Communications Business Advisor

Fifty episodes in, Tara McDonagh is looking back at some of the things she's said on the Communications Business Advisor™ Podcast and admitting that she'd say a few of them differently today.

The mission hasn't changed. Tara still believes Communications and the people in it should be treated as critical business advisors. But after fifty episodes and years of working alongside communications leaders and their teams, her thinking about what that actually looks like has evolved.

In this episode, Tara revisits four ideas she shared from the earliest episodes of the podcast, what she understands differently about those concepts now, and why those shifts matter for communications leaders who want to build greater authority inside their organizations.

• Why "protect the brand" doesn't go far enough, and how communicators can connect reputation risk directly to revenue, operations, and business goals
• The important difference between being invited to the decision-making table and being required there
• Why "editing business decisions" is actually a false summit on the path to becoming a Communications Business Advisor
• The shift from editing decisions to shaping decisions before they're made
• Why communications strategy isn't the ultimate outcome, but a vehicle for changing how executives engage with Communications
• What clients are really seeking when they ask for strategy, structure, resources, or support (hint: It's not the strategy itself).

Protecting the brand became protecting revenue, operations, and the business plan.

Being invited to the table became being required there.

Editing decisions became shaping them.

And delivering a strategy became changing behavior.

The language may have evolved over fifty episodes, but the mission hasn't: elevating Communications and the people in it as critical business advisors.

Communications Team Authority Index: https://www.taramcdonagh.com/authority-index/

Take the free, 10-question assessment to understand where your communications team currently sits on the path from executing decisions to shaping them, and what it takes to move to the next level.

Tara McDonagh is a Communications as Business Advisor™ activist, advisor to Fortune 500 communications leaders and their teams, and Founder of Raise the Tide™ for women in Comms. Recognized by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) in 2026 as an industry champion/thought leader, Tara helps Comms. teams elevate their reputations as critical advisors while elevating our profession and the people in it.

Visit: www.taramcdonagh.com

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications, helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review. It helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

What happens when two communications leaders who have been circling each other's work for years finally sit down for a conversation?

In this episode of the Communications Business Advisor™ Podcast, Tara McDonagh is joined by Gini Dietrich, creator of the PESO Model® and founder of Spin Sucks, for a wide-ranging conversation about where the communications profession is headed and the opportunities communicators need to claim along the way.

From measurement and AI visibility to authority, organizational structure, and the evolving role of PR, Tara and Gini discover just how much their approaches complement each other. The result is less "either/or" and a whole lot more "yes, and."

• How the PESO Model® has evolved from a framework into an operating system
• Why communicators need to move beyond measuring activities and connect their work to business outcomes
• The growing opportunity for Communications to lead AI visibility and "visibility engineering"
• Why communicators shouldn't surrender emerging areas of expertise to other functions
• The unique challenges women face when using and talking about AI at work
• How trust, reputation, and authority connect to the work Communications does every day
• Why Communications and Marketing should work together while remaining distinct functions

The conversation keeps coming back to one idea: Communications has more opportunity than many in the field realize, but we have to recognize it, claim it, and demonstrate the value we bring.

Gini Dietrich is the founder and CEO of Arment Dietrich, Inc., a Chicago-based integrated marketing communications firm. She is also the founder, CEO, and author of Spin Sucks, host of the Spin Sucks podcast, and author of Spin Sucks (the book). She is the co-author of Marketing in the Round and creator of the PESO Model® and PESO Model Certification®, launched with the S.I. Newhouse School for Public Communications at Syracuse University.

Gini works with C-level executives on integrated communications strategies that build relationships, reputation, and business results. A highly sought-after speaker, her expertise includes integrated marketing communications, public relations, reputation and crisis management, social media, content marketing, and business growth.

Tara McDonagh is a Communications as Business Advisor™ activist, advisor to Fortune 500 communications leaders and their teams, and Founder of Raise the Tide™ for women in Comms. Recognized by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) in 2026 as an industry champion/thought leader, Tara helps Comms. teams elevate their reputations as critical advisors while elevating our profession and the people in it.

Communications Team Authority Index: https://www.taramcdonagh.com/authority-index/

PESO Model® and more: https://spinsucks.com/

PR Budgets Expected to Double by 2027: https://www.inc.com/victoria-watters/gartner-says-pr-budgets-will-double-by-2027-ai-search-is-why/91345318

Code For Good Now Report: https://codeforgoodnow.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Research-Report-The-AI-Judgment-Penalty.pdf

UN Women AI Bias Report: https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/media-advisory/2026/06/ai-is-already-rewriting-reality-for-billions-of-people-it-is-getting-women-wrong

Lean In AI Research: https://leanin.org/articles/findings/ai-women-gender-gap-data

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications, helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review. It helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

Being invited to the decision-making table isn't the same as being required there.

In this episode of the Communications Business Advisor™ Podcast, Tara McDonagh introduces the Communications Team Authority Index, a new framework designed to help communications leaders understand where their teams actually sit on the path from execution to true business advising.

Tara breaks down the four levels of communications authority, including the place many strong teams mistake for the finish line: the false summit. You may be respected, consulted, and invited into the room, but if the decision has already been made, there's still another level of authority to build.

• The difference between being invited into decision-making and being required there
• The four levels of the Communications Team Authority Index, from Comms Waitressing to Shaping Decisions
• Why Level Three: Editing Decisions can feel like the pinnacle, even when it isn't
• How organizations become conditioned to experience Communications at a certain level
• Why authority isn't about seniority, tenure, or communications expertise
• The real goal: moving from reacting to decisions to helping shape them before they're made

The distinction is simple but significant: Levels one through three happen after the decision is made. Level four happens before.

You don't have to guess where your team sits. Take the Communications Team Authority Index, a free 10-question assessment, at taramcdonagh.com to identify your current level and what it takes to move forward.

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications, helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review. It helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

In this season finale of the Communications Business Advisor podcast, Tara McDonagh reflects on the themes that shaped the season and what they ultimately revealed about authority in the communications field.

What started as a conversation about authority evolved into something much deeper: the hidden dynamics keeping communications leaders stuck, the "helper trap" limiting advancement, and the difference between building a strategy and creating real organizational behavior change.

• Why authority became the defining theme of the season
• The evolution from "No" → "Partner" → "Authority" as yearly guiding concepts
• How the "helper trap" limits communications leaders
• Why communications strategy is really about behavior change
• What authority looks like in practice inside organizations
• Real client examples of transformation through strategy and structural change
• The difference between being respected and having authority
• A new framework to assess communications authority and potential growth

People often come for the strategy. What they're really building is authority.

Because the real shift isn't the document, the messaging, or even the structure. It's how communications is experienced, engaged, and valued inside the organization.

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications — helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review — it helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

In this third episode of the strategy series, Tara McDonagh tackles one of the most frustrating realities for communications leaders: you built the communications strategic plan … and it still isn't working.

The issue isn't always the communications strategy itself. More often, it's what happens after it's built. This episode breaks down why strategies fail to take hold and what it actually takes to make them operational, adopted, and effective.

• The difference between building a strategy and making it real
• Four common ways strong strategies fail
• Why lack of alignment, ownership, and cadence derail execution
• The concept of strategy as change, not a deliverable
• What operationalizing a strategy actually requires
• How to keep a strategy alive inside a fast-moving organization
• What shifts when strategy truly works

A communications strategic plan doesn't fail because it's wrong. It fails when it never becomes how the organization actually operates.

When the communications strategy becomes real, everything changes: resources grow, influence expands, and communications is pulled in earlier where decisions are shaped.

Keep advising. Always keep advising.

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications — helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review — it helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

In this follow-up to the long-term planning conversation, Tara McDonagh tackles a common but critical gap for communications leaders: having a strategy… that only exists in your head.

You know where the function needs to go. You're making decisions based on it every day. But without documenting and aligning it with your organization, that strategy can't build authority, secure resources, or shape how leadership experiences communications.

This episode explores why that happens, what it costs, and how to move from a mental plan to a strategic framework that actually works inside your organization.

• Why a "mental strategy" isn't enough at senior levels
• The concept of advisory debt and how it limits authority
• The real reasons strategy stays undocumented
• What a written strategy actually does for your role and reputation
• Why plans fail (and end up sitting on a shelf)
• How to build alignment and keep strategy active
• Where to start when you're ready to get it out of your head

The strategy in your head is a starting point. Authority is built when others can see it, align to it, and work from it.

Keep advising. Always keep advising.

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications — helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review — it helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

Welcome back to the Communications Business Advisor™ podcast with host Tara McDonagh. In this episode, Tara tackles a narrative that's gaining traction in the field: that long-term planning no longer works in today's constantly shifting environment.

Her take is clear. That thinking is not only incorrect, it's risky.

While volatility is real, abandoning long-term planning doesn't make communications leaders more agile. It makes them reactive. And over time, that shift changes how the organization experiences communications.

This episode reframes planning as a leadership responsibility, not a nice-to-have. Tara walks through why strategy still matters, the hidden cost when it disappears, and how communicators can approach planning in a way that reflects the reality of today's environment without losing strategic grounding.

• Why the idea that "long-term planning is dead" is gaining traction (and why it's wrong)
• What planning actually does for your role, your team, and your authority
• The risks of operating without a strategic framework
• How perception shifts when communications is experienced as reactive
• How to plan effectively in uncertain, fast-changing environments

Long-term planning isn't dead. It's what anchors your authority when everything else is shifting.

Resources:

taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara in through the Communications Business Advisor Counsel program mentioned during this episode, or on Communciations Strategic Planning. Raise the Tide Shoreline: https://www.taramcdonagh.com/shoreline/Raise the Tide Surge: https://www.taramcdonagh.com/surge/

Sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications — helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review, it helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

Welcome back to the Communications Business Advisor™ podcast with host Tara McDonagh. In this episode, Tara explores what happens when you're not in the right room — and how the right room can completely change your thinking, decisions, and authority.

Building on recent conversations about isolation and helpfulness, this episode focuses on a key shift: strong leadership isn't built in isolation. It's built in dialogue.

Tara shares how even experienced communicators can miss critical angles when thinking alone — not because they lack skill, but because of natural blind spots. The right conversation, with the right person, can change everything.

This episode reframes "finding your people" as something much more than support. It's a leadership strategy that directly impacts how you think, advise, and show up in your role.

• Why strong communicators can still have blind spots in their thinking
• The concept that judgment sharpens in dialogue, not isolation
• How thinking alone creates efficiency but can limit accuracy
• The difference between a room that validates you and a room that sharpens your thinking
• Why most professional environments don't provide the space for true, honest thinking
• The importance of shared context when discussing complex communications challenges
• How consistent dialogue over time strengthens decision-making
• Why psychological safety is essential for real, strategic conversations
• The connection between better thinking, stronger counsel, and increased authority
• How the right room changes not just your confidence, but how your organization experiences you
• The room where your thinking gets better is not optional.

It's how better decisions … and strong leadership … are built.

Resources: Raise the Tide Shoreline: https://www.taramcdonagh.com/shoreline/

Raise the Tide Surge: https://www.taramcdonagh.com/surge/

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor, Level Up: Be Extra, and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications — helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development, and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review — it helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

Welcome back to the Communications Business Advisor™ podcast with host Tara McDonagh. In this solo episode, Tara explores a counterintuitive pattern she sees repeatedly in her work with communications leaders: many talented communicators don't stall in their careers because they're underperforming. They stall because they've become exceptionally good at being helpful.

Helpfulness builds trust early in a career. It creates reputation, reliability, and momentum. But over time, that same instinct can sneakily become a ceiling. When leaders experience communications primarily as the function that executes, smooths, and fixes, it becomes harder for them to experience communicators as strategic partners whose judgment shapes decisions.

This episode unpacks how that shift happens, why it's so common in the communications field, and what communicators can do to reposition themselves from executor to advisor.

• Why many communications leaders plateau not from lack of talent, but from being too helpful
• The difference between being needed for execution and having authority in decision-making
• How communicators unintentionally train organizations to experience them as executors
• The subtle signals that shape whether leaders bring communications in early or late
• Why authority is built through consistent behavior, not titles or structural changes
• The connection between strategy and executive behavior change
• How communicators can shift from refining decisions to reframing them
• Why the transition from tactician to strategist is especially difficult in a misunderstood field
• The role of judgment, business framing, and questioning assumptions in building authority

Helpfulness builds credibility. Judgment builds authority.

The organizations' communicators serve don't need more messaging volume. They need communicators whose insight and judgment shape better decisions before messaging ever begins.

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor:, Level Up: Be Extra and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field Raise the Tide emails for women in the field.

This episode is sponsored by Raise the Tide™, a professional development ecosystem for women in communications - helping them grow, connect, and lead with confidence through mentorship, coaching, professional development and community.

If you found this episode valuable, please rate and review — it helps more communicators find the show and strengthens our collective voice.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.

Welcome back to the Communications Business Advisor podcast. In this solo episode, Tara shares an update, perspective, and invitation. Because right now, if there's one way to describe the collective experience of communications leaders, it's this … it's a lot.

The world feels heavy. The mental swivel factor is high. We are absorbing headlines, advising executives, managing reputational risk, running teams, parenting, partnering, and trying to remain reasonably stable humans.

Tara shares a personal story about a crisis in her own family that revealed something important about high-functioning leaders: when things get overwhelming, many of us isolate. We narrow the world. We close ranks. We "handle it."

But while isolation can often feel like control, it actually makes the load heavier.

And for women in communications leadership, that isolation is frequently normalized.

This episode explores why connection, not withdrawal, is what allows us to move forward.

• The "mental swivel" reality of modern communications leadership
• Why high-functioning women default to isolation during crisis
• The difference between professional processing and emotional processing
• How isolation slowly becomes normalized in leadership roles
• Why communications leadership is uniquely heavy right now
• The cost of carrying complexity alone
• Why connection is not weakness, but a leadership strategy
• How peer spaces reduce the invisible weight of this work
• What authentic leadership looks like during polarized and uncertain times

Tara also shares an update on the Raise the Tide ecosystem and why it exists — not as generic professional development, but as intentional connection and growth for women in communications leadership and emerging leadership..

• Shoreline: The brand new, Raise the Tide community space for connection and ongoing growth in any location or professional environment (agency, consultant, in-house, non-profit). For listeners interested in exploring Shoreline, Tara shares a limited-time discount code for early members (code: NEWCREW)

• Surge: The deeper, more intensive leadership experience for in-house women leaders and emerging leaders with coaching, mentorship, and an in-person retreat. After the upcoming April retreat, Surge membership will close for at least six months to allow the group to deepen.

Learn more at raisethetide.com.

Visit taramcdonagh.com to learn more about working with Tara or sign up for her newsletter on advancing as a Communications Business Advisor:, Level Up: Be Extra and her Raise the Tide™ emails for women in the field Raise the Tide emails for women in the field.

Until next time, keep advising. Always keep advising.