Less Chatter, More Matter: The Communications Podcast

#100 10 tips from 10 interviews over 100 episodes

• Mel Loy • Season 1 • Episode 100

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Team... we did it. Not only are we bringing in a new year, hitting the big 2025, but we're at 100 episodes of the Less Chatter, More Matter podcast and honestly, what a ride!

With our episodes now hitting the triple digits, it's no surprise that we're using this 100th episode to review and revisit some of the coolest interview learnings we had on this journey to 100 - with tonnes of amazing and intelligent folks joining us along the way.

From building business acumen to mastering the art of simplicity in communication, we've got ten key takeaways and tips that every communicator looking to up their game can use in the new year.

Whether you’re a long-time fan or tuning in for the first time, this celebratory episode is packed with golden nuggets of wisdom. Dive in and let us know your favourite moment from the past 100 episodes!

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Hi friend, and welcome to a very special edition of Less Chatter, More Matter, The Communications Podcast. I'm your host, Mel Loy, and I'm recording this on the lands of the Yuggera and Turrbal people here in Meanjin Brisbane. And it's a very special edition because this is our 100th episode. It's been a super fun ride, and I'd like to give a big shout out to April, who edits and produces this podcast every week. And keeps me on track, which is no easy task. And another shout out to you, dear listeners, who keep tuning in, sharing your feedback and making this all worthwhile. So to celebrate this auspicious occasion, we thought we'd dive back into the past 100 episodes and share 10 of the top key takeaways from the interviews with our wonderful guests who have joined us over the past couple of years. Now, there were so many pieces of gold information to share. I'm not going to lie. It was really hard to cut this down to just 10, but here we are. And if there's been a standout learning or interview from you for the last pod, for the, from the podcast for the last few years, I'd love to hear it as well. So please let me know. Okay, let's get into it. The first of my key takeaways from our interviews with our guests is from a episode we did just recently with Sia Papageorgiou. It was episode 97, all about strategic internal comms and some research that had been done around how comms people are faring in that internal sector. Now, my key takeaways from our interview with Sia was how she reinforced the need to develop business acumen. It's something I bang on about all the time. It's so important whether you are an internal or external communicator. So let's take a listen to what Sia had to say.

Sia:

You are there to help the business succeed. So build your business acumen. You also need to demonstrate the value of what you do by measuring what matters. And it's not enough just to measure what matters. You also need to link that to a business benefit by quantifying that value. Just because you work internally doesn't mean that you can't build your business acumen about what happens outside the organisation, about your key stakeholders about your employees, about leaders in the organisation - about your own skill set! Things are changing; look at you know, artificial intelligence the way we're using artificial intelligence right now, which is another area we looked into in the report and there are a ton of other reports globally that are doing the same

Mel:

Okay. Onto number two and accessible communications is a topic we've delved into a couple of times on the podcast and I just love learning about it. There is so much to learn and that's why I really loved our chat with Matisse Hamel-Nelis on episode 95. One of the key lessons from this episode that I took away was the untapped purchasing power of people with a disability simply because of inaccessible websites and social media. Let's take a listen.

Matisse:

1. 6 billion People in the world have identified as having a disability that's about according to a recent survey, 17 trillion dollar spending potential between the people with disabilities plus their friends plus their family.

Mel:

Wow...

Matisse:

Right, so if you are sitting there saying, you know I don't need to have an accessible website because somebody who is blind may not visit my website for example. Um, let's say you sell cars - well, what if that person with sight loss actually has a 16 year old daughter who is now eager to get her own car? She's not paying for it. It's probably gonna be the parents and if they need to actually look at the content, like, you know, look at the website to see is it a good car? Does it pass certain checks? But they can't access it.

Mel:

How good is Matisse? Okay, on to number three. So in November, I interviewed David Imber for episode 92, and it was all on the topic of political communication and how we can bring some of those techniques into communication in general. And it was really timely because the US election had just occurred. And of course, 2024 was the year of elections with 64 countries around the world holding elections in those 12 months. Now, as the conversation progressed, we talked about how that political divide is showing up in workplaces and often along gender lines, and also how more people are expressing their personal opinions in the workplace and online. Here's what David had to say.

David:

And what is it often actually quite different is now because we have less lifelong employment and people move around, um, and we have a lot more focus on personal brand and platforms like LinkedIn, where people display their personal brand. What I find is very interesting, you probably notice this too, you're on LinkedIn a bit. Um, I find really interesting when people on LinkedIn, you know, put personal views up. And I respect that. But if they're leaders, then their people are also seeing that. That's where things can get really tricky. Um, and I think, you know, there's a generational divide in terms of personal brand and what's appropriate and having views. And I think that's, you know, only going to continue to play out.

Mel:

And honestly, that conversation with David was so good. I could chat to him for hours. So if you haven't listened to that one yet, definitely go back and have a listen. Moving on to number four and in late October, I spoke with Julian Mather, who came to the podcast for episode 91, and he's a super experienced keynote speaker, as well as a workshop facilitator. And look, basically, he's a jack of all trades. You'll just have to listen to some of the jobs he's had. Now I asked Julian about why it's so important to develop our speaking skills and some of the lessons he's learned. I really loved when he reminded me that our audiences don't want us to fail. They want us to succeed. And here's what he said, which I think is great advice for everyone to remember.

Julian:

Uh, so when I started doing this, I was really terrified about audiences. I thought standing in front of a people that they were there almost ready to take me down. Like, um, like, like a pack of wolves takes down a lone deer out there. Uh, and then I started to learn and understand how audiences react. Um, and audiences want to be directed. And what I mean by that is that all of our lives. 24 hours a day. We're busy. We have to make decisions. We have to make decisions about our job. We have to make decisions, what to buy. We have to think for our children. We have to think for ourselves and we are tired. So if somebody stands in front of you and shows you with some sort of conviction and confidence that they can take over your thinking for be it 60 seconds, be it for 60 minutes. If you can make that connection and build that confidence with people early on, people go, Oh, take me. Does this mean I don't have to think for the next 30 minutes? And they are yours. So understand that audiences are on your side. They want you to be good.

Mel:

Okay, moving on to number five. And in September for episode 85, I chatted with Ross Monaghan, who is a lecturer in communication at Deakin University in Melbourne, and also the current president of the Asia Pacific region of the International Association of Business Communicators, also known as IABC. Now I wanted to talk to Ross because in both these roles, he has an incredible view of what's happening in the world of communications and how things are changing. One of the key takeaways from my conversation with Ross was the need to remember the important role professional communicators will continue to play in organisations of all shapes and sizes, despite AI. Let's take a listen.

Ross:

So we need to be there, and I think, communicators need to be much more confident and forceful, um, in organisations to let leaders know, let the community know, that the work that we do is is thoughtful. It's there to, uh, to listen to key stakeholders, to negotiate, to find appropriate ways forward. Um, so, you know, look, I think we're really, really well placed. So I think for communicators listening to this, understand that you do a really important role. I think it's easy to understand that if you're working for somebody, uh, you know, in emergency management or fire and rescue or cancer council saving, um, and encouraging people to, you know, not do things that are going to give them cancer, uh, but the role that we play within other or commercial organisations and government organisations as well. To make them efficient, to make them, uh, sustainable, to help them, uh, address the environmental issues. You know, things like ESG or CSR, um, issues, corporate social responsibility. Um, a lot of those issues were, were, were driven by communicators back, you know, when all of this started. So, you know. Get out there, listen to key stakeholders, network, talk with other people, share experiences with other communicators throughout the region, um, to learn the latest trends, learn how others are dealing with issues really well, learn how others have made mistakes. Um, and if we do those sort of things, you know, we will advance both the profession and our organisations and society more broadly.

Mel:

Okay, number six. And back in August, I was lucky to get a peek behind the scenes of internal comms at one of Australia's largest and most successful homegrown businesses, Flight Centre. The always lovely Cassandra Thurston is the global communications manager at Flight Centre Group, and she shed light on how they manage their internal communications in a business that employs more than 15, 000 people across the world. I really loved how Cass talked about taking a marketing mindset to internal comms. Here's what she said.

Cass:

We've also introduced what's called a marketing mindset to the way that we create and send our comms. So this involves really understanding who our target audience are, the way that they prefer to consume the content, and then finding really creative ways of getting that messaging across. And as part of that, you know, we've seen for a first time the focus on collecting and reviewing data on a regular basis as well. So a couple of years ago, I introduced HubSpot to send our internal emails across all our brands globally. So for those that know HubSpot, it has a fantastic analytics engine powering it, and we're making sure that we are analysing that data to see how our people are consuming the information. So we see how long they're reading it for, are they just glancing, are they spending a decent amount of time, you know, working their way down. We can see heat maps of where they are clicking, how many times they go back and read the email. Um, we've also introduced user journeys and AB testing too. So these are all marketing tools that have adapted incredibly to our internal communications world.

Mel:

And Cass's was one of the most highly rated episodes of the year. I got so much feedback on that, how much they loved that episode. So if you haven't listened to that, go back and have a chat. Cass shares so much from behind the scenes. It's brilliant. Number seven, and for episode 71, which aired in June this year, I interviewed an old friend of mine and a colleague, Mandy Plumb, on how we can use improv comedy skills to enhance our communication. This was such a fun episode. If you haven't yet, go back and listen to it because Mandy leads an improv game with me, and you will definitely hear my brain just glide to a halt in the middle of that. But apart from that, one of my key takeaways from this conversation was that improv can teach us not just to think on our feet quickly, but also to listen more deeply. Here's how Mandy explained it.

Mandy:

The second thing that we teach, so that was one of the foundational things and the other foundational thing that we teach is "Yes, And"ing-, which is basically collaboration. So, uh, listening and responding, uh, not bulldozing with your own ideas, which is something I used to do actually in the corporate world. So I believe improv has really helped me in my working life because it has taught me to listen to other people's ideas, and even though I often don't or sometimes don't think that maybe that's the right way forward, I will work with their idea and build with them on it and we'll come to a solution together.

Mel:

And definitely that chat with Mandy made me consider at least doing a couple of improv classes in the future. So maybe that's on my list for 2025. Okay, number eight and a key skill that all professional communicators need to develop is making the complex simple. And one of the queens of this art is Kate Norris, who I interviewed for episode 68 in May. One of my favorite learnings from Kate, which she mentioned in this episode, was one graph, one story. Take a listen.

Kate:

I have a rule, one story, one graph. Don't have a graph that tries to tell multiple things. So we see layering and we see you know these clustered bars and stacked bars and all of this stuff in one graph and you've got to sit there, and you've got to have training which I was talking about earlier - you've got to have training to know how to read that. So if you're giving that to someone who is not as data literate as you which is most people if we're working in data, One story one graph simplify it until it's so obvious that you feel like it's patronising. It has to be so stupidly obvious. I have a rule with pie charts because we see way too many pie charts. Um, a pie chart should only be used when you want kind of a vibe.

Mel:

Right.

Kate:

So you don't need to know the exact numbers. If you just want to get a vibe of this one's bigger, this one's smaller, like that. So, I say it's like a hard and fast rule, but it's such an ethereal rule as well. You want a vibe.

Mel:

Yeah, you want a vibe.

Kate:

But it works. It does work. Um, and then generally I would say. A bar chart, a column graph, and a line graph are 95 percent the charts that you will use because they are understood by everyone. And again, it's that thing of like, it feels impressive to use a more complex graph.

Mel:

Like a waterfall graph?

Kate:

Like a waterfall, yeah, it's just confusing. And waterfalls are such a classic example, like I literally have a statistics degree And it took me two years of being in finance to properly understand waterfall graphs, but I was creating them like left, right, and centre for years. And it took a few years to, to work out, like, no one had, I guess, the confidence to really say to me, I don't get it. So this is why I say to people, push back. If you don't get it, push back.

Mel:

Alright, we're coming in towards the finish line now. And at number nine for episode 57 in March, I got to chat with one of my favorite humans on the planet, Prina Shah. She's an incredible change and leadership coach and consultant based in Perth, Australia. And she's also just published her first book, Make Work Meaningful, which I highly recommend. I loved so many things about this conversation, but something that really stood out to me was her observation that we're relying so much on quick communication tools like email and teams, but to the detriment of getting the message across. And this is particularly damaging when those quick comms come from busy leaders who often forget that others don't have the depth of knowledge or context that they have. Let's take a listen.

Prina:

Yeah, so, oh my gosh, okay, miscommunication. So often, um, Um, nowadays what I'm finding is leaders are so, so busy as well. So I've got such compassion for leaders and there's a lot on them in terms of expectations of how they have to deliver. When they are trying to deliver messages, it's often quick and okay, I've just sent them an email. It's all good. We've done it. Or I've sent a message on our, you know, on our team's channel. Job done. No, not at all. Often the missing pieces, and I think leaders often forget this, is you, the leader, have had this information for so long, you've been incubating it, you've been dealing with it, and you've just dropped this bomb off a message, whatever it might be, to your team, who've not had any heads up about it, they've not had any, I guess, conversation about it as well, you know? And I think that's one of the big pieces that's, uh, A pain point for leaders. They are busy, therefore they're relying on these channels to quickly communicate.

Mel:

Mm. Yeah. I see that a lot.

Prina:

So the reliance, I think, on all of these wonderful tools and technology that we have, I think we need to revisit to see how we actually use them to our benefit rather than the opposite.

Mel:

And rounding out the 10 lessons is one of the best in the consulting biz, Leanne Hughes, who published her first book a year ago. It's a great read. It's called the two hour workshop blueprint, and it's a brilliant practical guide to developing a workshop. So I wanted to pick Leanne's brains on how we can make sure workshops actually work and aren't boring. So in episode 49 in January, Leanne shared a few golden nuggets, including this one.

Leanne:

There's so many; I wrote a whole book about it, so to pick three. I think it's. Uh, would be focus on, so I guess my mistake when I first started was focusing too much on the content versus the actual people and the context that they're in. And I think the value is, it's not about the content anymore. I think we really kind of default to that, but hello, we've got AI, we've got Google. It's not about the content. It's really around. What is the context? What do these people need? What result are you trying to drive? Um, Mel, you know, my favorite word, my number one criteria for all workshops is contrast. Like that's the number one question is like, how do you keep people engaged? And it's all about, well, how are you mixing it up? Like, um, often too often, it's just I mean, again, Leanne, first time facilitator, it was just Leanne, slides, next slide, next slide, next, next slide. Um, how are you weaving in stories, activities, getting people to stand up, move around. That's how you maintain attention. Uh, yeah. And so, and I think the third, the third topic for me is top of mind today really is around how do you generate your own excitement for your workshop? And how do you set the tone of, um, the people are going to find it interesting from the moment that you get started. So something I share is to engage early and engage often. And I think a typical mistake is that, um, sometimes we kick off in a very traditional way. We'll, we'll step up at the front of the room, we'll do introduction and housekeeping. And so something I share in my podcast is how do you create an unpredictable moment that predictably works. So spitting that on its heel, kicking off with a story, starting with an activity and then moving into... into housekeeping and things like that. Just again, create that contrast, but also maybe a bit of intrigue as well. And it provides a bit of a pattern interrupter to gain attention.

Mel:

So that's just 10 of many great chats and many, many lessons learned a big thank you to all the guests who agreed to chat on the podcast over the last hundred episodes. I am so grateful to each and every one of you. And just a bit sad that I couldn't include all of you in this episode. And of course you, my listeners, I hope you also got a lot out of those conversations and a big thank you again for tuning in every week, sharing your ideas, your feedback, your ratings, and sharing this show with others. It simply means the world to me. So as we kick off another 100 episodes, I'd love to hear from you about what you'd like us to cover. So just send me an email or DM me with your ideas or topics or people we should interview. I would love to hear from you. In the meantime, as always, keep doing amazing things and bye for now.