Episode notes
Are memes the new language of work?
Memes. GIFs. Reels. The things we send without thinking and yet somehow they’ve become one of the clearest ways we communicate how work actually feels.
In this episode of Work Is Weird Now, we’re joined by Martin Kevill, Creative Director at Tangerine Communications, to explore a deceptively big question:
Are memes the new language of work?
We unpack how memes have replaced the office “water cooler” acting as fast, emotionally loaded signals that convey shared reality, opinion, and feeling in a split second. We talk about why memes let people say the unsayable, how they function as pressure release and micro-connection in digitally fragmented workplaces, and what actually makes something a meme in the first place.
We also dig into the risks: where memes can exclude, muddy meaning, or become a proxy for leadership clarity and whether brands and internal comms teams can ever use memes without killing the joy.
We finish by looking ahead. If AI can generate infinite memes on demand, do memes still work without a real human moment behind them?
Playful on the surface. Serious underneath. Because memes might just be part of work’s new emotional infrastructure.
Guest: Martin Kevill, Creative Director, Tangerine Communications