The Year in Leadership Communication

(Retail) Starbucks was down and (Robby) Starbuck was up. Boeing’s CEO apologized sincerely, vowed solemnly and resigned eventually. Many beleaguered college presidents issued statements about why they’ll issue fewer statements from now on; “institutional restraint” is the word of the year in higher-ed leadership comms. And CEOs, during this election year, sounded a similar theme: “Less is more, in 24.”

Of course, that did not stop JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon from making Elon Musk look like the shy and retiring type. Rereading the year’s issues of the Executive Communication Report, I was reminded that Dimon publicly: sent majorly mixed signals about whether or not we will have a recession, about whether or not we’ll have a catastrophic AI cultural wipeout, about whether or not he would accept a White House cabinet position if offered one and about whether he would retire soon. Also, Dimon scolded federal remote workers that they go to the office, scolded fellow business leaders that they need to get out more and meet their customers in person, and scolded school leaders about how they need to do a better job of preparing students to work in businesses. And only recently he noted at an international conference that “World War III has already begun,” adding, “We run scenarios that would shock you. I don’t even want to mention them.”

Get this man some institutional restraint!

Meanwhile, I hope this review of other notable leadership communication stories from 2024 may help guide our way to a better 2025.

In January, Harvard President Claudine Gay resigned, writing a fiery op-ed in The New York Times:

My hope is that by stepping down I will deny demagogues the opportunity to further weaponize my presidency in their campaign to undermine the ideals animating Harvard since its founding: excellence, openness, independence, truth.

As I depart, I must offer a few words of warning. The campaign against me was about more than one university and one leader. This was merely a single skirmish in a broader war to unravel public faith in pillars of American society. Campaigns of this kind often start with attacks on education and expertise, because these are the tools that best equip communities to see through propaganda. But such campaigns don’t end there. Trusted institutions of all types—from public health agencies to news organizations—will continue to fall victim to coordinated attempts to undermine their legitimacy and ruin their leaders’ credibility. For the opportunists driving cynicism about our institutions, no single victory or toppled leader exhausts their zeal.

By December, her successor Alan Garber was sounding more conciliatory notes. He told a private faculty group that there are “bipartisan frustrations with Harvard and acknowledged that he believes the criticisms contain elements of truth,” according to The Harvard Crimson. Garber said Harvard faculty and administration “must listen to public criticism with ’empathy and humility.’”

The general AI freakout exploded in late 2022, and it was still roaring at Davos in January 2024. “It would be hard to overstate the degree to which discussions of AI dominated this year’s World Economic Forum,” wrote Fortune Media CEO Alan Murray. “While tempestuous politics and geopolitics, the climate challenge, and an uncertain economy all had their place in the formal agenda, every discussion somehow seemed to find its way back to the disruptive technology.”

But this year most speechwriters were less worried about ChatGPT stealing their livelihoods, their attitude captured by op-ed consultant Jake Meth, who wrote in March: “At this point, ChatGPT is not even close to being able to write a good op-ed pitch. I understand that I might look biased, given that my company uses a highly tailored, personalized approach for producing great opinion articles,” wrote Meth, who runs the op-ed consultancy Opinioned. “But I was only looking for efficiencies, not a workaround. And I can tell you that when it comes to op-eds, AI isn’t even making you more efficient.” 

(Also on ChatGPT: Remember the column in the Times of London: In French, “ChatGPT” sounds like, “chat, j’ai pété.” Which means, “cat, I farted.” And which, Times columnist Emma Duncan points out, “introduces an element of surrealism into otherwise serious conversations. Our jobs are going to be destroyed by cat, I farted. Civilization is being undermined by cat, I farted. Sartre would have appreciated it.”)

More worrisome for speechwriters: Institutional oratory continued to get shorter and less speechy. Amy Scarlino, a veteran matchmaker of corporate leaders and conference platforms, shared the results of her firm’s survey of conference organizers early last year. Topline: Sessions are shrinking in length, with most keynotes lasting less than 30 minutes and fireside chats even shorter than that. But in-person is in, Scarlino said: “Virtual speaking is virtually gone.”

“How many die as a result of [high drug prices], how many suffer unnecessarily?” Sen. Bernie Sanders asked the CEOs of Johnson & Johnson, Merck and Bristol Myers Squibb at a Senate committee hearing in February, answering his own question: “Nobody knows. But my guess is in the millions.” In December, the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson touched off huge online reaction against insurance companies and other organizations involved in healthcare.

Also in February, W.K. Kellogg CEO Gary Pilnick raised a tempest online when he suggested consumers might contend with inflation by eating cereal more often, The Washington Post reported. Touting a Kellogg’s marketing campaign urging people to “give chicken the night off” in favor of eating cereal for dinner, Pilnick told CNBC, “The cereal category has always been quite affordable, and it tends to be a great destination when consumers are under pressure. If you think about the cost of cereal for a family versus what they might otherwise do, that’s going to be much more affordable.” He added, “The cereal category is a place that a lot of folks might come to because the price of a bowl of cereal with milk and with fruit is less than a dollar. So you can imagine why a consumer under pressure might find that to be a good place to go.” When anchor Carl Quintanilla speculated that Pilnick’s pitch might “land the wrong way,” Pilnick replied, “We don’t think so. In fact, it’s landing really well right now, Carl.” Soon, however, social media was full of “let them eat cereal references,” and #marieantoinette was trending.

(I preferred Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary’s approach to income disparity; in March, he told The Wall Street Journal he was worth the $109 million bonus he was due to receive later in the year, depending on the discount European airline’s performance. “The obvious question is, well, is anybody worth 100 million over five years?” O’Leary said. “If premiership footballers are earning fucking 20 million a year and [French soccer star Kylian] Mbappé is being paid 130 million to go play football for fucking Real Madrid, then I think my contract is very good value for Ryanair shareholders.”)

Hey, remember how, early in the year LinkedIn was using AI to prompt us to share our expertise? (And that many of us obeyed, for some reason?) Did you notice that nonsense came to a merciful halt, sometime in the summer?

University of Kentucky President Eli Capilouto spoke out in February against two bills currently before his state’s legislature, according to the Kentucky Lantern. One bill restricted DEI and the other undermines tenure. “As the University of Kentucky’s president, let me be clear: I am opposed to the legislation regarding both DEI and tenure,” Capilouto wrote in a campus message. “I have voiced my stance in a manner that I hope is respectful and thoughtful. I will continue to do so. 

The University of Kentucky disbanded its office for Institutional Diversity in August.

Have you ever wanted to ask a principal, “Do you even know what executive communication is?” Well, in March the Executive Communication Council introduced a new “Leader’s Guide to Successful Collaboration with an Executive Communication Professional.” It’s been downloaded a lot this year.

OMG do you remember how awesome President Biden did in the State of the Union Address? In a live blog, I wrote: “The Republicans are lurching at Biden like Sonny Liston, at Muhammad Ali. Biden is luring them to swing at his chin, but after big misses they stagger, while Biden dances into a new position, another angle.” 

Four months later: On July 1, ECR quoted former Obama White House Chief Speechwriter Jon Favreau, saying on his podcast Pod Save America, “Look, we always want to be honest. You don’t listen to us for us to sugar-coat—I think it was a fucking disaster. I think it was maybe the worst debate I’ve ever seen in my entire life. … Joe Biden just in every single way failed at that debate. I don’t know what else to say there. I won’t make any other predictions now, but it was just a disaster.”

In 2024, we all took a rhetorical break from the environment, pretty much the only people talking about climate change being oil executives. “We should abandon the fantasy of phasing out oil and gas,” said Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser at the CERAWeek energy conference last spring in Houston. Saying that the energy transition away from fossil fuels is “visibly failing,” Nasser predicted, “Peak oil and gas are unlikely for sometime to come, let alone 2030. It seems no one is betting the farm on that.” Nasser concluded, “Many of us have been saying for a long time that the world has been trying to transition in fog, without a compass, on a road to nowhere. Consumers increasingly agree, as transition realities bite. They are demanding a transition that is affordable, reliable, and flexible, and that supports our climate ambitions.” 

This year, hostile stakeholders weren’t just entrenched, they were encamped. “We need a reset,” wrote Columbia University President Minouche Shafik in a statement calling for a day of virtual-only classes in the wake of virulent anti-Israel protests on the school’s New York City campus in April. “The decibel of our disagreements has only increased in recent days,” Shafik wrote, saying she was seeking to “deescalate the rancor and give us all a chance to consider next steps.” 

Shafik resigned in August, saying in part, “It has … been a period of turmoil where it has been difficult to overcome divergent views across our community. This period has taken a considerable toll on my family, as it has for others in our community.”

In April, Google CEO Sundar Pichai warned employees against debating politics at work. At the end of a memo detailing various changes to make Google more competitive through AI, Pichai wrote:

We have a culture of vibrant, open discussion that enables us to create amazing products and turn great ideas into action. That’s important to preserve. But ultimately we are a workplace and our policies and expectations are clear: this is a business, and not a place to act in a way that disrupts coworkers or makes them feel unsafe, to attempt to use the company as a personal platform, or to fight over disruptive issues or debate politics. This is too important a moment as a company for us to be distracted.

We have a duty to be an objective and trusted provider of information that serves all of our users globally. When we come to work, our goal is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. That supersedes everything else and I expect us to act with a focus that reflects that. 

Jeff Nussbaum is a veteran writer of humor speeches for Washington “silly season” dinners like April’s White House Correspondents Dinner. He said he thinks these dinners are dead. “However silly these gatherings are, they have traditionally served a serious purpose,” Nussbaum wrote in Politico. “They’re not simply a throwback to a clubbier, chummier time, although they are certainly that. They’re a recognition that when people across the political spectrum are laughing together at our own absurdity and the absurdity of the world, at least we’re seeing the same world. That’s no longer the case, and like almost every once-fun thing that is no longer fun, you can lay the blame for this state of affairs at the feet of former President Donald J. Trump.”

In May it was announced that former President Obama speechwriter Jon Lovett would participate in Season 47 of CBS’ Survivor. In the trailer, Lovett looked into the camera and said, “I have no outdoor skills. What am I doing here? I went camping as a cub scout. I threw up and went home.” When the show debuted later in the year, Lovett was the first contestant voted off the island.

Also in May, I was quoted a New York Times  DealBook piece headlined, “Who’d Want to Give a Commencement Speech Anymore?” The nut of the story:

Just three Fortune 50 chief executives appear to be commencement speakers this year, as colleges have faced campus protests over the war in Gaza, student arrests and wealthy alumni threatening to break ties with their alma maters over antisemitism. 

“The idea of CEOs going out aggressively and speaking anywhere near this environment on campuses, it just doesn’t seem like the moment for them to be doing that,” said David Murray, the executive director of the Professional Speechwriters Association.

As always, many male CEOs bragged about how much they work. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told Stripe CEO Patrick Collison on a podcast in June, “I work from the moment I wake up to the moment when I go to bed, and I work seven days a week. When I’m not working, I’m thinking about working. And when I’m working, I’m working.”

And also as always, women CEOs agonized about how much they work. TIAA CEO Thasunda Brown Duckett stopped trying to find work-life balance, she said in an interview this year. She described breaking down at one point: “I called my husband and I was like, when I get up in the morning, I don’t see my kids. When I get home, I don’t see my kids.” She said, “Here’s what I learned: Work-life balance is a lie because I was trying to reconcile it, and the math wasn’t mathing. The truth is I only have 100% of me, not 110%. Understanding that I am not 100% allocated to being a mom, [my children] only get 30%, allows me to be more intentional … So my children don’t get 100% of all of me. But within that allocation, they get 100%.” 

In June, I took a Zoom with a tech developer who wanted to pick my brain about how to bring AI to bear to make exec comms more effective and efficient. She told me she was impressed by the “passion” of my response. I’ve since heard through the grapevine that the project has trailed off. There is no app for that.

We reported on June 24: Yale Chief Executive Leadership Institute President Jeffrey Sonnenfeld says that while corporate CEOs have a “complicated” relationship with President Biden, they’re strongly against Donald Trump, in an op-ed in The New York Times. “If you want the most telling data point on corporate America’s lack of enthusiasm for Mr. Trump,” Sonnenfeld wrote, “look where they are investing their money.” He claims not one Fortune 100 CEO has donated to Trump—a break from traditional Republican/business bond “dating back over a century, to the days of Taft and stretching through Coolidge and the Bushes, all of whom had dozens of major company heads donating to their campaigns.” Why are CEOs turning away from Trump? “Several chief executives resented Mr. Trump’s personal attacks on businesses through divide-and-conquer tactics, meddling and pitting competitors against each other publicly. Scores of them rushed to distance themselves from Mr. Trump’s more provocative stances, resigning en masse from his business advisory councils in 2017 after he equated antiracism activists with white supremacists. Dozens of them openly called for Mr. Trump’s impeachment in 2021 after the Jan. 6 insurrection.”

In November, we passed along an Axios roundup of congratulatory social media messages from CEOs to President Trump upon his election. Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos and CEO Andy Jassy, Google’s Sundar Pichai, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Apple’s Tim Cook, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella are among them. This month, The Wall Street Journal had a piece titled, “The Week CEOs Bent the Knee to Trump.”

Institutional restraint? That’s not for Wesleyan University President Michael S. Roth, who wrote an op-ed in The New York Times as the fall semester began, “I’m a College President, and I Hope My Campus Is Even More Political This Year.” Excerpts:

Last year was a tough one on college campuses, so over the summer a lot of people asked me if I was hoping things would be less political this fall. Actually, I’m hoping they will be more political.

That’s not to say that I yearn for entrenched conflict or to once again hear chants telling me that I “can’t hide from genocide,” much less anything that might devolve into antisemitic or Islamophobic harassment or violence. But since at least the 1800s, colleges and universities in the United States have sought to help students develop character traits that would make them better citizens. That civic mission is only more relevant today. The last thing any university president should want is an apolitical campus.

College students have long played an important, even heroic role in American politics. Having defended the voting franchise during the civil rights movement and helped to end the Vietnam War, they have continued to work for change across a range of social issues. If you went to college in the past 50 years, there’s a good chance the mission statement of your school included language that emphasized the institution’s contribution to society. Like many others, my university’s founding documents speak of contributing to the good of the individual and the good of the world. Higher-education institutions have never been neutral … 

Roth concluded: “To strengthen our democracy and the educational institutions that depend on it, we must learn to practice freedom better. This fall we can all learn to be better students and better citizens by collaborating with others, being open to experimentation and calling for inclusion rather than segregation—and participating in the electoral process.”

The remote-work war continues. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy told employees they need to come into the office five days a week, in an employee memo in September. “Our culture is unique, and has been one of the most critical parts of our success in our first 29 years,” Jassy wrote. “But, keeping your culture strong is not a birthright. You have to work at it all the time.” He continued:

Before the pandemic, not everybody was in the office five days a week, every week. If you or your child were sick, if you had some sort of house emergency, if you were on the road seeing customers or partners, if you needed a day or two to finish coding in a more isolated environment, people worked remotely. This was understood, and will be moving forward as well. But, before the pandemic, it was not a given that folks could work remotely two days a week, and that will also be true moving forward—our expectation is that people will be in the office outside of extenuating circumstances (like the ones mentioned above) or if you already have a Remote Work Exception approved through your s-team leader.

Amazon gave employees until January 2 to comply.

And finally, this year in leadership communication has sent me back into the recent past to find perspective in this fast-evolving (rapid-cycling?) field of ours. In 2017, I wrote after a summit I attended at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business: “To whom are people turning for principled leadership and cultural compass points? Of all things, corporations and other large institutions. With an erratic president and a discredited intellectual elite, people need someone to trust, someone to know the responsible, sensible, sustainable ‘corporate’ view on gun control, transgender restrooms, gay marriage, Confederate monuments, immigration, Black Lives Matter, Obamacare, tax reform, kneeling during the National Anthem and climate change. What social activists long decried as amoral self-interest in corporations is now treasured as impartial interest in sustainability. Corporations are now social arbiters by default.”

That sounds like a very long time ago.

And this last year, after the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, I recalled the original vision of the Executive Communication Council, founded five tumultuous years ago: “The leaders of corporations, nonprofits, universities and other institutions will be more expressive and candid, and the institutions they run will be more humane, socially sensible and effective.” 

As we tiptoe into 2025, my question is for all of us: As institutional leaders are focused less on social participation and more on lowering their profiles, how do we go about that now?

David Murray, Executive Director, Executive Communication Council

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