.svg){kind=logo}
October 15, 2026
October 15, 2026
I first got to know Joe Ziemer in 2017 when he led communications and policy at Betterment, a client of ours at the time. He spent nearly a decade there, helping the mission-driven company evolve from a fintech startup to an innovative financial institution meeting the needs of an evolving investor base. After a year at blockchain technology company Figure, Joe became head of strategic communications at Jefferies in 2022, serving institutional investors, regulators, and reporters who can move a stock by the afternoon.
We got on a call recently and talked about why he says no to the media far more than he used to, what it takes to build comms discipline around one of Wall Street's most unfiltered CEOs, and why he's living two separate AI lives. This is an edited version of that conversation.
You spent nearly a decade at Betterment before moving to Jefferies. What actually changed about how you do the job?
What's most interesting is how much has stayed the same. Both organizations move quickly, and the cultures are more alike than many people would expect. Beyond the difference between operating as a public company versus a private one, the biggest change has been scale. We're a large global organization with more than 6,000 employees, offices in 24 countries, and a broad range of businesses and products. As a result, my decision-making requires more analysis. When evaluating a story or communications strategy, it's no longer a matter of considering a single audience or business objective. It requires balancing a wider range of stakeholders, perspectives, and potential outcomes to ensure alignment and confidence in the approach.
When evaluating a story or communications strategy, it's no longer a matter of considering a single audience or business objective. It requires balancing a wider range of stakeholders, perspectives, and potential outcomes to ensure alignment and confidence in the approach.
Are you saying no to the media more often?
A lot more. Especially at early-stage companies, you operate with almost no leverage. You want to say yes because you're building from scratch. You might have 15 employees, and any time someone hears your name, it feels like a net positive. As you grow, you've got to be a bit more selective, and learn to say no. If you say yes to everything, there's an expectation that you will always say yes.
Sometimes the right move is to pass, sit tight for six months, wait for the momentum to line up, and strike when the iron's hot. There's always a risk the opportunity doesn't come back around, and you have to get comfortable with that.
At Jefferies, Rich Handler is one of the more visible, unfiltered CEOs on Wall Street. What's it like building comms discipline around a principal who wants to be out there?
He has his own voice and ability to get his message out via social media. He also doesn’t seek conventional media attention. That’s why we are hyper-selective about what we ask him to participate in. It has to be something he is comfortable discussing and that he believes is additive. He wants to talk about the things that matter to him: our team, culture, mentoring, the success of our clients, helping to build a firm with purpose, and the financial markets. That is what he cares about professionally, which isn't always what an interviewer is after.
Is authenticity a pattern with the executives you've worked with?
It's a common trait of many of the best CEOs I've worked with: Andy Dunn at Bonobos, Jon Stein at Betterment, and Rich at Jefferies to name a few. They're all authentic, passionate people who built something real. Your job is to let them harness that energy and find the right spots for them to engage.
With every key stakeholder, the most important thing is making sure they feel you're not just informed about the business but invested in its success. You act like an owner, not an employee. That's a standard ethos in tech, but Jefferies is unusual for an investment bank—a distinct culture that's more entrepreneurial and flatter. Everyone at the firm acts like an “owner,” and I have to bring that mentality to work every day.
With every key stakeholder, the most important thing is making sure they feel you're not just informed about the business but invested in its success. You act like an owner, not an employee.
Crises move faster than ever. How do you think about managing them?
The expectation now is a faster response than even two or three years ago. But with thornier issues, often the worst thing you can do is put out a statement that turns out not to be accurate once you've parsed all the information. It's okay to acknowledge you're still working through it, as long as you're clear that you’re taking it seriously and you're gathering what you need. We see companies go rapid-fire and later it comes back as egg on their face, because they hadn't grasped the full picture. The bigger the organization, the more outside pressure there is for a quick response. But the worst move is a self-inflicted wound.
The bigger the organization, the more outside pressure there is for a quick response. But the worst move is a self-inflicted wound.
Let's talk AI. How has it changed your day-to-day?
I hadn’t really had that eye-opening moment where AI tangibly improved my life until I started using Instinct. Historically, I’ve neglected my personal inbox, but now I feel more on top of it than ever. It has helped with a wide range of tasks, both reactive and proactive, from switching my car insurance to a better policy at a lower cost, to coordinating family logistics and booking appointments. I probably spend just a few minutes a day using it to handle things that I otherwise would have ignored or spent considerably more time managing.
At work I use a variety of AI tools and agents, but none have been as impactful as what I can do with it in my personal life. One work area where I think AI has been underappreciated is as a measurement tool. For example, I’ll ask how investment banking franchises are perceived within a particular sector. Over time, as we’ve emphasized different business lines, you can see those shifts reflected in the responses from large language models. In more complex situations, I’ll use a series of prompts over several days to gauge whether our message is resonating in the market and how it may be influencing perception.
My biggest friction point is that I’m effectively living two separate AI lives. I have to keep work and personal use completely separate, which means managing two parallel systems. A bigger unlock would be the ability to blend those experiences in a way that mirrors how I actually think and work. At the same time, there are legitimate concerns about exposing work data to newer applications that have not yet been thoroughly vetted from a security standpoint, particularly given the sensitivity of the information in my inbox. I think that’s a challenge many people in highly regulated industries are navigating today.
Which comms leaders do you gravitate toward in the field?
The communicators I admire most are the ones I meet who are rarely part of the story. They prefer to stay in the background and build. I'm saying that while fully aware I'm doing this interview right now—which I rarely do.
It's funny. Our summer interns ran an analysis of executive visibility across banks, and outside the assignment they looked at my role and other CMO roles, too. On LinkedIn, I wildly underperformed a lot of my counterparts. I'm okay with that. I used to see it as a negative when a CMO was more active in the media, talking about the marketing work as much as a CEO was talking about the company and product in the press. I don't think those two things mesh well.
What keeps you sharp in a global role across all these time zones?
Two things. I'm a voracious consumer of media, probably dozens of outlets a day. I've read the news since I was a kid, asking my parents for more newspaper subscriptions. It helps me think about how things will translate and play out.
The second is counterintuitive. I have two young kids, and I think that's increased my ability to be comfortable with some level of chaos. It's made it easier to absorb the body blows and still focus on what needs to get done. It's helped me prioritize what matters most and not sweat the small losses, which is hard to do early in your career. People can certainly do that without kids, but it has helped me.
Joe Ziemer is the Global Head of Strategic Communications at Jefferies. This interview is part of Signalmakers, a Mission North series exploring how modern communicators blend curiosity, critical thinking, and creativity to lead in an AI-driven world.
