#125: PR Hall-of-Famer Gary Sheffer on the State and Future of Corporate Communications

Welcome to The Crocs, join one of the world's top communicators, Mike Fernandez, and Guest as they take you behind the scenes of the news of the day and explore the crux of stories that are shaping business, politics and our daily lives. Hello, I'm Mike Fernandez and we're excited to welcome you to an episode of Milestones. First, this is the 125th episode of The Crocs of the Story Podcast. Second, we have a new sponsor. Since the beginning of The Crocs, we've been hosted by Boston University's College of Communication. When Gary and I began the podcast, we used BU studios and through the years have been blessed to have a number of its exceptional students work with us on the editing and production of the podcast. Going forward, The Crocs will be produced by the Kennedy Greenhouse Studio at the University of South Carolina's School of Journalism and Mass Communications. And the third milestone today is that for the first time, the host becomes the guest. My guest today is my dear friend, my colleague, my partner in crime over the crux's first 124 episodes and one of the most influential communicators over the last several decades. Gary Sheffer. Gary, it's a thrill to have you on today. We're turning the tables. You're in the hot seat. I get to ask the questions that I've long wanted to ask. You have a big recognition coming up this next week. The Page Society, which includes the world's top communicators, is inducting you into their Page Hall of Fame. You were being cited for your deep commitment to transparency and ethical leadership, which has earned you deep, deep respect among our colleagues and industry peers. Not bad for a kid from Hudson, New York, who studied English at Sienna College, eh? Yeah, I'm thrilled. Mike, I, you know, I'm honored that they think me worthy of induction and I'm just so thankful for all the support. And, and I'll talk about some of the learning from you that I've had over the year. And, but, you know, you and I, again, grateful to be in the Hall of Fame, but there was another Hall of Fame that you and I probably both aspired to as well with the baseball Hall of Fame. Absolutely. I can't even go in that, you know, as a customer, they won't let me near it. Well, any Hall of Fame feels good to me, but paid particularly. Yeah, absolutely. Gary, after graduating from Sienna, would go on to work in journalism as a reporter and editor, ultimately work for the Albany Times Union. He worked as a press aide to two New York governors, including the state's last Republican governor, George Pataki. He would join GE in 1999 working in media relations with Ben, GE CEO, Jack Welch, who's kind of an iconic CEO of that era. And, later serving as GE's VP of Communications and Public Affairs, effectively the company's Chief Communications Officer, while Jeff Milt served as a company CEO. Upon retiring from GE, he worked as a strategist and consultant with the large PR firm Weber-Shanwick. He and I both taught together at Boston University as professors of public relations, and he is the president of spokesman communications, a strategic communications firm. Welcome. This time is a guest to the Crocs Gary. How you doing? I'm doing well, Mike. I'm just worried that this could be the end. The career that you just described, I'm hoping I get through this without, you know, bringing it in. Thank you for having me on, I really appreciate it. Well, I love it because it puts a bit of a button on kind of what we've done that's been sort of a. A question of both of us and working with all those students through the years as well as are many guests and it's been a great thrill. But I want to focus on you today. So, as a communicator, you've had an amazing career. During the time you were the lead communicator at GE, you and your teams had to navigate some really complex global issues that included the 2008 financial crisis, you and I've talked about before, the Fukushima nuclear incident, even the Hudson River cleanup, but also just navigating an extraordinarily diverse business model that included GE financial. It was larger than most US companies in and of itself, and even the entertainment side with NBC Universal out of curiosity. What was your proudest moment? You know, Mike, I would say, I mean, all of those things, you know, in some cases I did well, you know, in retrospect and you learn from every one of those crises and issues. I was so proud of, in 2005, we launched EcoMagination, which was really a company-wide environmental initiative committed to bringing to market better technologies after all when you generate one third of the electricity. One third of the electricity in the world, your equipment, that's important. And you mentioned all the things that we could have hunkered down and going into our bunker, but we really said we have a, we can lead in this space. It was an across the board from marketing to advertising to branding to communications and people remember sort of we had a dancing elephant and the air television. But the thing that I was so proud of for our team was the engagement that we did to build trust with stakeholders in the environmental community and the regulatory community. And what people sort of forget about EcoMagination is what got the attention really at the beginning was that we took a stand on climate policy as, you know, a big, a big global conglomerate. And we said we need a price for carbon in the United States, which was sort of really. Yeah, so, so those kinds of things, Mike, where you assert your values and you bring it all, you bring the whole team with you in a 360 way, those are the kinds of things I really was fortunate to have the opportunity to work on it. And it goes to telling the story as opposed to just being the story, right, that's right. That's right. And, you know, there were instincts in the company to, you know, go behind the wall and just say, hey, talk to the hand. Jack Welch was a great communicator and I'll talk about him, but that was the instinct in the late 90s and early 2000s. To be sort of a monolithic communications company, you know, only one person speaks. And I have to say, Beth Comstock and Jeff Emelt and that whole crowd of leadership at GE just said, no, we're going to, we're going to be who we are. And we're going to tell people who we are. And if they don't agree, they don't agree. Well, you just mentioned Jack Welch and you had the opportunity to probably work with two of the most well known US CEOs of the last quarter century and in Jack and in Jeff Emelt. What was that like? And what were their strengths as communicators? You know, Mike, I got Jack at the end, right? So Jack was the king of the world. At when I joined the company and really my job as sort of had a media relations was to get out of the way. And some, you know, to make sure that Jack was talking to the right people and pairing with, you know, people who might be critical and that kind of thing. But Jack was the best person I ever saw at simplifying communications telling his story in a simple and persuasive way and Mike. He was so good at bursting the bubble of journalists who, you know, thought they were going to take a piece of hide out of Jack and they, it was very difficult to do that. And he had a stock price, you know, that, you know, made him almost untouchable. So I learned so much from him. Look, I can still remember the four E's. Jack's management philosophy for leaders was four E's energy energizes you had to have edge and you had to execute. And if you ask people from GE, even today, people who worked many decades ago talk about the four years. Yeah, exactly. So Jack. And then so I got Jeff at the beginning. Yeah, right. And in a period of tumultuous change, not just in the world and business and the emergence of China and recessions and all of that. But the change in communications. And Jeff was very savvy is very savvy about the media, Mike, you know, he, we had a media business. Yeah. And he learned from them. He was smart enough to, you know, and alert enough about the value of reputation and brand to just saturate himself and what was going on at the change. He was also using fax machines with Jack, you know, I'm going to fax you my statement. And Jeff, the reputation became democratized with the emergence. But the list of our audience think that you're totally old school and talking about facts. You're watching GE probably did the most early on in the world of trying to manage multiple channels online and otherwise, particularly around telling the story Run Eco imagination. Isn't that right? We were going through a difficult period. You know, it was Jack, you know, and then 2001 Jeff's first full day on the job was 9/11. And we were impacted our company significantly. We lost a couple people in the, in the attacks and, and of course our businesses were greatly impacted. And so it became necessary to tell our own story. And I have to say Beth Comstock was essential to this in, in, you know, let's, let's become our own media company. We started things like GE reports, which is to my knowledge, the first sort of corporate blog. To tell what people into our company, right? To give them a window into who GE actually was. And because social media became, was beginning to emerge as what it is today, which is, you know, a place for people to. Criticize, take counter positions all great. It has even created a site that dealt with technology that encouraged people in the academic community to also post and share their latest insights. Yeah, we, we, we worked with the Atlantic Mike. Yeah, we tried something to, we were the first company that I could think of. To, I said, let's partner with the media company. Yeah, and I'm not afraid of the debate. Let's say on the future of energy. We're not afraid of the debate on health care and, you know, where it should go and, and all of that. So let's partner with someone and let's participate in the conversation. Who had more experts on these topics than a global company like GE. And so it, you know, scared, it scared some of our lawyers and that kind of thing. But it worked out well and I particularly in Washington, Mike, I think people there respected our willingness to not just meet them in the hallways and offices, but to meet them in the public forum. Yeah, talk about things. Well, you know, I had the great fortune to sit for coffee not too long ago with one of your former colleagues, Russell Wilkerson, and here in, here in Houston. And, you know, he worked for you and, and since served as the lead communicator at Baker, used now leads corporate communications at Sinova Energy. He spoke about you having the remarkable capability of getting senior business executives who were like flying off the handle in the midst of a crisis and saying this and saying that you kind of say, we got to get the release that we got to do this, we got to do that. That you have this remarkable way of helping executives, understanding in the moment about getting the communications done and out so you could be part of the story. And Russ, I have to say about Russ, Russ is, we don't get through, and I mean this, the company doesn't get through the 2008 and 2009 financial crisis without Russ. He was our financial communicator at the time, and just did an amazing job, clarity, his ability to understand complex financial. I mean, you know, Mike, we had 50% financial, we were in a bad neighborhood when the collapse came and Russ was essential to us telling our story. Here's the thing Mike, trust, I had been there, you know, for almost a decade, when we got to the financial crisis, and the communications team had built trust with everyone, I hope, I think, including the finance people who are, as you know, can be tough. You know, can be tough, can be tough stakeholders of for communications. And what I did was simply explain to them the consequences of not being timely and not being accurate and not telling what we know. And let's do the work that's in front of us. I'm talking about what's going to happen tomorrow. We have to deal with today, and that doesn't happen. I wouldn't have done that in my first few years at the company. That trust. Yeah, well, and the fact thing is also interesting. It's one of our mantras or one of my mantras through the years has been, if you can't source it, you can't say it. Mike, I always still love this. I think I've said this under Crocs previously, which was, I would say somebody would tell me a fact, you know, saying, well, is that true? And, you know, they'd say, well, it's truthy. Okay, tell me the truth part and leave the E part out. We get to the cold bear days when he was doing truthiness. Yeah, exactly. As you look at the political landscape today, particularly at the tone of civil discourse and the polarization we see in politics, you know, you worked in politics, you worked for George Pataki. It would be your tips for political communicators. And, you know, that would be helpful in the political fray of today. Yeah, you know, Mike, it's the world has changed so much since I did it. I think people are, as a voter and somebody who's an observer now, they are desperate for someone who's going to talk in a realistic way. I think I've been engaged in not to be political, yeah, dealing with really childish things in many ways. And it continues. It continues. I'm very critical of traditional media and the way they're able to cover politics now. And so I think people are yearning for someone who's honest, who's fallible, who, and says, I look, you know, I screwed up here, I didn't do this well. That sense of reality authenticity is a word that's overused, Mike. But I think it's important. I like just like, let's, I'm not going to get caught up in this craziness, this. And I think you saw that in the latest debate. I'm not going to be political. I'm going to talk about policy. Somebody else is going to talk about all this other. It would be interesting to share with, with our audience, you know, what your early career, what being a journalist, what being in political communications meant to your later career. Yeah. Well, journalism is like you learn to be a self starter. You were in self-reliance, because it's just you, and a notebook and a pen. And, you know, I'm 22 years old and Gary, go figure out the state budget. You know, to help you out in the like, what I was trying to author two weeks ago, I don't know what this is. And so you really learn about, of course, writing, which I think is so important. You and I've talked about that many times. But this idea that the only person who's going to ensure you get it right is you. Yeah. And that has stuck with me. And then politics, Mike, you know, you've been in politics. Politics can be really fun. It can be, and that's why I'm afraid that young people are sort of sowered on politics, but you have to be a quick study like you were right in the US Senate. The youngest press secretary, you know, you had to be a quick, you had to certainly the world is open. And people are asking you for your opinion on these global issues. Yeah, exactly. So politics. And you know what, Mike, I also liked about politics is I like a good fight every now and then. And, you know, you could throw bunches and politics, but you can't do that in the business world as well. What was speaking of that, you know, we've talked a lot of the show about what political polarization means and other realms of society. And, you know, you think about today what companies face, you know, companies like GE companies like embridge. How should companies be talking about politics and political issues? We've had workplaces and universities divided on Israel and Gaza. We've had state attorney generals warn companies about DE and I practices after the Supreme Court decision last summer against using affirmative action and admissions decisions. It has as a clock run out on companies being able to take a stand on social issues. And if so, is this a good thing or bad thing? Yeah, boy, you know, in some ways, we did this to ourself, Mike, you know, once we had the tools, we felt like we had to say something about everything. And I hope not. I hope the clock hasn't run out. Companies should not be political, though they are. I mean, you know, they make donations and every company should have the right to represent themselves through traditional lobbying and support for people who have similar ideas about how business should be conducted. But I'm afraid that, you know, these things go through cycles and we're in a down cycle for this. You should have an intentional process, Mike, where you anticipate what issues are important to you, really important to your company and prepare for those things. I'm going to talk about this a little bit in my remarks. If I have the courage, Mike, you will, you will. And like, who can argue what global organization enterprise or any organization, who can argue that diversity isn't core to who you are? We know the diverse ideas create things that you're not going to be able to create if we all are, you know, automatons. And diversity, by the way, on the flip side of that, Mike, you said it so well, on the flip side of that, it reduces risk. You know, I mean, you see the world more completely when you have a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds and everything. So I really hope we're not going to give up on things like DEI and ESG. I think you're just good business. Well, and one of the things that I should underscore here, you you led the page society at a point. And when you were, I guess the chair is the title, you were the chair, you started the diversity initiative within page and the startup of the diversity committee, which I think I was either the first chair, maybe the second chair of. But you showed a real commitment in that space and you've done great work, Mike, ever since, you know, diverse futures, which is something you participate in is such a fantastic. I've stayed in touch. This is a program where diverse communicators from page members come to a conference over a year. I've stayed in touch with those folks that I've seen. And it started off on the journalism side, you know, because there was a, there was that sense that there was a lot of combining and different newspapers and the like we're going out of business and that the people being squeezed out were people diverse individuals. That's when Mark Carter and some others started. Mark Carter, my buddy here in Columbia County and upstate New York, yes, he's a great guy. But so I just think like, who doesn't like for ESG, you know, reduce mentions of it and, and company filings. Yeah, reduce in all of that. Look, I can't see into companies and all bud lights syndrome is real. I get it, right. But man, who doesn't want to be environmentally responsible as a kind of connected to society, we cannot separate ourselves from the society that gives us license to operate. And so that's what I, but you can pick what is really core, what are your people really care about? You don't have to be commenting on everything. Yeah, yeah. You've also had an unparalleled impact on the industry, not just through your deeds and your team, but through the leadership and mentorship of a lot of communicators, many of whom have gone on to lead in their own right. I think of Becky Edwards, we talked about Russell Wilkerson, Stacey Tank, Elaine Kasky, who worked for you and then worked for me. Yeah, exactly. You know, they're just so many. And I'm just curious, you've had such a profound impact on these individuals who you help mentor and who among others had great impact themselves on the industry. One who had the greatest impact on you and your public relations and communications career, and what's the best career advice you received. Oh, that's interesting. Mike, I have to say, you know, Jeff ML, the CEO, you see, you know, for 16 years, I was CCO with him for 13 years. He understood the value of communications, as I said before. But more importantly, he held me to account for how talented our team was. Right. I mean, he when we would fly around the world, he would do his performance review of me, and it was completely like, OK, who do we have in Russia? How's the team in China is the guy at energy any good? And he would say, you know, he had to, you know, fool around who's in your wallet, sort of like whatever the capital, you know, when he meant it like Gary, are you bringing people with you? Yes, that had the most profound effect because you asked me about my proudest moment and the proudest moment I actually of anything was when PR weeks said GE over the past whatever 50 years, you know, sort of the distinesty of people and it was because Jeff allowed me to invest in the team, not with head count. Through development, through training, through retention, through equity, inclusion, everything, and, and so that, and the best advice to answer the second question is Zenyamuka, Zenyamuka is, was my boss with Governor Pataki, went on to great career at Disney. And now it's at TikTok. I mean, can you imagine a tougher battle and a really person for that, does she dance? But so I can remember back when I was a young, I was coming from journalism into communication. And we had a touchy issue and she asked me how I was going to handle it. And Zenyam said to me, Gary, if we're going to do this, we're going to do it right. Now here's what right looks like, you know what I mean, and it wasn't, you know, it was really, she was completely right about the content and she was right about don't fake it, Gary. It was not good enough and everything you do should be the best it can be, should be excellent. And I always remember that moment when I'm looking at something that's really important is like if we're going to do this, we're going to do it right. Yeah, yeah. You and I both participated in a page study some years ago on the evolution of the chief communications officer. It was a go like yesterday. Now that has been a few years, what do you see as kind of the most important evolution of the role of chief communications officer? Well, Mike, this is where I'm going to talk about you. So, no, I mean this, this role of the CCO plus which we read about where people are going beyond like your role, you know, with Enbridge now, not just, you know, communications function, but other important external parts of the company. And I always remember, I think about this and I learned so much about it when you were at Cargill and you know, you talked about the engagement that you did with stakeholders for an important global company and people who in the past might have been critical. Yeah, you know, of the company and easily could have been talked to the hand people in the past. We're environmental activists who hated us. Right. And I just remember that that if you what you went out and you sat down. We did. And in some cases, you continued to disagree, but at least there was a relationship in a sense of respect and trust. And I took that back with me to GE, which we had no shortage of our critics, environmental activists and others, financial otherwise. And just like my job is not just to produce words and it is to build relationships with people who have a stake in our company. So in many ways, I mean, Harold Berson, for me, was kind of a model of that because he was, he was, he was sad to see the profession run away from public relations. He saw that as a higher order skilled in communications as he thought, you know, communications is but a tool in order to manage those relationships with publics or stakeholders. Yeah. And there's an outcome, right? You know, communications is you're trying to reach a result, which is trust. In many cases, I always love Harold, you want them to actually do something. Yeah. You might want them to, you know, praise your company, they might want them to buy the stock or, you know, so communications is a tool to your point to reach and achieved, you know, to achieve an objective. And so we sit here, you're about to go into the page hall of fame, you've done all these incredible things, business, politics, journalism, communications, consulting, teaching as a university professor at BU. What now has you most excited about the future of public relations and corporate communications? Yeah, I think Mike gets that expanded role and the recognition, you know, in a few places, in a recognition by business leaders that they themselves need to be better communicators. That they need to have good communications teams and capabilities within not, I think we've advanced the idea that communications is not fluff. It's not something to spin or anything like that. It's about fundamentally who you are, what your purpose is, what you value and expressing that and activating that page has been so essential, you know, prove it with action. Yeah, I think that's what excites me, the tools excite me, you know, AI and all that, that excites me, but I'm a, I hope we continue to focus on the humanity of who these companies are, it's just a group of people. Yeah, really, who are doing some essential things. So, we've got to see it at the table, maybe too many seats at the table, Mike, you know, like, you've got a big remit, but it's the recognition that page has helped to build that this is a value adding function, essential function in these large organizations. Any questions, concerns about the future, I worry that we focus too much on tools, yeah, and not enough on personal relationships, but, you know, that I get it, I get it, something like AI is fundamentally, it's changing. Yeah, right, and I hope we continue the person to person connections like you did at Cargill, right, that are so effective in asserting the value that we bring and helping understanding we just, you know, we're trying to build understanding. And, and I hope you don't forget it, even with media, you got to get to know the reporters, you got to talk to them, sending them corporate words on an email is not enough, even with the people who are critical of you. Yeah, at BU, you were selected one year as the top professor, was it hard to step away from the classroom? Mike, I love in like you, I love, love, love teaching, it is at this point in our lives, right, and look, it makes you better, you know, students today, they're good. They are paying a lot of money to be in these classes, and so they look at it as sort of a consumer, you know, customer point of view, so you got to stay sharp. And I so, I have to say Mike, I think the most satisfying thing in my career professionally was when I could open a door for a student to a job, you know, the student steps through because they're so damn good. Opening a door to somebody to begin their career, boy, I can tell you, you know, in a selfish way, that's really satisfying. I stepped away from BU only because I lived 200 miles away from you. It's a long commute. And I just after six years, boy, that, you know, I went through four sets of tires and a couple windshields on the old mass pipe. Yeah, so for now, you still have your consulting business, I suppose. Yeah, what's next for Gary Schuffer? Boy, you know, I'd really like to clean out my barn. If something I've been planning to do for a long time, no, things like that, you know, you know, Mike, these jobs are all consuming. Yeah, and you spend a lot of time away from home to even when you're home, sometimes you're not present. Yeah, so we have four children, two have gotten married in the last two years, spending a lot of time with Barb and the family. Yeah, I'd like to look forward to seeing Barb and then Sarah who actually also worked for me at person. That's right. And Sarah's our daughter, she's the head of comms and strategy at refugees, international, just an amazing young person. And so some of that, Mike, and I, you know, at some point we'll go back to teaching, I think, I miss Mike. Here's what, you know, when you, I miss the business and strategy meetings that you're in all the time with the board. You know, I miss that and I miss the social part of which is, you know, just like talking to you. Well, and I'm going to miss this. I'm going to miss, you know, our banter. I hope that we'll still continue our conversations. It just won't be on the crux, but let me say that it's been an extraordinary honor, privilege and a great joy to host the crux of the story podcast with you. And at 125 episodes, we've done more shows than Larry David did of curb your enthusiasm. More episodes than there are madmen or the sopranos or shits Creek. So as you reflect on the work any favorite shows or moments, you know, Mike, I, I, by the way, we've been up shits Creek. On the show and otherwise, but Mike, I think back like to my favorite episodes and everyone was great and the people were so smart and I learned so much wrong. Like CCOs, I really enjoy learning. You don't get a lot of opportunity these days to talk with CCOs at conferences and such. But like, remember Fernando, the Venco you want to go. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He was a Max or Max R technologies. And he talked to us about, here's a satellite company. And how you think, well, it's a satellite company, right? How connected they are to global issues, politics, you know, the whole issue in Ukraine and so I, man, I really enjoyed that. It was eye opening and he's a great communicator. So I think more of that that we can, we can show in the profession and communications, the kind of work we do. And I tried to show that to students, you know, it's like, if you want a front seat to history, man, communications is a good place to be. And into influence, not just to witness. So that's my, that's my point of view on. And by the way, after 124 episodes, I think I've said everything, Mike, that I know communication. So any tips for future gas future topics? And I do think so, you know, this issue of what's our role in the world? You know, what is our responsibility to democratic capitalism? And then just stories from communicators, CCOs and others in their, on their teams, on how they're dealing with it. I think that's, man, that's so important and right now. Great. Thank you, Gary. I could go on it on with you. I know we will. We just won't do it on the air. You know, as I, as I take this on, on a little solo ride, know that you're always welcome on the show as a guest or host. It has been great working with you. It really has a very special. That same you're right. You rescued me many times when I went down the wrong path. So I was called in now. Can I be like a crank caller? Absolutely, absolutely. For those of you listening, please continue to tune in as I and colleagues at the University of South Carolina across a multiplicity of communications disciplines from news and journalism to marketing PR in the world of books. Seek to continue to bring you the crux of the story. Thanks for listening to the Coox, a production of the School of Journalism and Mass Communications, an association with the Kennedy Greenhouse Studio at the University of South Carolina. You can find our episodes on SoundCloud, iTunes and Spotify or by visiting our website, thecruxpodcast.org. (upbeat music)