Call it a communications conundrum. 

The world shouldn’t be just uber connected, but overflowing with lightning rod social issues. And fashion brands are feeling the pressure — from consumers, shareholders, employees, seemingly everyone — to take a stand and make a difference. 

But what stand? And what issue?

When almost every little thing alienates someone and so many are shouting, just when should corporations wear their hearts on their sleeves and the way do they know what to say and what to not say? 

There aren’t any easy answers, but a duo of former White House staffers have formed Second Floor Advisors with a watch toward helping corporations work out how one can speak while standing on the intersection of politics, fashion and social impact. 

Founded by Thomas Isen and Alex Yudelson, the advisory’s name is a nod to their former perches within the West Wing under President Joe Biden. 

Isen was the first liaison between the president and his cabinet on the White House and before that worked in quite a lot of roles in fashion, beauty and retail, including stints at Charlotte Tilbury and Dr. Barbara Sturm. Yudelson served as executive secretary of the Domestic Policy Council under Biden in addition to President Barack Obama’s liaison to the sports teams, leagues and athletes and chief of staff of the City of Rochester. 

“Whether it’s a celeb, a fashion brand, a retail brand, a sports team, an athlete, everyone seems to be existing in the actual world at once,” Isen said. “Crises just keep mounting and persons are being asked or being forced to reply in ways in which they’ve never needed to.” 

From gun control and racial justice to the assault on LGBTQ rights to the Supreme Court takedowns of Roe v. Wade and affirmative motion, society appears to be at any variety of cross roads.  

“There does appear to be more happening, and I feel that’s only a function of the more connected world that we live in at once,” Yudelson said.  

“We aren’t of the philosophy that somebody needs to talk out on every issue under the sun,” he said. “Knowing when to talk out is as necessary as knowing how one can speak out and what you say and the way you do it.” 

And controversy abounds. Witness Goal, which pulled a few of its Pride-related merchandise from stores after receiving threats in addition to complaints from some shoppers. Then there was a backlash to the backlash and drag performer UltraViolet launched a petition to encourage Goal “to not give in to anti-LGBTQ+ bullies.”

Yudelson said: “As a matter of kind of principle, we shouldn’t let a couple of protesters at a Goal stop a multinational corporation from just simply having some clothes which are inclusive. And so to the extent that you simply are seeing some conservative backlash, we expect we’re well positioned to each help alleviate that, but additionally to offer the message that you simply don’t must kowtow to a couple of, a really small minority of those who just occur to be very loud.” 

Yudelson and Isen aren’t lobbyists, but communication guides and advisers who know whom to refer to in Washington and how one can make the suitable connections. 

“What we would like to do from the social impact viewpoint is to take this beyond a performative social media post,” Yudelson said. “So if you happen to actually care about LGBTQ rights, if you happen to actually care about voting rights, if you happen to actually care about gun violence issues, we would like to be the those who let you know how one can communicate about this in a way that moves the needle in the suitable direction or be the those who brings you to D.C. so you should utilize your platform to maneuver the needle in the suitable direction.”