Episode 47
Public Service Through Strategic Communications with Angelique Myers
Welcome Angelique Myers Evans, Director of Communications, to Saturday Soundbites! Angelique has had a successful career in communications and in her last few roles has used her vast strategic communications skills in the public service sector.
As entrepreneurs and business owners learn how to grow their brands through their visibility strategy, they can take a page from this talented communicator and writer. Non-profits, governmental agencies and public service organizations also invest time and resources into growing awareness for the services they officer. Learn what works!
No matter your niche or space, we can all learn from this episode's amazing content.
Transcript -
[00:00:00] Veronica: Hello. Hello and welcome to Saturday soundbites. I'm your host, Veronica. So for, and here, it's already soundbites. We talk about all things. Visibility, strategy, communications, branding, advertising, network, marketing, everything you need to grow your visibility strategy and share your brand. Now, we usually talk about how this affects your business and the entrepreneurs space or the brick and mortar space.
[00:00:23] Sometimes we have folks that are on that have a specialty. Products and brick and mortar businesses. But today I have a phenomenal guest. That's going to talk to you about how this translate into the public service sector. So I'm really excited about this conversation because a lot of the strategies and techniques really can cross over and it's fantastic to borrow and learn from each other.
[00:00:43] So with that, we're going to take care of a little bit of housekeeping. If you are listening on our podcast, make sure you hit subscribe. We don't want you to miss any episodes. And if you are watching us on Facebook, let us know you're here in the comments. And if you catch the recent. Hashtag replay so that my guests and I can go back and chat with you.
[00:01:00] All right, let's go ahead and get this episode started. I am inviting my good friend, angelic Myers Evans. She's joining us today. Welcome.
[00:01:09] Angelique: Hi, how are you? Thanks for having me.
[00:01:12] Veronica: Absolutely. I am so excited about today's conversation because a lot of people don't realize that the basics are the basics. No matter the space.
[00:01:22] And you have had such an illustrious career, especially in public service that we hadn't really had that conversation about how it crosses over. So I'm really excited about today's
[00:01:31] Angelique: conversation. As am I thank you so much. I'm really, really happy and excited to get into it. I love, love, love this platform and what you're doing.
[00:01:39] So I want to do everything I can to support that and share some knowledge. Awesome.
[00:01:43] Veronica: All right. So first of all, tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us about your background and how you figured out that public service is really where your communication skills were going to.
[00:01:54] Angelique: Well, believe it or not, I actually started about 20 years ago on the radio.
[00:02:00] Just being on air board operator, doing play by play announcing for those wonderful Friday night lights. You know how it is here in Texas. Love it. Yeah. So several years, you know, being on, on air on commercial and just local radio. And then through that was actually able to finish out my degree in journalism.
[00:02:19] It very hard. And just really flourished. When I had the opportunity to go on commercial radio, I basically handled the midday radio show out in the Waco temple Coleen market for several years, and then went off to be a national spokesperson for the national association of broadcasters. And we're on an awesome tour.
[00:02:38] They should run a tour is talking about the digital transition. I did grow up in a military brat. So traveling is kind of in my DNA, so that national tour was just really right up my alley. After that wrapped up, I really was just kinda clueless as to what I wanted to do next after traveling to 40 out of the 50 states.
[00:02:56] And then any shin is kind of like, okay, So I knew that I wanted to come back to Texas. But I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do, but the army actually the department of defense was interested in going into the radio space themselves having folks overseas and making sure that they had opportunities to connect with those that are stateside in their families.
[00:03:16] So I was tapped to start an online radio show and channel for Fort hood. And so went out to three core public affairs. And started working for their operation newspaper television station, and actually ended up crossing over to TV there. So after kind of wrapping that up for several years, I ended up going to graduate school at Texas state in public administration.
[00:03:39] I had such a great experience working in the government space that I said I wanted to kind of expand and capitalize on that. And decided to start the MPA program, the master's in public administrator. And through that, I had the opportunity to meet so many people that worked in the local space, worked for the state and a couple that worked on the federal level.
[00:04:01] And so through that, I got a chance to really just kind of say, okay, do I want to stay here or go elsewhere and work overseas? So I studied abroad and when I was, yeah, yeah. I went to Barcelona, studied out there and I thought I wanted to go into the foreign service and decided not to, you know, politics.
[00:04:20] Kind of taken a turn and made me feel a little uneasy. So I said, okay, I have to kind of pivot and go in another direction. And so when I finished school in 2014, actually had the opportunity work for the round rock police department, just kind of you know, saw a posting for public information officer.
[00:04:37] Hadn't no idea what that was. You know, after you kind of really read the details of the position, it's kind of like, oh, I know what that is. I can do it, you know, and just kind of threw myself in the running and ended up getting that position. And that's really where it all started. Got a chance to. Chief banks out there and really in a smaller community and smaller department, just really learn the groundwork and lay a good foundation for the communication strategies necessary to really expand on public service and public safety for that community.
[00:05:10] So once that happened, ended up meeting the love of my life and moved out here to to the Houston area and ended up getting on with Harris county, one of the constables offices and was actually blessed to continue on the same work with media relations. The safety and thankfully have the opportunity to go back to that market and work for a larger agency.
[00:05:33] It had always been a dream of mine to work for a larger agency, go back to Austin and worked for their public information office. And in there had the opportunity to work for you. Yes. At Fort bend ISD and the public. I believe one of the areas where it was new. And so I was, I had the opportunity to work for the school police department, which was in itself is so unique, which I know we'll get into, but the different types of public safety, but really, it just kind of started from there and been going strong ever since and, and happy to be back here in Harris county.
[00:06:05] Yeah,
[00:06:06] Veronica: that's, it's such a phenomenal journey from radio to, to the military and then back to public service. And at the end of the day, the theme has been public service, public safety sharing information. And for those people that don't know. Our entrepreneurs and business owners, a public information officer is a term that we use in the government space.
[00:06:29] And it really talks about the, the skills necessary and the tasks that are required for that agency to engage with the media. And so Angela has just a phenomenal experience with that. So Angela, tell me a little bit about some of the things, you know, that. Coming from radio, because I'm assuming you had to like sell products or, you know, make sure the traffic was, was correct.
[00:06:54] And the commercials were going firing off when they were supposed to have, how did that prepare you for the public service part? Because there's a lot of similarities.
[00:07:03] Angelique: Yeah. Yeah, I think a lot of it goes down to grit and overcoming a lot of, you know, setbacks and adversity that you face, you know, in the radio industry, there was a huge kind of turn of events that happen.
[00:07:16] And it's the digital transition that happened really. And the great layoff that happened in the. Field, it really changed the trajectory of radio and news for that matter where they were downsizing. And so you were forced to, you know, not necessarily have a camera person with you or, you know, have a production assistant to produce that commercial or to go out on that live broadcast with you.
[00:07:37] You were faced to do everything. By yourself and expand your skills. And so I think for them, for the most part, one of the things that I always leaned on is just focusing in on timeliness. That was something that was huge during my promotional days, you know, and, and the whole goal of that is really to have a call to action.
[00:07:59] Right. You, you want to ensure that people either, you know, come to your location buy the product or the concert or whatever it may be that you're promoting. And so obviously there's a level of persuasions specific language, energy and things that you have to put into your message. When, when speaking to your.
[00:08:16] Now, you know, from the promotions and radio world, we were talking to the general public versus going on the public service side. And you actually have a service, right. That everybody expects of you tax dollars involved and things like that. We get a little bit more strategic, right. And you're going to be held to a much higher standard in terms of what you're doing with.
[00:08:36] Funding that's being provided to your agency. And actually being able to demonstrate and articulate exactly what you're doing with that and how that translates to the.
[00:08:46] Veronica: And you said a couple of terms that I really want us to dig into. You talked about a call to action, and you also talked about you know, your target audience.
[00:08:55] And I think that that's really important for folks to hear, because regardless of the space you're in, regardless of the niche non-profit government, for-profit. If you don't have those basics down, you're going to struggle to tell us a little bit about what a call to action looks like on the public service side.
[00:09:11] When you're talking about law enforcement or fire or public health, anything like.
[00:09:17] Angelique: Absolutely. So you really have two different spaces for that. You have the emergency and response space for that, and then you have the services programs and resources on the other side. So obviously you'll, you'll look at those in two different ways, but in, in an emergency setting you're really wanting people to number one, make sure that they're following a credible.
[00:09:36] And make sure that they're following directions. You have to be very clear and succinct in what you want people to do. Because in that type of situation, time is of the essence. So clarity is important. Being succinct in the word usage in all of the instructions that you're giving and obviously accuracy is of utmost importance during an emergency situation, Now on the other side of that, when you're talking about programs, resources, and services that may be available to the community, you really have to get what should I say, creative creative in that space.
[00:10:09] And that's one of my favorite spaces to, to work in number one, because. There's no necessarily going to be a wives' laws, finds a mistake. And, you know, the, the the level of emergency is very much lesser. And you have a lot more time and planning and you can be more proactive in that space. So that's of course my favorite part of it.
[00:10:30] But on that side of it is a very important for me specifically to focus in several different areas and I'll point out to. Ones that I'm really focused on right now is, is reaching underrepresented populations and also language access, huge, huge obviously building trust is a huge gamut of what we continue to do in public service and public safety.
[00:10:51] And so through that, it's important for us to be able to reach those folks that are not. Speakers. They get sort of the same safety parameters that everyone else does. There are residents, they may not, you know, I, I make sure that I use the word residents instead of citizens because there's a lot in that word as well communities and so every method in deserves to feel safe.
[00:11:10] They deserve a good quality of life and it's you know, it's our responsibility that they have the proper information. So you have to sometimes go out of the normal, not everyone has this internet connection. Right, right. You know, but you know, maybe Ms. Sandra on the east side goes to church every Sunday, you know?
[00:11:31] And, but she doesn't have an internet connection, but she reads her church bulletin every Sunday. So, you know, it's up to folks like us the communication professionals to be able to reach those non-traditional methods of communication to reach those underrepresented populations or those that are non English speakers.
[00:11:48] So that's something that I like to focus on those two areas. Especially when it comes to programs and services rendered to the committee.
[00:11:56] Veronica: And, and let me ask you this, because it's a really great point. We always talk about reach people at where they're at, and that could be a language barrier. It could be a connection barrier.
[00:12:05] It could be different platforms. I know. And a lot of the spaces that we talk about, some folks are really on Tik dock and Snapchat, and we've got other folks who are more engaged on Facebook or Twitter. How do you, I mean, you're responsible and your team is responsible for really reaching so many lives.
[00:12:22] That I'm curious about how you distribute the, the work in terms of social media, because that's probably something that has evolved every, you know, every few months it probably changes is
[00:12:33] Angelique: I would imagine. Absolutely. And it does. And I definitely, I go, I continue to go back, you know, kind of those methods that are outside of social media, because we've been doing it for a very long time, but we continue in public service and public safety to get the same kind of responses is that, you know, I don't have any mail.
[00:12:53] I don't have a printer. I don't have this. There's so many people that don't have. So a lot of our energies are expelled in methods outside of social media, but in social media, there's one thing, you know, that I think that we've come a long way in. It used to be, you know, for public service and public safety, you would see just a lot of money.
[00:13:12] Right. Just, just arrests, you know, and everyone knows that, you know, within the law enforcement field that we're, we're going to make arrests. That's that's our business. Right. But what, the thing, the key about that is is what else do you do, right? What makes you unique? Your agency unique? A lot of times tend to lean on social media a lot to detail that and to tell that story while I have not explored the tick-tock world, you know bringing on a team members that have is it's something that I'm definitely looking forward to, just to kind of explore that, that platform, but our traditional Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, those accounts continue to experience a lot of engagement.
[00:13:57] And I I'm happy to say that we continue to evolve. You know, every day and what law enforcement and public safety agencies and government entities are using social media for. So I applaud all of my public sector folks out there that continue to use tools like this to return. Yeah,
[00:14:15] Veronica: absolutely. And it's changing and we all have to change and it changes from region.
[00:14:19] I was just talking to a colleague in New York and the, some of the issues that they're dealing with are completely different than the issues that we're dealing with in our state. So let me go back to something you talked about, and that was planning and that's one of my favorite words. And so there is an opportunity for us on this side of the table to do some strategic planning.
[00:14:38] Talk to us a little bit about what that looks like in the public sector. I'm guessing it's not that far off from what our non-profit friends do. And it's probably not that far off from what our entrepreneurs and traditional brick and mortar business offices do when it comes to strategic
[00:14:53] Angelique: planning.
[00:14:54] Yeah. I think a lot of it for, for us. Specifically comes down to issues management guides us a lot for some agencies image and reputation management will guide that. And then just a solutions based approach. You know, we, we really are problem solvers and overall, I think it's important. And one of the things in my experience too, To work with.
[00:15:21] And when I get to an agency is to get with that leader, whoever that may be that director, that Constable that achieve and set organizational goals in addition, because a lot of them do not have that. Right. You have a lot of times. Yeah. Yeah. Unfortunately. You know, a ton of silos, you know it's not specific to the public sector.
[00:15:44] It happens in all agencies on the private side and the public side. But I think for, for us especially when you're working with, you know, a group of people that are severely. And you have a group of people that are sworn our mindset, our perspectives, and the way that we do things are quite different.
[00:16:01] You know, we deal with the chain of command and that that decision making in that process is quite different in unique, special. But definitely getting with the leadership and setting those organizational goals is key first. And then after, cause a lot of times they don't have a lot of times they don't have, it's just kind of sitting, sitting those executives down and all the administrators would say.
[00:16:23] Let's get our stuff together. What are we doing? Where do we want to go with this? And then from that, at that point, I'm able to detail and demonstrate exactly where we're going with the communication strategy and go to, to really attack each problem issue or barrier, right. That we're trying to overcome.
[00:16:42] And that's in place where, you know, my communications planning.
[00:16:46] Veronica: Yeah, I love that because that sounds so similar to what so many of us do Al on the other side of the table, you know, you do your SWOT analysis. You, I always tell people all the time, the first question I'm going to ask is what problem are you trying to solve?
[00:17:00] Once we identify the problem we're trying to solve, they, we can build out a system. And this is true, not only for communications, but it's also true for just general, some general business functions, but communication specifically, because. We can invest too much energy in something that isn't going to give us our end result.
[00:17:20] Right. And, and as a visibility strategist, it's going to be important to understand what the end goal is so that we can go back. And, you know, I tell people all the time, especially managing a government budget, you've got your advertising budget, marketing budget, and public relations budget, and all three are three legged stool that it's going to support your message.
[00:17:40] But to your point earlier in, in the government sector, there's a lot of scrutiny as to how that money is spent. And so oftentimes I think people like you and I have to balance out our fiscal stewardship, which we take very seriously and and then, and then also make sure that we're being effective.
[00:17:57] And so tell us a little about or give us an example of a project that you've done, where you were able to implement that strategy, because I know you've done some really fun.
[00:18:07] Angelique: Well, I would look, I was just gonna say, I don't know if it's going to be a fun thing because obviously in, in my space, everything is not necessarily fun and I have to be, you know, honest.
[00:18:18] And that's why it's a tough field to be in. And it's something that, you know, not everyone can do, but you know, Really good examples that I'm quite proud of and comes from from APD. There, there was a lot of things going on that while I was there and one of them was just the case of, you know, one of our overall goals of rebuilding the trust with the.
[00:18:40] And through that, obviously transparency was huge. And whenever there'd be a critical incident where there was, you know, shooting or something of high magnitude loss of life, that there would be camera footage, body camera footage that the public wants to see. And when I got to the agency we were sitting at a policy that was sitting at a 90.
[00:19:01] The policy was that you have 90 days from the date of occurrence of a critical incident to release this footage. And the great thing about that existing policy and process, it had a number of stakeholders involved in the process. You had, you know your office of this and your office of that. You have community members advocates, and obviously multiple.
[00:19:21] Departments within the city. But through that, I think you know, one thing I noticed is like, man, this could be so much more efficient. You know, I just kind of kept thinking that it's a lot of things involved in script development and reviewing and editing and just the. A lot of moving parts. And I just, I just knew that it could be kind of all in house thing that my PIO office could carry this out without all these extra entities involved.
[00:19:46] So I was able to streamline the process and. A new policy and also engage all the stakeholders, you know, the oversight bodies and the community activists and, and people that, you know, had their hands and interests in what the police department was doing. And I was able to get it and rewritten to getting that video released in 10 days, 10
[00:20:07] Veronica: business days, that's a phenomenal way to improve trust in a community.
[00:20:12] That's fantastic.
[00:20:13] Angelique: Yes, thank you so much. And I'm just so proud. Every day I just, I just think about just how that has just changed the trajectory of that community. And from this time forward, just, you know, even a year with the policy being in place, how much more, I'm not saying that it's going to happen overnight, right?
[00:20:30] Cause that's just one piece of the pie, but that's just one huge step, you know, when a controversial incident or critical incident like that happens, people want to know what happened. Right. You also want to allow due process to those involved and have time and walls, but you know, as time progresses, what happens you and I know you have rumors, you have all these things, people kind of start the media will start finding people to talk to.
[00:20:56] And I think 10 days is just something that afforded us just that opportunity to get it out there and, and, and just, you know, And improve the process, I think overall. So I'm very proud of that that new policy there
[00:21:09] Veronica: I love it. I love it. And as you were talking I think that's a very similar process to what maybe manufacturers use.
[00:21:16] When we talk about customer service with returns you know, everyone loves Amazon PRI prime because you can return everything quickly, but there was a time when there were delays and all of a sudden when you're able to. Serve people in a quicker time. It builds trust and it builds loyalty. And that's ultimately what you're doing, whether on the business side or the public sector side.
[00:21:36] So I love that example because it's essentially the same thing. How can we make people's lives better? How can we make them feel more comfortable? How can we build trust? How can we help people understand that we're, we're, we're in it together. And I think that's so important on the government side. And I just think you're, you're doing a phenomenal.
[00:21:56] Angelique: Oh, thank you so much. I totally agree with that. And I think the effort involved in collaboration and just utilizing and capitalizing off all the stakeholders that have a vested interest in what you're doing is just so important in that. And I think that was one of the reasons why it got through and approved so quickly and implemented.
[00:22:15] Yeah, no, it
[00:22:16] Veronica: was brilliant. It was brilliant. All right. Angelic, you have dropped some phenomenal gems of knowledge for us. I mean, my mind is kind of exploding because I'm going to really think about some of the things that you said and put it over what it is that I'm doing. And in both my organization and with some of my friends and clients tell us how people can connect with you because you have got just such a vast knowledge base.
[00:22:38] And I know you're always about helping people. So how can people reach out to you? And can you. To learn more about why.
[00:22:45] Angelique: Well, sure. Thank you for saying such nice thing for you. Make me blush. I'm still not used to being in this space. I'm so used to preparing others for this. I definitely am all about pouring into others.
[00:22:59] And connecting folks to resources and sharing knowledge. So I am on LinkedIn, under Angelique Myers Evans and I'm very happy to connect with folks share information and connections. I'm also just really enamored that the last time we went to the PRS a event that I saw you out, I just had the opportunity to, to meet some new graduates, right.
[00:23:19] From, from the Beaumont near, I think it was Lamar university and it's just. It reinvigorates, you know, why we started in this business, speaking to new folks that are coming into our industry. And so I invite those that are new folks, right. Coming into our space to, to connect with me. Cause I, I definitely would like to you know, share, share some information.
[00:23:39] So LinkedIn would probably be the best opportunity. I also had the chance this year to write an article. For police chief magazine. And that, yeah, that article is about building community trust during the crisis and about crisis communication. So that is also in my LinkedIn and also proud to to share that as well.
[00:23:56] Cause it's all about building.
[00:23:58] Veronica: Oh, I love it. And I'm going to go ahead and put that in the show notes for everyone listening on our podcast, because I want to make sure you read it. I think that's fantastic. Angelique. You have just been, so this has been so much fun for me because I love talking shop, but I love talking to people who are smarter than me.
[00:24:12] So it has been a
[00:24:13] Angelique: blast. You're so sweet. Thank you for Hanukkah,
[00:24:19] Veronica: RI guys that wraps up this episode of Saturday soundbites. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did, and I hope you learned a lot and got an opportunity to see how so much of what we do crosses over from the. Spaces. So you can always learn and grow from people, even if they're not in your niche or in your space.
[00:24:36] So with that, I'm going to wrap up this episode. If you're listening on our podcast, make sure you hit subscribe. We don't want you to miss any episodes of our podcast. And if you're watching on Facebook, make sure you give us some comments and hashtag replay. So we can go back and connect with you with that.
[00:24:50] I'm sending you lots of positive energy and light.