Longtime Community Activist/Leader Mark Walker Talks About Media Change
March 5th, 2009 Posted by Tawnya Lancaster Posted in Blog
Mark Walker is the Managing Director of Global Community Affairs for Applied Materials. He’s been a leader in the business and non–profit communities in Silicon Valley for years and is well respected as an experienced, authoritative voice in the industry who can get things done. Prior to working with Applied, he was the CEO of United Way Silicon Valley where he played an instrumental role in transitioning the agency to its new funding model—a monumental task. Before that, he was in charge of SBC’s community relations in Silicon Valley.
We asked Mark for his thoughts on the changing landscape of media and how that affects his ability to do public outreach.
PRx: The San Francisco Chronicle’s recent announcement that the paper is in dire trouble is further evidence of the media industry’s deeper problems. The traditional channels of communication are closing as new ones are opening up, and this is changing how we as communicators get our message to the public.
—As we continue to lose our newspaper base (and for that matter, local TV and radio as well), how does that affect corporate community relations, i.e. in terms of how you deliver your message to various audiences (employees, the public, etc.?)
Mark: Adding value to the brand through community involvement has always been a challenge. Often, “traditional” media is reluctant to use “soft” news and unwilling to give identity to the company name behind community activities. The erosion of our newspaper base speaks less about corporate messaging but speaks volumes about lost opportunity for deep dialogue about civil society.
PRx—Are you doing things now that you weren’t doing five or 10 years ago? If so, what are they?
Mark: Today we are more focused on environmental philanthropy that we were 10 years ago. Setting company goals to reduce our carbon footprint 20 percent and leverage philanthropy to support our environmental business objectives is very new.
PRx—How do the Internet and social media affect the way in which you communicate and do outreach with your audiences? Do you feel it is easier or more difficult?
Mark: Our CEO started a blog more than a year ago for employees to engage in issues every couple of weeks. It has become a successful communication tool. We use our Intranet almost exclusively for employee communication and use video as a medium frequently.
