Article by Catherine Fisette, Founder & Principal at Les Incorrigibles

Is it time for a rebranding of communication? 

This suggestion might sound off kilter but it’s apposite in the state we’re in. 

The 2025 communication trends include increased reliance on social media and refined algorithms, marketing micro-influencers, IA-powered tools for monitoring, analytics, recommendations and time savings, personalized content and a demonstrated corporate conscience;  with increased connection as a common thread. 

In this Zeitgeist of fake news and deepening divides, connecting is touted by most communicators as the passageway to engage and impact others genuinely. As an aspiration, the merits of human connections are unrivaled. They transcend borders and cultures and are so revered that they become somewhat untouchable. Sadly, this idealized vision of authentic interconnections rarely materializes as dreamed up. And when it does, there is a price to pay. 

Building relationships is a fine purpose, the channels and strategies we use to do so, however, are not as benevolent as one may think.

Many bear a very prominent dark side.

They can deceive and coerce for gains, foster exclusion, and cancel or aggrandize depending on their moral grounds. Before long, this creates mistrust that seeps through both audiences and messengers. Welcome to a lair paved with unintended ethical fall outs.

Let’s call the kettle black: 

To connect stakeholders to leaders, CEO activism is emerging as a highly effective strategy. It attempts to position leaders as courageously taking a corporate stance on global issues. But, doing so only brings a few select issues into focus, and we readily assume that positions taken by leaders hinge on their own values. Turns out, it rarely does. Not all that glitters is gold. It’s woke washing, actually. 

To tie audiences to a cause, we look to corporate philanthropy and strategic advocacy. Laudable, but with a potent boomerang effect that can influence non-profits’ public position on policy and regulatory processes and affect corporations who support them. Independence is confused with neutrality. The latter is rarely viable, let alone sustainable. 

To connect consumers to a brand, we call on influencers. When the hype is high, it fuels the very insidious authority bias. Before long, we start confusing the message with the messenger, elevate influencers’ content to an undisputed truth, especially when sponsorship isn’t disclosed, risk preying on vulnerable viewers by spreading disinformation and strip influencers of privacy in the name of clicks. Authentic engagement, anyone?  

To offer audiences experiential marketing and gamification, we resort to micro-targeting and the use of wearable while collecting data. And no holds barred in the Metaverse. These are as entertaining as they can lead to privacy infringement, especially when the extend of consent is blurred. That’s the equivalent of connecting with someone under false pretenses and start opening their mail. Godspeed.

Nowadays, sophisticated algorithms profile individuals based on their online activities, purchases, socio-economic status and political sidings. This heavily biased segmentation creates echo chambers of like-minded people, determine who’s in or who’s out, justifies in-group favoritism which typically collides with race, gender and economic status. The excluded ones become rounding errors. The machine clearly got out of hand. 

To connect with prospective talent, employers put forth internal advocates to depict corporate culture in all its staged glory. Associated testimonials imply that happy employees are more engaged, and therefore perform better. But read the disclaimer. The relationship between engagement and productivity is a correlation, at best. It is not causation. In dysfunctional organizations, this dogmatic level of engagement rhythm with hypervigilance, stress-related disorders, mounting anxiety and it has a deleterious impact on health, relationships and productivity—at, and outside of work. But we knew this already. In 2024, a survey found that half of PR professionals surveyed considered leaving their job due to burn out. The weight of the number…

We’re bound by the modus operandi of the channels and strategies we rely on to accomplish what we see as our mission. Can we renege on these to engage with audiences? Of course not, especially when we rely on metrics provided by said channels to showcase our performance. But there is an injunction to assess whether our communication apparatus upholds our organization’s code of conduct and, more fundamentally, if it aligns with our own moral compass as professionals. 

If not, we need to confront the fact that by placing our faith in these as effective conduits while turning a blind eye on what they dredge up, we condone their legacy and underpinnings. As such, we become flag bearers for these channels, with a perfunctory attitude. Bottom line: is connecting elevating or eroding our field?  

A way out might be to rethink the marketing of communication in which connecting is a means, not an end. We don’t exist to connect –if I erred and we do; we’re in for a painful performance review. With our network of influential contacts, knowledge of organizations’ lore, negotiating abilities, mastery of narratives, access to insightful data and staunch dedication, we’re most apt than anyone at igniting change, sparking ideas, propelling movements, questioning the status quo and carving up new creative space. But it requires audacity. 

For these lofty goals to come to life, we need to take the agency on how to bring change – not only communicate on them – by deliberately selecting channels and strategies that adhere to ethical standards, are sound, balanced and convey an unaltered message. Otherwise, we risk desecrating our purpose, skew audience segmentation, disfigure messaging, retrofit our plans to meet ethical standards we pledged to and blind communicators to what they can leave in their wake, as if the end justifies the means. It doesn’t. It only aids and abets what we hold on to dearly. 

P.S. The emperor has no clothes. Reset. 

Source: https://strategic.global/The-Dark-Side-of-Communication/