Mastering Public Safety Communication: Insights from Braden Frame S6 - E11

In this episode of the PIO podcast, Braden Frame, CEO of the Cartographers Group, shares practical strategies for enhancing public safety communication. We explore how leadership, technology, and authenticity shape community trust and organizational success.

Key Topics:

• The importance of trust and transparency in public safety messaging
• Aligning leadership behavior with effective communication strategies
• The evolving landscape of social media and AI risks
• Building strong relationships with media professionals
• Developing a written crisis communication plan
• Metrics for measuring communication success — focusing on outcomes, not just output
• How to manage corrections and maintain credibility during crises
• Long-term strategic planning with content calendars
• Skills future PIOs will need, including technology literacy and relationship building
• Practical tips for internal and external stakeholder engagement 

I built my career on the front lines of public safety as a firefighter and a nationally registered paramedic. On and off the job, I served in crisis response, political action, and labor leadership, learning how to lead decisively when the pressure is highest. A line-of-duty injury in 2020 ended my time in public service, but not my drive.

I went on to co-found Reactor Graphs and the Cartographers Group, building a national force in public safety strategy, campaigns, and lobbying, delivering results that strengthen the lives of public servants and the communities they protect. Most recently, I served as the Chief Commercial Officer for Wrap Technologies Inc, a publicly traded company with technology products in public safety, defense, and the rapidly expanding counter-UAS market. I've led marketing teams, product launches, internal and external partnerships, and executive leadership, as well as product R&D, trademark and patent filings, and training across the United States and Canada.

I've spent my life making tough calls in environments where trust and clarity matter most. Today, I help mission-driven partners do the same, operating with purpose, precision, and resilience when the outcome truly counts. As an experienced fractional Chief Operating Officer, I am ready to help your executive team lead and deliver with operational support and design for scale and success.

www.bradenframe.com

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Transcript

Robert (00:00.128)
Today on the PIO podcast, we would like to introduce Braden Frame from the car... Let me go back and do that again. Today on the PIO podcast, we would like to introduce Braden Frame from the Cartographers Group. Braden, thank you for being on the show.

Braden Frame (00:16.078)
Thanks for having me, Robert. Really excited to be here, talking about this stuff.

Robert (00:19.398)
Yeah, you know, today's episode, we're going to talk about leadership communication strategy with an emphasis on some practical takeaways from public information, officers working in public safety and government. And you came, you came up, you, you, you offered your, your insight and background. So I'm going to pick at it a lot. So first of all, for our listeners meeting you for the first time, how do you describe the work you do today? with Cartographers Group?

Braden Frame (00:46.648)
Yeah, so right now I'm the CEO of the Cartographers Group. I've done operations here and been kind of leading our strategic communications team and effort with police and fire and EMS for the last four years since we started. Before that, though, I was on the job as a firefighter paramedic down in central Texas. And during that time, I spent a lot of time doing public speaking, advocacy, advocating. I was the president of our local union and had a number of opportunities to work with the press, work with RPIO.

administration and kind of talking about public safety as a brand, not just as an afterthought, I think, in the public eye.

Robert (01:23.912)
I agree. And well, let me just say, so you guys are a, a boutique group for public safety and government organizations. that PR group?

Braden Frame (01:25.752)
Boom.

Braden Frame (01:32.334)
Yeah, yeah. So our goal, we primarily work with police, fire and EMS, public safety, public sector unions. We do some work with agencies from time to time. We do a little bit of work with public safety adjacent technologies. But primarily speaking, we're working with cops and firefighters. And we're one of the only shops where everybody who works for us has been on the job. So everyone's been either an EMT, a police officer, a firefighter or a paramedic.

Robert (01:58.019)
outstanding. All right. So your focus is on strategy and messaging. What problems are you most often brought in to help organizations?

Braden Frame (02:07.224)
You know, the biggest problem we see, and I think that anybody who normally listens to your podcast, who's a PIO or who's on the job, it's a misunderstanding of what it's like to do this every single day. And I think that there's a lack of appreciation because so many things that law enforcement officers or firefighters or paramedics or EMTs tackle every day, we think of as ordinary. It's just what we do. And I think that the general public, because

Hey, what did you do today? I just did my job. Well, you did this amazing. you know, just happy to be here. That's what we say. We've said that for so long. And so the true risks, the everyday decisions, the impacts of those decisions, I think are so often misunderstood. And so when the time comes to pay more, spend more, invest more, buy more, get the latest thing, get the right thing, the community doesn't understand.

the value exchange for that. And so that's where we really try to help them and where we try to make sure that we've got elected officials who understand those things and communities who support our public service.

Robert (03:07.968)
All right, so that kind of goes with what you see these organizations, they struggle with when it comes to a communications strategy, right?

Braden Frame (03:16.27)
Yeah, I mean, and you think about the last, you know, I was around when Facebook pages were not appropriate for firefighters or police officers. Oh, we don't do social media. You know, that's not appropriate for no comment. We're not going to make a page like that. It's just going to turn into a cesspool. Like I remember having those conversations back in the early 20 teens. And now, you know, the expectation of transparency has completely evolved.

And even with that evolution and PIOs being at the front of that, think fighting for that, because no one understands it more than those who are out there making the posts. I think we're still constantly working against this idea of insulatory communications internally and the public's continuing growing appetite for more. And trying to bridge that gap in a way that protects, I think, the public servants. We have to make sure we protect the integrity of investigations and officer safety and, you know, the work that we do. But there is a demand and accountability.

Robert (03:42.559)
Yeah.

Braden Frame (04:10.188)
with the public that we serve who pays the bills and cuts the checks.

Robert (04:13.854)
Right, absolutely. so how does leadership, so you work closely with leadership, how does leadership behavior show up in public messaging, whether they realize it or not?

Braden Frame (04:23.554)
You know, the most important thing that a chief could remember about this is that saying nothing is absolutely saying something. You know, it goes back to, I remember in the first time that I was going through some of the advanced fire training and they would tell us, you know, not making a decision is making a decision. You know, inaction is one of the worst decisions you can make. And we see that leadership pause in communications when things get tough.

And so I think that that's really important for leadership. I also think it's really important to understand that there is a trust that has to exist between command staff and frontline communication staff. And it goes back to, I've used this example a few times in talking to chiefs, is you trust us with a million dollar fire engine. You trust us with a gun and the choice to make a life or death instantaneous decision. But you put the air conditioner inside of a plastic cube where I can't adjust the temperature in the middle of the summer.

Like where's the trust there with that boss? We've got to work on these things. And I think any PIO who's been told they can't make that post or they shouldn't have made that comment understands. It's like, you got to trust us. got to let them get out there and do that work and become that extension of the brand of your local public safety agency and really get into that, those weeds there. Cause that's where the community and the coalescence builds.

Robert (05:20.755)
You

Robert (05:46.034)
Yeah, no, I, I agree a hundred percent. I That's a great analogy about locking up the, the air conditioning. like that. What breakdowns do you see? What communication breakdowns do you see when leadership, and communication teams aren't aligned?

Braden Frame (06:01.59)
You know, whenever we're not on the same page, I do think it always comes back a lot of that to trust. And some of that is, is a difference of perspective of risk management. So, so often you'll see administrators, chiefs, legal professionals, city attorneys step in with a very limited approach to risk management. And on the other side, you'll see the public information officers, the union presidents, the communications directors, people who are out there saying, Hey, there's a vacuum.

of information, vacuum of truth. And I've always taught that in the vacuum of truth, the rumors become facts. And it's very difficult for the bean counting bureaucratic legal folks to understand that you can't allow that vacuum to exist. And if I on a tangent of like half a second, I have a personal experience of this. We had a really critical incident at my fire department. We had a bad day.

Bad things happened. People got hurt. Citizens got hurt. Oh, is that a car on fire? It was a day. And there was a divide between administration and myself and the communications wing representing the association at the time, not the fire department, but about how we should communicate and how much truth we should put out. And I said, hey, more is better because they can find out anyways. We're not giving out information that isn't

public or isn't in the public domain. We're giving out information that if they knew where to look, they will find this. So let's make it easy for them. And we were able to control a very difficult story by being more transparent and telling the whole story rather than what was easiest to focus in on. And we got an excellent result for both the firefighters, the community, the department. was a good day overall. And I know it doesn't always work out in our favor in communications, but I do think that the more often willing to at least consider more, we get better.

and we get more trust as we build.

Robert (07:57.888)
You know, I couldn't agree more with you on that. It's funny you bringing it up. used to, I was in a meeting one day and it was me, the chief of police, a deputy chief, the city manager and the mayor. And there was a conversation about an incident that happened. We were kind of strategizing some things and, and the secretary comes in and says, uh, Mr. Mayor, there's a reporter that liked to dig into things that's on the phone wants to speak to you.

And he goes, tell them I'm on vacation. I'm not in.

Robert (08:34.378)
We all looked at each other like, you're right here. Just tell them you'll call them back and we'll come up with some talking points. And he goes, no, he says the way I handle this, just don't call them back.

I mean, that's not going to work. It's not going to because it's going to come to myself or the chief. Yeah. But that's the way he was. He was not there. He was not a mayor very much longer after that. He had a he ended up retiring. But still, just that kind of mentality. It does more damage to the organization than it than that. And. Yeah. All right. So how do PIO is better? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Braden Frame (08:48.59)
No, that wouldn't work 20 years ago. Yeah.

Braden Frame (09:11.078)
They're gonna find it too, right? They're gonna find it, you know, with Google and Facebook and Instagram. If you don't give them the department picture of your member in uniform, that's the nice one, they're gonna find the worst one from that guy on a beach somewhere on his personal Instagram from 30 years ago. If you don't provide their full resume and experience, they're gonna take the one clip that they can find from some awful report from 10 years ago. And that's gonna be the story. We've got to appreciate how much...

Robert (09:27.392)
Alright.

Robert (09:34.674)
No. No.

Braden Frame (09:38.313)
Access exists today too. It's just a different world.

Robert (09:40.736)
And how easy it is to get it. mean, anybody can do a background check on somebody for four bucks online and get enough information then to unravel somebody's world. It's not hard to do. So how can PIOs better position themselves as strategic partners rather than just the message distributor?

Braden Frame (10:02.36)
So I like to believe that the PIO is like the brand icon. They're the mascot. They are the public face of this entity. And we think about mascots in sports and how they get their own kind of person. I mean, they represent the Colts. represent the Fortin... They represent these iconic teams, but they are their own personality.

and they have their own way of communicating with people and they build this kind of informal relationship that allows them to be formal speakers. And so I really have always encouraged anybody who's going to represent an agency as a PIO, spokesperson, communications messenger, press coordinator, whatever you're gonna be doing out there where you're gonna be the contact, it's gotta be you as the person, not...

badge, you know, not the office, but be a person there. Because when you can do that, reporters pick up on that and they're more likely to talk to you, listen to you, you have a relationship with them. And the community members pick up on that. And when the community says, hey, Robert, tell me what really happened. I really want to understand this. Hey, I've got a question for you. And you get a message in your inbox and you can be like, hey, man, yeah, happy to tell you about this. This is what we're doing. This is what's going on. You know, this is

You know, this is why it matters. This is how keeps you and your family safer. That intimate relationship is something that just can't be bought. And it builds a level of credibility that is, you know, really inoculating to the bad days. It really gives you level of credibility.

Robert (11:36.926)
Yeah, I've had, I've had relationships with reporters where they call me and like, Hey, I know it's real early. And they're like, is this, this worth me coming out to? And I'll just say to them, yeah, you're probably going to want to come. And they're, they know right away that by me trusting, by me being honest and saying, it's going to be an incident, you need to show up to do your story. And then there'll be those times where.

They'll call and I'm like, this is not something you guys normally cover. And they'll realize that I'm talking maybe about a suicide or something along those lines. They don't, they don't cover those unless there's something more to it. But on the other hand, they've also been, Hey, I got this great story and I'm going to, I'm going to give it to you. I'm going to give you the whole package video and all that. And they're like, thank you. I just was trying to pitch a story to my editor and they didn't like what I was giving them.

Or to the producer or whatever. And now you've just given me something that will give me a lot of, good press for, for me with my boss, but also for the community. So I think that you're right. You have to have those relationships with them. Plus you could, you know, they always say, don't trust a member of the media, but if you have that strong relationship with them and they already know that what you're giving them is truth and honesty in situations.

that you could turn to them and say, listen, can you hold off on this? I know you're asking about it, but hold off on it. And I'll give you information when the time comes, but could you hold on? And I've had that relationship with several and they've been really good about it.

Braden Frame (13:19.886)
Well, and I think you are on the law enforcement side. And I think law enforcement has an incredibly difficult job, you know, especially in this day and age, especially with the state of affairs and the way that the media is. But we would never want a reporter to say, I don't trust Robert, don't trust anything he says. We would want some credibility in that relationship. And at the same time, I think the reporter's professional understands that

Robert (13:44.927)
Right.

Braden Frame (13:48.918)
If you're the PIO, you have a job to do, you have a mission, you have a brand, you have a system you have to ensure. We have to understand that the media, the reporters, they're in the same boat. They've got a job to keep. They've got a story to tell. They've got some, just like a citizen. You can't say, we don't trust citizens. You can't tell them any of this stuff because, you know, they're, they're just going to go put it on Facebook. Well, no, have a reason for this too. And if we understand, think also people's motivations and this very symbiotic relationship of communications and public speaking and being aware of our brand.

We can find a good balance that helps them tell the story, helps us build our relationship with our communities and ensures that public safety is always the bottom line of what we're doing.

Robert (14:31.86)
Yeah, absolutely. Braden, when you assess an organization's communications approach, what are those first warning signs that that strategy is not working?

Braden Frame (14:41.646)
It's not written down. It's not written down. There's a drill. have a really good friend of mine and we've taught crisis comms and strategic comms for the last decade together. And I'm gonna steal his line. He looks at the audience, he says, how many of you have a plan when things go bad? half the chiefs raise their hand. You all the PIOs raise their hand. Great. How many phone calls do you have to make in the first 30 minutes? And most of them can't answer that question because they don't actually have a list of who they have to call.

Do you have an officer involved shooting? You have a line of duty death. You have a civilian injury. You have something bad happen. How many people do you, as the chief executive, PIO, communications member of your department, do you have to reach? And do you have that list written down so you can start coming through it? Or are you gonna accidentally miss a phone call, call in the wrong order, or make a mistake because you didn't prepare? That right there, if you don't have that list written down, you're not ready. And that is the first question that I always ask when we're getting into a new relationship, is what do you do when things go bad?

What's your plan right now?

Robert (15:43.84)
Yep. Nope. I like that. You know, it's interesting. You know, I, when I was a, and that's a row many years ago, I revamped all of the, the, the schools crisis plan. So was the little flip charts, flip it up. Hey, active shooter, lost kid. What do you do? And it's boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. When I redid our crisis communications plan at the, at the PD, that was exactly the way I did it because I wanted to make sure that it was just flip it up.

go to that incident and run through it. And it worked. And I did the same thing when I revamped city, each building's crisis plan for each building. I did the same thing. you have to have it written down. You have to have all that stuff there. Cause you're right. Your brain, we're human. We're going to miss something. We're going to get another phone call and then we're going to forget who to call.

Braden Frame (16:37.142)
And there's a reason why the airline pilots have a checklist for every emergency. There are just some things that you don't want to do my memory and you don't want to make a decision. Do I call the city manager or the mayor first after an officer involved shooting? That's not a decision you should be making in that moment. You should have a plan for that and you should have already briefed both of them about what's going to happen because that shows your professionalism. I think as a PIO that shows your level of leadership as a chief officer and executive is that you've already been thinking about this.

Robert (17:04.266)
Right.

Braden Frame (17:06.042)
And you've worked out why we call the mayor before the city manager or why we call the city manager before the mayor. And that way they understand and can appreciate those decisions in that moment. It makes it so much easier to stand with us in a crisis when everyone is going by the same sheet of music and on the same page.

Robert (17:23.272)
I liked it. Braden, many agencies focus on that output, push it out, push it out, push it out instead of outcomes. How should PIOs rethink success when it comes to communications that way?

Braden Frame (17:36.152)
I like to think quality matters. And I like to think with the algorithms, especially on social media, I think if you stick in the social media realm today, quantity is not the best answer. know, true quality is engagement is relationships are. And I think that when we're approaching how to communicate, we are building relationships.

And so I want every communication, everything we talk about, every time we speak to come back to our core mission, our core values. And if you don't have a plan for what those things are, then you need to work on, you need to sit down and really tabletop that. was, our fire department was small, six stations, 96 firefighters on the job at the time that I was there. We weren't super busy, but we ran, we ran a good number of things at a highway, you know, that ran through our city.

And our slogan was Lake Travis, you you call, we're there. And that was the core message at the end of every communication. And that was our brand. And if you talked to the community, or you talk to, you know, my firefighters who made fun of me for it, or you talk to the chief who would give us, you know, laughs over it, or you talk to them, that was us. And everything we talked came back to that. And I think it's really important to have those little nuggets that, you know, there's a reason why Nike is just do it. There is a reason why...

You know, the original diet coke is a thing and it's a part of it. And so I think that if we can copy those things, it's just, have so much more value to give.

Robert (19:01.852)
And you talk about this consistency that plays a huge role in shaping your public perception, right? Over time.

Braden Frame (19:08.554)
Absolutely. No, you you have they know, you know, they know the media knows, but the community knows too, you know, and every once while you can even find the community can tell when you took a day off and somebody else is doing your job and posting for you, they can tell they know what's going on. And if you're doing a good job.

Robert (19:23.678)
I never had a day off. I was, I was posting one of my days off because nobody wanted to do it. They were like, I'm not doing it. I don't want to touch it. They keep me away from Facebook. I don't want to do it. I was on vacation once and I got a phone call from one of our detective sergeants. Can you put this out? I go, I'm in my swimsuit on the beach. He was all emailed at all to you. I I'm like, really? You have the access. Just do it. Yeah.

Braden Frame (19:32.738)
Yeah.

Braden Frame (19:51.054)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, we gotta overcome that fear. That's an important fear to overcome, you know, we're getting there. We're getting there. Yeah.

Robert (19:55.74)
It is, it is. It's much better. It's gotten much better. Yes. I have many partners now that for the agencies I used to work for that are doing just fine now. So let's talk about, advising organizations on growth and innovation. How should the new technology that changes with AI, how is that helping communication workflows now?

Braden Frame (20:18.956)
You know, man, what an opportunity and what a trap AI is for public safety and PIOs. I think there's two ways to answer this question. I'm gonna try to cover them both kind of quickly. Number one, you have got to understand what's out there. You've got to be in it. As a human being person who is in law enforcement, in public safety, on the fire side, in a PIO role, in communications, you have to understand and see all of it.

Robert (20:25.054)
Yep. Yep.

Braden Frame (20:47.01)
and you have to try to do your best to keep understanding it, because it is moving so fast. You will be behind a lot quicker now than you ever realized. Also, I think conversely as part of that, the only way you can protect your brand from the reputational harm that is coming from bad actors using these new tools against us is by knowing it and by trying to plan for it today. And we are already seeing that in Minnesota. We are seeing bad actors create false flags about what didn't happen with law enforcement.

and what didn't happen with protesters. We're seeing both sides of the equation. We're seeing protesters who are having their images altered and put out as fact. And we're seeing videos being created of law enforcement doing things that never happened. And that is the canary in the coal mine for a PIO in any department, in any role, anywhere. I saw a really great post from a firefighter friend of mine who does public information and strategic communications. And he showed a post

Robert (21:30.965)
Yeah.

Braden Frame (21:46.552)
that showed a firefighter who was saving a baby from 1916, 14. Some old black and white picture told the story of this guy and how he saved this baby and then he heroically died right after. None of it was true. And it wasn't a slam on the baby or slam on the fireman or the department. It was just all fake. But it looked close enough where people were like, it's so amazing. We should remember his heroism. That is the warning sign for all of us. Should we be adopting it?

we should find a way for it to fit into our workflow. But more importantly, we should be training now to protect against this upcoming threat. Because the most important thing we've come back to, you and I have both talked about it already here. I've heard you speak about it on the podcast before, is credibility, transparency, authenticity. And this is a direct threat to those three key pillars of the work.

Robert (22:33.344)
And if you're not prepared for it, and if you can't recognize it and you can't react to it, you're going to run into a heap full of problems. I just finished writing a course on dealing with AI and the impacts to an agency when they either target an agency or they target an officer. I have a whole lesson plan for that. And I'll tell you, the research that went into that and what I've seen agencies that have been targeted and the pace, how slow they were.

in responding.

Braden Frame (23:04.27)
They didn't even know it half the time, I bet.

Robert (23:05.98)
No, no, they did not. And by the time they did, it was already full fledged out there. And then they were playing catch up to try and get out from underneath it. And that's where having having alerts set up on your on Google alerts and and paying for a service attract hashtags and all that other stuff. Those are important things that people should be doing. All right. So let me ask you this.

What mistakes you see agencies when they adopt that new platform too quickly or that new tool too quickly.

Braden Frame (23:38.254)
No, they don't know what they don't know. mean, what's the old one? There's a hashtag. It's a great story. was a DiGiorno's Pizza, I'm going to say, nine or 10 years ago. They were new on Twitter back when it was cool. And the hashtag that was trending that day was why I stayed. And their social media guy, girl, person hopped on there.

What hashtag why I stayed de journo's and why I stayed that day happened to be a hashtag that was specific to domestic violence and women who were trying to tell their story about how, why they had stayed and how it impacted them and how terror. And that was the moment for domestic violence survivors awareness day. And they didn't know they just stepped in. And I think it's a simple way to explain how quickly doing something new that's trending, that's fast and going too fast can create reputational harm. Their pizza company.

I'm probably the only person who talks about it now 10 years later. But if you were a cop and a PIO or a chief, that thing would be stuck with you for years. And the expectations of the public from public safety, public servants is so much higher. So we really have to make sure we're trying new things that we fully understand them. And that's really difficult. It's really difficult, I think, to know everything.

But that's what I think teams are for, and think that's what experts are for, and that's what we just, have to make sure that when we're doing something new, we're not scared of doing new things, but we truly do understand how to use them and how to best use them.

Robert (25:16.404)
You know, you bring up the hashtag thing with DiGiorno and I go back and I've been using this for, I was teaching social media for agencies 15 years ago, right in the early stages of it. And my NYPD hashtag that went out and it was an idea of one of the big social media people and actually a big PIO person now.

She came up with this, put it out and did not realize this was, this was just before she put it out. And it was right before they had the whole, Wall Street thing happen. And they took over that section of wall street. and it was pictures of #my, NYPD officers, brutalizing people, hitting them with batons, you know, doing all kinds of stuff, sleeping in squad cars. And that was the hashtag.

It just it they just got blasted. But the original thing was, tell us about NYPD doing good things. It was my and you know, and they didn't think that it was going to go negative in it. And it went negative right away.

Braden Frame (26:26.092)
Yeah, yeah, it'll get away from you quick. But you know, I mean, think it's kind of, it's so interesting when we think about new technologies in public safety as a culture, I think we're really slow to adopt new stuff. And that's kind of been, it's been okay, because one, a lot of times people didn't know any better in the public and two, we're kind of the subject matter experts in public safety. So if we're a little slow to get to it, then, you know, not a big deal. But in communications, we,

Robert (26:49.034)
Mm-hmm.

Braden Frame (26:55.074)
there's a higher expectation. And so I think it does put a lot of responsibility on the subject matter experts in each department, the teams that you're working with, to be able to give good advice to leadership about when you can use AI, when you can use a new social media platform. Should we be on Blue Streak or Substack or what is the next way of communicating with our general community and really getting into that.

Robert (27:21.62)
And you really have to know what your community is utilizing too. mean, there are a lot of small social, well, larger social media platforms that some communities would never use. But if you have an Asian population, WeChat is a big one that they use. So, you know, you, you may use it. And I do know an agency out in the, on the West coast that does quite a bit. but where I'm at the, we don't have that kind of population. So it would not.

Braden Frame (27:40.334)
Yeah.

Robert (27:48.979)
would not support or benefit in us in any way.

Braden Frame (28:01.72)
Don't lie about dumb stuff. Just be cool, you know? One of the best stories I ever had was when I just told people why Smitty Fire and just show up when you call 911. And it was this long diatribe about, you know, why, what they all do and how every person actually has a job. And that thing blew up. It went well outside of our community. It went into the city. It went into the county. It just kept going for months. And it was because it was something that we took for granted.

but that they really appreciate. And I think that you build trust by sharing honest, authentic things about the work, the risk, the success, the choices that officers, firefighters, paramedics make every single day. Those simple things, you know, the decision to use this medication or this medication, the decision to enter into a home or not, the decision to, how you decide when you write a ticket or give a warning. Just that methodology, those thoughts are all things that

It's normal if you're on the job. But if you can bring people back and bring them in and keep telling them and story tell it, the storytelling is how people learn things. And you can story tell those things. They understand the work that you're doing. When they understand the work, they understand the people. And when that person has a brand and is a reputation, it builds that institutional trust.

Robert (29:23.136)
Yeah. I think back to this course that I teach for Texas A &M is one of the things in there is in the absence of information that you can share, give them the process of what is going to happen. And that process is such an important part for the public to understand that, oh, that's why they're doing it. That's why the road has been blocked for so long. They have to do this. And that helps them.

Braden Frame (29:36.802)
Yeah, absolutely.

Robert (29:52.981)
then believe, okay, this is credible. This is a realistic reason why that's been closed for as long as it has. So yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Braden Frame (30:01.334)
especially when someone does something wrong, especially when we know this ain't gonna be a good day for somebody. someone is gonna be having some paperwork, someone's union rep is getting called. We know that pretty early. And when we know that, explaining the process and being able to say, here are the things that we do to ensure just due process, clear investigations, transparency, accountability, and everyone.

Robert (30:07.668)
Yeah.

Braden Frame (30:28.578)
being fully aware of those things, I think it helps people understand why it takes so long, why we're doing what we're doing, why I can't answer a question today, but I might be able to answer it in a week.

Robert (30:40.998)
Right. But when, when messaging starts to drift from reality, what steps should communicators communications teams take to realign it?

Braden Frame (30:48.974)
Full stop, you gotta get everybody back on the same page. And usually you have to bring everyone back to the document, to the strategic communications plan, to the branding kit, whatever that is and say, hey, this is what we all agreed to six months ago when everything was chill and we were drinking coffee and hanging out writing this thing. And now maybe something bad happens, maybe something challenging happens, maybe we've just kind of gotten off the rails, but we've drifted, we're way over here. So we need to decide.

Is this the new norm? Do we need to rewrite the strategic communications plan and head down this new road? Is this our new path? Or do we need to work on a course correction back to what we agreed to do previously? Because communications isn't so strict that it never changes. We do have to adapt to politics, emergencies, events, leadership, the decisions of a city council. We have to adapt to those things. But we need to do that in a structured, strategic...

I think, documented way, which is how most of us think in public safety. Like when you get on the job, you think to those things. And so having a written down communications plan can guide you. And when you get away from it, that could be okay, but you have to make that conscious decision to update, to make sure we're all doing what we wanna be doing.

Robert (32:08.0)
I always ask, whenever I do, when I teach my PIO courses, the first thing I ask people is, where's your crisis communications plan? And somebody will say, it's on a shelf. I go, it's not sitting on the desk next to you? No, it's on a shelf. So I know that it's got dust on it. They've never really looked at it. And that's the first thing I say, pull it down. When was it last updated? Cause it's probably going to be a problem.

Braden Frame (32:17.048)
Mm-hmm.

Braden Frame (32:31.724)
Mm-hmm. Yep, absolutely. You're 100 % right.

Robert (32:35.648)
How do you recommend leaders and PIOs handle corrections without damaging confidence in the community?

Braden Frame (32:41.666)
I think you have to be structured. You have to be clear. You don't have to answer more than the question that you're correcting, but you do have to be truthful. And if the answer is, we made a mistake, that's okay. If the answer is, I did not have a piece of information that was critical at the time, so I want to provide you with the most up-to-date information, that is okay too. When we are human beings, we can be fallible.

When we pretend that we're not human beings and we are just a shield, we are just a badge, we are just a logo, and we are perfect, then we put ourselves in the position where that becomes the expectation. And so I think that goes back to the humanity of the person, hey, you know what? I got some more information. I need to make a correction from earlier. This is what we know now. And I think people in general,

are going to fall into two very broad categories. They're going to be the normal human being people who can understand it and appreciate transparency. And then there's always that 20 % of trollers who are going to troll and that's okay. We have to know, and I think we have to tell command staff and tell the chief going into it. These people are going to hate you and say mean things no matter what you do. You could have told them the truth two weeks ago. They're still going to say what they're going to say. That's okay. Those people are in a block of audience that are not influenced by public communications. And that's part of life. It's these people.

It's this group of general population who deserves our best and deserves us to constantly be striving to be as truthful and as transparent as possible.

Robert (34:20.618)
Thank you. Brennan, from your consulting work, what communications habits do high performing organizations all share?

Braden Frame (34:29.518)
I think they're in it. They're in it all day, every day. They're like you. They're like how I was when I was on the job in that role. They're listening to the scanner. They're following the alerts. They're tracking their brand reputation. And they consider the reputation of their brand as an individual, the reputation of their role as PIO president, communications director, media specialist.

and the reputation of their agency as key critical things that are worth protecting and building every single day. And truly, like to make corporate examples, I think it makes sense to a lot of people. You don't see Coca-Cola take a day off. Every single day, wherever you go in America, if you drive down the road, you have seen a Coke ad, whether you realize it or not, whether it was...

the Coke ad that's on the cup when you ordered a Sprite, whether it is the Coke ad that is on a billboard, whether it's on a truck, whether it's in the, you've seen one. And every day they're working to make sure that you remember that genuine, real, original Coca-Cola is the best drink on the planet. And that's to an extent what I believe we should be striving towards. And we're not Coca-Cola. We might be 17, know, firemen or cops in a small town of a community of 5,000. It's different at scale, but truly,

I think high performing teams are constantly thinking about how can I talk about us better? How can I tell our story more? And I think that's key.

Robert (35:57.867)
Yep. Yeah, I agree.

Go ahead, go ahead.

Braden Frame (36:03.688)
I think it's key, period.

Robert (36:05.94)
Yeah, absolutely. It is key. No, it is. I look at, I don't know if you have ever seen Indianapolis, Metro PD. they, they have a, a series that they do about the officers and it's, it's all about why they became police officers. And it's always bad. It's such a really good series that they have. And it just, it, gets people to understand who the officers are in the community, but they also see that they're human. And I think when you can humanize those officers and

those firefighters or anybody in your community for the public, they're gonna feel more trusting of the agency then.

Braden Frame (36:43.318)
No, you're absolutely right. yeah. The storytelling of why you came here, how you got here is, I think, so valuable and truly important. And we've seen, I think we can all imagine the other side. We have seen the general public, we have a friend, a family member who has said to us, they would never do that. Right? When some story comes out that is negative about a pop star.

personality, political person, whatever, who they have a communicational relationship with. I have an invested relationship in the success of my quarterback. He would never have done that. And that's their first response. But something bad comes out about a police officer or a firefighter or an EMT or one of our members. well, you know, we should, that, that kind of crap should never happen in my city. Where's the present? Why are we jumping to conclusions? You, you didn't think your quarterback did that thing that came, well, he would have never done that. Our goal.

I think my goal is always that that's how I want people to think about my team, my officers, my firefighters, my members, you know? And that's the goal. It doesn't mean that everyone, while they don't do that, and we have a lot more work to do, that's what the crisis comms plan is for. But this is the goal of where we wanna start in building our reputation.

Robert (37:48.533)
I liked it.

Robert (37:59.125)
Right. Do you have advice that you can give PIOs who are managing both internal expectations and external pressure?

Braden Frame (38:08.418)
They should all be managing internal expectations and external pressure every single day. And if you're not doing that, then you're not doing half of your job. Anybody who is in communications has to understand that there is a demand to communicate internally every time before you communicate externally. The first time your members, your fire chief, your police chief, your detective squad should be hearing about something should not be necessarily from Facebook, especially if it's important, especially if it relates to them.

The demand and it's funny I see in crisis comes and crisis comes plans all the time You go through the list of everybody they have to call they call the mayor. call the city manager They call the city attorney they they call the fire chief. They call the police chief They call the EMS division blah blah blah They get down to it and then they have press release call the media have a press conference and I ask When are you gonna tell the rest of the police department about what's going on? When are you gonna give them the official position?

of management. When are they going to be making sure that they're in the loop about what's going on, the presumptions of innocence, the due process? Where are we at? You know, and they, yeah, that's right. They are an audience also. Your political officials, your public, your community stakeholders, your media, and your membership, your employees are audiences that are key and critical. So I would tell...

You know, my advice to any PO, if you're not working the internal comms of that audience, you're missing a key audience that matters in everything that we do.

Robert (39:38.602)
Thank you for saying that because I think a lot of PIOs still forget internal expectations and communication. Brandon, if a PIO wants to move from reactive messaging to a long-term strategy, what's their first step?

Braden Frame (39:53.39)
sit down, piece of paper, a pencil, because you're not going to write the first time, a glass of wine, and write down where you want to be, and then work backwards from there. Every good campaign, communications campaign, political campaign, crisis comms campaign starts with where you want to be at destination. I want to win city council. I want to grow our Facebook page by 500%. I want to not be getting yelled at about this crisis that occurred.

in my community, whatever your destination is. Now work back from there. How much time do you have? I know when the election date is. What's a reasonable expectation for growing our Facebook community? What's a reasonable expectation for getting out of the auspice and criticism of an officer involved shooting? What's the reasonable amount of time? That by the way, is going to be years because you have a judicial process that follows that. So there's time you have to build from the time. And then, okay, what's my long-term, short-term, medium-term goals? And how do I achieve those?

and you really have to break it down. And then what happens is that you've gone through this very deliberative, exhaustive process, but at the end of it, you have strategic things that you can start doing today and you don't feel overwhelmed about tomorrow because you know when you should hit those measures. And I think that's the best way to get out of a rut. And the best way to be proactive about tomorrow is to talk about where you want to be then.

Robert (41:14.014)
Yeah. And I also look at like having a long-term marketing campaign or a marketing strategy for your agency. So what you're going to talk about over the 12 month period of the year, a lot of those are repetitive. So every year, every September, we know it's national preparedness month and so on. So you, you plan the things that you're going to put out and have a content calendar for that.

Braden Frame (41:40.416)
your ongoing communications absolutely need to live into a calendar in case one of us gets hit by a bus. And key things that should be on there, if you have them, is when was your department founded? When was the, how many police chiefs maybe have you had, depending on how old your department is? When was the first female officer, firefighter, paramedic, hired? Have you had any line of duty deaths ever in your agency? And are those on your calendar every single year?

Robert (41:48.724)
Right.

Braden Frame (42:09.582)
And then there's all the holidays and all the community events. does school start? When does school end? And when do they go on spring break? And you start working your way out from there. That calendar, I think that's PIO 101. And if you don't have one of those, you definitely gotta go start over there for sure. That's the baseline of what you do every day talk.

Robert (42:27.328)
All right, Braden what skills do you believe PIOs will need more of in the next few years?

Braden Frame (42:34.465)
Hmm.

Braden Frame (42:38.254)
I think I don't want to say that you have to become technologically sound because I think you can be a great PIO and still be an idiot when it comes to the internet. I think that is possible. If you have good advice and a good team, you know, I never was a hazmat guy, but I had some guys who are really great at it. Right. Like, and they could tell me what to do and we could do good things together. I think it's OK that you don't have to be an expert in AI. You do not have to be an expert in technology or social media. But.

It is essential if you are the chief who does not know how to log into your Facebook account, that you have a team that you trust to give you good solid advice and they're a good team. We must have people on our team who understand how fast technology is moving and the evolving expectations of our communities. We have to have that, but it doesn't have to be you, but it does have to be somebody that's on the team and that's trustworthy.

Robert (43:34.24)
Right. I agree. I agree. What final advice would you leave with PIOs trying to strengthen their agency's communications approach?

Braden Frame (43:43.244)
You know, try to have lunch with your boss at least once a month. And your boss's boss if you can pull it off. I think that we, when you're in a pointed position like a PIO, which is usually an appointed position, you normally test for that job, right? You are there because of the grease. You're there because of the system and that's okay. I think that's fine.

But I think that we have a responsibility to keep selling, keep branding, keep showing why we're good at this job and why you should keep trusting us and why you should keep earning your position. think everybody in public safety from a rank line firefighter, patrolman, EMT up to the office of chief should be trying to keep working to keep their job every single day. Cause all of us are one bad decision for this being the last day of our career. We all are.

Every single decision you make could be that one. And so we all have to keep that goal in mind that we are fighting to earn this really great, amazing opportunity, responsibility, and this really amazing trust that the public has in us. And so I think that as a PIO, we want to keep earning that public trust. We need to keep earning our bosses' too, and keep showing them how we're showing up and how we're...

We're all in how we're building that brand every day. And I think that we can do that, we'll keep the right people in the right seats.

Robert (45:12.458)
Braden, is there a question I should have asked and if so, how would you have answered it?

Braden Frame (45:16.406)
No, these were great. mean, I've had a blast. think this is, I think it's a really important conversation because I think that I would want any PIO anywhere to know how critical they are to the success of their department, more so than I think a lot of people give them credit for. And the ones who are really killing it out there, the ones who are out there making a difference every single day are

building their personal brand. They are building their personal brand with their community. And I would want them to know that that's okay. That's not self-serving. That's not individualism. That is not aggrandizing. That is absolutely the key hallmark of doing your job, just as important it is for a chief to build their brand in the community every single day. And if everyone's doing that, man, good things are happening for those of us who are on the front line, digging ditches, know, kicking doors and doing cool stuff.

Robert (46:04.969)
Yep, absolutely.

Robert (46:14.193)
Nice. All right, let's go to some rapid fire questions.

Phone call, voice mail, or FaceTime.

Braden Frame (46:21.004)
Funko.

Robert (46:22.877)
streaming binge or weekend read.

Braden Frame (46:25.315)
streaming bitch, don't like to, I know, yeah, there's no reading. Reading's terrible. It's slowest form of communicating whatsoever is reading.

Robert (46:28.831)
You

Morning rituals, sunrise workout, quiet coffee, new scroll.

Braden Frame (46:35.63)
wait, sorry, coffee. Yeah, night owl.

Robert (46:38.303)
What's your, I've earned this indulgence for a tough week.

Braden Frame (46:43.918)
a nap. I'm a big fan of naps. Fire Service naps.

Robert (46:50.353)
If you could adopt an animal, real or mythical, what would it be?

What's the one song that always gets you moving no matter what?

Braden Frame (46:58.318)
I'm a big fan of Shake It Off by Taylor Swift.

Robert (47:02.279)
Nice teleportation or time travel.

Braden Frame (47:05.479)
Time travel, absolutely. Yeah, I would never work a day in the rest of my life ever.

Robert (47:10.855)
If you could master one skill overnight, what would it be?

Braden Frame (47:14.246)
Linguistics, I would love to speak additional languages. I think that'd be super cool. Communicating with new people, cool as it gets.

Robert (47:20.735)
Play it safe or roll the dice.

Braden Frame (47:22.274)
Roll the dice. Every day.

Robert (47:24.487)
If you had, yeah, it's PIO's way. If you had 48 hours and no responsibilities, where are going?

Braden Frame (47:29.838)
To bed, I'm tired, I'm very tired. I got kids, I got jobs, I got response. I'm taking a nap, turning my phone off, it's gonna be great.

Robert (47:38.089)
There you go. What historical figure would you want to shadow for a day? Not just me.

Braden Frame (47:43.034)
shadow four. that's a tough one. I don't know. I don't have a rapid fire answer to that one. I don't know. think there's so many cool people that I don't know who I'd want to follow around that could be that could be interesting.

Robert (47:50.354)
Okay.

Robert (47:54.856)
Okay. All right. No worries. Final thoughts. What key points do you want our listeners to take from today's interview?

Braden Frame (48:00.774)
You're doing great work and it's important and nobody realizes how hard it is and keep going because you are the face, the front line and the tip of the spear when it comes to brand protection and reputational building. And if you suck at your job, we all suck at our jobs no matter how good we're doing.

Robert (48:22.643)
Nice. As we wrap this up, is there a piece of wisdom or a motto that you live by?

Braden Frame (48:28.99)
There's a great movie from when I was a kid called Cruppier, had Kaleiwa went in it. I steal his line from that one and he said, hang on tightly, let go loosely. And it was about gambling, but I just, I've always kind of dug that line. It's not in like my email since or anything, but yeah, hang on tightly, let go loosely. When you've got something you hang onto, when it's time to let go, just move on, it's okay, yeah.

Robert (48:51.185)
Nice. Where can listeners learn more about your work with Cartographers Group?

Braden Frame (48:55.618)
Yeah, so the Cartographers Group, we're just CartographersGroup.com. It's a fancy old word for Map Maker. Or you can find me on LinkedIn or online at braidenframe.com.

Robert (49:06.235)
And you just answered my next question. How can people reach out to you if they want to follow up? So there you go. Thank you.

Braden Frame (49:09.836)
Yeah. Follow up, Bradenframe.com. Make a meeting, reach out, happy to hang out, answer questions. I love this stuff and I love, you know, I got hurt on the job. So I was, I was on the job. I had a couple of injuries. I had a really bad one and I didn't get to go back to work. And this is the one thing that's allowed me to stay connected to the really incredible work that I know that police officers and paramedics and EMTs and firefighters do every single day. And so yeah, reach out and you know, keep doing great work. It's really important.

Robert (49:38.537)
Thank you, right. In today's conversation, we focus on leadership and communication strategy, the real world challenges that public information officers and public safety and government face every day. We talked about what aligning leadership with messaging, the technology, protecting credibility. Those lessons apply whether we were working on a day to day media relations or preparing for that next crisis response. I want to say thank you, Brendan, for everything that you do. And thank you for being on the show.

Braden Frame (50:07.47)
Thanks for having me, Robert. Absolute pleasure.

Robert (50:10.002)
All right, and we are out. Nicely done,

Braden Frame (50:13.934)
Thank you, sir. Thanks for