Dan Slee

The COVID-19 pandemic will prove to be turning point in history. There was the UK before it hit and after. Oxford University hospitals director of communications Matt Akid talks of how the pandemic has been captured in the staff’s own words.

Beyond Words is a unique book of images, many taken by frontline NHS staff at Oxford University Hospitals (OUH), which reflect their personal and professional experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our aim was to create a book to chronicle an extraordinary time in the lives of all staff working at OUH and to produce something of high quality which would show that in-house NHS communications and graphic design teams can match anything from the commercial PR world – at a fraction of the cost.

The total budget was less than £10,000, to cover the costs of professional printing of the book, which was kindly provided by a grant from Oxford Hospitals Charity whose remit is to support patients and staff at OUH.

The book was written and designed in-house by our Communications and Oxford Medical Illustration (OMI) teams – with photos provided by OMI, Oxford Hospitals Charity and our own staff.

We wanted to enable staff to submit their own photographs for inclusion in the book to document their own experience, and we also wanted to thank staff for their incredible service during the COVID-19 pandemic by enabling them to order a free hard copy of the book.

All of this fitted in with our Chief People Officer’s Growing Stronger Together – Rest, Reflect, Recover programme to support the health and wellbeing of all staff working at OUH as we emerge from the pandemic.

In April 2021 we launched an eBook called Stories from the COVID-19 Pandemic – #OneTeamOneOUHwhich told the story of OUH’s response to the first 12 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. We wanted to help our staff to make sense of their experiences by telling their stories, to share how they felt, and to talk about what they did as individuals and in teams.

And so we invited all staff to submit their contributions in order to truly reflect the experiences of our people. More than 50 teams and individuals submitted their stories and many were included in the final eBook.

Based on this evidence that there was a genuine appetite from staff for communal storytelling in order to reflect on personal and shared experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic, we came up with the idea of a printed book of photographs.

Jackie Love, our Head of Design, came up with the title of the book, Beyond Words, to reflect the fact that these experiences can be difficult to put into words but powerful images can tell a story and evoke emotions.

Our strategy was to encourage staff engagement in the project and so on the NHS Birthday on 5 July 2021 we communicated a call to all staff to submit their photographs. We also collated images taken during the pandemic by our in-house teams while Jackie developed the creatives, the look and feel of the book, structured around our six OUH values of compassion, respect, delivery, excellence, learning and improvement.

We made the decision to publish the book in January 2022 as we approached the two-year anniversary of the first COVID-19 positive patients being admitted to our hospitals, in order to maximise media interest and as a milestone for our staff.

We also invited staff to order a free copy of the book to meet our key objective of the book being a thank you. We had a pre-ordering window in November 2021 and a further ordering window in January 2022 after the book was published. We also worked with our Voluntary Services team and with Oxford Hospitals Charity on the logistics of distributing hard copies of the book to staff working across four hospital sites and at multiple other community locations.

3,500 OUH staff ordered a copy of Beyond Words, both before and after its publication in January 2022, and we have also had overwhelmingly positive feedback from staff about the book and free copies being made available as a thank you gesture.

Helen Doling, a nurse on our Haematology Day Treatment Unit, said: “Truly amazing book. Very grateful for my copy, providing a lasting memory of dedication and hard work of so many in such a difficult time.”

Daljit Dhariwal, a surgeon in our oral and maxillofacial surgery team, said: “A really fantastic record of one great team coming together through the adversity of COVID to deliver the best care for our patients.”

Beyond Words has also been read online more than 4,000 times since launch by readers as far afield as the USA, Australia and India.

And it has attracted positive national media coverage by BBC Breakfast News, as well as local media pick-up.

We’re proud of the book and we’re thrilled it’s been shortlisted in the ‘Best Publication’ category of the CIPR Excellence Awards – fingers crossed for the awards ceremony in June .

Matt Akid is director of communications at Oxford Universities Hospitals NHS Trust.

It’s been a busy few weeks and over a cup of coffee I was reflecting on what I’d learned.

It’s a useful exercise I sometimes do after a particularly rapid period.

For some reason, it was the questions that people asked during training that really stuck with me.

I was reflecting on how my answers are often around what questions they can ask of the people they work with. All of that points to the importance of building a relationship with people. For some communications is science. For me it’s a lab coat and a piece of cake. The lab coat represents the data and the cake is the soft skills you need.

It led me to what questions I most find myself asking or recommending.

Q: You want half a day from me, I need 15 minutes from you, is that alright?

The comms inbox can be a wondrous thing. It can move from command ‘we need a poster by tomorrow or this thing will fail and it will be your fault’ to ‘can you help me reach young people?’ In other words, some people think they can click their fingers and some don’t.

The question I often find myself reaching for when people prescribe what they want is this: ‘You want half a day from me, I need 15-minutes from you, is that alright?’

The need for 15 minutes is to go through a basic comms planning template. I’ve blogged about this before here. You can rattle through in 15-minutes or take far longer.

There’s a load of supplementary questions in the comms plan but it starts here.

Q: Who are you trying to talk to?

The more aopproachable way of asking: ‘who is your audience?’ It’s a question to pin down who they need to talk to. They know the people they serve better than anyone. Plug into that.

Q: When you say ‘our audience is everyone, can you jot down what that looks like on a piece of paper… and then identify the top three?

The audience is rarely everyone. When it is, you’ll probably need to break it down into demographics and channels to find each audience. This helps them understand this. If you’ve only got finite resource would it be young people on TikTok or the over 55s on Nextdoor? What would you go for?

Q: We both want this to succeed, we know that don’t we?

Sometimes at the start of comms planning, I’ll mention this just to name check the elephant in the room. They may be engineers / clinicians / a station officer. You are a comms person and your expertise is to help people communicate. You both want a successful outcome but it helps to spell it out.  

Q: What does success look like?

A broad question to help them pin down what they’d be happy with. That needs to come from them. Selling 100 tickets? Selling 100 ice creams? Recruiting 100 firefighters? What is success? That’s your starting point. So, if you recruiting firefightersd, how old do they need to be? The questions start flowing from the number.

Q: Who, what, when, where, why, how?

Kipling wrote that everything he learned came from six good men. Their names were Who, What, When, Where, Why and How. These are known as ‘open questions’. They encourage open answers. The question ‘Is your favourite colour blue?’ encourages a closed answer that doesn’t encourage conversation.

Q: Why, why, why, why, why and why?

Toddlers in supermarkets ask questions. ‘Why is tiger bread called tiger bread?’ They are curious. They find out information. Be like a toddler. Ask a why question politely six times and it’s amazing what you find out.  

Q: What is working and what is not?

Evaluation means you can see what works and what doesn’t. Do more of what works and less of what doesn’t. It’s that simple.

There’s no question that the wind is filling the sales of TikTok the short form video channel.

What has started as a Chinese platform with music is morphing into a genuine contender to break the Facebook monopoly.

The public sector, by and large, has been eyeing up TikTok warily. Innovators have been experimenting.

Trends and audio

One key way to get people to see your content is to ride on the coat-tails of poppular trends and popular audio.

In a nutshell, a trend can be a particular style of video. It can originate in one part of the world, burn fiercely and just weeks later be burnt out. Similarly, a music track can drive a popular style of video.

If you watch one video on a trend, say, you can lose yourself in exploring other takes on the trend.

With this crop of video, there’s some examples of public sector creators using trends. Why bother? Because if you do this you are likely to reach a a larger audience so when you’ve got that must-share content you are reaching more people.

Not all of the examples here are public sector but all have ideas that can work well in the sector.

Public sector TikTok ideas

Creator: @redbridgecouncil

Purpose: Voter registration amongst young people.

Trend or Audio: ‘Everybody’ by Back Street Boys.

Why this works: It’s self deprecating and shows a sense of humour. It links a music track with a call to action. You’re original. You’re the only one. You may or may not be sexual.

Creator: @thisisrangerkeith.

Purpose: By having no clear call to action the video reminds viewers that it’s good to take a break in the wild and listen for just a moment to bird song.

Trend or Audio: None.

Why this works: It deliberately shuns trends and trending audio that people can jump on to reach an audience. By doing so it reinforces why the countryside is a good place to go and recharge. This isn’t a service. It’s a bloke called Keith that you can build a basic web relationship with. You can even by merch.

This is by an individual rather than an organisation. I’m taking this that he could be a countryside ranger.

Creator: @southyorkshirefire

Purpose: Entertaining content.

Trend or Audio: #ringlightchallenge and the ‘Nobody wants to see you naked’ audio.

Why this works: This is a really good example of a public sector account embracing the platform. It creates entertaining content so it can build an audience and then deliver calls to action. This is a piece of that entertaining content.

The #ringlightchallenge began as a trend amongst super fit gym goers so they could show off their rippling shoulder muscles. It was then subverted by others. The overweight girl with the light disappearing into the fridge, for example. The audio ‘nobody want to see you naked’ is also a trend which the service have used here.

Creator: @livingliverpooltour

Purpose: Explainer video.

Trend or Audio: None.

Why this works: Living Liverpool Tour is a man who loves Liverpool and wants to explain and explore the city he clearly loves. The purpose is to educate and inform. This video is an answer to a question posed to him why playiong fields in the city are called locally ‘The Mystery’. By using period pictures, a voiceover and original video it tells the story of a mystery donor.

“Now,” each video concludes, “where shall we go next?”

It’s a lovely piece of place marketing.

Creator: @worcsacutenhs

Purpose: Celebrating a patient story.

Trend or audio: none.

Why this works: This is a video that works on its own independent of trends. A patient story its a celebration of a baby born 15 weeks early finally going home.

The issue of ramping down after an emergency is the pressing issue facing public sector comms. How can work get back to an acceptable pace? Here are some crowd-sourced excellent ideas that may be a bit life saving too.

When rabbits are pulled out of hats every day the act stops being magic and it starts to be normal.

Over the last two years public sector comms teams have worked long hours to communicate in a pandemic. Their work has helped saved lives. They have pulled a field full of rabbits out of a factory of hats.

But let’s be honest. The cost of this sacrifice is being overlooked. You only glimpse the real cost in conversations. Heard about the entire team who burnt out and walked off the job in the space of a month? Or the one who went off with stress and never came back? Or the one who can’t sleep regular hours anymore?

More than half of public sector comms people say their mental health is worse now than before the pandemic. Physical health isn’t much better.

In March 2022, there is a sense that the worst has passed and business as usual has long since returned. With 100,000 daily cases and 192 dead on the day in March 2022 I’m writing this the idea that the storm has passed is open to debate.

But anyway, how do you return to normal?

In an anonymous blog, one senior comms person observes that the emergency pace of long hours has become expected. It’s now baked in.

But should it be?

Of course not.

The major comms challenge of 2022 is not how to ramp up delivery but ramp it down before even more people burn-out, go off with stress or quit the profession.

How to ramp down is the big strategic question.

I’ve asked members of the Public Sector Comms Headspace to come up with some ideas.

A comms strategy and a plan

A comms strategy and plan. Some clearly identified organisation priorities, comms objectives linked to them and an activity plan so we can plot resource against it. So that we know what we’re working towards most of the time and can schedule our days and weeks, and our leave – apart from, say, 10 to 20 per cent of the time when there’s a genuine emergency or reactive situation.

Bridget Aherne

Learn to say ‘no’

Build and maintain a strong comms team and wider network so you always have other people to share your experiences with, to vent to, to support and be supported, to laugh with in the dark and not so dark times, to be a touchstone so you know it’s not just happening to you.

It’s really tough and it’s not over yet, but at least you’re not alone.

Giuseppina Valenza

Ask why is it urgent

When people say ‘this is urgent’, ask why?

Is it a legitimate, couldn’t-be-foreseen priority which will achieve a real outcome for the organisation. Or is it ‘shit, we forgot to tell comms – quick fire them an email.

If it’s the earlier, fair enough. If it’s the latter, well, sometimes saying ‘no’ can be a good thing and demonstrates planned, professional comms is not a rabbit-out-of-a-hat demo.

Sharon Dunbar

Have a workplan and make it visible

Show senior managers the service’s workplan on a regular basis. It might not stop the request coming in but it will make it a little easier to push back.

Suzie Evans

A detailed plan for you

We are currently addressing some of these issues…

Slowing down the inbound requests by making customers think about what they need before they ask. A drop down menu of options available negates the need to send unsolicited ‘we need some comms’ emails. Also an auto response to acknowledge and manage expectations- business critical? Patient safety related? We’ll be with you within 24-48 hours. Time specific but no major impact? That’ll be within 3-5 days. Longer term request? We’ll put it in the queue and you’ll hear from us within 7-10 working days. Customers need to understand Comms aren’t sat there playing Wordle waiting for the next request to land.

Also try to work with programme and project managers/directors to educate them into understanding that they need to identify the comms outcomes they need to achieve before they can ask you for resource. Because if they don’t know, then you can’t work out if you have the capacity to offer support for it.

Develop some self serve options so that some of the ‘small c’ comms can be delivered by colleagues across the organisation. One of our execs recently took a selfie with staff, submitted it with a couple of lines and we did the rest. Not all content needs to be created by Comms…

Finally, be supportive of your team and help them decline unnecessary requests and meetings and enable them to ask ‘why’ rather than simply react with ‘yes’.

Louise Sharf

Research through social listening

Use social listening to show whether there there is actually public interest… people are often actually looking in a different direction

Susannah Griffiths

Never stop challenging

Never stop challenging and asking why. Urgency has become a habit with corporate colleagues, perhaps due to the amount of actual crisis comms needed to be turned around at pace over the last two years. Time is needed to check work aligns to priorities and has purpose, and there needs to be a clear recognition of the difference between crisis comms and poor planning.

Sacha Taylor

Relax and cut the audience some slack

Our audiences are also exhausted. After two years of having to pay attention to our channels to access vital information they needed to meet their basic needs, such as income and healthcare, they’re finally able to get back to some level of normality. We need to cut our audiences some slack and stop communicating like they’re hanging on our every word, they’re not.

Ruth Edwards

Selfcare: Deliberately cut back on work hours

Make yourself less available and work to a sensible drum beat, so you have the capacity for genuinely urgent matters. Work out what actually isn’t going to break any eggs if you slow the pace down.

Melinda Brown

Selfcare: Look after yourself first and then others

‘Put your mask on first’ is advice I often give out, but forget to tell myself If you are not ok then you aren’t in a position to help others and do your job effectively. So, hard as it is, look after yourself. How ever that looks to you.

Sara Hamilton

Selfcare: Book and take proper leave

Take your annual leave.

And really take it – no ‘Oh, I’ll just log on for a minute,’, no ‘Oh, I’m around if you need me Mr/Mrs CE.” No, ‘I’m not going anywhere therefore I’ll pick up my phone’.

Kate Pratt

Selfcare: Switch off

My other half was prised away for his birthday weekend recently, two days of no internet and Scottish sunshine. On return he remarked that a really difficult issue he’d been dealing with had been made worse by people emailing each other all weekend about it. A bit of perspective and energy helped him resolve it on the Monday. His advice to his senior, academic peers was, switch off more and make better decisions.

Lucy Hartley

Don’t say ‘I’m busy’

Being visible about what work you have on. Just saying ‘I’m busy’ doesn’t cut it with others who also think they’re busy.

Lead-in times really help, and a clear message that if this work is taken on, something else has to give. Usually does the trick.

Clare Parker

Thank you to Bridget Aherne, Sarah Forgione, Melinda Brown, Sam Kemp, Caroline Howarth, Georgina Button, Kate Pratt, Hannah Rowley, Kelly ShutlerRosalie Fairbairn, Suzie Evans, Louise Sharf, Sacha Taylor, Sara Hamilton, Clare Parker, Lucy Hartley, Susanna Griffiths and everyone who contributed.

To read part one of this mini series head here.

The greatest fear of someone new to dealing with media queries is simply this… answering the phone to journalists.

The nightmare runs along the line of a phone rings and at the end will be an angry person demanding answers NOW.

That’s the fear. The reality is very different, of course.

In life as in anything, preparation leads doubt and doubt leads to worry.

Here’s a simple approach.

Not all reporters are scary

First things first. Not all reporters are scary. They’re just trying to do a job just as you are trying to do a job. They need your help to get the right information. You need them to tell people about the job your organisation is doing. It’s a two way street.

I was a reporter for 12-years and I worked in a Press-heavy comms team for eight years. I’ve asked thousands of questions of press officers and I’ve answered thousands, too.

Here’s your script

Here’s what you need to know when dealing with a media query.

If you ask the reporter:

• What’s your name?
• What’s your publication?
• What are your contact details?
• What’s your question?
• When’s your deadline?

Top tip: read the question back to them and email it back as a confirmation that you are on the same page.

You won’t go far wrong.

A more experienced reporter may try and pump you for a steer before you’ve gone and checked out the information. A couple of occasions as a press officer I’ve fallen into the trap of trying to give unapproved information to help a reporter on a deadline. It’s not always ended well.

One time I told someone what I knew. Turns out it wasn’t all accurate. It came back on me. Yes, I was quoted. No, it wasn’t ideal. I did it once.

I realised at this moment that name, publication, question and deadline was what I’d stick to from here on in. Even if I had some background knowledge.

One time I was buttered-up by a reporter who asked me how long I worked there. “Five years,” was the answer. Five years? Then I clearly knew more than I was letting on.

I stuck to the script.

This formula may seem simple.

But the best ideas always are simple.

Simple.

I help deliver ESSENTIAL MEDIA RELATIONS workshops to help people with the proactiove and the reactive of dealing with journalists. More here.

The worst of the pandemic is over… but trust and mental health has been badly damaged amongst public sector comms people.

That’s the verdict of almost 300 NHS, police, fire, local and central government PR, marketing and communications people.

The results are in the 5th quarterly tracker survey as we emerge from the omicron variant into the bright new future of 2022. Key trends emerge.

Key survey findings

Are we there, yet?

It’s over, is it? 45 per cent agree or strongly agree that the worst of the pandemic is behind us.

So, does that mean a return to the old ways? Not at all.

Mental health isn’t bouncing back. 56 per cent say this is worse – five times as many as those recovering.

Partygate HAS damaged the message. 82 per cent of communicators found that evidence of Ministers and civil servants staging parties during lockdown had made it harder to deliver public health messages.

We need to live with COVID-19. This has support without it being a majority. 41 per cent agreed with the idea – twice as much as didn’t.

Hours have increased after the pandemic receeds. 77 per cent of comms people are working longer hours than they are contracted. There has been a leap from 42 to 51 per cent working between one and five hours extra. in just three months.

Staff remain isolated. After two years of working from home, more people are feeling isolated now than at the start of the pandemic. The figure is 44 per cent to 34 per cent in June 2020.

Staff are more not less stressed. Staff are more stressed now than the first three months of the pandemic. 67 per cent say the problem has increased compared to 65 per cent in June 2020.

Through it all, they felt as though they worked for the common good. In an optimistic note, 73 per cent agreed with this statement after two years of lockdown against 74 per cent in June 2020. A remarkably robust figure.

Teamworking has not been so strong. While people see the big picture, a feeling of working as a team 48 per cent has slipped six points from June 2020.

Working from home is here to stay. 82 per cent are still at home either full or some of the time.

All of these figures are striking but in their own words they are particularly memorable.

PARTYGATE

After hours parties and the protracted cover-up have made an impression on people.

“Their behaviour undermines the basics of trust.”

“Definite strong change in the public mood, hostility on social media.”

“I don’t think that people link the PM to the NHS in Scotland. It would have been far more difficult if it was our First Minister.”

“Shameful and shameless. Having endured the past two years seeing the things I have in the NHS first hand it boils my blood.”

“This is a complete breakdown of trust in what the Government are saying.”

“I think the Government and Boris have lost public trust.”

“I don’t see a link between partygate and public health.”

“We’ve lost he goodwill of the people entirely in my borough.”

THE WORST OF THE PANDEMIC IS OVER

There is broad support for this position but while people hope as much there’s sometimes doubt and a hedging of bets.

“It is still not over… still impacting on services and people. We do need to learn to live with it but this will take timeand behaviour change. Living with it isn’t the same as doing what we did before.”

“The impact on mental health and the economy will be felt for years.”

“Agree today, but who knows if it’ll change again tomorrow with another variant.”

“This phase is still very much here, it’s rife in schools and large numbers of people are still losing their lives.”

WORKING FRM HOME HAS HAD AN IMPACT

What was once an adventure has become the norm.

“There’s a weird guilt I feel. Feel the need to work more hours and sacrifuice lunch and breaks to prove that my role is still worth the money.”

“There’s enough work for me to do more hours but I’ve made the conscious decision since the Christmas break to focus on keeping my work life balance in a better place.”

“Horrendously understaffed and working at home has made hours ‘electric.’”

“Been in the office and home since March 2020. Feels like living at work.”

“Exhausted, on my knees and with no end in sight.”

“I have put boundaries in place and I stick to them for the sake of myself and my family.” 

ABUSE REMAINS A FACTOR

“The public seem frustrated and angry and this can come across in their communication with the council.”

“We have seen levels of abuse increase. The vibe at the start of the pandemic when we were all in this together has long been forgotten.”

“A lot of abuse aimed at the organisation is due to other issues not the pandemic.”

The winners of a box of brownies prize draw are Catherine Laws and Oly Tipper.

A couple of weeks ago I recalled the views of Clay Shirkey who in ‘Here Comes Everybody’ observed that the social web saw a shift.

Consumers were no longer happy to be consumers but wanted to have a voice too, he said.

Those words really came back during International Women’s Day on March 8 that global celebration of women and their place in society and the workplace.

Over recent years, this has often been content focused by brands and organisations on women who make a difference.

Like this one…

See more

However, over the last few years this has taken a markedly activist turn.

Comedian Richard Herring has taken the day off to search Twitter for blokes complaining at the lack of International Mens Day.

In 2022, it’s got a harder as fewer people make this quip. But still…

See more

Found one! November 19th. Last man to ever ask the question. We can shut up shop guys. A lot easier this year, but you have to sponsor me regardless https://t.co/bMzAfsmtIS https://t.co/j8ueeQ65tG

— Richard K Herring (@Herring1967) March 8, 2022

This year, the whole International Women’s Day under a microscope has gone on several levels.

Sharon O’Dea, who was a local government force for good before she became a wider force for good, calls out the worst offenders.

Here, she tweets Capgemini for ‘upholding the values that drive our actions’ and yet their female staff don’t share in pay equality.

See more

We have an early frontrunner this year. At Capgemini women earn 35p (thirty five pence!!) for every £1 that men earn when comparing median bonus pay.

How about rewriting the code in your own pay and reward systems? pic.twitter.com/8EBixskK2e

— Sharon O'Dea (@sharonodea) March 8, 2022

Of course, its marvellous to read but this year, it’s gone to a whole new level with @PayGapApp whose Twitter bio reads:

Employers, if you tweet about International Women’s Day, I’ll retweet your gender pay gap.

Here’s one…

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In this organisation, women's median hourly pay is 40.8% lower than men's. https://t.co/ORmJSglTDF

— Gender Pay Gap Bot (@PayGapApp) March 8, 2022

And another…

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In this organisation, women's median hourly pay is 54.6% lower than men's. https://t.co/U90nkg1I81

— Gender Pay Gap Bot (@PayGapApp) March 8, 2022

The fact the account is having some impact can be seen by the number of accounts deleting tweets or deleting then reposting without the hashtag.

https://twitter.com/oldenoughtosay/status/1501161363263078401

Of course, online activity is one thing but taking real steps to demand action is something quiote different. But this feels like a start. If you make claims you need to back them up.

If women are important then pay them.

Just as if the environment is important, do real things to make a difference.

It is the job of communications with a poker face to flag up the reputational damage of standing next to a cause without the policies to back them up.

Words and action.

Judge people by their actions not their words.

Sometime in the far away days of 2012 an email landed to invite me to the Russian Ambassador’s residence in London.

Well, of course I said ‘yes.’ I remember the Cold War.

Today, this invitation would be to sit down with evil. Back then it was to be in the audience for a discussion ‘How internet affects political discussion making.’ I know this because I checked my gmail to re-read the invite. Douglas Carswell MP was making a keynote.

On the day, I went along to the Russian Ambassador’s venue. Kensington Palace Gardens was guarded with a barrier and armed British police. The Russian Ambassador’s house was one of dozens of huge white homes with driveways. More Disney than Dacha.

Going into the building, past central casting Russian security I went into a ballroom where the talk was taking place was elaborate. A top table of gold leaf chairs and rows of the same for the audience.

I sat in the audience for the discussion and chatted to fellow guests. I remember media people, someone from Conservatives for Russia and a veteran British journalist about to launch an English language newspaper in Moscow.

Why was I asked? Maybe because I was a blogger. There was certainly no illicit approaches or Putinesque lectures during the session. The British panel talked about the strengths of the internet in Britain. The Russian Ambassador joked of how he finds things out on the news before the communiques from home. Then we wrapped up with a convivial buffet of tea, caviar, vodka and smoked salmon.

Of course, this was the days when Russia was adopting soft power rather than hard power. Running the same event today would be unthinkable. No-one would come. But the question of the session remains valid.

How does the internet affect political discussion making?

I was reflecting on this as I listened to BBC Ukrainecast on the ninth day of Russia’s invasion and war in Ukraine. It was a day after Russia had made illegal to reference ‘war’ to describe what is going on. It was six days after Twitter and other social media sites were blocked by Moscow.

As I listened, I heard audio from a video posted by a Ukrainian politician in the north of the country. It captured the stunned aftermath of a Russian artillery attack. On the podcast, Victoria Derbyshire describes the scene of grey dust, fire bodies without limbs and you hear a woman screaming.

So, how does the internet political decision making?

So, Back to the Russian Ambassador’s question.

Russia has tried to brick up all the ways that the internet can get into its borders. The Kremlin deny there is a war. They stop people seeing the aftermath. Twitter and Facebook has been banned in the country. Independent journalism has been banned. Protestors face 15 years for voicing opposition or even calling war ‘war’.

Elsewhere, the internet is finding ways to bypass the blockage as it always has done. Ukrainians are using Google reviews on Google maps to post harrowing pictures from Ukraine in order to tell their Russian cousins what is going on. The Russian social channel is being unbanned in Ukraine to allow the network to be flooded with messages to ordinary Russians from Ukrainians. The BBC is upping short wave broadcasts to by-pass the internet entirely. And other ways for Russians.

On TikTok, residents are filming actions. The car driver who stopped and offered to tow the broken down tank back to the border. The myth of the ghost airplane that shoots down Russian jets.

Some Russians are uysing VPNs to by-pass the bans. But the vox pop of real Russians I saw yesterday is depressing. They still support Putin because and they’re not exposed to what’s going on.

Winning the PR war?

A few days ago, I was reading optimistic commentary pieces on how Ukraine was winning the information war. A video of the country’s President in fatigues surrounded by his chief ministers was posted to deploy Russian misinformation that he had fled the country. What chops, the comments ran. They’re right.

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"All of us are here protecting our independence of our country."

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy shows his people he remains in the country's capital, Kyiv, as Russian forces approach the city. pic.twitter.com/i0ZylY7nkE

— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) February 25, 2022

But no war is not won by information alone. There are bullets and guns and in the case of Russia, the casual threat of nuclear war, too.

I stop short of reading too many PR blogs with hot takes on how company CEOs need to be more like Zelenskiy. Please, don’t. This isn’t a place for hot takes. I’m using this blog to think things through rather than deliver a zinger. .

Internet pioneers

In ‘Here Comes Everyone’ Clay Shirky wrote of how social media was going to change things and people will no longer be passive consumers. In the old model, media gatekeepers would filter and then publish, he said. In the new model, we are all producers. There will be publish and then filter. There was no mention of the bad guys winning.

But it’s filter of journalists that I’m finding most important in 2022. Good journalism isn’t dead. It’s never been more needed to cut through the avalanche of misinformation.

Those of us who saw social media as a purely force for good have had our minds changed a lot since Shirky first published his bold ideas.

The reality is obscene truths from Ukraine can be found if you look for them on social media. There are dead bodies. There is the news crew ambushed in their car. A Facebook Live broadcast will happen which shows a family’s painful death in realtime.

But that won’t be the truly shocking part.

The really terrifying thing will be that nothing may change as a result.

Then what?

You can donate to the UK’s Disasters Emergency Committee appeal for Ukraine here.