Integrity Alone Will Get You Outplayed

Integrity Alone Will Get You Outplayed

From Designing Tomorrow: Creative Strategies for Social Impact by Eric Ressler

May 19, 2026 · 45 min · Episode 89

About this episode

Joelle Lester discusses the challenges of maintaining integrity in the social impact sector against powerful industries that manipulate public perception.

There's an unspoken rule in the social impact sector: we tell the truth, we follow the science, we play fair. But those rules are increasingly a losing strategy, because the industries we're up against don't have to win the argument. They just have to muddy it. Joelle Lester, Executive Director of the Public Health Law Center, has spent 25 years studying how Big Tobacco manufactured doubt, and how that same playbook now drives opposition to progress on climate, food, and public health. Episod...

People in this episode

Host: Eric Ressler

Guest: Joelle Lester

Topics covered

  • social impact
  • public health
  • climate change
  • food policy
  • tobacco industry
  • truth in advocacy

Keywords

  • social impact
  • public health
  • Big Tobacco
  • climate change
  • food policy
  • advocacy
  • truth
  • science

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Public Health Law Center, Big Tobacco

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