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# Podcast: Ashbury's Adam Harper on the Gulf's strategic communications shift
- URL: https://www.earned-first.com/podcast-ashburys-adam-harper-on-the-gulfs-strategic-communications-shift/
- Published: 2026-02-04T02:23:22.000Z
- Updated: 2026-02-04T02:23:22.000Z
- Description: Adam Harper joins the Earned First podcast to reflect on how capital flows are reshaping the Middle East communications landscape.
- Author: Arun Sudhaman
- Tags: Earned First Podcast, #interviews

As capital, talent and political relevance increasingly converge in the Gulf, the Middle East is emerging as one of the world’s most important financial and geopolitical crossroads. In this episode of the Earned First Podcast, Adam Harper, founder and CEO of Ashbury, explains how the UAE is benefiting from growing Asia–Middle East capital flows, diversification away from the US dollar, and a global search for stable, trusted hubs.

Harper also explores what this shift means for communicators: from navigating neutrality between the US and China, to using AI to understand relevance and discoverability, and to helping organisations align with national strategies without losing commercial focus. Drawing on Ashbury’s expansion into the region and its work with global financial institutions, he reflects on how trust, soft power and strategic counsel are becoming central to reputation building in a more fragmented world.

[Ashbury's Adam Harper on the Gulf's strategic comm | RSS.com](https://rss.com/podcasts/earned-first/2514798/?ref=earned-first.com) 

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