How PHCC Closed the Communications Gap for Thousands of Frontline Workers with Carrie Fox

And so we started listening again to those public health communicators who were using the tool and we realized public health communications collaborative that was a word that was designed to talk about the funders who came together . Right , the funders were the collaborative . The community saw themselves as the collaborative . Anyone who opts in and engages with PHCC .

They're not just getting information , but they can also contribute information . It's a community .

It feels like when I was first starting my business and realized we both started our businesses the current , existing ones in 2017 , both of us , which is wild .

She is the founder and CEO of Mission Partners , a women-owned strategic communications firm and certified B Corp , which is awesome that guides nonprofits , foundations and socially responsible corps in realizing their greatest social impact .

She focuses on issues of community , from social justice , sustainability , children's rights , higher education you name it , and this is pretty cool .

She serves as the creative visionary behind a nationwide campaign to transform the foster care system for young people aging out of care , and was the lead comm strategist behind a 10 million prize competition aimed at advancing global technology for more fuel efficient vehicles .

And I think maybe my favorite thing about your bio is this last part that she is the author of more than words , communication , practices of courageous leaders and adventures in kindness , which she wrote with her 10 year old daughter , sophia , which I bought for my niece , and we did like your workshop exercise together , which is so fun .

Carrie , I'm so excited to have you .

Yeah , so context , carol Cohn is like the godmother of like purpose is what I like to call her , and when I was starting my business , I was looking for groups to learn from and that were in the social impact space , and a friend of mine was also part of this group called the Purpose Collaborative , which now is I don't even know how many 40 plus 50 plus

organizations globally , and there's calls once a month . We've had conferences together and it's really just shared leadership and we peer share on things that we're learning in the space and collaborate .

And so I've been lucky and fortunate to work with Carrie on a few of her client projects , and obviously this show is all about case studies and breaking down incredible ones within the social impact nonprofit sector , and I was like , oh my gosh , I know Carrie has hundreds of these case studies , and so I was so excited when you were willing to come on and

share one today .

and how to navigate through it . So , knowing that we're halfway through the year , almost at this point , it's a great conversation to go check out .

And I know you're going to take us back a few years now to COVID , when you were working with a client . So what was the client's challenge that you were presented with ?

So the client we were working with is an organization called the Public Health Communications Collaborative Big name there , so I'll call them PHCC Public Health Communications Collaborative and they came together at a time when they were realizing that COVID-19 was overwhelming . How we understood what public health is and , honestly , what value it delivers .

Right , we were all , every single one of us , regardless of where we lived and what our background was and what education we had . We were equally confused about the moment we were in and how to make sense of the science , the competing information , what was true , what wasn't , misinformation , disinformation .

We were being pushed out so many different messages on an intraday basis , right , and so this organization it actually was a group of foundations who came together and they recognized this issue that public health communicators , the tens of thousands of public health communicators who are on the front lines of any given community , whether that be a formal public health

official or that be a school principal right . Anyone who's serving in a public facing role where they need to communicate information about public health were confused .

They were sending mixed messages , they were trying to make sense of really complicated CDC data , and so what that was leaving is cities and communities and individuals confused , not sure what to believe , not sure who to trust , which also led to fear .

It led to a lot of fear , yes , and you remember there were all of these campaigns that came out around trying to get people comfortable with the vaccine , being able to trust the vaccine .

been doing forever . Right , but was it good enough ? Again , fear , right . I remember so many videos that were with kids showing what happens when you put soap on and how it retracts . I mean just wild , wild time .

Also , the judgment that we had during that time with people and I was in Los Angeles at the time which was , oh my goodness I mean , there was people wearing full on hazmat suits in the grocery store and then we moved to Atlanta , to Georgia , in June of 2020 . So it was a really interesting and we drove across the country and it was so interesting .

Talking about communication , we drove through so many different states and , of course , that's part of the conversation . You're seeing how everybody's dealing with these different , how they're communicating it so differently . So sorry , I just had to like no , you're so right .

Right , that's the way the general public was feeling . So just think for a minute , if that's the way the general public , you and I were feeling , what the frontline public health communicator was feeling .

Right , those who are in the position to have to communicate this really complicated , science-based messaging , taking federal guidelines and trying to figure out how to communicate it to me and you . Well , the messages were literally all over the place .

So this group , public Health Communications Collaborative , comes together and says we need to find a better way to solve the communications gap . We need to equip public health communicators so they don't all leave their jobs tomorrow .

Right , we need them more than ever right now , but we need to also help them close the gap , because we understand that most of them have never been trained as communicators . They're not professional communicators , right ? And yet that was the role that they were in . So we started in 2020 . We actually still work with this organization today .

They do a lot more than pure COVID messaging at this point , since we are past the worst of that pandemic , but we serve as the kind of back of the house communications agency that supports tens of thousands of public health departments and communicators in making sure they all have consistent messages and tools to push out to their community , and so what I want to

talk a little bit about today is what that did for those folks in that moment , what we learned . We did a lot of research for where their biggest gaps were and how , ultimately , it became a case study in trust building . So this is well . Again , public health is the frame .

My hope is that your audience can hear this as applicable to any issue where you need to find a way to bridge divides and bridge gaps for trust .

The reality is , before COVID it was known that the public health system had a communications problem and in fact there were some pieces where the former CDC director , rochelle Walensky , went on the record and she talked about some of the issues that the system was facing .

And so , if I can just go back there for a minute , she had this Washington Post editorial where she said the system of communication isn't working , it's fragmented , it's marginalized right ? So she knew that the system itself was broken and that was part of our then theory of change .

Right , if we know the system itself is broken , we can't go out and fix that right . The system's level change is going to be bigger than what we can do . But if you look one layer down of what's amplifying the brokenness , it comes down to communications .

So a lot of our research focused in on engaging directly with those public health communicators to understand what they felt like they had , you know , in their bag of tricks that they could pull on and where they felt like the gaps were biggest . And there were two key findings I'm going to share with you .

So the first part is actually back from September 2021 to January 2022 . And what we knew about the way public health workers and communicators were feeling in that moment . More than half of them were reporting symptoms of PTSD . One in five said their mental health was fair or poor . Oh , geez .

Many public health workers , especially the executives , reported experiencing bullying , threats and harassment . Right , they were on the line and their communities were pushing against them . Yeah , and more than one in four said that they were considering leaving their jobs .

So here we are , right , this entire sector of employees that we need , who are all like maybe I'm out , right , maybe I can't manage the complexity of the moment we're in .

And so we started to think what could be a way that we could actually support the public health communicators , bolster their efforts , close gaps where they have them , train them where they knew they needed to be trained , and basically understand and acknowledge that there's only so much the government system was going to be able to do for the public health

communicators in that moment . So enter PHCC right . These four organizations CDC Foundation , de Beaumont Foundation actually at the time it was three and Trust for America's Health came together and said you know what we're going to provide ?

Unbiased communication , support about how to communicate through this time , literally daily answers to tough questions , resources that you can download and share across your digital platforms . Talking points , tools , webinars , everything you need to make sure that you feel good and well in your position and that you can communicate effectively with your constituents .

That was the basis of it , and I'll get into it more , but that's really why this group of foundations came together .

How would they share all of these resources or let them know that they are there for them to have ?

So there were emails very regular emails that were going out , but there were also intraday many , many communications that were going out across Facebook , twitter , instagram , linkedin to engage public health employees who were already online trying to make sense of the latest news that was coming out .

And so we were meeting them where they were on those social platforms , having them engage and opt in to our own list , and so , literally , we went from zero to over 30,000 people on our mailing list in a fairly short time , because people were looking for this information , they were looking for a trusted resource .

We know that people are there in a professional setting looking to close skills gaps , and so we meet them right there when they're looking to figure out how do I take a course to figure out , how do I take a course on plain language , or how do I take a course on bridging or tough messaging or media training , whatever it is . We meet them where they are .

We are also on all of the other channels , but the messaging looks very different there and the tools look different there . So there's a lot more kind of digestible nuggets of information . You know , five tips for a healthy , happy summer . You're going to find that kind of stuff on Facebook and Twitter and that's an easy reshare right to their entire network .

So thinking about your content when you're creating it is key so that people will actually engage with it and do the thing that you want them to do . There was an organization I was recently talking to where I was like just because you post something on Instagram doesn't mean you have to get them to always click a link in a bio .

It could just be to start a discussion within the actual post and have a bunch of comments . And that's the point and that's the reason of that piece of content .

Was the idea and the hope to build that list , to then continue to educate or what was their hope through the distribution of all the content and , obviously , to make people feel like they are having a sense of educated information so that they can feel confident in what they're sharing .

The other piece was how do we make sure that we are creating pass-through materials that literally anyone who's working in public health at any level comes back to ? That idea Could be a formal public health department official , or it could be a community leader in a small organization that they could literally download and share and pass along the information .

So we understood that some of those folks might not opt in to our community , but they could still have access to the tool that could extend the life of this important message .

But , yeah , ultimately now you know they have an enormous , strong , dedicated community of public health communicators all over the country who are regularly attending monthly webinars , coming together to share ideas , sharing case studies among

themselves of what works and what doesn't .

Dana , that we learned we were solving for and this was a huge aha in this process A few years in to the Public Health Communications Collaborative we decided we were going to do a bit of a rebrand right , we had become known , very strongly entrusted in the sector , as this COVID response tool and we realized we could be more than that , and so we started

listening again to those public health communicators who were using the tool and we , not too long ago actually , we changed our branding to acknowledge that , that anyone who opts in and engages with PHCC they're not just getting information , but they can also contribute information . It's a community , and that's really a piece that many communicators felt was missing .

Was there a new survey done for how people were feeling and how they felt after receiving the materials ? And then I want to get to like where it is now .

We had about 600 responses from 51 states and territories . We heard from commissioners , public health officials , community health workers , contact tracers , educators , nurses , right Like the whole gamut of whoever is in the public health sector , and we made it really simple . The topic of the survey was two years , two questions , two minutes of your time . Love it .

Right , people really felt like they were having trouble creating graphics and videos , hosting virtual events , using social platforms . They needed the skills to close the gap . Many people literally said if I only had access to Canva Pro , things would be so much easier . Right , like we were really realizing this very practical need was on digital savvy .

And then after that , we started to hear questions around I don't understand plain language . How do I make really complicated topics easier to understand and accessible for many different languages and backgrounds ? Crisis communications , risk 101 , media and talking points , countering misinformation right , there were basically top six .

So we zeroed in on that , dana , and then we realized that the future of PHCC could be built around this set of needs .

And so now , everything we do , the webinars we do , the trainings we do they don't just provide that emergency response messaging , they respond to what the sector needed , which was these closing the digital gap , closing the plain language gap , et cetera .

But for marketing language for websites , the average grade level that you want something to be is , I believe , like fifth grade , fourth or fifth grade , and there's a tool called Hemingway appcom . I just learned about this and it's free . There's a free version and there's a paid version .

But you can put in your website language or whatever copy you have and it essentially gives you a grade and it says that your language is eighth grade and it like will highlight words for you too . And it sounds silly because you feel like you're like am I dumbing this down ?

And it's no , it's just , it's just making it easy to read and to understand for everyone that might come in contact with your brand .

And what's interesting is I was just listening to a speaker who said she put in which is ironic , put in one of Obama's scripts from a presentation he gave and it was I think it was like 11th grade and to reach the mass demographic of Americans , you really want it to be that fifth grade level and so it's interesting .

So , anyways , hemingway app is a great example where , if you're looking to do some of this broad education and not only

I don't want it to be thought about as dumbing it down , but it just makes it easier and quicker to comprehend . Naturally , so , as you just talked about that with comms , I thought that was an interesting little .

The Center for Plain Language has wonderful classes and resources on how to not just grade your language but learn from the beginning how to apply best practices of plain language , them beginning how to apply best practices of plain language , awesome , awesome .

We don't want to just be able to say back to this client look , we got X number of eyeballs on it .

We literally are tracking against how many people went to the website , downloaded the tool , how many people are sharing the tool , and so we're looking at that next level down , the effect of the resources we're creating , and time and time again , we're seeing that LinkedIn has the greatest possibility here .

Awesome , but I'll share since the beginning , we've had 175% community growth , all through our strategic digital engagement , and it's really that listening that was central to it . Right , like we could have come out day one , dana , and just said we're going to push , push , push , push as much as we can .

But the more we listened and then refined the strategy , the more we saw those numbers increase .

If it's especially something that they've seen before , there's that credibility , there's that trust . So I love that . That was your answer . Like , don't complicate it with anything that needs to be .

sometimes we would literally only have a moment of their time right , so we couldn't make it complicated .

I wanted to lean into the last couple of questions of our conversation today , and that is what is one thing that you would like to ask for help or support on what ?

So one thing I would like to ask for help on maybe is a broad question of I would love , as we are coming into this consequential year , what this case study did for me is had us challenge a lot of our biases right , like there's not one way to communicate , there's not one right way to do something .

I would love the folks who are listening right now to challenge their biases in the year ahead and their communications right . So think about if you are on autopilot and one way you're communicating , whether that's you use one channel specifically or you use a set of words specifically . Challenge them right .

I invite you to challenge the way you communicate in the year ahead .

I don't even want to go too far , but the next like three years .

Our values are really clear , right , they are public as it relates to our B Corp certification , and we have surpassed every goal we set for ourself by this seventh year .

And so when we think about where we are and where we're going , we're continuing to say , as a women-owned agency , now we tend to hold ourselves back , right , we tend to think I might not be ready to take that leap yet . Well , this year we've made some of our biggest goals yet and we're going to continue to reach for those .

So , while you might not know our name or our work , as you're listening , I tend to think that over the next few years , you're going to hear more from mission partners . You're going to learn more from mission partners and think about how we can serve as your partner in helping you move your agency and your work forward .