Age gaps exist all across the organization. 

From your eager intern to your seasoned board members (and your program staff to your executive director), you're likely communicating across up to 40 years of generational differences. 

Here are some tips and tricks to help you stay aligned.

When we launched our research process – the one that led to our new Frenemies + Jargon: Breaking the Habits That Stall Child and Family Advocacy report – I had suspicions about what we’d find.

We heard that as a field, we’re often fake friends. 

Let’s break down what we heard and what we can do about it.

Our average coaching client is a communications director. For the sake of this blog, let’s call her Chloe.

Chloe typically works at a public school district, a foundation or a nonprofit. 

She landed in her director role coming from the policy, program or development team. She may only have a few years of direct communications experience, but she’s a natural. 

Most of the time, she’s a team of one, and she’s carrying everything communications for her organization. 

That’s where we step in as a coach.

Here’s a behind-the-scenes peek at what we normally help out with.

So, you need to tell your board of directors or your school board some bad news.

First, blerg. Sorry about that! 

Second, we’re here to help.

I've had the opportunity to be involved in some excellent examples of how to do this well – and, unfortunately, I’ve also had to help clean up a few, um… shall we say, less-than-stellar attempts.

Here is a key approach that I’ve seen work well over the years. 

We know that right now, the families you serve, the partners you need, the funders you want to attract and the policymakers who need to know your work have completely changed how they use the internet.

The way they use conversational search on platforms like ChatGPT, Google's AI Overviews, and Gemini means we simply need to make sure your organization is the trusted AI citation your audiences find.

My cats have me trained. 

Yeah, you read that right. 

THEY trained ME. 

Are we suckers? Oh, absolutely. No question.

Yet, there are some very solid communications lessons to be learned from being a human… trained by… a cat. Here’s what we can all learn.

We’re so used to chasing perfect. Perfection in our work, presenting the perfect image online.

But the thing is, people are tired of perfect. And that needs to impact the way we do our work and the way we advocate. Here’s what’s going on – and what to do about it. 

I’m the first to admit it: I’m a nerd for data. 

If something is going wrong – I want to know why, so I can fix it. 

If something is going well – I want to know why, so I can keep doing it. 

That’s why I love a good communications audit. Here’s why you should join me in my nerd-dom and hop on the communications audit train.

An organization (yours, in fact) needs a succinct and centralized set of messages that say what the organization does and how you do it. 

When done well, core messages are data-backed ways to describe your work that everyone uses when they talk about your organization. 

They typically tell a cohesive story about your organization. You’ll want them to include why you exist (what needs are you fulfilling?), what your mission and vision are, and how you accomplish them.

We’re sharing more about core messaging and how to get it right here.