At every On Think Tanks Conference, we try to organise a public event that opens up one of the conference conversations to a broader audience. In Rabat, during the 10th OTT Annual Conference, the Policy Center for the New South hosted a conversation titled “The Trust Equation: Balancing Public Visibility and Policy Impact”.
The session brought together Karim El Aynaoui, Executive President of the Policy Center for the New South; John Schwartz, CEO of Soapbox; and Anthea Haryoko, Chief Operating Officer of the Center for Indonesian Policy Studies. Together, and with a very engaged audience, we explored questions that many think tanks are grappling with today: how can organisations be visible without becoming noisy, influential without being opportunistic, and trusted without pretending to be neutral in a world where evidence itself is increasingly politicised?
Visibility and impact
I opened the discussion with a distinction that I first read in Andrew Rich’s book about think tanks in the United States and has stayed with me for years: visibility is not the same as influence. A think tank can be very well known and have little policy impact; another can be almost invisible to the general public and yet shape the terms of a national debate. The challenge, then, is not simply to be seen. It is to be seen by the right people, for the right reasons, at the right time, and with something useful to contribute.
In fact, Andrew Rich argued that the visibility that matters was the one that comes with being recognised as having described and clarified the problem in the first place.
John Schwartz captured this well through the language of brand. Brand, he reminded us, is not just about a logo or a colour palette. It is the collection of things people think about you. Whether we manage it or not, every think tank has a brand. The question is whether that brand helps the organisation clarify what it is for, who it serves, and what intellectual territory it wants to occupy.
Anthea Haryoko added an important distinction between marketing communications and public affairs communications. For many think tanks, influence is not built through mass visibility alone. It is built through relationships: with policymakers, civil servants, journalists, allies, critics and communities. In her words, people often do not “buy” from a brand in the abstract; they buy from people they trust, people they know, like, and respect. For think tanks, institutional reputation and interpersonal trust reinforce each other.
Karim El Aynaoui offered a different but complementary perspective. For the Policy Center for the New South, he argued, visibility is not the starting point. It is the outcome. A think tank should first worry about credibility, usefulness and the quality of the spaces it creates for serious discussion. In his framing, think tanks are public goods: institutions that combine scientific discipline, policy judgement, intergenerational exchange and public purpose. If they do this well, visibility follows.
Politics and rigour
As with most events that I moderate, this first part of the discussion led us quickly into politics. Can think tanks stay away from politics? Should they? John challenged the idea that think tanks can sit outside politics altogether. Politics, he suggested, is the medium in which think tanks swim. Elections, legislative windows, leadership changes, consultations and crises are precisely the moments when ideas can move. The point is not to avoid politics, but to navigate the tension between analysis and advocacy with honesty and rigour.
CIPS is explicit about its pro-market orientation. In some contexts, think tanks avoid stating their values openly, even when those values are easy to infer from their work. Anthea argued that being transparent about one’s lens can build trust. It allows others to understand where an organisation is coming from, to agree or disagree with it, and to judge the quality of its analysis on that basis. The audience confirmed this: several participants described how clearly stated values can help with funding, internal coherence, external positioning and negotiations, even when they also create challenges.
The conversation then turned more directly to trust. What makes us trust a think tank? What makes us distrust one?
The audience responses were telling.
Transparency matters: who funds the organisation, who works there, who sits behind it, and what interests might shape its work? I said that if I cannot see who leads or works for a think tank that reaches out to us for support, I simply do not engage with it. This may sound basic, but it is still too often overlooked.
Intellectual honesty matters too: does the think tank acknowledge evidence that complicates its preferred argument? Does it recognise trade-offs? Does it make room for uncertainty? Karim described trust in institutional terms: predictability, transparency, regularity, integrity, stability of purpose and no erratic behaviour. Trust, he reminded us, takes years to build. It is discovered through working together, not just through reading a website. He spoke of his own role as a custodian of institutional trust and values. That idea resonated with me. Think tank leadership is not only about strategy, fundraising or visibility. It is also about protecting the conditions that make the organisation worthy of trust.
A new lexicon
Anthea then introduced a word that shifted the conversation – and carried through into the main Conference: respect.
She reflected on CIPS’ early years in Indonesia, when the organisation had to work hard to demonstrate that it was there for the public good, not simply as the project of a founder or a foreign-backed initiative. Over time, consistency in their work on a variety of topics such as food security, agriculture, entrepreneurship and education helped build a reputation. This consistency showed that the organisation cared about the issues, not just the news cycle.
Respect is not the same as agreement. In fact, it may be more valuable. I thought of football: the moment when Real Madrid fans applauded Ronaldinho after a remarkable performance at the Bernabéu. They did not become Barcelona fans. But they recognised excellence. In the think tank world, I have heard the same sentiment many times: “I disagree with that organisation, but they do good work.” That is respect. And perhaps respect is what allows disagreement to remain productive.
John then offered his own trust equation and a new word: trust equals keeping your promises plus mutual care.
The first part is familiar: define who you are, make clear what people can expect from you, deliver over time, maintain standards, and keep going. But the second part — mutual care — opened up a different kind of conversation. A trusted organisation is one that people care about and that shows care back. It shows care through clarity, usefulness, relevance, timeliness, dialogue and accessibility. It thinks about its audiences not as targets but as people with needs, pressures, constraints and responsibilities.
This is where the language of the session began to change. We started with visibility, influence and credibility — the usual words in the think tank lexicon. But by the end we were talking about trust, respect, care and, thanks to a final audience intervention, humility.
Think tanks have often described their value in technical terms: evidence, policy analysis, independence, expertise, impact. These remain essential. But they may no longer be enough. In an environment where evidence is contested, institutions are distrusted, and public debate is fragmented, the qualities that sustain relationships become just as important as the products we produce.
Care does not mean softness. Respect does not mean agreement. Humility does not mean weakness. As one participant put it, boldness is not the opposite of humility; arrogance is. Think tanks can be bold and humble at the same time. They can take positions and still recognise uncertainty. They can advocate and still acknowledge trade-offs. They can seek influence and still remember that public purpose is not a communications strategy, but a responsibility.
The discussion also raised hard questions about the current information environment. Several participants asked how think tanks can introduce nuance when public debate rewards certainty, outrage and simplification. John argued that communications can help — through better narratives, clearer formats, more relevant channels and stronger brands — but that tactics alone are not enough. The information system itself is broken in many places. Karim pushed the point further: if we cannot agree on basic facts, then dialogue becomes almost impossible. Think tanks can contribute to reasoned debate, but they cannot carry the burden of repairing democracy alone.
A new era in how we think about think tanks?
Trust is not rebuilt through a single report, campaign or event. It is built institutionally, relationally and generationally. It is built by showing up, delivering, listening, being transparent, staying useful, acknowledging limits, and creating spaces where others can contribute.
The trust deficit is real. But perhaps part of the answer lies in expanding our vocabulary. Think tanks need to talk about rigour, independence and influence. But we also need to talk about care, respect and humility. These are not soft concepts. They are the foundations of serious public institutions.
And if this conversation in Rabat is any indication, they are becoming part of our lexicon.