H/Advisors Cicero is the retained public affairs agency for L&G and has been tasked with providing policy and regulatory support, engagement and insight across both the UK and EU.

In addition, with infrastructure being of strategic importance to government both in terms of the Covid-19 recovery and in the Levelling-Up agenda, our Campaigns and Corporate Communications teams were briefed to develop a campaign to reinforce L&G as the leading institutional investor in the UK built environment sector, and in doing so support their overall brand awareness.

Strategy & Execution

Our strategy was to create a distinctive quarterly index that drives regular content to engage with key audiences across web, social media, print / broadcast media and direct engagement. The index also sought to offer a platform for L&G to showcase the impact of their UK investment portfolio.

We designed the L&G Rebuilding Britain Index (RBI) to provide a key benchmark of the UK’s success in ‘levelling up’ the economy across the left behind communities and households in the wake of the global pandemic, identifying the  UK’s investment priorities, regional investment gaps and barriers to increasing investment.

In addition, our team provides day-to-day arms and legs to support to L&G – including stakeholder mapping across Government, Parliament, Whitehall and regulators, providing support on a range of select committee inquiries, engagement briefings and logistics and analysis on key set-piece political events.

The Rebuilding Britain Index campaign really highlights our ability to use the entire H/Advisors Cicero toolkit in order to deliver strong client outcomes across all disciplines – including media, brand and policy

Andrew Roberts – Chief Creative Officer

Results

Across social channels, the first three waves of the index alone achieved in excess of 1,000,000 impressions across Twitter and LinkedIn, with engagement (i.e. likes, shares and comments) of over 40,000 and more than 30,000 video content views. Compared against L&G’s press email benchmarks, all emails concerning the RBI exceeded the click rate.

The dwell time on the RBI hub was six times higher than the website’s average. Equally, the articles published in conjunction with the 2021 waves of the RBI are in the top 10% of L&Gs most viewed articles.

The campaign was covered by major press outlets, including BBC, Sky, Telegraph, Times, Daily Mail, CNBC, Bloomberg, and reached over 1.5 million people. It has also driven enquiries from around 150 central and local government officials. Furthermore, L&G CEO Nigel Wilson often uses RBI data to inform his work on the Prime Minister’s Build Back Better Business Council (BBBBC).

The campaign has also been a success in public affairs channels – using the quarterly reports to drive an MP meeting programme and using the campaign to host a Parliamentary receptions in the House of Commons – including handling all logistics.

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Andrew in H/Advisors Cicero’s campaigns team on andrew.roberts@h-advisors.global

Open Banking Implementation Entity (OBIE), was established through a Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) regulatory order to boost competition and innovation in retail banking by providing an architecture for personal banking data held by high street banks to be shared with other financial services providers, including FinTechs. H/Advisors Cicero is OBIE’s retained communications and public affairs agency, with the objective to support OBIE through a period of intense change and challenge.

Strategy & Execution

H/Advisors Cicero is OBIE’s retained communications and public affairs agency. We have supported OBIE through a period of intense change and challenge including:

• A CMA review, including public consultation, of the implementation of Open Banking. This would determine the future oversight, governance and funding of Open Banking
• An independent inquiry commissioned by the CMA, carried out by Alison White, into whistleblower allegations about the working environment at OBIE. The failings identified by the inquiry resulted in the resignation of the then Chair and Trustee of OBIE
• Supporting the incoming Chair and Trustee, Charlotte Crosswell as she began to overhaul governance and operations at OBIE to prevent a repeat of the failings identified by the White Report
• Helping the organisation, including its new Chief Executive, Henk Van Hulle, move ahead with a positive agenda for the future after the publication of the CMA’s next steps for Open Banking in March 2022.

H/Advisors Cicero provided completely integrated communications advisory, including crisis comms, media relations and public affairs. This helped the leadership of OBIE steady the ship after a period of intense disruption and uncertainty and remain focussed on the delivery of the CMA’s order.

Despite the many challenging scenarios faced during our continuing engagement with the OBIE, the organisation is very well positioned to see Open Banking achieve its full potential. Our agile approach to communications is shaped by an ability to call on technical experts spanning public affairs, crisis communications and in-house research and campaigns professionals, at a moments notice. This enables our clients to contend with the unforeseeable and move forward their planned agenda simultaneously. It is this ability that helped place OBIE in the position it is today.

Adam Taylor, Managing Director Corporate Communications

Results

OBIE is a significant success in the rollout of open banking and is positioned as a likely candidate in the next steps around open finance and smart data.

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Adam in H/Advisors Cicero’s Corporate Communications team on adam.taylor@h-advisors.global

In January 2018, Royal Mail Group (RMG) and the Communication Workers Union (CWU) announced a ground-breaking agreement on matters including pay, pensions and operational change.

Following the decision to close RMG’s Defined Benefit pension scheme, RMG and the CWU agreed to implement a new Collective Defined Contribution (CDC) scheme combined with a guaranteed lump sum at retirement to deliver the best pension arrangement for RMG’s c.143,000 UK employees. However, this required primary legislative change, which the Government and officials were initially sceptical about implementing for just one company.

Strategy & Execution

This long-term campaign began in November 2017, with RMG and CWU called to appear in front of the Work and Pensions Select Committee to contribute to its inquiry into CDC pension schemes. The Committee’s report, published in July 2018, recommended that the Government move quickly to enable the creation of the UK’s first CDC scheme; the Government subsequently consulted on the issue and stated in March 2019 it would bring forward legislation for CDC schemes as soon as possible, also backed by the Shadow Pensions Minister.

As other major political developments – including the change of Prime Minister, turmoil over Brexit, the 2019 election and the COVID-19 outbreak – took centre stage, RMG worked to maintain momentum with senior stakeholders across Westminster. Through the pandemic, RMG updated previous evidence, including extensive actuarial modelling, and informing stakeholders about the impact of COVID-19 on the financial markets and RMG’s proposed scheme.

Our work with the Royal Mail Group and Communication Workers Union really was about making history and shows how strong stakeholder engagement over a sustained period can bring about real world change that makes a difference to the lives of thousands of people.

Tom Frackowiak, Managing Director UK Public Affairs

Results

The Pensions Schemes Act 2021 was given Royal Assent on 11 February 2021. 

The campaign aimed to build cross-party support, see the smooth passage of the Bill, and ensure the Bill was compatible with RMG’s scheme design.

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Tom in H/Advisors Cicero’s UK Public Affairs team on tom.frackowiak@h-advisors.global

H/Advisors Cicero was appointed to support the creation of a thought leadership programme and long-term media engagement for Liberty Specialty Markets (LSM) and Liberty Mutual Reinsurance (LM Re), the overseas specialty insurance and reinsurance arms, respectively, of established US risk carrier Liberty Mutual. H/Advisors Cicero provides outsourced press office and thought leadership support to drive brand recognition and awareness in the UK and EU markets.  

From the outset, the ambition was to provide bolder and broader content and develop LSM’s flagship Unique Perspectives programme – creating thought leadership based on the industry-leading broker engagement event series.  

Strategy & Execution

We provided numerous thought leadership articles, blogs and social media posts, which span from the future of aviation, to the European fine art & specie market to lessons learnt from a Unique Perspectives event with Dame Joanna Lumley. We also created a series of opinion pieces for LSM’s Latin American operations.

H/Advisors Cicero smoothly established itself as the outsourced press office function for LSM and LM Re, successfully pitching LSM into the FT for the first time within weeks of appointment.  

We also reformulated Liberty Specialty Markets’ ESG messaging, working closely with the US based ESG leadership team to equip LSM and LM Re executives with the tools to engage on a global stage on the topic, including at COP27.

Liberty Specialty Markets have demonstrated the power of effective thought leadership in taking complex industry concepts and translating them into engaging and media friendly concepts. This thought leadership programme has provided LSM with a platform to enter into industry-critical discussions they previously avoided, securing a thought leadership position on relevant forward looking topics

Kuba Stawiski, Director of European Communications

Results

LSM has a steady stream of quality, engaging content either published or awaiting its turn as a Unique Perspective, is ready and willing to engage with national and global publications, and has the messaging and tools to respond rapidly and flexibly across a range of topics it previously avoided, including ESG and environmental liability.  

LM Re is in the process of publishing an engaging and unusual series of perspectives on the European reinsurance markets, and LSM and LM Re are now well placed to assume their role as thought leaders for the London, European and Latin American markets.

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Adam in H/Advisors Cicero’s UK Corporate Communications team on adam.taylor@h-advisors.global

NOW: Pensions were looking for retained support across their public affairs and communications agenda. This included campaign support across the launch of a hard-hitting report on the “under-pensioned”, designed to facilitate amendments to policy.

Strategy & Execution

H/Advisors Cicero form a seamless extension to the NOW: Pensions communications and public affairs team. Contact is frequent and the reporting line is straightforward and near instantaneous, with single sign-off provided by the policy lead on each space. NOW: Pensions and Cicero maintain both regular email and phone contact for day-to-day activity and communication through WhatsApp to react to immediate crises, urgent events or time-sensitive actions. When several NOW: Pensions communications staff left the business, account executives from Cicero swiftly stepped in on a secondment basis to help fulfil needs.

With a deep understanding of every ongoing workstream., H/Advisors Cicero were able to apply our significant experience of pensions policy and related media knowledge to plan and execute the launch of the ‘underpensioned’ report.

NOW: Pensions have demonstrated how to engage media and policymakers effectively under the remit of a single campaign. Whilst it is not everyday people consider their pensions, the topic has a considerable impact on the welfare of millions of people, and is best addressed at the legislative and regulatory level. That does not mean that you cannot make the topic engaging. Our approach has always centred around making pension jargon digestible and accessible, which in turn, makes it more palatable to news readers

Adam Taylor, Managing Director, Corporate Communications

Results

NOW: Pensions has significantly increased its profile as a business. The “underpensioned” report was a stunning success. Now: Pensions exceeded all objectives set by the campaign, with 183 pieces of coverage (a 186% over-delivery), 11 of which were national (83% over-delivery), 36 pieces of trade coverage (500% over-delivery), 127 pieces of online coverage (154% over-delivery) and nine broadcast interviews (a 350% over delivery).

The campaign as a whole generated 4.7 million social media impressions across owned and partnership content, an 840% increase on KPIs.

NOW: Pensions then went on to present two policies to HM Revenue and the minister for pensions. If introduced, these policies would generate an additional £1.2bn in annual pension contributions and see an extra 2.5 million people access a workplace pension.

The term “underpensioned”, promoted by H/Advisors Cicero to policymakers and the media, has entered industry parlance and prompted the launch of multiple Government consultations on policy change.

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Adam in H/Advisors Cicero’s UK Corporate Communications team on adam.taylor@h-advisors.global

H/Advisors Cicero has provided public affairs support for Barclays since 2012, spanning its retail, investment, and corporate banking business. Through the course of our relationship, we have provided strategic advice, monitoring support, engagement campaigns, crisis support and arms-and-legs support for many of Barclays’ public policy priorities.

Strategy & Execution

Our objective has been to cover numerous fast-moving and complex policy areas, ensuring that Barclays is at the forefront of the conversation and able to advocate for its interests, both proactively and in response to relevant policy developments including:

• Tracking (both backward and forward-looking) of legislative and regulatory activity providing regular updates on the status of Parliamentary Bills, statutory instruments, discussion papers and consultations. For priority legislation, tracking of amendments during the passage of Bills.

• We also track the broader political sentiment on the bank through a weekly database of social media comments from political stakeholders.

• Support on the design of events, such as Barclays’ activity at the political party conferences.

• Ongoing support in mapping stakeholder targets across Westminster, Whitehall and other relevant bodies as well as engagement support where relevant. Ad-hoc advice on business-critical political developments.

Cicero’s ongoing support relating to the FSMB has been invaluable. They have provided critical insight into what to expect from the Bill, and helped structure our understanding of this wide-reaching legislation which touches on all areas of Barclays business

Barclays Government Relations Team

Results

Our guidance and counsel during the last decade has included supporting Barclays through major policy upheaval, including:

• The UK’s exit from the EU and the associated reforms to the UK’s financial regulatory landscape

• Major reviews into Wholesale Markets, the Future Regulatory Framework, the implementation of Basel 3.1, Fintech and Ringfencing among others

• Closure of bank branches as the industry moves towards online and other forms of banking, a key focus for MPs

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Tom in H/Advisors Cicero’s UK Public Affairs team on tom.frackowiak@h-advisors.global