August 2026 Member Spotlight: Samantha Rae Ayoub
Each month, IABC Ottawa does a Q&A with one of the members of our chapter to learn about their career and experiences. To kick off the 2026-2027 season of this series, we spoke with Samantha Rae Ayoub about her lessons from a career as a communicator in STEM, how communicators can position themselves as trusted advisors, and her best tips for putting together a communications plan.
Your Title: Samantha Rae Ayoub, MA, CMP, Founder & Chief Strategist, Matters of Science; Vice-Chair, IABC Canada East Region
1. Your work focuses on translating complex science and research into stories that resonate with policymakers, funders, partners and the public. How do you make information accessible without losing the nuance and credibility behind it?
This is definitely one of the top questions I seem to get! I would say that in order to make complex scientific information accessible while also maintaining its credibility and accuracy, you need to get three things right: First, understand what matters to your audience. Why do they care? What are their pain points? What action should they take? It’s the old WIIFM trick, or “what’s in it for me.” Put yourself in their shoes.
Second, as a communications professional, you need to work avidly to genuinely understand the science. When you work in science, it’s not enough to skim the abstracts and conclusions. You need to dig in and become science literate enough to understand the research, its limitations and why it matters.
And lastly – and this point is perhaps the most important – always (always!) work with the researchers themselves. The best science communication happens when researchers and communications professionals work together. We each bring different expertise and perspectives to the table, and that collaboration is what allows you to make the science accessible without oversimplifying it.
2. Many communications professionals aspire to become trusted strategic advisors. In your experience, what actually earns a communicator influence in important organizational decisions?
Oh, I’m a sucker for a good leadership question! It has been my experience that earning influence starts with building trusted relationships and proving that you know what you’re talking about. This takes a lot of time and effort, and it’s the “hidden work” that comes with the job.
Practically, I think I would offer a few tidbits of advice for communications professionals: First, I would say that it is important to remember that communications professionals are not tactical doers but rather strategic business advisors. If you are only thinking about tactical communications and not about the business of the organization and what matters to the CEO, then earning influence will be impossible. It is vitally important to understand the organization’s objectives, goals, risks, problems and financial situation. To be a trusted advisor, you need to understand how the organization actually works and the kinds of things that keep the CEO and stakeholders up at night.
Second, I would say, don’t be afraid to tell it like it is and say no when you need to. The best CEOs I have worked with don’t want people who tell them “yes” all the time. They want people who will share their perspective, find solutions, and also tell them when they think something is a terrible idea.
And lastly, I would say, don’t wait for the title to start acting like a leader. Support and encourage people, ask questions, listen to what matters to them and figure out how you can help them succeed. Get to know people across the organization, not just within your own team. Over time, the relationships you make will help you understand what matters to people, where you can help and how you can make your team’s work visible.
3. When you’re developing a communications strategy, what are the first questions you ask before any planning begins?
I think, like most communications professionals, I tend to ask “why?” or “so what?” a lot. Why do you want to do X? What is the “so what?” And why should I care? Anyone who knows me has probably heard these questions come out of my mouth more than once. But I have found that these questions can quickly get people focused on messaging and wordsmithing, so I like to add some bigger questions to the conversation.
When I’m developing a communications strategy, and especially a science communications strategy, I tend to ask things like: What impact are we trying to have, and why? What change are we trying to make, and why? Who needs to know about this, and why? What do we want them to do, and why? Does this align with the business goals of the organization, and how?
I also think the regulatory and political context sometimes gets missed, especially in science communication. It’s great to say you want XYZ to inform policy. But have we paused a second to understand how policy-making actually works? Do we know who we should be talking to and when those conversations need to happen? Do we know whether what we’re asking for is actually possible within the current regulatory environment, or whether major changes would be required?
As you develop your communications strategy, it’s very important to understand the ecosystem in which you are working and to ask yourself some questions about the practical realities and constraints. Otherwise, you risk mistaking information-sharing for communications strategy.
4. You’ve communicated with researchers, executives, governments, funders and the public. How do you build trust when stakeholders have different priorities and expectations?
Over my career, I have found that establishing trust requires two things: building meaningful relationships with stakeholders and building solid brand equity. In short, people need to trust you personally, and they also need to trust the organization you represent. Both are a long game, and neither happens overnight.
To build relationships with people, there are no shortcuts (sorry!). You need to reach out, talk to them, understand what they are working on and what their priorities are, and figure out how you can help or be supportive. You don’t have to sell a thing or close a deal all the time. It’s just like they tell you in crisis communications or media relations: you don’t wait until you need a story covered to build a relationship with a journalist, and you don’t wait until a crisis happens to talk to your stakeholders. The same principle applies here. Invest in building the relationship before you need something from it.
You also need people to trust the organization behind you, and for communications professionals, that comes down to brand equity. Is it clear what your organization stands for? Are you consistently demonstrating expertise, credibility and integrity? Are you putting useful thinking out into the world? Do your leaders have an online presence? Are your communications clear and consistent? All of these things shape how people perceive the organization and whether they see it as credible and trustworthy.
As for different priorities of stakeholders, I don’t think trust is necessarily dependent on the specific thing you are delivering. If I’m a professional chef and I make you an excellent lasagna, you might trust me to make a great eggplant parmesan for someone else, even if you hate eggplant. You are trusting my expertise and judgment, not necessarily the thing I made for you. The same applies to communications. Stakeholders will have different priorities and expectations, but if they trust your judgment, your expertise and the organization you represent, that trust can extend well beyond a specific issue.
5. IABC Ottawa is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. Why do professional communities like IABC matter, and what message would you like to share with Ottawa’s communications community as we look ahead to the next 50 years?
It’s an exciting year! Happy 50th Anniversary to IABC Ottawa!
For me, IABC matters as a professional community because it helps set the standard for our profession globally, and it connects communicators across the world. At IABC, you will find people to learn from and be inspired by, but just as importantly, you will also find people who will cheer you on and support you as you navigate new and sometimes scary opportunities in your career. I’ve personally made several lifelong friends through IABC whose work I admire and who have cheered me on along the way. Pictured here are the members of the executive board of IABC Canada East celebrating the launch of my new company, Matters of Science, and I am forever grateful for their support.
As we look ahead to the next 50 years, I think the thing I would like people to remember is this: the role of communications professionals is important now more than ever. We are living in an attention economy, trust is low, misinformation is everywhere and AI is changing how quickly and easily content can be produced. Anyone can churn out a social post, design a graphic or write an annual report in a few minutes. But those are things we do. They are not what we do.
Our job is to understand people. We focus on what employees and stakeholders might think and feel, what will land with our audience and what won’t, where an organization is aligned and where it isn’t, how to tell an impactful story and how to help a leader communicate something that actually matters. That work takes judgment, context, strong relationships and a deep understanding of people. And those things will always matter.
6. If you could recommend one book, podcast, newsletter, course, or other resource that has shaped your thinking as a communications professional, what would it be, and why?
Oh, this is a tough one. I’m going to cheat a little and give you two.
Radical Candor by Kim Scott has shaped how I think about leadership and working with people. I appreciate the notion that you can care deeply about people while still being willing to challenge them, give direct feedback and have difficult conversations. The kindness lesson in it is also something I take forward with me in my career: Yes, it’s important to be kind to people, but sometimes being kind means being candid and giving direct feedback. If you say nothing, well, at the end of the day, that’s not very kind.
I also really enjoy Under the Influence with Terry O’Reilly. Listening to the stories behind advertising campaigns has been an excellent reminder over the years to always think deeply about my audience and what makes people pay attention. The episode about Texas’s anti-littering campaign in the ’80s, “Don’t Mess with Texas,” was one of my favourites. Telling someone not to do something in advertising rarely works, but the campaign creatives really understood their audience and tapped into something very important to Texans: pride. That kind of audience insight is something I’m always looking for in my communications strategies.
