Spitfire Sparks

Young people take center stage as Spitfire brings their voices to the forefront. Annabelle Gardner believes in the power of young people to change the world. A devoted advocate for youth — particularly in the areas of mental health and foster care — Annabelle feels strongly that...

Every month, Spitfire hosts a strategy lab where we discuss best practices or hear from external experts to improve our craft and make us smarter. For the March strategy lab, we held a special alumni edition, inviting former Spitfires to join current staff and explore a topic...

Data is inherently neutral. How you obtain data and what you do with it is what makes it good or evil. That’s at the center of the recent firestorm with Facebook and Cambridge Analytica, the data analytics firm founded by Steve Bannon and Republican megadonor, Robert Mercer. On...

A conversation with Spitfire President Kristen Grimm on the historic achievements of women — past, present and future. It is well worth celebrating the accomplishments of women during Women’s History Month, but the fact is that women are making history every single day. That’s...

Being patrolled by armed military guards at a conference gala in Latin America. Getting driven through the dark of night in Kampala, Uganda, unable to see anything through the tinted windows of a beat-up Toyota Corolla except for fire pits burning in remote villages. It’s all in...

Spitfire’s special sauce is its people. They are tremendously talented and committed. We know they would never brag about themselves, so we are going to do it for them. This occasional series gives you a chance to get to know the people of Spitfire better. Enjoy. Seeking the...

As someone who finds there are never enough hours in the day, I value the time I do have and appreciate every morning’s moments. I begin each day in a similar fashion: wake up, open my window, put in my headphones and turn on my favorite podcast. “From the New York Times, I’m...

At Spitfire, we’ve been engaged in the fight to preserve a free and open internet for nearly a decade, so we know how far we’ve come – and how far we still have to go. We’ve always understood that achieving the big victory of permanently preserving the open internet is a long...

Volunteering offers more than a chance to network, build your skills and feel the satisfaction of doing a good deed. Serving our communities strengthens us professionally and personally, and makes us want to give back all the more, creating a virtuous cycle that helps us as much...

Today, I woke up to the news that President Donald Trump had created “political headaches for Republicans,” and my immediate response was yippee. No, not because I am mean. I, for one, love when something unanticipated opens up a big fat opportunity – one I couldn’t create no...

At Spitfire, we pride ourselves in our ability to use effective communication to make positive change in the world. But in an era of “truthiness” and “fake news,” breaking through the clutter is easier said than done. To make our messaging stick, we need to understand not only...

The same week I started Spitfire in 2002, Chris DeCardy – my mentor and the first person to hire me many years earlier – asked if I could write up a memo about how to do communication planning. No problem! I told him I’d have it to him by the end of the week. As it turns out, it...