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Transcript

New Media for Water Communications · Clean Water Works

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Clean Water Works.
• 0:02
  Speaker 2: Stop tapping the table.
• 0:03
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, we're coming up on like two years and you're still tapping the table Nervous Abbott.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm especially nervous today because the guests for today's episode are myself and Donna.
• 0:17
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: And the reason for that is Jess Schutte, who's been here before to promote Clean Water Fest, wanted to interview us for the podcast.
• 0:28
  Speaker 3: The listeners need to know, because you know, I'm sure you guys get it all the time how did this come?
• 0:33
  Speaker 3: Why do we do this?
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: Who are the people behind it?
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: You guys are, like the ones that need to be interviewed.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: It might be of some use to other utilities considering a podcast of their own.
• 0:47
  Speaker 3: Plus, don't you ever like listen to something or watch something and you want to know more about the people who are the hosts of it?
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: Yes, you do.
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: Did Mike just wake up one morning and stretch and say podcast?
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: I bet he did.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Stretching is important.
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: That's where a lot of good ideas come.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Well, let's do some introductions, because we're not the only ones in the room here.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Evan is here as well.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Evan, introduce yourself and why you're here.
• 1:05
  Speaker 4: Hello, who are you?
• 1:06
  Speaker 4: Well, I'm here because Jessica dragged me, no.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: Evan has like an NPR voice.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: Oh, thank you.
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: Definitely a radio voice.
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: For sure.
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: Appreciate that.
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: Dang it, he does improv.
• 1:16
  Speaker 4: I do.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, so wait.
• 1:19
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we.
• 1:21
  Speaker 4: I am an intern so I help out with outreach events and packing up boxes and moving boxes and finding out where boxes are at.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: But a large part of my identity is in boxes right now, I think it's interesting that you do improv, because I feel like we do improv here too.
• 1:34
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah.
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: Well, you know, like we say sometimes when we introduce ourselves, life is improv and we're just doing it in nicer clothes in front of a bunch of people?
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: we don't know, yeah, I like that.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: Why'd you come to work at the sewer district?
• 1:48
  Speaker 4: uh, well, um, I graduated with a degree in english bachelor, a bachelor's in english?
• 1:54
  Speaker 4: Ah, yes, and I do have one of those.
• 1:56
  Speaker 4: Yeah, many people in many different walks of life have a degree in english and it's versatile.
• 2:02
  Speaker 4: It's versatile, but it is sometimes difficult to find employment when you're right out of college with just a bachelor's of english it is both.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: It's both versatile and not very useful no, it is somehow both.
• 2:15
  Speaker 4: It is an enigma of a degree.
• 2:16
  Speaker 4: It both does so many things and yet does nothing right, it doesn't automatically do something no, it doesn't automatically.
• 2:21
  Speaker 4: Yes, that's a good point.
• 2:22
  Speaker 4: I was a substitute teacher teacher for a bit at the high school where I went to, but then I saw that there was an opening for an internship position, one that was actually paid, because many are not and so I figured I'd give it a shot.
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: And you're recently married newly married Yep, new house homeowner A year and a month of being married and yeah, Aw Cat, cat owner year.
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: And a month of being married.
• 2:43
  Speaker 4: And yeah, fun cat cat, yes, cat, lovely dad yes, I'm a cat dad yeah yes, honeybee, she's adorable and also a little jerk did you have more questions about the podcast?
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: no, I mean, I thought your face right now.
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: It's just listen.
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: I really feel like people because I have gotten asked like how did the podcast come to be it's?
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: true that clean water work started out as a magazine, a print magazine, and we did that for eight years.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: Eight volumes, eight issues on various topics about the district's work plant operations.
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: We could have done more well, we covered all the main issues they didn't want to hear about any of mine, so we switched to the podcast instead, that's why Donna's issues?
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: Issues 9 through 47, Donna's issues.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: You need to go higher.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: We covered plant operations.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: We covered water quality and industrial surveillance tunnels.
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: Stormwater.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: And I was kind of thinking that I didn't know how many more full-length issues we could do, like we had covered all the major points.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: And you're like what are people actually listening to and reading and how are they getting their content?
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's another thing.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: It was hard to track readership if all the work that was going into making this magazine was worth it.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: But when, with the advent of podcasting, it seemed like you could cover a lot more topics and turn things around quicker so you could be more responsive to things, like we did an episode, a podcast episode on the East Palestine train derailment, like a week after it happened, and that was you can't do that with print, right?
• 4:17
  Speaker 4: No.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: And I was kind of burned out on on the print publication.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: I've been in print publication for decades and I was just more interested in setting up microphones, right.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: And you have the background, Like you have the editing background, you can tell I don't do any of it because I don't actually even know the right words to use right now.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: The making, the cutting and the putting together of the—.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: Audio editing yeah.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: That have something to do with the fact that you also have your own band.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: Yes, I didn't know that yeah so I learned how to do home recording in my 20s and I just started on various so just a couple years ago then.
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, a couple years so setting up microphones and using different equipment to capture performances.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: And I actually moved to Cleveland with friends of mine who I was making music with at the time.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: You know, if you wanted to make a recording, you didn't have to book studio time anymore, which was very costly and you could do it on your own by purchasing some microphones and setting things up and learning how to do it on your own.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: And so I learned to do that, very poorly at first and then, you know, gradually develop some confidence with it.
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: The band that you're in now.
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: Is it the same folks that you moved here with, or has that evolved and changed that?
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: has evolved.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I've had a number of different music projects, so this latest project that I'm in is more of a rock project.
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: Okay, how do we find this music?
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: Nonbruisescom Band Camp is another place you can hear.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: It's like Spotify or Apple, but it puts more of the money into the artist's pocket.
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: Okay, what is your role in the band?
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: Do you sing, do you play?
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: He plays the tambourine.
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: I was hoping the triangle, I do play the tambourine.
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: I was hoping the triangle, I do play the tambourine.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: I recently actually was involved with a friend's project.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: We made a record up in Michigan and my sole duty was to sing and play tambourine.
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: Nice, I mean, that's pretty sweet.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: It's like Stevie Nicks.
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: So, mike, good, you got the band, you're doing that.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: You want to talk about the fam.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: Is the house finished being painted?
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: I've been painting my house.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, god bless you, it's pretty close.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: There are a couple small sections on the front of the house that I haven't gotten to, just because I've gotten a little lazy in the last week or so, but it's pretty much done, yeah All right.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: You live there with my wife danielle great we have two boys, two teenage boys sam and theo.
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: Nice, we have a dog, coco, most important.
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: Oh so you, you got a band do home remodeling, kind of like a jack of all trades, master of none, yeah master of none.
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, watch a lot of youtube videos.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: There's a wealth, wealth of knowledge on the internet now, where you can pretty much learn how to do anything.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: Again, poorly at first, but that's okay.
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: Right, and how long have you been with the district, mike?
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: 17 years.
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: Whoa, that's impressive 2007,.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: July 2007.
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: Well, Donna, how long have you been with the district now?
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: 11.
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: Okay 11 and a half Cs if we're counting.
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: And you have the most amazing dog in the whole.
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: Friends of the Show?
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: I do.
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, grizz, he's the bombcom, he's huge and he has multiple fan clubs of children that like being petting him.
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: Maybe tell the listeners what kind of dog we're talking about.
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: He's a Cancorso Rottweiler mix.
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: Weighs more than Donna by like two times.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: No, His head weighs I think like 116 pounds, he's got a giant noggin that one.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: When you were growing up, did you always have an interest in science and or the environment, or was that something you discovered throughout your education?
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: How did you kind of land here?
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: I've always liked science and the environment, like when I was little, my dad used to take me to the Metro parks and we would like go look for where the deer sleep at night, which is like a really fond memory that I have.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: Um, or he would, you know, take me, uh, to the Cuyahoga river.
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: Or my mom would take me to the lake, uh.
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: So I've always been pretty engaged when it comes with like the outdoors, I think.
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: And then science came pretty naturally to me, academically, I would say, and so that's what I ended up going to school for, and it felt right.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: In your earlier work here at the sewer district you were a member of our water quality and industrial surveillance department Out in the field, kind of a more physical role Do you miss doing?
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: That or do you like doing more of the public engagement and manage?
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: That's a great question.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: I do miss field days on and off.
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: I really miss being on the boat.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: Being on the boat and collecting water quality samples on Lake Erie was just one of those moments where you're like people pay me to do this.
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: What is happening right now?
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: I'm a mermaid on this boat and it's awesome, and so I don't really get to do that anymore.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: So that's kind of a bummer, but I do appreciate that the sewer district allows you to grow and move and change, and I pursued this position.
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: I pursued the position before this when I was watershed team leader, and it does a good job of emphasizing my skill set.
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: So I still get to do the technical stuff.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: I still get to sit in on project meetings and do plan reviews and talk about streams and stream design, but then I also then get to translate that for the public and I really do like that part a lot because it's the part I think, for me that is most important to bringing everyone along.
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: That's really where I hit my stride is where the science meets the communication.
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: Where I hit my stride is where the science meets the communication.
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: So you're titled now you are the manager of Watershed Team Leaders.
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: Am I saying that correctly?
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: No, you're not, but I do love you All right.
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: Did you do any prep for this?
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: interview Manager of Community Watershed Coordination that is a great term.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: So many words.
• 10:22
  Speaker 4: That's why Jessica didn't remember it.
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: I have brain issues.
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: Do you think that you are the busiest person at the district?
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: That's so funny.
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: No, I definitely don't think I'm the busiest person at the district schedule of meetings usually because my the team that I have is like we have touch points with every community.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: We have all 63 communities that we work with and so there's projects in a lot of those and they all have people that call us you're everywhere, like any meeting that I'm in.
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: If you're not there, I?
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: I think Someone forgot to invite.
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: Donna, because you're just.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: I do feel like I have to have like an overview and overarching knowledge of everything and of all the projects that we're doing, for like the nitty gritty details, though, like that's all the Watershed team leaders, for sure.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: That's a good management style I would think so.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: they're kind of.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: Sorry.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: So they're managing all the different stormwater projects throughout.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: Stormwater projects and then any of the wastewater projects that are not within the city of Cleveland, but any of the stormwater projects and wastewater projects that are in the suburbs is, yeah, the three watershed team leaders.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: It's a lot of responsibility for them.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: So you're running the place basically.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: But you make time you make a little time for the podcast and actually talking about scheduling and finding time on your schedule.
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: That is probably the biggest hurdle.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: Or the hardest thing, I think, for doing a podcast Scheduling is very hard.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: How do you guys figure out the topics?
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: I know like you have a lot of people, not just district folks.
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: We just like cold call and then like see who who like bites.
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Do you have people like hey, I have a great topic, Can you choose me?
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: And you're like sometimes we get requests and we say well, we'll see.
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: My mom used to say that to me all the time, and it usually meant no.
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: Right, it's a glimmer of hope.
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: Why do you think it's important to do the podcast?
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: Because someone's got to try to outshine John G.
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's a hard one.
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: It's actually impossible.
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: John G is our social media guru Award winning.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think the podcast has been really good.
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: Mike's so good at talking about his accomplishments.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: Yes, he loves it.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: That's why this is so hard for him.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: I think it's a good communication tool for utilities and other public organizations to consider because it is very easy to do, you can be responsive to different topics that come up and it's very accessible.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: It's very accessible.
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: That's what I was thinking.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: I listen to a lot of podcasts, and some of them actively, some of them passively.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: You can put them on and be doing dishes you can.
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: It's like an easy multitasking thing, and so I think for people who are interested in our content, it's like probably the easiest way to absorb it right compared to like going to our website or you know what I mean.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: We have a good website, but I think it's just an easy way to get to know the sewer district.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, now there's an archive too, so all the episodes.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: If you listen to all the episodes, you would probably have a pretty good understanding of the sewer district.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: That's a good point, and I think it's another way that we are innovative in getting our messaging out there, not just solely sticking to one way.
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: We do the print we do social, the podcasts we're keeping up man.
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: The leadership here has been very supportive of trying new things and giving us some creative license to do something like this.
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: We did ask about skywriting, but they weren't on board.
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: We did.
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: Yes, that was kind of poo-pooed.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: I do think that, having now listened to more podcasts, I do think we should probably introduce ourselves at the beginning of episodes.
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the point, because that's like a thing that I think we're just supposed to do and we don't ever do, right we don't do that, we just roll, we just like roll into it, and then we've never done it, just to see if people are going to know who you are.
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's probably good because you're right.
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: All the podcasts I listen to, they at least have some type of an intro.
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: They're just like hi, this is Kathy from Shush, shush, shush.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: By the way, I'm the host of the program.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: You don't get that here.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: No, we don't do that.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: No, we just start talking.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: We just cut straight into the.
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: Some podcasts do cold.
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: Thank you guys, this was fun.
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: You wanted to make it a goal of yours to interview us.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: Personal goal.
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: But in all seriousness, I think it's good that people got to hear a little bit about you guys.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: You guys talk and introduce everybody.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: I'm an enigma.
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: It's nice to see who you guys really are.
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: I thought this episode would benefit from having yet another communications professional.
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: The man, the myth, the legend.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: Communications manager, John Gonzalez, the head of our social media outreach.
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: We have a Twitter account that John started.
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: How many years ago did we start?
• 15:25
  Speaker 5: We started sometime around 2009.
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: And now we have 63,000 followers on ex-formerly Twitter and a good 5,000 followers on Instagram Pretty close, yes.
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: When you first started posting on Twitter, first of all, why did you think it was a good idea to do that?
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: And then, when did you start to get an inkling that it was picking up steam and could really turn into something?
• 15:50
  Speaker 5: We ventured into social media when we realized that there was a tremendous opportunity, that we had to begin reaching customers where they were.
• 15:58
  Speaker 5: We couldn't always expect customers to come out of their places of comfort, come out of what they were committed to and come to events or meetings or engagements that required them to leave their space.
• 16:10
  Speaker 5: So we went to their space and established accounts on a number of different social media platforms because we felt there was an opportunity for us to engage them where they felt comfortable.
• 16:20
  Speaker 5: We started to experiment and say how can we use these platforms to talk with customers?
• 16:24
  Speaker 5: We started by simply putting content out there.
• 16:28
  Speaker 5: The same way we would put out press releases or email blasts or newsletters to customers, but it wasn't very conversational, it wasn't two-way in any way.
• 16:36
  Speaker 5: But we began to see that there was a great way for us to have conversations with people in real time, and Twitter was the first place where we started to have actual two-way conversations in the social media space in a way that we'd never had seen before, and began to establish a personality and a presence for our organization as a utility that opened some eyes and some ears to our message in a way that we didn't necessarily expect or plan for early on.
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: And you've been here for a minute 20 plus years 20 plus years.
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: So my question is when you're tweeting or when you're posting on our social media, are you method acting?
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: Are you like I am the sewer district and I am method acting and I'm putting out the sewer district message?
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: Or have you been here so long that you are the sewer district, in a sense, and so you're just posting what you think makes sense?
• 17:31
  Speaker 5: It's going through my mind.
• 17:32
  Speaker 5: How will this be received?
• 17:34
  Speaker 5: How is it being read and consumed on the platform itself?
• 17:39
  Speaker 5: And I simply try to make it fit.
• 17:40
  Speaker 5: As a human engages, it has a feel to it, you know when it sounds human.
• 17:46
  Speaker 5: So you're actually engaging with a real person, and so we just try to give it a good feel.
• 17:49
  Speaker 5: And I like to think that when you see our content, you see it's coming from a real person.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: So you said when you started out, the engagement on Twitter was not lukewarm, but it wasn't as engaged as it is now and I think you tapped into creativity in your own background and that's when things started really to pick up.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: When you started, you know more memes and things that really tapped into popular culture and things around Cleveland as well.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: Was that a side of your personality that had been dormant for a while?
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: Or had you previously had other creative outlets?
• 18:24
  Speaker 5: I went to school.
• 18:25
  Speaker 5: I got an English degree.
• 18:26
  Speaker 5: I did a lot of creative writing in high school and in college.
• 18:29
  Speaker 5: I like to write poetry, I like to tell jokes and be personal with people that I know I am introverted, so it's not something that comes naturally.
• 18:35
  Speaker 5: I found that the organization was allowing us to use creativity to connect with customers.
• 18:40
  Speaker 5: That's not just on social.
• 18:41
  Speaker 5: If anyone is engaging with our members of our outreach team, members of our watershed team leadership team, if you're engaging with the sewer district, it's because we are seeing value in the conversation and we're seeing value in the space where we are present and we respect the people who are giving us their time to be there.
• 18:59
  Speaker 5: So why don't we use social the same way?
• 19:01
  Speaker 5: The fact the organization has allowed me to be creative in that space I take that very seriously because they mean they trust me with the opportunity to simply have conversations with people.
• 19:11
  Speaker 5: Even if it's telling a joke or being humorous or being emotional with people, we can do that.
• 19:16
  Speaker 5: We're telling people why our work matters and they are seeing value in the work we're providing.
• 19:21
  Speaker 5: And I like to hear, when people are having conversations with us, to say I do things differently now or I see things differently now because of interactions that we've had online with them, on Twitter or X or Instagram, wherever that might be.
• 19:33
  Speaker 5: And, anecdotally, we hear people all the time coming to us and saying I saw your Twitter account or hey, I will follow you on Twitter.
• 19:37
  Speaker 5: And without a social media presence, we might not have been able to reach customers the way that we have over the last 10 plus years.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: I would say more commonly than not, as soon as I open my mouth and tell someone I work at the sewer district, they tell me how good our Twitter is, and I always say thank you, and it's not me, it's this wonderful person named John G and yeah, and so it really is a great way that that you've been able to connect with the freedom that you've been given or allowed here to connect with residents across the board.
• 20:11
  Speaker 5: What I like the most is that when employees come to me and say somebody said they saw you on Twitter and they thought they were asking me if I was the one doing it.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: They always think it's me and I'm like you guys.
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: I'm really not that funny, nor do I know anything about pop culture.
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: But there's something in the essence of our content that makes people think anybody could be doing this it might be Donna, it might be Mike, it might be Nicole, it might be anybody on our team, and the fact that it represents any number of our employees and the experience they're having it means we're doing something right, because employees feel as though they're captured in what's being presented and I like being able to capture employees' stories and represent them in our work, represent them in our content, and it's a positive thing for me for people to say that there's some confusion on where the account is coming from and who's doing it.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I get the same comments from people like oh, you do that cool Twitter account.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: I said no it's not me.
• 21:04
  Speaker 5: The content comes from across the organization.
• 21:05
  Speaker 5: So somewhere in our content your work is ideally being represented, because it just showcases the variety of things that are happening that people don't ever think about, and how the work gets done behind the scenes or underground or in the field.
• 21:18
  Speaker 5: And it's just.
• 21:19
  Speaker 5: It's taking place around them every day and interacting with them, even though they might not realize it.
• 21:22
  Speaker 5: It's making that experience more applicable to their day to day, because they're now seeing it differently and seeing the world around them, the infrastructure around them, the systems around them, in a way that they might not have seen before.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: We were talking a little bit about Twitter and just the format, or X as it's called now.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: Just the format where you're reaching out, you're sending one tweet and you're reaching thousands of people, but also there is also a feeling that they are being spoken to directly and this has really become apparent.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: Just the feedback we've gotten from some of the holiday posts become apparent.
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: Just the feedback we've gotten from some of the holiday posts where we're not just posting content about how many gallons of wastewater we're treating.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: You almost have like an outreach tone where you're trying to comfort people around the holidays especially.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Talk a little bit about when you decided to broaden the scope of the Twitter account and just the reaction to that.
• 22:22
  Speaker 5: Let me speak about our customer service team.
• 22:23
  Speaker 5: They are known for trying to meet our customers with empathy and try to help them solve problems or overcome challenges that they have.
• 22:31
  Speaker 5: And that's just on the one-on-one interactions that I know our customer service reps have with customers, interactions that I know our customer service reps have with customers.
• 22:38
  Speaker 5: Our Watershed team leaders are having one-on-one conversations with customers that they feel more trusting of our work.
• 22:43
  Speaker 5: They understand what the projects are, and so that personal level of service that we try to employ is valuable and it's sincere what we're trying to do.
• 22:52
  Speaker 5: On social and specifically around the holidays, we realize that it can be an emotional time for people.
• 22:57
  Speaker 5: Social and specifically around the holidays, we realize that it can be an emotional time for people and the typical end of the year happy holidays greetings can apply to any utility, can apply to any business or corporation or company account.
• 23:07
  Speaker 5: Holidays are joyful for me and I know many of our other listeners are joyful during the holidays but there's a very real sense of heaviness for any number of reasons, whether it's the loss of a loved one or challenges of a history of holidays that were difficult.
• 23:23
  Speaker 5: So why not realize that if we're truly going to meet people in the moment.
• 23:27
  Speaker 5: Not every moment is joyful for people.
• 23:29
  Speaker 5: Your experience at this time, in this moment, is valuable.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: And valid.
• 23:36
  Speaker 5: It's valid because other people are having a similar experience that you just simply might not be aware of.
• 23:40
  Speaker 5: When we posted a voicemail greeting last year and simply opened it up to customers or anybody who was following us and said call this number, we have a message for you.
• 23:49
  Speaker 5: We simply wanted them to know that the end of the year is tough for a lot of people.
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: Not everyone's experience on the holidays is a happy one, so if you have something you want to share, please feel free to, but know that your experience is valid.
• 24:10
  Speaker 5: That inbox in a very positive way, unexpectedly blew up, bigger than we would have ever imagined, when thousands of people called and listened to a voicemail, to begin with a two-minute message from myself, just simply kind of meeting people where they were, and nearly a thousand people left voicemail to begin with a two-minute message from myself, just simply kind of meeting people where they were, and nearly 1,000 people left voicemails for us.
• 24:22
  Speaker 5: They were sharing a message of their own, they were thanking our employees, they were telling me thank you for giving me a platform to realize I'm not in this alone, whatever that situation was.
• 24:32
  Speaker 5: Yeah, a lot of heartfelt reactions it was unbelievable the way people simply were feeling vulnerable enough to open themselves up and share something about what the holidays meant for them.
• 24:43
  Speaker 5: I listened to every single message that came in and there were times I had to kind of stop for a minute Because people were really putting themselves out there to a faceless voicemail box.
• 24:55
  Speaker 5: But the reality was they were putting their they put themselves out there to a person because they began to feel a human was a part of this account.
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: They knew this.
• 25:06
  Speaker 5: They knew that they were going to be sharing their emotions with a unexpectedly sincere public utility.
• 25:13
  Speaker 5: They were calling from all over the place.
• 25:15
  Speaker 5: We had people calling from around the world.
• 25:16
  Speaker 5: People were calling from around the country because somebody had posted the number on their Facebook community group or some other place on LinkedIn.
• 25:23
  Speaker 5: They were just calling to see what this was about and they saw something there that was important to them.
• 25:28
  Speaker 5: I'd like to say that this is just a representation of how we see our customer experience should be is recognizing that people have challenges.
• 25:37
  Speaker 5: We want to help them in that moment.
• 25:38
  Speaker 5: We have a service we have to provide, but it's all going to start with recognizing the human connection that pulls all of us together and doing what we can in that moment, then, to move both of us ahead and ultimately make a difference for the region and for each other.
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: This came up when we were in the interview with Jess and Evan.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: Evan mentioned that he was an English major.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: I joked with him about that because I have an English degree too, and we joked about what a versatile yet sometimes useless degree it can seem like right.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: So I wanted to ask you, because I remember that you were an English major, and I wanted to ask you about your background in that and what led you to arrive at the sewer district 20 years ago.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: You said 20-plus.
• 26:23
  Speaker 5: I graduated in 2000,.
• 26:24
  Speaker 5: And just before that I had an internship opportunity here at the district and I still tell the story that I had an email come in that indicated there was an internship opportunity from our career services department at Baldwin Wallace and I had looked at it and I remember scrolling past it and at some point my high school girlfriend became my fiancé in college and we were married thereafter.
• 26:46
  Speaker 5: But when the email came in she had known I had discarded it and said I want to be a writer, I want to be someone who can be poetic.
• 26:56
  Speaker 5: But she said you have no other prospects, why are you passing?
• 27:00
  Speaker 5: We are getting married.
• 27:03
  Speaker 4: There's nothing going on here.
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: What are you?
• 27:04
  Speaker 5: doing, and so I thank God for her because I was able to.
• 27:08
  Speaker 5: Then I took the internship interview, had a great experience here over the summer and it was communications role, it was in production support, it was helping employees understand more about the organization organization, helping to manage our newsletter and things like that.
• 27:24
  Speaker 5: so it was a way for me to be creative in a space I wouldn't have expected it, and the way the organization has embraced our use of social media is something of a continuation of that creative experience that I've enjoyed being able to help to tell stories in a way, an unexpected way.
• 27:37
  Speaker 5: Ultimately, that's what the workout comes down to, and so I definitely think that our social media is consistent with our broader organizational commitment to outreach and that we recognize that there needs to be an investment connecting with our customers.
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: Do you have any like inspo, inspiring other organizations that you follow?
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: I really like US Fish and Wildlife, but that's also because I really like fish and wildlife, so I might be a little biased, you might be but it's warranted.
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: They're funny.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: They are funny and the animals are always so cute.
• 28:10
  Speaker 5: That's true.
• 28:10
  Speaker 5: They have wins on both of those columns.
• 28:12
  Speaker 5: We have a whole list of people that we respect on our X account.
• 28:16
  Speaker 5: We have a list of people that we respect on our on our x account.
• 28:17
  Speaker 5: We have a list of accounts that we follow and give a lot of time to, but the us consumer product safety commission is a great one and it's a surprising one.
• 28:27
  Speaker 5: Joseph galbo is the guy who's in charge of that and I I really respect the way he's going about his business and giving people what they want in an unexpected way.
• 28:37
  Speaker 5: We truly are somewhat unique in the utility space, but more and more organizations, especially utilities and federal and state organizations they're realizing that they can't just simply put press releases out.
• 28:53
  Speaker 5: You have to be creative and you have to find ways to relate your message to the people, who are who you want to speak to and speak with yeah, how?
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: how are you consuming media?
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: Because, um, whatever you're doing, I think it's working, because most of the time, um, someone will send me something, and I am not in the loop with what's happening in pop culture, but everyone else seems to be, and so I guess I'm asking you how do I be cooler?
• 29:24
  Speaker 5: maybe is the question I'm probably not the right person to ask about being cool.
• 29:28
  Speaker 5: I don't ask my kids that.
• 29:29
  Speaker 5: But, in terms of I consume content the way most of us do.
• 29:34
  Speaker 5: Most of us in this day and age are simply scrolling content.
• 29:39
  Speaker 5: Your thumb's always moving.
• 29:40
  Speaker 5: There's always something blowing up in front of you blowing past you.
• 29:44
  Speaker 5: I regularly am checking in on the platforms that run and seeing what people are talking about.
• 29:47
  Speaker 5: I gotcha Trending and even so the trends aren't always accurate because you can't just assume this is relevant to you.
• 29:55
  Speaker 5: I gotcha, but based on the variety of accounts that we follow, we kind of see what people are talking about and we see what type of content people are consuming.
• 30:03
  Speaker 5: So if we can find our way to put our angle on it, it's just a matter of making it relevant to our work.
• 30:08
  Speaker 5: Okay, but more importantly, letting people see that we're relevant to their lives as well.
• 30:14
  Speaker 5: I can't give you tips on how to be cooler were relevant to their lives as well.
• 30:16
  Speaker 5: I can't give you tips on how to be cooler, and I'm not telling you to consume more content, because sometimes it's better to step away from the content for a while.
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: Is this a fun part of your job?
• 30:23
  Speaker 5: I enjoy having this freedom and.
• 30:26
  Speaker 5: I enjoy being given this responsibility.
• 30:28
  Speaker 5: It does allow me to be creative in a space that I wouldn't have expected 20 plus years ago.
• 30:33
  Speaker 5: Our social media is meant to translate our work into something that is relatable and relevant to the people who are following us.
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 30:42
  Speaker 5: And to be able to have them understand who we are and what we're doing and, ultimately, what their connection is to that.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 30:50
  Speaker 5: And there's a lot of different ways to do it the fact that there's a conversation that requires more exploration and more discussion, a conversation that requires more exploration and more discussion.
• 30:59
  Speaker 5: It's like you can.
• 30:59
  Speaker 5: You might be able to have one tweet that starts the dialogue, or one meme that makes people think about the topic in a different way and then allows you to create some other supplemental content that actually allows for the conversation or to allows it, allows them to then spend two minutes watching a video that might be motivated by the fact that we can say damn, a whole bunch of times.
• 31:15
  Speaker 5: And that's where you hook them and then realize wait a second, I'm learning something about the way that hydrology is functioning here in this area.
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: So it's a matter of seeing things in my role.
• 31:24
  Speaker 5: It's about seeing things through that lens of content consumption and so what's something that will get people to stop for that moment and laugh or feel something?
• 31:34
  Speaker 5: That then, will keep them either a coming back or be in that moment and allow us to to have an engagement with them.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: Well, I want to thank you both for extending our conversation about communication and the different venues that we're taking it.
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: John Gonzalez, our communications manager, and this has been clean water works a podcast about clean water.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: I say that at the end of every episode too, just so people we don't want to assume people know what they're talking about.
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: They're just going to, they're going to assume like like this is NPR up first.
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: All right, great Thank you both Perfect.