me. My problems are very real and your problems are very real to you. How do I accurately give voice to these challenges and how do I accurately address these issues using communications? Because I'm a big believer that language leads to behavior. And that actually is kind of a handoff to the kind of work that you do on cultural work.
angela_r_howard (16:55.501)
Yes.
angela_r_howard (16:58.823)
Yes, that's exactly what I was going to say because your last C was consistency. And all culture really is, is a culmination of consistent behaviors over time, matching your words with your actions, right? That's what culture is. I think we try to romanticize it and talk about like, culture is the ping pong tables and the food trucks and it's the celebrations. And it's like, no, at the end of the day, it's like...
kim_clark (17:23.412)
No!
angela_r_howard (17:29.127)
Am I in a space that feels safe because I'm not doing mental cartwheels and there's consistency? And there's clarity about how things are done here, right? You're not telling me one thing, but I'm doing another thing. And I think what's happening to kind of continue some of the work that you were talking about communications perspective is you're talking about the conscious communications, the words.
Now everyone's watching you to see, are your actions matching those words? So if you are saying we care about the LGBT plus community, and this is a priority of ours to ensure that these voices are heard, or diversity and equity is a focus at our organization, but then your behaviors and your decisions and your policies and the way you treat people does not match that, that's...
that creates some trauma, that creates some, the lack of safety from my experience being in the organization. So the culture you're building is really just like, do what you say you're going to do. Don't be performative. Make sure that your actions are, and if you don't know what those actions are, or you're like, well, how do I really hear somebody who looks or experiences something different than me, then ask them. It goes right back to honoring, celebrating,
kim_clark (18:24.642)
Oh yeah.
kim_clark (18:38.208)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (18:53.015)
different experiences, not just acknowledging them, like actually celebrating them. That's the difference, right? And I think sometimes we think, well, we've set up this BRG and we've acknowledged that these people exist. So that's all we need to do, right?
kim_clark (18:59.179)
Yeah, absolutely.
kim_clark (19:06.692)
Thanks for acknowledging that I exist.
angela_r_howard (19:10.035)
Right, that is the, literally that is below the bar. Like some people, I talked to some executives and they're like, well, we've done these 11 things, right? And those 11 things were like, we had these three trainings, we have a BRG, we hired one woman on our executive team, we've put up a diversity page on our website and so we're doing it, right? And it's like.
kim_clark (19:13.255)
Bye!
angela_r_howard (19:36.099)
You are below the bar. You're not even doing the bare minimum of celebrating different experiences, if that's all you're doing. So.
kim_clark (19:43.294)
And we want to be careful about checking that box of like, oh, we've got a woman on the executive team. There are certain women that I can think of that I would never want to give power to because they're actually harming themselves. So they're actually harming other women. And isn't there a great quote by Madeline Albright, rest in peace, you know, saying there's this special place in hell where women don't help other women.
angela_r_howard (20:00.716)
Yes.
angela_r_howard (20:05.228)
Mm.
kim_clark (20:08.678)
And so there are women I can think of, there's women of color, there's women with disabilities, there's LGBTQ plus women that I would never want to work under, they're actually causing a lot of harm and participating in the systems of inequity. And you were talking about, what are your actions? And in comms, we talk about that in the framework of say, do gap. So as comms people,
angela_r_howard (20:35.196)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (20:37.794)
One of our biggest excuses is, hey, I can't control what people do. I just, you know, write this thing and I just put out this slide and I just post this thing and hey, I'm just doing my job here. And to a certain extent, yeah, it's a performative system that we get recognized and rewarded for. We are the artists of spin. And we are similar to film directors who direct your eye and attention to a certain direction.
angela_r_howard (20:45.51)
Yep.
angela_r_howard (21:00.521)
Mm.
kim_clark (21:07.466)
And we have all this other stuff going on that we don't want you to pay attention to until we kind of like plop it in your lap, which may be a good segue into Twitter. Ha ha ha ha.
angela_r_howard (21:20.135)
Yes, yes, let's talk about Twitter because this is a real time example of things from a culture and a communication standpoint going horribly wrong. And one of the things that you, or horribly right, yes, I'm interested in hearing that. But here's the thing, I just want to mention that the first thing is that
kim_clark (21:32.454)
Or horribly right. I'll talk about that in just a second.
angela_r_howard (21:46.091)
The connection, communication should not live in a silo. All of the roles that I've held before I started my own business, I had a very close connection with my communications partner because I wanted to bridge that do-say gap that was like an intention, a strategy of mine to make sure that whatever I'm doing over here, we're connected. And so that might be another good segue into Twitter, but tell me your thoughts. Let's kind of unpack.
this a little bit. For those who maybe are hearing like bits and pieces of it, give us the landscape of what's happening.
kim_clark (22:22.062)
Well, there's so much out there. I'm sure I have not read everything that is going on, but what I have seen is that up to 75, 80%, it's been estimated that employees have either been fired, laid off, or have quit on their own. There's been around 5,500 contractors. Out of those 5,500 contractors, 4,400 have been let go. There's a...
Several folks who cannot leave Twitter because they are on an H1B visa and in the US That basically means that you're sponsored by a company to work at that company If you do not have that visa within two months and you don't get another sponsor You will have to go back to your country of origin and there are people here that don't want to do that They'd prefer to stay here and stay here and work so
Now, some of them have been victims of the layoffs, not only at Twitter, but Meta and Facebook, PayPal. There's been many, many, many other companies who have also gone through layoffs that have been below the radar because Twitter's kind of hogging up a lot of the headlines. So there's that going on, and then there's the concern around Twitter just failing as an app.
from a technical standpoint, but however, the engineers who are no longer there built an amazing capacity planning stable system that has a lot of redundancies in their data centers, and it's still trucking along. However, now we're getting to the content. Now there's been a lot of openings and of reinstallment and reactivations of accounts that I just saw a headline today talking about. There's no more.
content moderation in place for misinformation around COVID-19. The first weekend that Elon Musk, the new owner, and we mean owner, there is no board of directors. There's hardly any execs. It's literally his and his alone and the people that he brings in, the decisions that he makes. That unto itself is its own podcast. But
kim_clark (24:41.102)
But he has reinstalled previously banned, you know, folks like former President Trump, Major E. Tyler Green, many other folks. In the first weekend of his takeover of the channel, the rise of the N word was like over 500%. It's completely unchecked and it's only going to increase. So.
angela_r_howard (25:03.185)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (25:06.874)
More and more people, their accounts are being reactivated. There's this more of this permission where people will say, well, it's free speech. That is not free speech. That's hate speech. So let's be really clear. And so the harm that's being done now, many people, celebrities, other content creators, advertisers are deactivating their accounts and or pausing their advertising spend.
angela_r_howard (25:30.486)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (25:35.142)
as we watch this kind of spiral of what we used to know Twitter about. So that's kind of the overall, that's my understanding. There's more to it. I'm sure that I haven't read, but that's just kind of a high level observable facts without too much commentary about what's happened to Twitter. I've deactivated my account. Um, it's just, it's in alignment with my values that I'd rather not have anyone.
angela_r_howard (25:52.705)
Yes.
angela_r_howard (25:59.211)
same.
kim_clark (26:05.428)
uh, including, you know, Elon Musk, make any money off of my content.
angela_r_howard (26:12.031)
Yeah, I'll just add the other point is the expectation from Elon Musk around the workload. I think the words, I can't remember what words were used, but essentially saying like you can expect hardcore, yes, hardcore was used. Very clear expectations around what his expectations are, essentially.
kim_clark (26:22.125)
Yes.
kim_clark (26:29.198)
hardcore.
kim_clark (26:36.974)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (26:42.415)
Now, is this the right thing to do? No, but he's being very clear about what his expectations are of the people who do stay.
kim_clark (26:47.518)
on a Google form, any internal communicator, which is then the comms team got blown out pretty quickly. So really the only communications team is Twitter posts by Elon Musk, you know? So yeah, there is no comms team at Twitter.
angela_r_howard (27:07.511)
So what's, you talked about what's going, what's going, like what's wrong with this, right? I mean, you mentioned obviously the product itself and the regenerative nature of the hate speech on the bad side, right? And what that's causing. But what else is going wrong? And then what's going right, to your point? Because I know you have some perspective on that.
kim_clark (27:23.756)
Yeah.
kim_clark (27:32.382)
Okay, so what's going wrong is the clarity of the bully CEO doesn't work. What we're also seeing is that folks who have the privilege, we have to understand it's privilege to quit your job or wait for the package, the severance, to take that package, have a nice holiday.
and try again when budgets open up and hiring starts back up in January. That's not everyone has that privilege to do so, but we have to recognize that there is privilege in this for people who can do that or are willing to say, I don't have the privilege to do this, but I value my life, my relationships, how I'm treated much more so than I'm just gonna figure it out. It's about our values. So the idea of the whole like,
engineer and like I mentioned, I'm geo located south of San Francisco. I'm very used to the whole mindset of working under your desk with a bunch of red bulls and the thrill of that creativity from an engineering standpoint. Um, and trying, you know, being a part of Twitter 2.0 is what Elon Musk is calling it and he, you know, only the best of the best and, you know, uh, you know, what is considered excellent performance. I.
You know, that kind of motivation, it doesn't work anymore, especially post 2020 for most people who have the privilege to walk away from something like that. Now, do we wanna work for something that's meaningful, that's gonna change the world and have an impact? Yeah, absolutely. But who Elon Musk is and has been unabashedly consistent about who he is and...
while he has switched political parties over the years. You know, at least he's being honest and transparent. We can give him credit for that because then we can make a more informed choice. Whereas some leaders try to hide that kind of stuff or say, look at our company values. This is amazing. We care about DEI. Here's our statement. And then go with the PAC, the Political Action Committee, that the company...
kim_clark (29:51.682)
funds and then goes and gives it to legislators who are pushing, you know, reproductive rights, you know, stripping those from women and non-binary folks and all those who have reproductive capabilities, voter suppression. So, you know, where the right hand is not matching up with the left hand. So that is part of communications. Visibility drives accountability. So that's one thing I'll give Elon Musk.
Credit for he is unabashedly saying, this is who I am. And he has the privilege to do so because he's kind of like the housing market and mortgage firms back in 2008. He's kind of too big to fail. So that's where I'm saying horribly wrong. You know, like employees, culture, communications, breaking all of the rules, doing all the wrong things.
at a social and historical context that are completely counterproductive to where the world is going, where the era of the employee and the voice of the employee is going. It's completely backwards because it's more of a dictatorship, authoritarian, you know, et cetera. And plays into patriarchy and all of the isms, right? Where I'm saying, or is this going horribly right, is that Elon Musk also,
angela_r_howard (31:01.963)
Hmm.
angela_r_howard (31:11.862)
Mm.
kim_clark (31:18.03)
is a great magician in that he will enjoy the free publicity. He will enjoy the PR that he's creating for himself by bringing these people back, allowing misinformation. But I can't help but wonder that where he's throwing our attention is what's going on behind the scenes. Where's the other hand and what's the other hand doing? It's like a magician, like, you know,
angela_r_howard (31:20.587)
Hmm.
kim_clark (31:47.198)
It's all happening right in front of us, but what's being emphasized is really casting a shadow of what's being intentionally de-emphasized. So I give him credit that he has a plan. So if it's to strip it down, the one tweet that I paid attention to and it keeps coming up in the back of my mind is that he says that, you know, the purchase of Twitter was to build the.
angela_r_howard (31:55.295)
Mm.
angela_r_howard (32:03.318)
Mm.
kim_clark (32:15.786)
Build X, the everything app. So is it kind of a strip Twitter for its parts in order to build this other thing that he's been wanting to do and he needed the database and the data and the data mining and the infrastructure to do that? Or what? I don't know. I don't know what it is, but when anybody goes out with like kind of more egregious, intentional, I know this is gonna piss everybody off and I'm gonna enjoy every single minute of it.
angela_r_howard (32:22.486)
Mmm.
kim_clark (32:45.35)
I immediately go, what's going on that's being de-emphasized? Why is our attention being pulled so emotionally and emphatically in this direction? What else is going on?
angela_r_howard (32:51.299)
Mm.
angela_r_howard (33:01.335)
Hmm. Yeah, it's that spin you talked about, right? Earlier.
kim_clark (33:04.154)
That's exactly it, Angela, that's it. It's like as communicators, we should be seeing this like, oh, thumbs up. Because we do this, this is what we're trained to do and we need to be more honest and transparent. That's a whole point of shifting communications as a discipline to be DEI social change agents. It's why I do what I do, that's my point. It's my goal, to honor language by
angela_r_howard (33:11.387)
Yep, something is going on. There is...
angela_r_howard (33:26.668)
Yes.
angela_r_howard (33:31.309)
Mm-hmm.
kim_clark (33:33.806)
you know, honoring people by honoring language about people. And so this whole idea of like, okay, let's take what we know as communicators and we know that there's an underbelly that goes on, especially in, in, in, you know, kind of these boardrooms and C-suites and stuff. And we're part of the pawns to kind of sell the company back to the employees or sell the company to our audiences and consumers.
And we're part of that system, but we do have to stop every once in a while and say, what are we doing? What are we doing? And what am I putting out there that actually is going to cause more harm than good in the long run? So when we see some, this kind of activity in using PR for someone's advantage, we should know better than anybody that there's something else going on. And I don't know what it is. I have very...
angela_r_howard (34:06.901)
Mmm.
kim_clark (34:31.538)
I don't really have a theory. It's just, I just, whenever anybody's trying to pull my attention somewhere else, I'm like, hmm. And that's about being a critical thinker. Just in general, is any kind of media, any kind of messaging, you know, murder mystery shows, shoot. Just watching Murder, She Wrote, if you want to get retro about it, like where's our attention going leading us, or I'm watching White Lotus, you know? It's like...
angela_r_howard (34:41.511)
Yep. Yep.
Yes. Yes.
angela_r_howard (34:49.509)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (34:55.299)
Sorry.
Yes. Oh, yep.
kim_clark (35:00.442)
Yeah, so it's just like, okay, they're leading us over here, but there's gonna be some other character and there's gonna be, but it's right in front of us, but I can't put my finger on it. So it's kind of an investigation from a comm standpoint to say, where is this leading? But just know that we don't see the whole story here. There's gonna be something else just like the magician that's gonna be a trick. It's gonna shock us.
angela_r_howard (35:10.211)
Mm.
angela_r_howard (35:18.26)
Mm.
angela_r_howard (35:30.135)
Hmm. So it sounds like the work you do is twofold. It's helping people understand how to be conscious communicators, but also just how to be conscious citizens, right? Of like the world and the information and the critical thinking. I just I can't emphasize that enough. And I know you have a book that I would love to just.
kim_clark (35:44.548)
Like, yes.
angela_r_howard (35:57.075)
hear more about or have the audience learn more about. We'll include it in the show notes, but tell us about our book. And then let's end with just where to find you. People wanna work with you. People need kind of that additional partnership or consulting around this work. Where can they find you?
kim_clark (36:14.178)
All right, so I co-authored a book with a TED speaker. Her name is Janet Stovall. And it is called The Conscious Communicator, the Fine Art of Not Saying Stupid, I don't know, can you swear on this podcast? Okay, I didn't know if you'd do the beep. So the fine art of not saying stupid shit. And so it's just like, let's just roll up our sleeves, let's get to work. It's genesis of the book was
angela_r_howard (36:29.619)
Of course. Yes, please.
kim_clark (36:43.018)
was to help communicators and content creators as well as people managers, honestly. Individuals can use it as well. You can certainly apply the same principles, but our specific target audience are communicators, internal or external PR agencies, brand agencies, to say, hey, we really messed up with our black squares in the summer of 2020.
with our statements of solidarity, they sure sounded great. What y'all been doing since then? It's been a crappy track record for almost everybody. Janet has done some research to say it's been two years. What's the report card on those statements of solidarity? And there's been many organizations that have very visibly gone against, talk about that say do gap that you talked about with the culture.
Netflix, for example, Amazon as another example. So, you know, Walmart. So there are several organizations, big brands who should know better, honestly. They should know better, but they made these statements of solidarity. And as I watched them pop up in the summer of 2020, and I was like going, no, no, no, no, no, no, stop, stop, stop, stop, because you don't know what you're saying. There's real work behind this.
So only say it if you mean it and mean what you say. So if there was these statements that came afterwards, it's like, great, but do you understand the work that needs to go on behind this? And again, communicators, we have that superpower, visibility drives accountability. So sure, we can put out those statements, but we then need to go back to our leaders and to the budget, because the budget is a moral document and say, where are we putting those resources?
Where are we following through with this? So the book is basically saying to communicators, no more reactive knee jerk, use a hashtag stop Asian hate. You need to go beyond that. We need to shift from that performative to transformative communications. We need to grow up to my earlier point. And here's a five step model, a framework called depth, D-E-P-T-H, that gives you...
kim_clark (39:03.478)
the framework that you need to have the conversation that you need to build the strategy that you need to position your organization from a place of strength in this overall conversation and work around social justice issues and the role of the organization. And where you can find me, I'm mostly on LinkedIn. Honestly, I'm obviously not on Twitter.
angela_r_howard (39:24.575)
Love it.
kim_clark (39:29.678)
But I am on LinkedIn, just DEICommunicationsKimClark, as well as on Instagram, Conscious Communicators, or is it Conscious Communications? I can't remember, but I'm primarily there, yeah.
angela_r_howard (39:43.282)
Well, we'll get it, yeah.
Perfect. And I just, I, you know, personally just really enjoy and connect with the work that you're doing. I know Kim, you're helping Angela Howard consulting with some work to help us with our, the communications part of the culture blueprint service that we have. You know, we were really focused on ensuring that communications and conscious communications was a core part of that service.
And so just really appreciate your help and your partnership on that and can attest to the talent and the background that you bring to this work.
kim_clark (40:23.03)
Well, and back at you, and people really need to bring both of us in. I mean, everyone, you know, cause there's a lot of culture work that needs to happen. Now, as communicators, we can, because we control the tone, the languaging, all of those kinds, you know, the approachability, the accessibility by using language, we're setting that tone, right? As communicators, but, so we're giving permission to the culture.
angela_r_howard (40:27.724)
Hmm.
kim_clark (40:49.902)
of how we need to be talking to each other. That's the beauty of inclusive communications, using our pronouns, those kinds of things that influences the culture and that's where you come in and really help people identify those unwritten rules that people are actually acting by, which makes the communicators work even harder and the gap of say, do wider. So we can, totally preventable.
angela_r_howard (41:00.998)
Mm-hmm.
angela_r_howard (41:04.811)
Yes.
angela_r_howard (41:16.264)
100%
kim_clark (41:18.414)
Just get the right people into place. Be willing to hear the answers to the questions that you ask, but the work has to be done. I think you say this to your clients all the time, Angela, that DEI is a business transformation, just like a digital transformation. Those who did not go through the digital transformation are not here anymore. And if you do not go through...
angela_r_howard (41:21.708)
Yes.
kim_clark (41:42.402)
DEI as a transformation of your business, embodying it into the very fabric of your being as an organization, and it played out and manifested daily in the culture and in the language that's used and shared, you will not be here much longer.
angela_r_howard (42:01.64)
Yeah, well that is a great way to just tie a bow, that accountability with that action. I think that is what we're missing in this work and you know it and I know it and I'm sure those who are listening know it too. Kim, I just want to thank you so much for your time, your brilliance, your perspective. We will make sure to include your Instagram, your, not your Twitter, your LinkedIn.
kim_clark (42:25.614)
Hahaha
angela_r_howard (42:28.267)
and the link to your book in the show notes so everyone can reach out if they need your expertise.
kim_clark (42:33.762)
Thank you. Yeah. Yeah, it's really a pleasure. I know we can just keep talking and talking because our worlds overlap and interact and intersect all the time. And companies need to really recognize the value of the influence of culture and communications. And that if we get that right, oh my gosh, the work is exponentially easier and faster.
angela_r_howard (42:40.793)
Oh my gosh.
angela_r_howard (43:00.755)
Yes, well, you and I will maybe have to do a part two as some of these things with Twitter play out and we have other examples to touch on. So Kim, again, thank you so much and appreciate your time on the podcast.
kim_clark (43:04.942)
Mmm.
kim_clark (43:12.546)
Thank you.
