About This Episode:
In our final episode for season 6, Communications Strategist and Wakeman Agency CEO, Vanessa Wakeman, sits in the interviewee chair, sharing her latest insights. In conversation with guest host, Camaro West, Executive Director of Peace is Loud, a nonprofit that uses the power of storytelling to advance gender justice, Vanessa dives into how nonprofits can surface narratives to prompt transformative social change, and why it is essential to ask the question of who should be telling the story. Touching on funding dynamics, narrative resilience, and the needs present in our changing media and information ecosystems, this conversation is sure to get you thinking strategically about communications for your nonprofit in the new year and beyond.
About Camaro West:
Camaro West is a filmmaker and nonprofit leader committed to advancing social justice through her work. She is currently the Executive Director of Peace is Loud, where she leads the organization in its mission to use the power of storytelling to advance gender justice.
About Vanessa Wakeman:
Vanessa Wakeman is the founder and CEO of The Wakeman Agency. She serves as a trusted advisor to nonprofits, foundations, and socially responsible companies globally. An accomplished strategist focused on leveraging communications in pursuit of systemic justice, Vanessa has led engagements across numerous social issues, including healthcare, education, arts, civil rights, philanthropy, social innovation, economic mobility, children’s advocacy, animal rights, environmental, and technology sectors, amongst others.
With more than two decades of experience in strategic communications, Vanessa has worked at the intersection of meaning-making and systems change to help organizations shape powerful narratives that influence public opinion and inspire action. She is an innovator and disruptor who has created numerous communications frameworks to shift the way organizations bring stories to life. Vanessa has been inducted into PRWeek‘s Hall of Femme, noted as one of the 100 Most Influential Black Leaders in New York on City & State‘s Black Power List, and named one of 50 Game Changers of PR by PR News.
In her words…
“I don’t think the nonprofit sector gives itself enough credit for what it knows, what it does, and what it understands—the insights, the lived experiences, the earned experiences. Even when we are fatigued and exhausted, feeling like we are losing, we must never forget just how much power lies in that information.”
“I always say, let’s not leave room for people to interpret. Let’s be very clear on how we need to be talking about an issue, and what language helps to strengthen the narrative.”
“We are seeing narratives being tested in different ways today. They need to be able to withstand, adapt, and respond to harmful narratives and shifting dynamics. So we’re helping organizations think about what they need to do to position their narratives to be more resilient.”
“There is a responsibility in storytelling and narrative development to not go into it thinking that because you have communications expertise or understanding of an issue, that you are the best person to tell that story.”
“I would say to funders that communications is no longer a ‘nice to have’. We have found since 2020 that the role of communications needs to be a priority in how organizations advance their work. It shouldn’t be just project-based, or ‘let’s do this thing for this amount of time’. Funders should reimagine communications as a long-term investment.”
Questions Answered on this Episode:
- In your opinion and experience, who shapes the story?
- Given that so many of us in the nonprofit sector are feeling insecure and powerless, what opportunities do you think there might be for social change narratives to still persist? Is there anything we can learn from other times where we’ve seen ourselves in these contexts of great insecurity, that we can pull from to get us through?
- We’ve seen the ways that narratives have been wielded to try and divide, to try and other. I know you’ve spoken a lot about the importance of language for social change. Can you expand a bit on that, and why you think language is so important?
- How are you thinking about the medium through which a story is being told, and how that influences the actual storytelling or the narratives?
- Talk to me about narrative resilience. That’s a term that you have coined—what exactly does that mean, and why do you think that narrative resilience is important?