Innovation, communication, and the Errors Tour

An important lesson: sometimes our efforts to connect with an audience fall flat.

It was great to be back on the Missouri S&T campus earlier this week to give the keynote talk for the university’s first Innovative Communication Conference. (Huge thanks to Dr. Jossalyn M. Gale, director of S&T’s Writing and Communication Center, for inviting me to speak.)

In my talk, I wanted to expand on the idea of the conference theme — “Innovation Requires Communication” — to emphasize the importance or storytelling in communication and innovation. I also wanted to impress on students the importance of embracing failure, and I needed a catchy title, something that would resonate with the mainly Gen Z audience, so I decided to borrow from 2023’s biggest pop culture event, Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, and call my presentation “The Errors Tour (Andy’s Version).”

Reactions to my cover slide were mixed. The older folks in the audience (read: faculty and staff) appreciated the wordplay. The students either smiled politely or remained expressionless. It seems they were over 2023 and all things Swift.

But …

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(Off topic) I’m featured in ‘Confessions of a Higher Ed CMO’ podcast

This post has nothing to do with the writing life, but I wanted to share that Jaime Hunt, host of a wonderful podcast called Confessions of a Higher Ed CMO, interviewed me for her podcast about a month ago, and that episode goes live today. The focus is on my nearly 33-year career in higher education, all with Missouri University of Science and Technology. I had a great time talking with Jaime about my career and the many changes we’ve seen in higher ed marketing and communication over the past three decades.

If you’re interested, check out the episode, From PR writer to CMO: A Lifetime of Marketing in Higher Education, and consider subscribing to Jaime’s podcast or any of the other great shows in the Enrollify Podcast Network.