Nine Years, and How We Work Now
Last week, we celebrated our 9th birthday.
Swash Labs has always been an enterprise which acknowledges and embraces a particular Zen truth about the world: the only constant is change. The world has certainly changed since 2011, and we have been successful because we’ve changed as well. We have been, as they say, the water flowing around the rock as opposed to the rock itself.
I wrote about this in a post about ethics in advertising which we published on this blog on January 28th of this year. I talked about how hard it is to project yourself into an uncertain future, and predicted (from a risk perspective) that the world would change radically in the next five to ten years.
How long ago does January 28th feel to you?
Take a minute and think. Really try to map out the edges of that ensuing time in your mind.
Weird, right?
Since that day three months ago, the world has changed more radically than I thought would be possible, even in my imagined ten year period. As every nation on Earth grapples with COVID-19 to varying degrees of success, many aspects of life on this planet will stay radically different for many people for the foreseeable future. Beyond that, some ways in which we live will change forever. Defining the concept of “normal” will be an ongoing, provisional experiment, especially until a vaccine is universally available.
COVID-19 has had many, many negative effects on life in America, with the threat to public health being the most obvious. The virus has also been a meteor crashing into our hemisphere for many businesses, like restaurants, bars, movie theaters, sports, massage therapists, hair salons, and entertainment venues, that had to close due to necessary social distancing measures.
We are fortunate in that we have been able to keep operating, and that the nature of our work allows us to do that work remotely. We have managed to keep our team intact since the pandemic began, employed and insured, and for that we are grateful.
Many of our clients, however, have felt the effects of COVID-19 more severely. We are a small business in the service of small businesses. Every small business, non-profit, institution, and organization now has to figure out what it means to do business in a safe and ethical manner while trying to survive, both economically and literally. And, since we all have to figure this out in a new and unfamiliar operating environment, we’re doing it on Hard Mode.
Swash Labs does not face the same challenges and trauma as essential businesses or frontline healthcare workers, or grocery store employees, or delivery drivers, or anyone else who can’t work from home, and we recognize our privilege. It is that recognition which makes it all the more important for us to stand in solidarity with those workers by reducing risk in every way we can.
As the founder and principal of Swash Labs, it is my responsibility to articulate a plan for us to continue to operate safely into the future. It is likewise my responsibility to counsel our clients on how they can communicate effectively about their efforts to do the same thing. Finally, it is imperative that we do all of this in an ethical manner.
The truth matters now more than ever, and, if we’re keeping it candid, ethics are now a matter of life and death. To be blunt, every organization now bears the unfair but real responsibility of managing the effects of a global pandemic on their own. Every political campaign is responsible for the health of their staffers and the risks to which they choose to expose their constituents. Every business is responsible for the safety of their employees and customers.
With that in mind, and on this occasion of our 9th anniversary, I want to share some things with you about how our operations have changed, and how we are addressing the challenges of COVID-19:
Swash Labs will not return to a physical office space or to doing business in person until a vaccine for COVID-19 is available. We have been fully remote since mid-March, and while I miss seeing everyone I work with in real life (and seeing our clients in person during Co-Lab Sessions), our actual ability to operate is not impacted by distance. Forcing our employees to work in a collective physical location – and likewise asking our clients to come to a shared, physical, indoor space – is an unnecessary risk, and we won’t do it.
Swash Labs will not publish, promote, write, or create any advertising which advocates for unsafe behavior, as determined by guidance from public health organizations. We will monitor guidance from organizations like the CDC and WHO. (We encourage other advertising agencies and communications shops to follow suit.)
Swash Labs will work with our clients to ensure that their advertising and communications are well-suited to, and reflective of, our current reality.
Whenever we can, however we can, we will help businesses that need help or are facing an economic existential threat, whether they are our clients or not.
Swash Labs will take an active role in educating our community about ethics in advertising and communications, digital risk, and changes to our shared economic and risk environments in the months and years ahead.
On a personal note: As the individual in charge of a company that has a platform (however small) to communicate effectively to a broad audience, I will confront denialism and disinformation about COVID-19 in every way possible. This includes disinformation and communications harmful to public health which originate from any source. As long as I am capable of combating such dangerous nonsense, I will do so to the best of my ability.
Thank you for supporting Swash Labs over the last nine years. We are, without exception or qualification, proud of the work we do and proud of the people, companies, and campaigns with which we work.
Stay safe, and if you can, stay home. — Josh