While studying, he took part in two parliamentary campaigns and then spent three years working with the then Minister of Science and Education, Blaženka Divjak. During that period, Maro Alavanja worked on communication surrounding education reform, a strike, earthquakes and school closures during the pandemic. Today, he is the co-founder and director of the communications agency Narativ, where he continues to work on projects in political communication and other areas.
Alavanja graduated from Edward Bernays College of Communication Management, where he received the Dean’s Award. Over the course of his career, he has advised ministers, members of parliament and local politicians, as well as company and startup founders, investors, board members and representatives of the nonprofit sector. Political journalists in Croatia nominated him for the title of best PR professional in political communication in 2019, and he frequently comments on political developments for the media.
In this interview with Media Marketing, he discusses the pace of work in government and how quickly a crisis can grow beyond the issue that started it. He reflects on the response to illegal waste disposal in Croatia, explains where his team uses AI tools and why projects such as School for Life remain important to him. He also talks about the PRO PR Globe People Achievement Awards recognition he received for his work in the profession.
You began your career in the public sector, at the Ministry of Science and Education, and later opened your own agency. In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges in political communication today?
After two parliamentary campaigns, in which I worked as a nonpartisan professional in junior roles while at university, a turn of events brought me to the then Minister of Science and Education, Blaženka Divjak, with whom I spent three exceptionally demanding years. The first reform in 27 years, affecting children, mums and dads, grandmothers and grandfathers, teachers; two earthquakes, COVID-19 and the first school closures in Europe in 100 years, the longest strike in Croatia’s history… There was simply no crisis we did not go through, and that is the defining feature of communication in government: constantly changing topics and audiences. It is a pace and intensity after which nothing can surprise you anymore, but which also take a toll on physical and mental health. In the attention economy we live in, it has never been harder to be a politician.
Crisis management is becoming increasingly challenging because of new technologies and digital platforms, while crises can develop almost instantly, partly because of artificial intelligence. How would you assess organizations’ understanding of crisis management, and how do you view the crisis Croatia is facing over illegal waste disposal?
Organizations are aware that communication matters more than ever in today’s world, particularly in the age of AI, but there are still serious problems with adequate budgeting and with executing communication concepts and strategies that look great on paper.
As for the waste management crisis that has been shaking the entire country for a month now, it is a communications and sociological case study in how not to manage processes. It also shows how even the most experienced communicators can suffer a communications fiasco if they do not fully understand the issue and if they underestimate the public.
Beyond affecting the government’s approval ratings and relationships within the coalition and even the opposition, the snowball effect has reached smaller communities, where the NIMBY (not in my backyard) effect has now taken hold. We have not seen the Croatian public so united and motivated in a long time, and this issue will not disappear from the radar anytime soon. The greatest praise goes to the NGO sector, which raised a local issue to the national level. That is how you participate in democracy.
We are witnessing the rapid development of artificial intelligence without a complete legal framework, while agencies are increasingly using it to make their work easier and improve it. What is your view of AI and its role in communication projects?
AI tools are something new that, whether you like it or not, have been imposed on the entire industry at this point. At our agency, our chief digital person and Narativ team member, Sandro Hamzić, brings them to us every day. As a boutique agency, Narativ simply has to adapt to the market, however challenging that may be. Accordingly, we use AI tools every day, precisely as you said, to speed up and simplify research, digital marketing, organization and similar tasks that do not require much deliberation or decision-making, but are purely operational. So yes to AI tools for speeding up and optimizing work processes, while the human element remains crucial in developing strategy or creative work.
Which project in your career are you particularly proud of, and why?
School for Life is definitely the project dearest to me and the most important one I have worked on in my professional life. Beyond its communication aspect, it matters to me that I made some small contribution to making Croatia a better place to live. Then, of course, the first things that come to mind are those for which you have been recognized by the profession: two regionally recognized public health campaigns on muscular dystrophy for DMD Hrvatska and an award-winning local election campaign for the Istrian party IDS-DDI. I will never forget the moment we turned Alma from Marčana, the grandmother who was the party’s spokesperson at the time, into a national TikTok star and showed that politics, too, can be communicated on TikTok in a different and more effective way.
What does the PRO PR Globe People Achievement Awards recognition mean to you?
To begin with, it was a pleasant surprise that professionals around the world recognized our effort and commitment to the profession. I think it also helped that, when I comment on public events and politics for national and regional media, I genuinely try to do so in a balanced and objective way because I simply want to bring a little common sense to the airwaves. On the other hand, I think the award is important for Narativ as well because, alongside our existing awards, it further shows that, although we are among the youngest communications agencies in the market, we can comfortably compete with the big players.
