Interesting week this week.
Monday saw a face-off between the new Commissioner for Climate Change Tim Flannery, Barnaby Joyce (no intro required) and some lunatic from the Qld branch of One Nation on Live TV. Thank god for Q&A's Tony Jones who did an admirable job of controlling the debate. What we were witnessing here was old school common sense thinking versus new school common sense thinking.
I like this idea of the Common Sense. On Tuesday I had a really interesting chat with someone whose job it is to invest millions of dollars of one of Australia's richest people in things that support a better planet and stronger community.
Helping ordinary people to do extraordinary things that benefit all of us. Much of the conversation was punctuated with the phrase "it just makes common sense".
By Wednesday I was at the Communication Council's Circus Festival where again we heard a lot of common sense being talked about regarding how the creative communications industry needs to behave. Less same old, same old, more innovation, more cleverness, more community building, more leadership.
It was really interesting to hear so many of the presenters talking about the need for brands to "take responsibility", "truly engage with real insight and truths", "become beacons of leadership", "be open, honest and transparent" and "behave like you mean it".
The most powerful case studies such as the ones for the Times of India had little to do with product efficacy or spurious product benefits. Instead they tapped into genuine brand, product and audience insights which had real meaning and value.