Full Transcript

Tom Garrity: Welcome to the June edition of The Garrity Group water cooler conversation where we have a chance to talk about the events that are on our mind on this June 21, 2021. Joining me, I’m Tom Garrity, and we have Amanda Molina, as well as Andie Mirabal. Andie, what is one thing that you’re looking forward to this summer?

Andie Mercer: I’m actually going to do two things. The first is reintroducing myself as Andie Mercer not Andie Mirabal. And the second is using my patio. We last year we did my patio so having dinners outside on the patio are one of my favorite things.

Tom Garrity: That’s fantastic Andie Mercer. Can’t wait for the HR department to get on me for this one. How about you, Amanda?

Amanda Molina: Well, because yesterday was Father’s Day and just one of those really busy June weekends but this was one of those first weekends that we have, you know, we’re just invited to birthday parties and a graduation party and Father’s Day gathering so it was, it was really fun too, and we had kids sport so it was fun to get around just all those people and do lots of fun summer things so I’m just I’m looking forward to reconnecting with some friends who I hadn’t seen in a while and getting to those big group events again. It was fun.

Tom Garrity: That’s great. Yeah, it’s kind of like the summer has officially started now which I’m really actually technically it has is today’s June 21, the first day of summer, which is also my sister Shawna’s birthday today. I think she’s celebrating her 39th birthday, I don’t know how many times, but she is celebrating and so Shawna Happy Birthday. Hope you have a wonderful, beautiful day. I’m looking forward to cooler temperatures at some point in time. And with that, that’s all I got on what I’m looking forward to this summer.

Tom Garrity: One way that communication professionals can be thoughtful when communicating to a diverse audience. And this, of course, on the heels of Pride Month, which we’re still in the midst of right now, as well as Juneteenth, which officially occurred on this past Saturday, June 19. What are some of the ways that communicators, can be more thoughtful? My thought is, remember your target audience. You know a lot of times, communicators will wrongly want to create echo chambers, and basically all echo chambers do is they make a lot of noise, they don’t make a lot of impact. So, for me, what I’d like to be able to see communicators do is really focus on connecting with their target audience, instead of just hearing themselves kind of celebrate their own successes celebrate the community’s successes, and that’s a good first step. Amanda, Andie, what are your thoughts?

Amanda Molina: Well, I think in addition to just being knowledgeable around, you know, subjects that are taking place, being able to, to guide clients, and, and as communicators, knowing when to speak I think so many people these days are just so quick to oh we better say something about this oh we better speak up. Additionally, but is it meaningful, have you truly made an investment in your knowledge is, is what because you don’t always have to automatically, you know, say something. Let’s first take a breath. Think about it, has there been some meaningful discussion around the topic, and then you can look at what you might want to say or, you know, work with your clients to say but I think it’s just, you know, really sitting back and evaluating. First, what sort of discussion you want to have before automatically it’s, oh let’s put a stamp out there. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Tom Garrity: Andie, anything you wanted to add onto that? Amanda, I thought great comments.

Andie Mercer: I agree with what Amanda said I also think it’s important when as communicators. When we’re starting to create these messages and stuff to have some somebody, if you can, from that audience, take a look at it before releasing it because sometimes you’re not familiar, you know, with that perspective. And so, I think it’s helpful when you can, to be able to run it by somebody that you trust from that audience.

Tom Garrity: Solid, good, good advice. Okay, the last topic today is one thing that you’re keeping an eye on in the month ahead.

Andie Mercer: I’ll jump in.

Tom Garrity: Good because I was about ready to do hashtag awkward silence, you know.

Andie Mercer: Summer Olympics, and how they’re communicating, you know, with these large events starting to take place I’m interested to see how everything starts to pan out and messaging related to it.

Tom Garrity: I’m looking forward to New Mexico reopening. I mean that’s kind of what they’re saying right the Governor made an announcement last week that July 1, New Mexico will officially reopen which means that most of the public orders, public health orders will cease to exist which means we can resume life as normal pre-COVID. There is still may be some indications that you know there might be some aspects of the public health order that would remain but I’m looking forward to seeing how New Mexico looks like it looked again, back in 2019.

Amanda Molina: I kind of along, I mean, similar lines, and from a work perspective. I’m going to be keeping my eye on all of the media applications that we’re starting to get in for Balloon Fiesta, people are asking questions about it and making travel arrangements, and very anxious, you know, as I just submitted my application today how soon will I know, we’re super excited to start planning our trip. So that’s been really fun, you know, from this, from our perspective is to see folks really starting to get out there and make their plans and so I’m looking forward to seeing the big, wonderful event in October but in the months ahead, all the planning that’s going to take place.

Tom Garrity: Great, yeah, I am as well. Great way to tie work back into it, Amanda, I mean, that was brilliant. That was brilliant. But yeah, a lot of inquiries coming in from media who want to come out and cover Balloon Fiesta and just a lot of different media successes for our other clients as well. So, with that, if you’d like to see more of our water cooler musings, please feel free to visit Garrity PR dot com and just take a look at the blogs section, you’ll see a lot of the news and insights that we post there are available for your review. So, thanks for watching.

Published June 29, 2021