Geopolitics and us.
A growing network for a changing world.
Welcome again to our weekly Not in Dispatches newsletter. Rather than a deep dive into a current topic, we wanted to instead give an update on Geopolitical Dispatch.
First, this coming Tuesday we’ll be sending our 100th dispatch since we began writing at the start of May.
Turning 100 is a big deal for anyone. And while we’re only a few months old, we’re celebrating that milestone by bringing on three new team members.
They will help us build our daily geopolitical reports into what we hope will become the world’s most useful, informative and concise daily summary of international developments for business leaders, investors and executives.
More on who they are shortly, but for those who have only recently subscribed, you may have missed our origin story.
Michael, Cameron and Damien are three friends and colleagues who had an idea.
Having worked in politics and government, we were familiar with the lengths taken to make sure leaders were fully informed of current affairs, without being swamped by too much information.
Entire teams of analysts would be dedicated to a single briefing document. Overkill? Perhaps. But the need for rapid and accurate information in high-stakes situations should never be underestimated.
Having worked in media, we were also familiar with the changing (and in some ways breaking) business model of global news and analysis.
Useful data and intelligence were too often buried beneath social media clickbait, hot-take opinion, and gossipy filler. And more recently, there’s computer-generated verbiage and barely disguised disinformation to wade through. There’s still great reporting, but it’s dispersed and getting harder to find.
Written by former diplomats and industry specialists, Geopolitical Dispatch gives you the global intelligence for business and investing you won’t find anywhere else.
And having worked with academics and think tanks, we knew that while the output of economists and political scientists had never been higher, finding signal within the noise is increasingly difficult.
Who, after all, has the time to read through a 30-page journal article, or a 50-page analyst report to get to a nugget of truth? And in a publish-or-perish academic culture, is the research presented really accurate or novel?
We realised nothing like the US Presidential Daily Briefing existed for a senior business audience that was time poor, but needed precise and frequent analysis of what was going on – ‘situational awareness’, as they say in the military.
We wanted to do for executives in business what leaders in government had been getting for years – something sensible, digestible, informative and daily. And hence, Geopolitical Dispatch was born.
Fast forward a few months later and we have been delighted to attract a loyal following of readers across every continent and various industries.
Our intuition that geopolitics was everyone’s business proved correct. Whether you’re in finance, market research, manufacturing, trade, agriculture, technology or consulting, it seems you agree – geopolitics matters to you.
We now want to build a sustainable business model and will announce some new further changes in the coming months.
In the meantime, joining Michael, Cameron and Damien are three new team members. Check out our About Us page to see the full bios, photos and connect with us on LinkedIn.
With the brevity of a media digest, but the depth of an intelligence assessment, Daily Assessment goes beyond the news to outline the implications.
First, we’re delighted to welcome Yuen Yi Chang to the team.
Yuen Yi is a former Singaporean diplomat in Jakarta and the United Nations in New York. She studied at Fudan University in Shanghai and speaks fluent Mandarin, Cantonese and Indonesian. Her insights into the world’s fastest-growing region make her a valuable addition to our international team.
Second, we’re also delighted to welcome Andrea Palasciano.
Andrea is a former business correspondent in Moscow, currently based in New York. Born in Germany, educated in France, raised in Italian and fluent in three other languages, Andrea is Europe in one person. She’s also an award-winning journalist and will be helping us extend our reach across the media.
And third, we’re very pleased to welcome a fellow former colleague from Australia’s foreign service, Kim Northwood.
Aside from postings in Afghanistan and Papua New Guinea, Kim has worked in The Hague on international war crimes and advised the former minister for trade on multilateral policy. He’s also a published author and has run several successful businesses. He brings a unique perspective on the intersections of development, trade, conflict and international law.
Finally, a big thank you to those who completed our recent reader survey.
Those insights will feed into the next iteration of Geopolitical Dispatch, which we look forward to telling you about in a future edition of Not in Dispatches. We appreciate the time you took to provide your valuable thoughts and ideas.
That’s all from us today. We’ll be back on Monday with our next Daily Assessment.
And if you enjoy what you’re reading, please forward one of our emails to your friends and colleagues or click share above.
Best,
Michael, Cameron, Damien, Yuen Yi, Andrea and Kim
Emailed each weekday at 5am Eastern (9am GMT), Daily Assessment gives you the strategic framing and situational awareness to stay ahead in a changing world.
Thanks for your exceptional reporting and analysis. I've been referencing your news stories for my regular LinkedIn posts when possible to provide the Dispatch with more exposure. Hope it helps.