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TOR143 ― Effectively Communicating Social Impact With Angus Hervey Of Future Crunch

Angus-Harvey

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We’ve had a lot of change makers on this show over the past two years – people and organizations that are redefining old systems and creating new products and processes that demand completely new ways of thinking about how we serve those in need. Across these interviews, one of the factors critical to the success of any endeavor is the ability to communicate effectively. This skill not only entails the ability to bring facts and evidence to the table, but to weave these into a narrative that conveys the “why” behind what you believe.  While I’m fairly certain that most of you would agree that communication is important, it is still something that we don’t properly prioritize, even thought many times it is the deciding factor for convincing someone to join your cause, retain top talent or secure funding. If you think I’m wrong, I challenge you to spend 30 minutes at any event in any major hub of the aid and development sector this week – places like Washington, DC, New York, Geneva, Bangkok or Nairobi – and tell me if you don’t witness rooms full of participants spending more time on their mobile devices than engaged in the presentation and speakers who still haven’t incorporated even the most basic presentation and public speaking fundamentals. I invite you to share your stories about this challenge in the comments section on Aidpreneur.com for this podcast. But here’s the good news: my guest for the 143rd Terms of Reference Podcast is Angus Hervey. He is the co-founder of a new media company call Future Crunch. They’re decidedly optimistic mission seeks to help people understand what’s on the frontiers of science and technology, and what it means for human progress. You should definitely check out their website, YouTube channel, and get on their newsletter. I’m absolutely certain you’ll love this conversation about new media channels and the evolution of journalism, fake news, bringing stories of change and progress to the world and what it means to embrace the hacker culture of today.   You can connect with MXX here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gussa

IN TOR 143 YOU’LL LEARN ABOUT

  • The need for better stories, more good real stories that keep happening all over the world
  • Why despite what everyone says, 2016 was one of the best years in the history of humanity
  • Why the new outlets are revolutionizing news, bringing new voices
  • The importance of a unique, “biased” opinion
  • Why innovation comes before technology, and why we should embrace a hacker culture
  • How the internet is revolutionizing humanitarian funding

OUR CONVERSATION FEATURES THE FOLLOWING

Names:

Topics:

Places

EPISODE CRIB NOTES

«People want to know what your opinion is, because that how people respond. Human being are storytelling species. We want to hear what your experience is, we want to hear why you think the things that you do. By all means, bring a lot of evidence to your argument, but tell me what you believe.»   January 23rd, 2017   03:27 Future Crunch
  • Started with a friend, about stories
  • “They did not match up with data, people in-the-know”
  • “We must be able to tell better stories”
  • Stories are delivered through the internet
  • “We still remember some of what the world was before internet”
  • Public talks, social media feeds, online video
  • “What matters is to hit as many people as possible”
  05:27 2016 was a year
  • “Weird but cheeky”
  • Angus write why 2016 was actually I good year
  • “There was a lot of pessimism, in social media, the New York Times, the dinner table”
  • “That was not what we saw last year”
  • “2016 was a great year for humanity”
  • As of 2016, we are educating 93 of 100 children (up from 50% on the ’70s)
  • “This is an aid and development podcast, of course there’s a lot of complications”
  • Education progress is good, it does not mean there are not issues. But the idea that education matters has been embedded across nations, cultures
  • We are moving forward to a place where everyone is literate. “It gives you a lot of hope”
  09:08 So many outlets, so little… attention?
  • All organizations need to work on their message, no matter the size, no matter how humanitarian or charitable
  • We all must recognize, embrace our biases
  • “We hear a lot about the end of journalism” from people in journalism with jobs at stake
  • For each traditional media that falls, 3 spring up, they keep popping up
  • Citizen media
  • Hundreds of angles
  • In aid & development, we’re thought objectivity. It holds true in political science, in economics
  • “We’re supposed to be balanced, look at both sides of the argument”
  • “You end up with this anodyne, boring result”
  • Qualified views are good (great), but nobody gives a dam about your balance
  • We want your view, your beliefs
  14:07 Bringing the blessing of bias into programming
  • “You want to tell a story. You want to be very explicit about where you come from, what you have to say”
  • Personal stories elicit empathy. People relate
  • But we are the Fake News world
  • “Fake News has been around for a long time”
  • They underline a problem of empathy to those with opposing view
  • U of Minnesota research reveals we talk about very different things when discussing values
  • Right-wing ideas are not those from aid and development
  • “If you don’t mention ‘climate change’, but take a view of ‘purity’ in ecosystems and energy, you get a whole different response”
  • So don’t talk climate change, talk clean water
  18:33 Future of Future Crunch
  • Communicate more better stories, to more people
  • Future Crunch newsletter, includes good news. “Serious good news, big stuff”
  • There is a lot of amazing news
  • It goes on Future Crunch newsletter and YouTube’s Future Crunch TV
  • Drone technologies are big in aid & development
  • In Guyana, a community orders drone parts from Amazon, learns how to make it with YouTube videos
  • Then they fly drones over forests to look for illegal logging
  • Then they bring the evidence to authorities
  • “It is not a perfect process, but it is a great example on empowerment, autonomy, accountability and social justice”
  • Institutions matter
  23:57 Technology will solve everyting… NOT
  • Angus loves technology and tech mindsets
  • But their success depend on the institutional frameworks the work in
  • Best case of technology is when they improve parts of the governance framework
  • “If you get technology in the right aid & development hands, you really see progress”
  • On local tech and ‘maker fairs’: Hack involves taking things to make them do new, unintended things
  • “McGuiver is the original hacker”
  • Spending a while on A&D shows you just how much of a hacker people are all over the world
  • Hacking mentality does not require drone assembly or coding, just seeing paths for new tools and solutions, ways that haven’t been thought before
  • Empowerment about one’s own skills
  • And not believing in authority (blindly?)
  • Whatsapp story: An Indian vendor has it on his phone, and groups with hundred of his customers where he shows pictures of his product. That’s unmatching marketing bang for the buck
29:31 So what’s the hacker formula?
  • Innovation has a lot to do with the way you organize yourself
  • The International Rescue Committee, David Miliband brought a lot of new procedures
  • “I bet few A&D organizations use Slack”
  • The main thing David brought to IRC was culture change, more accepting of failure
  • “If we want to be successful supporting needs of refugees, we cannot stop ourselves by protocol”
  • Funding is always a point of contention. Vocal purpose tends to bring more private funding (as IRC showed)
  • The internet is a whole new funding highway. More people are finally having a way to support causes they believe in
  • Microtransactions, crowdfunding, Patreon
  • “People no longer pay necessarily for products, or even projects, but a person’s lifelong work”
  Who Angus listens to
  • “I’m a huge fan of email newsletters”
  • Social Capital “Why are there no news from Ethiopia, or South America”
  • Recomendo’s six tips
  • Blockchain “It’s email for money”. It enables tamper-proof economic identities
 

Please share and participate

If you have any questions you’d like to ask me or Angus directly, head on over to the Ask Stephen section. Don’t be shy! Every question is important and I answer every single one. And, if you truly enjoyed this episode and want to make sure others know about it, please share it now:
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