Heard @ Harvard

In episode 3 of the Heard @ Harvard podcast, Ellie & Louie chat to CEO Dean Forbes. Here we gain crucial insights - including Dean's lessons on leadership and how he thinks the tech market will look in the up-coming months. This one is not to be missed! 

In our first video Heard @ Harvard podcast, we talk to comedian, Tik Tok influencer and content guru, Rob Mayhew about influence, agency life, nostalgia and comedy in marketing and PR.

Welcome back to Heard @ Harvard's second season. For the first episode of this season, we are joined by Bodacious founder and self-proclaimed Web 3 optimist, Zoe Scaman, Louie and guest-host Jessie get to grips with decentralisation vs centralisation, the NFT marketing fad and the importance of materiality when it comes to metaversal worlds.

In our twelfth episode of Heard@Harvard, we had the pleasure to sit down with Emma Roffey, VP Marketing EMEAR at Cisco and our very own Andrew Last. Managing Director, Marketing. We uncovered how the pandemic affected Cisco as an organisation and where the brand was heading next as we believe there is a huge amount of opportunity for them. This naturally led on to exploring how Emma ensures Cisco remains creative in its approach and ahead of the curve. Further into the conversation we discussed growth marketing as the number one trend that marketers need to focus on in the present moment, and how customer advocacy fits within this. We wrapped up the conversation by looking ahead to 2022 and sharing some trends and predictions for B2B Marketing. You can listen to the full episode below and check out all our previous episodes over on Anchor.

Last week, Pride Month came to an end. Harvard’s content for the month involved two Twitter takeovers highlighting LGBTQ+ tech icons and a list of our recommended educational content. Resharing previous articles from our employees, as well as a new blog on ‘Why Coming Out Should be a Thing of the Past’. Our final piece of content is our eleventh episode of Heard@Harvard, which we’ve purposely waited until after Pride Month to go live with. Why? Because we want conversations around LGBTQ+ rights, representation issues and inclusion in the workplace to happen all year round and not just during the month of Pride. Our guests for this episode were Nicky Hoyland, CEO at MCG and Huler and our very own Jo Franklin, Director here at Harvard. The conversation focused on what Pride means to them and also what businesses need to do to ensure Pride isn’t tokenistic and instead use it as a moment to create longer term change. We hope you enjoy.

In our tenth episode of Heard@Harvard, we had a brilliant conversation with Elizabeth Bananuka, Founder of The Blueprint and BME PR Pro’s. We kicked the conversation off by uncovering Elizabeth’s career and how it sent her on the journey to grow her own organisations. This ultimately led us to discuss the issues within the comms industry and the key to keeping up momentum when it comes to honest conversations within the workplace. At the start of the year, we were extremely proud to have been awarded Ally status from The Blueprint. As previously mentioned, this was the start of our journey and not the destination and we’re excited to continue to evolve for the better. Next week, we’ll be joining The Blueprint for their first event, #DiversifyComms, where we’ll be speaking amongst other Blueprinted agencies. There is still time to grab tickets, just follow this link - https://thisistheblueprint.co.uk/events/ 

In our latest episode of Heard@Harvard, we were thrilled to be joined by Louisa Joseph, Founder of BAME to Boardroom – an oganisation that coaches and develops individuals and helps progressive organisations implement proactive strategies to grow high-performing leaders delivering remarkable results. Harvard partnered with BAME to Boardroom last summer as part of our commitment to diversity and inclusion in the workplace and Louisa has been an ongoing guide and inspiration to us, which is why we were keen to have her as a guest. Throughout the episode we discussed the desire to create real lasting change, the importance of learning about and creating the environment to call out microaggressions in the workplace and how to become allies for our colleagues.

Following the release of our latest report, Covid-19 The Long-Term Legacy, myself and Pete Marcus sat down to discuss the findings with Chris Talago, PR/Comms Director at AWS and Stephen Shaw, Director at Coleman Parkes for our 8thepisode of Heard@Harvard. The report explored the impact of the pandemic and how it has affected business leaders, so now being 12 months in, we wanted to start to uncover what the long-term effects are on business priorities, the role of brands and the impact on the way we live and work. A key theme pulled from the discussion is digital transformation. Stephen made a very interesting point, which was that all companies have accelerated however, they’re not all transforming in the same way which raises all sorts of challenges for tech brands. You can catch the full episode below, and check out previous editions over on Anchor. If you’d like to read the full report, you can find it here.

As 2020 draws to a close, we were joined by Maja Pawinska-Sims, Associate editor EMEA at PRovoke Media, in our final podcast where we reflected on the year that’s past. It’s been a challenging 12 months and we’ve all had to adapt to a new way of life due to the pandemic. We asked Maja for her thoughts on the impact it’s had on the agency landscape and how agencies’ priorities have changed in this time. But, of course Covid-19 wasn’t the only topic to come out of 2020. The Black Lives Matter Movement, the US Election and Brexit have all had an impact so as you can imagine, we had a lot to reflect on. In Maja’s words, it’s felt like “changing the engine whilst flying the plane”

In episode 6 of Heard @ Harvard, we sat down with two of the brightest minds in B2B Marketing. Cat Dutton, Global Vice President of Marketing at Atos and Andrew Last, MD, Marketing, here at Harvard. The conversation kicked off with a discussion around Cat and Andrew’s personal experiences of the year and the impact it has had on their work, which then led into a broader chat around how they think this years’ events have changed B2B Marketing. We discussed the rise and importance of brand purpose, as well as who is currently doing it well and looked to the future to chat about what 2021 looks like for brands and agencies a like.