Season 4, Episode 139 : John Brown

Will Richardson 00:04
Welcome to the Green Element Podcast, where we meet business leaders, innovators, transforming their operations to be more environmentally and socially sustainable, and in the process help you on your journey of sustainability. I'm your host, Will Richardson. Joining us today is John Brown, the CEO, and founder of Don't Cry Wolf, a branding and communications consultancy for brands who want to communicate honestly. John is a communications and branding expert, a B Corp ambassador, and a proud dad. He believes that a total dedication to truth and transparency is one of the most powerful positions a brand can adopt. John, it's great to have you on here. Before I ask you about sustainability, and the run up to COP 26, I'd like to know a bit more about you and your journey.

John Brown 00:52
Great, yes. So thanks very much, what a fab introduction. So the journey has been, I started the life of in the industry as a journalist doing some writing on a heap of different sort of titles, worked in one of those old fashioned smoky newsrooms with cigar smoke and Benson and Hedges wafting about the place at that time. And then found myself in PR and comms and basically went to a few fantastic agencies where I learned the trade of branding, creative communications, and then in 2018, founded Don't Cry Wolf, and very, very proud to say that we've gone from strength to strength, with a tremendous focus on this idea of complete transparency and honesty at every step of the way and that's the founding principle. And it's seen us in good stead so far.

Will Richardson 01:55
And talking to other PR companies you've actually got a very good reputation by your peers as well and I think it's being held up by your peers is probably one of the best accolades you can have.

John Brown 02:05
I mean, yeah, that's, that's very kind of them. But this is an industry that is fairly opaque still, I think a lot of people have a kind of view of that is the PR industry as being quite clandestine, shady corners sort of world. And, and you know what that still happens, right. That's that still occurs, like, there's no getting away from it. Whilst we've done so much to try and define what on earth PR is, there is still a bit of a murky territory around there but I think with more agencies like Don't Cry Wolf, what we're trying to attempt to do is to shift the industry into the light a bit more, go beyond just saying great words, and actually putting some proof behind it, and actually trying to sort of operating in a way where, you know, wouldn't it be great where PR agencies just didn't just have a benefit on their clients' reputation, but actually had just a little bit of a benefit on the wider world as well. I think that's kind of what we wanted to see whether we could actually achieve that. So this is still a bit of an experiment, to be honest with you. Can we do something? Can we grow an agency in an industry which has got a bit of a bad rep, but grow an agency that people are actually fond of, and are happy to see it do well?

Will Richardson 03:26
So what would you say your business superpower was?

John Brown 03:27
Just an unwavering focus on honesty. That's it. And I think I know that sounds daft but that is, I think, it is powerful. I think it is a superpower. Because if you approach everything with complete honesty, total transparency, you're not afraid of anything. Because it's warts and all, it's already out there. You know what I mean. So if you have that kind of mentality, if you have that approach, you actually feel quite bulletproof. So that's why we make a point and not just reporting on the good stuff, but the bad stuff as well. So we report on what we're doing well, whether it's on our environmental footprint, diversity, how we're performing as a business, I will report all the good stuff. But then we'll shine a spotlight on what we're not doing well, where we're missing the mark, where things need to be better. And that's actually a really empowering position to have. It feels scary to do that at first, but it's actually quite an empowering position to be in. Yeah, so I'd say that that is a superpower.

Will Richardson 04:38
I'd agree with that, particularly in the industry that you're in and we were talking about before the reputation that your industry has. I've been doing this for long enough to know that greenwashing isn't a new phenomenon and sadly, one of the reasons why many of our clients that we've been with since 2004/2005 don't shout about their environmental credentials is because of greenwashing. They are scared. And that's, I've always found that a real shame because they're the ones that are actually doing something, they're the ones that we can learn from, they're the ones that we can take, you know and go: 'Wow, okay, that's what we should be doing. But they don't want to tell anyone, because they've been doing it for so long that when they started, greenwashing was a big part of a No-No.

John Brown 05:30
Yeah, well, I mean, do you know what? Comms does have a role to play in this. Actually, quite a big role to play in this if I'm being perfectly honest. So what we've done over the years is definitely jumped on that greenwashing bandwagon. I think one of the best campaigns - or maybe best is not the right word - one of the clearest examples of this was, you know, one of the big three oil and energy companies saying: 'Hey, don't worry about our carbon footprint, pay much more attention to yours'. You know, and the launch of this idea that somehow your own, you know, whether or not you use a bamboo coffee cup has more importance than whether or not we decarbonize the economy in some way. And that is that was born out of comms, you can tell that there was a comms function around that that said, 'D'you know, what, why don't we shine a light on people's own personal carbon footprint for a little while as we can deflect attention on ourselves. And that happened that sort of late 90s, early noughties, and now we're into a territory where actually we're armed with a little bit of information and doing what could be a lot of damage. So take net-zero as an example, you cannot breathe right now, Will, in a PR conference without someone talking about net zero. And they haven't got a clue what they're chatting about. You know, they've heard it, they've read it, they've seen it, they have seen that people are winning awards for it and then it's getting plastered on billboards somewhere and, you know, funky beer companies are talking about it, and they want a bit of that. They haven't got a clue what that means or how to get there, or what the sort of path towards net-zero even remotely looks like. And this is evidence for how the comms industry has to level up its knowledge because they've taken a little bit of information, and they're really trying to get mileage out of it, rather than delve deep into the issue and say, 'Well, actually, should we be talking about net-zero? Or should we be talking about science-based targets? Or should we at least educating the wider world? It was what a scope one, scope two, scope three emission looks like? No, no, we're just gonna say net zero over and over again, plastered across all of our copy until people get bored of it. And you can see the amount of organizations that have through their comms channels, through creative campaigns highlighted something to do with net-zero, versus the amount of organizations that are actually reporting on their footprint. And you can see that there's a big disparity. So many businesses are prepared to make the claim, I think that there was a report somewhere, and that highlighted just how few are prepared to actually report on it.

Will Richardson 08:18
Do you think education will help? I mean, obviously, it will help but do you think they're willing to be educated?

John Brown 08:23
I think they are. Do you know what it is? So I've kind of given them a bit of a slap in the face, my industry peers, and now I'll defend them as well at the same time. They are willing, as long as they are being given the time. And I think this is what's important, you have to be brave enough to turn around to, you know, a pretty aggressive board or fast pace CMO or CEO, and say, 'hold your horses mate, we're not going to run a campaign on you know, this one thread of sustainability that you think your organization has. First, let's take a little moment, let's take a pause in time to retrospectively reflect on where we are as an organization, whether we could be doing better to understand these issues in a deeper way before we start blurting it out there in the wider world'. And I think what the PR and the comms industry is faced with a lot of the time is how do you balance up this immense pressure from clients or from organizations or from boards to you know, be the first be out there be part of the headlines get that coverage that everyone's talking about, versus do we actually genuinely understand the the issue that we're actually talking about? And I think this is where the bravery piece has to come through. So I think there is an appetite to learn more, but right now the industry needs to be brave enough to say, look, we're not putting out another campaign another, you know, greenwashing campaign or a sort of eco consumer campaign until we understand this a little bit more, until we can talk a little bit more authoritatively, until we actually come and have a chat, you know, with people like Green Element to actually work out what it is, we should be knowing and understanding within this space.

Will Richardson 10:12
And how do you think we can do that?

John Brown 10:14
Dutch courage, I might have two glasses of whiskey before you go into a board meeting. I think you've got to be able to provide examples, case studies of where people have taken the time and still actually ended up getting it far more right than some of their competitor organizations. And this is where celebrating the unsexy wins, I think is deeply important here because we can all go and sort of cheer and clap for a billboard that says, 'F*** you CO2', right? And everyone's jumping up and down with joy for that. And that's cool. I understand that. That's, that's the sort of sexy part of this world. But actually, there's so much happening in other industries, in other organizations that might not have that sort of that sex appeal. That that kind of shiny factor, but is deeply important is actually rooted in some real science and understanding and courage as well. And it just doesn't have a light shone on it yet. And actually, I think there needs to be more celebration of unsexy case studies. Stuff that is so fundamentally important and a real celebration of everything that we love about the progress that we're making, from technology through to switch, looking at jobs, through to decarbonizing really, really intensive industries, but it doesn't get the attention it deserves, because bamboo coffee cups and, you know, carbon neutral beer and more sexy headlines.

Will Richardson 12:01
Yeah, totally agree. Yeah, totally agree. It's very clear from you that you have a real passion for transparency, authenticity, and telling the truth. Can you tell us how this passion came to be? And where does it come from?

John Brown 12:15
I think there's a bit of journalistic roots there of being quite keen on finding out the truth and having honest conversations, I think that's come through through my sort of early part of my career. I think - maybe I'm just a cynical git and say, should I spend a lot of my time just going, is that are we being really true to ourselves? Are we being genuinely authentic to ourselves? I think I also have the luxury of, you know, being fairly apolitical, I suppose, in some sense. So I think a lot of the discussion that you see within the industry or within my industry as well, the universe, it always feels as though it's tinged with some form of kind of political allegiance or alliance and stuff like that. I've always, absolutely, and I've always been, I've always been fairly careful to, I suppose give both sides a lot of s***. That's where describing it, you know, like, and I think that's, and I've always been like that. I've always had that kind of, look, I'm not really interested in whose side I need to be on here. As long as I'm on the side of whatever's honest, true, and provable.

Will Richardson 13:37
I bet you're a good journalist, we need more journalists like that now.

John Brown 13:42
Well, I don't know. I mean, yeah. Well, I didn't make it as a journalist so perhaps I wasn't.

Will Richardson 13:48
You didn't conform.

John Brown 13:50
[laughs] Yeah, that may be it.

Will Richardson 13:54
In your opinion, have you found that organizations mislead their customers willingly? Or is it more often the case that organizations promote something they don't understand which is ultimately misleading? Or have they perhaps been misled by suppliers? Oh, what a great question. A third of each, because I think there's organizations that having unknowingly misled the public and doing so whilst earning a huge amount of money. I think Boohoo is probably my clear example of that and I've been on a warpath with them for a while because I think they know things are wrong. They know things are bad. They know that what they're doing is completely unsustainable. They're washing it by joining lots of different sort of partner alliances and things like that. And I think it's complete nonsense, but also they're being guided by consumer pounds. So, you know, there's a societal issue there to fix. I think, on the other two, there are occasions where it's just naivety, absolutely. And that you see campaigns where you think that's just an absurdly naive perspective to have. And I don't actually think there should be an excuse for that now. You can sit there in an evening - and that sounds ridiculous - but you can sit there over an evening and delve into the climate crisis and the positives and the negatives and get really to grips with even just some of the terminology and you'll have informed yourself a bit more than what I think some of these campaigns, and some of these organizations have exhibited over the past couple of years. You know and so there really isn't an excuse to be making big bold claims around the sustainability of a T-shirt, when in actual fact, you've kind of ignored like, for example, an entire supply chain on the way there, but because you've used one type of cotton versus another, it's suddenly become an eco t-shirt. You know, and there's so many examples of this, you know, like, my team, tell me how often I bang on about bamboo coffee cups, you know, they are not going to save the world. And yet, we still see every month, another come campaign where it's backed by some very, very flimsy claim around a particular product being ever so slightly more sustainable than it was before. Go and buy it go and purchase it when in actual fact, the message should be, you know, you probably don't really need this, you probably don't need the eighth bamboo coffee cup that you've got in your kitchen. And then yeah, you know, the final part is absolutely around suppliers like comms people, like, you know, consultants and all sorts who have piggybacked the rise in ESG discussions and earning a living out of it, you know.

Will Richardson 16:51 As I mentioned at the start, misinformation, and misrepresentation of sustainability claims is particularly important to tackle climate change. Have you noticed an increase in sustainability misinformation, particularly with the run up to COP 26?

John Brown 17:04
Do you know what I've noticed? A dangerous version of it which is pseudo misinformation. I don't know. It's misinformation that has been wrapped up to look like intelligence or evidence. I've seen more superficial carbon footprinting taking place and reporting taking place where it's been, you know, I've genuinely seen this, organizations making enormous claims about their carbon footprint because they switch to a different energy supply. That and that was it, that's where it stopped. That's where the measurement stopped, how much electricity, how much heating, how much water, and that was it, there was nothing beyond that, then look at the supply chain and look at anything else. And I'm seeing more and more of these claims sort of start to start to crop up. And I think there's people earning a lot of money off of that as well. Worryingly, seeing a lot more people rebrand themselves as ESG experts and consultants have seen, even to be honest with you, even in the even in the world of B Corp there's been a hole. Previously the closest B Corp ambassador I knew we lived in Cornwall, and I live in London. Now, I think they're around every corner. And whilst I think that's great for the movement, there's that you've got to scrutinize how, where their expertise is coming from.

Will Richardson 18:45
But then some would say that that's probably not a bad thing because you've got those same people started somewhere. I mean, I started somewhere. I mean, you should see the carbon footprints I did back in 2003/2004. There were horrendous, absolutely horrendous. But I was learning but equally, not many people really knew what to do anyway, or how to do it. And I remember, and I'm not allowed to use the word offset, but I'm using an A right, the right sentence where I had an organization - a large organization - that bought a lot of renewables because they switched from normal fossil fuel to renewables. And we worked out a very crude way of them being carbon neutral before the carbon neutral was - I'm absolutely appalled that I was doing that. But then -

John Brown 19:37
It's very honest of you,

Will Richardson 19:38
You know, well, at the end of the day it was quite early on and we didn't really know what we were doing. But the fact that they switch to renewables, at that point was actually pretty impressive. I mean, that's what I would take away from that. But, therefore, people do learn and they but it's quick, it's easier to learn now. I mean, I kitesurf, you could say the same thing. It's quicker to learn to kite surf now than it was back in 2000 when I was learning.

John Brown 20:06
But also Will, you know, the channels for you to communicate misinformation now are so fast, varied and broad, that there has to be an increased responsibility from organisations and communicators and consultants to actually genuinely very, very genuinely check their facts, figures, stats, information, because the accessibility that that comms has now, the size of the audience that they can approach, and that they can discuss, and that they can have these conversations with is so vast that you have to take a stronger responsibility. We've seen an exponential rise in people who are able to have a platform, whereas you might have been able to say something that wasn't quite right to maybe 10 people, 20 people down the pub, how many decades ago, now you're talking about a platform that you can spread that across millions. And if it's packaged up beautifully in a nice video, and what have you, it will be shared and it will be engaged with. So you have to be more responsible these days. So yes, it's access to knowledge is critical, but you have to be more responsible to check yourself as well, because of the platforms that people have with which to communicate.

Will Richardson 21:33
How great a threat to think misinformation is to climate change?

John Brown 21:36
It's huge. It is huge because I think those that are interested in keeping things under wraps, can do so quite well through the spread of misinformation. And I think greenwashing now is turned into eco consumerism, which I think is a wonderful little wrapper for people just to buy more stuff but feel a touch - like 5% - better about it. And it's as I said, previously, it's much easier to go and buy a T-shirt that has got an eco-label on it than it is to really get to grips with the issues and the fundamentals behind what we are facing. And I think that is where the greatest threat around misinformation is occurring, where it's, it's just easier to wrap things up into a lovely, lovely package and put a bow on it, and not have any substance behind it. It's easier than ever before to do that. And I think that is going to lead to complete apathy. Or on the flip side to that on the sort of the climate alarmism side of that side of things, because I think this happens on both sides of the fence, it's gonna lead to such paralyzing fear to engage in the debate that you're going to miss some real, real strong success stories. And I think that is equally as detrimental to solving this or to have a chance at solving what we face is that those that are doing an extraordinary job are terrified of entering into the discussion because they're sat there thinking 'well, how am I going to compete with x, y, and z with marketing budgets of millions and millions talking about all of this stuff, which I know to be complete bollocks. But I can't talk about my bit here which is absolutely fundamental to solving the crisis. But I can't talk about it because it's going to be either drowned out or they've got the audience so riled up that their way is the only way, no one's going to be paying any attention to me'. And I think that's equally as detrimental. So, you know, whereas greenwashing, however many decades ago was very much kind of focused on covering up, now it seems very much more focused on giving an air of transparency but with very little evidence behind it. I think that's actually even more worrying.

Will Richardson 24:04
It's harder to decipher.

John Brown 24:06
It's harder to decipher, it's really clandestine. And it's quite sinister in practice.

Will Richardson 24:12
Have you spent much time on - you're probably going to say no and look at me really weirdly - the Advertising Standards Authority website?

John Brown 24:21
Only very recently I was on there checking what the boundaries for putting a political billboard up [laughs]

Will Richardson 24:31
If you type in 'climate' they've got a really good search function and you can type up climate change or net-zero or whatever and you can find out what companies have, have actually swayed and veered into the 'oh, they shouldn't be saying this'. And I spent some time on it the other night, and it was actually quite interesting, and I think they are becoming more savvy than they ever used to. They are starting to wake up to what you're talking about.

John Brown 25:03
And I think this is where my industry, the PR and comms industry, really, really needs to ensure that we get to grips with this. So there is a code of conduct, there is one with the PRCA one of the largest PR trade bodies. That Code of Conduct does not go into any form of real genuine detail as to how you should be communicating within the climate crisis. And I think that admission is dangerous because we see ourselves very grandly as consultants that advise at the very highest level as to how you should communicate and as organized as an organization. And the research that we've recently conducted alongside the PRCA showcase that - I think there's been about 7% increase - in PR and comms professionals being asked to consult on discussions and topics to do with the climate crisis. Now, if we don't have a code of conduct around what's legitimate, what's genuine, why you should be informed around this first and we're being asked our opinion, and that's being then taken into practice. I think that's a fairly nervous position to be in.

Will Richardson 26:25
Yeah, yeah, I'd agree. Now, your business as a certified B Corp.

John Brown 26:29
We are.

Will Richardson 26:30
Can you tell our listeners a bit about the steps Don't Cry Wolf has made to make itself more sustainable?

John Brown 26:37
Yes. Well, first and foremost, we started from a position of how bad are we? And I know it's a cliche, but you know, until you understand the problem, you can't really put any steps in place. Which is why we work with you, Will, because the first and I think that was the first open conversation you and I had, which was: 'I'm about to write all of these fantastic policies and procedures and practices in place and haven't got a clue whether it's going to have any impact'. So the first thing that we wanted to try and do was to understand, genuinely, where our biggest impact was being had. Where that pushed us was fascinating. So as an agency, as a PR agency, we have a fairly small footprint. We're not, we're not producing anything, you know, certainly our scope one and scope two emissions are fairly, fairly low. However, we have a huge footprint in things that you just would not even really consider. So procurement of technology in our industry, everyone's wandering around with a MacBook or an iPad or your phone, because we're all communicators and we're on the move, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But actually, that has a real impact. So we've put in place practices and policies right now so that everything that we procure on the tech front is from refurbish sources so that we're reducing our footprint that way. Another area was we - typical AB FAB PR person, right? We spend a lot of time doing events or at lunches, or hosting a dinner or something along those lines, and actually what we discovered was - what having a real detrimental impact on our carbon footprint - where we are eating out. So we put in place a vegan vegetarian policy, that if you were going to eat out on the company dime or at the company's expense, you have to choose somewhere that was more sustainable, you had to choose a vegan vegetarian meal. And it sounds trivial, but it's actually it, we saw that correlation. So we put in place that practice and put in place that policy. Yeah, another thing that we've done is released guidance around home working and remote working. So not just to say that this is the equipment that we're going to furnish you with and we're going to make sure that if you do need a new chair or new this or a new that, but it comes from a reused source. But actually, this is what we would love you to follow as a guideline or as a policy for working at home, this is how you recycle when you're working at home, this is our policy around printing documents so you know that you shouldn't be, we've provided you with software to be able to do whatever you need to do over a computer, these are the energy suppliers that we would recommend you investigate and now we're looking into how do we provide some form of financial support so that people who do want to make sure that they have switched to renewable energy provider in their home for home working and can do so without it really impacting their own wallet. And it's been really, really practical because we've been able to pinpoint exactly where we're having the worst impact if that makes sense.

Will Richardson 29:58
When it comes to running an ethical and sustained business, what would you say has been your biggest struggle so far? And could you tell us a bit about how you've come to overcome it?

John Brown 30:08
I don't think I have overcome it. Because I think it's how you grow sustainably. That's the biggest, that's the biggest struggle. And that's going to be a continuous struggle because actually, the most sustainable thing I could do would be to not take on loads more clients, not take on lots more team members, buy lots more stuff because as we grow, our footprint increases, right? And that's, that's a real challenge and you have to wrestle with that. I think, as an organization what we try and do, and the constant challenge that we are faced with is, how do we grow but how do we grow sustainably? So if we are looking at next year's revenues and growth trajectory, what are we going to do now that it's going to allow us to reduce the impact that we have? Where can we invest more in an area that we know is going to make a real difference in preparation for what we hope will be another year of significant growth? And that, and that is a continuous struggle and continuous challenge and I think this is where I get really pissed off with some of the people that I've spoken to run organizations, agencies, and what have you, is like, well we implemented plastic-free policy a year ago. Okay. That's fabulous. But is that it? That's it. That was your answer?

Will Richardson 31:40
Like, yeah, it's great. And I'm trying, not trying to belittle it or diminish that work but that can't be the full stop. You're an organization that is going to be great, organisations are living breathing entities in their own right, if you like, they grow, they expand, they consume more, you have to take that into consideration. So I think that's one of the frustrations that I have, which is that there is no endpoint to addressing this and challenging yourself and reflecting on what else you could be doing because if you are an ambitious entrepreneur, or business leader, which I am, you want to grow, you want to increase you want to be able to sort of being the best in the field and you have to balance that out with a sustainable ethical philosophy Which I think you can, personally.

John Brown 32:37
But it's hard, right? It's hard. It's tough.

Will Richardson 32:39
Yeah. But I think that's the reason why you're almost in a better place to do it because you're thinking about it and therefore you'll learn from your mistakes, and others will learn from you and what you're putting into practice will in five years time be like: 'Why didn't he do that? Why didn't he do this, this, and this? And we'll be better, and we're continually bettering ourselves. But you need to have people in employment. Surely it'd be better to work for a more sustainable, more ethical organization, than one that isn't.

John Brown 33:15
Well, absolutely. Well, I hope so. I absolutely hope so. And I've made tremendous cock-ups over the past, and this is why I'm perhaps almost even kind of less sympathetic these days. I was talking about, well, we're going to become carbon neutral back in a sort of, when I first started the business, I will be carbon neutral within months. Right? Not knowing what on earth I was actually genuinely banging on about. But like we had that discussion years ago, why? Why is it coming to fall like it? Why is it still there now? So we've made some errors. We've made some mistakes, we've made big claims that we then thought 'actually no, that that isn't right, which we then had to transparently communicate to the wider world and say 'no, this is what we're doing. And this is why and this is why it's more important. And I think this is what I would say to anyone who's considering really investigating and looking at this, you are going to make an enormous number of errors. If you transparently communicate that journey, warts and all, people will love you for it firstly, but they will learn from you and you can be fearless then. You can make mistakes, you can make big decisions, you can move into different directions and know that if you do mess up, report on it, provide insight to it, provide what you've learned and you will have enriched everyone else.

Will Richardson 34:36
No, absolutely. Finally, I'm also interested to hear about your outdoor pursuits.

John Brown 34:40
Oh right.

Will Richardson 34:41
And I read that you're working towards gaining some mountain leader certifications.

John Brown 34:46
Yeah, yes. Yeah. That is going terribly, Will. So yeah, I have a bit of a love of, well not a bit of love but a huge love of the outdoors and I would love to continue to follow my passion of becoming an actually accredited, certified mountain leader. I've done a couple of courses so far, which have gone well, but I need to get more mileage under my feet and haul my 17 and a half stone frame up and down a few more mountains to complete my logbook. But on top of that, I'm into my bushcraft and dressing up a bit like Ray Mears and going into the forest and pretending to know, pretending to myself that I could survive where I really couldn't.

Will Richardson 35:38
You should have a listen to our podcast and Nicolas, who spoke about the 721 challenge a few weeks ago. He has really interesting stories about climbing mountains and protecting rainforests.

John Brown 35:48
Oh, fabulous. I will, I'll definitely give that a listen.

Will Richardson 35:51
Thank you so much for being on the show today. John, it's been an absolute pleasure.

John Brown 35:56
Thank you, I really really enjoyed it.

Will Richardson 35:58
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