Netflix both teaches and learns a lesson

In my first-year classes this week, we've been discussing professionalism and ethics in PR, and how fundamental they are to any kind of long-term credibility (and, therefore, success).

In PR, we're in the business of building and nurturing relationships with a wide range of internal and external audiences. As is the case in our personal relationships, if the "other" doesn't have reason to feel we're dealing fairly and honestly, there's little chance of any positive relationship at all.

So ethics are, really, the bedrock of any successful public relations operation or career.

Just this morning, as my class discussed the elements of the Canadian Public Relations Society's Code of Professional Standards and what they mean for professional communicators, a real-life case study appeared to be playing out on a Toronto street, at the Canadian launch of Netflix.

The first impression wasn't good.

The first I heard about the launch was on Twitter later this afternoon, when I followed a link to a story in The Globe and Mail about video-streaming provider Netflix's Canadian launch... and the revelation that some of the enthusiastic "everyday Torontonians" who had been on-hand at the launch event and sharing their enthusiasm with the media were actually actors paid by the company to attend.

It looked as though Netflix had stacked the deck, so to speak, with people paid to express company-directed opinions about the Canadian launch.

The problem with this, as my first-year students will tell you, is that the ethical practice of PR would preclude trying to fool reporters with paid spokespeople masquerading as unbiased observers; in fact, such a practice would contravene articles 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the CPRS's Code of Professional Standards.

Why is it such a big deal?  Well, if journalists (and their audiences) can't trust that a company will deal honestly with them, they naturally have a harder time believing what it says. And that's going to have an impact on a company's ability to share its messages with its audiences in the long run. 

Then, it got a bit better.

In the story in The Globe and Mail, Netflix's Vice-President of Corporate Communications, Steve Swasey, sounded as though he'd completely agree. Explaining that the extras had been hired but that their talking to the media "was not supposed to happen,” Swasey said, “some people got carried away and it's embarrassing to Netflix.”


But then, it got a bit worse. 

An article on Cnet quoted Swasey as saying "We did not pay [the actors] to attend the press event. We didn't need to. The event was very well attended...somebody there said it was better attended than some press events for [Canada's] prime minister."

And an article on the CTV website further quoted him as saying "I was unaware that a script was handed out to extras and that was not supposed to happen... Extras were not supposed to talk to reporters or convey that they were anything other than promotional people."
But if you read the actual instruction sheet reportedly handed out to extras, it seems to suggest whoever wrote it did intend for them to talk to reporters: "Extras are to look really excited, particularly if asked by media to do any interviews about the prospect of Netflix in Canada."

So... what's really going on here?

Of course, I don't know; I wasn't there. But it wouldn't surprise me at all if someone at a lower level than Mr. Swasey had set this thing up, and fully intended for the media to unwittingly quote actors (let's say because he/she didn't know any better), and Mr. Swasey's responses were inconsistent because the company was truly caught off-guard by the turn of events.

Netflix isn't a beginner in the PR game - I think part of the reason this fumble got so much attention was that we collectively expect the company to be above this kind of thing.

Regardless, though, Netflix is going to have some making-up to do.

Lesson review 1: what did we learn from Netflix today?

Today, we got to witness in real-time what happens when public relations people don't deal honestly with journalists. As Swasey himself is quoted as having put it, this should have been a "perfect day" for Netflix; instead, he spent the day putting out fires on an embarrassing story.

Lesson review 2: what did Netflix learn from Netflix today?

As for Netflix, I suspect they may have learned that they have some tightening to do in the way they manage their events. Whether or not the company executives were aware that someone in their organization (whether internally or at their PR agency) was planning to try to dupe reporters, they paid the price in negative coverage.

I'm willing to bet that next time around, Netflix PR and agency staffers can expect to deal with a significantly stricter signoff process on the plans for company events.

UPDATE: Thursday morning

There's an update on the story this morning from the Canadian Press, in which Mr. Swasey apologizes for the incident in a blog post entitled "We Blew It," saying the extras were given "improper direction" and that they weren't supposed to have been talking to the media. "Swasey says the company didn't intend to mislead the media or public and he understands why questions were raised... 'This was a mistake and was not intended to be part of our launch plan. Simply put: we blew it,' Swasey writes in the blog post. 'We're sorry that our misfire has given Canadians any reasons to doubt our authenticity or our sincerity.'"

Given the circumstances, I don't think Netflix could have done anything more/better. Admit to the mistake, apologize, and move on.

Doctored photo "crisis": BP just can't catch a break

We've been reading in the last couple of days about a new front that's opened up in BP's oil spill PR crisis: an altered photo of its crisis command centre.

Photos from msnbc.com

The original photo was altered so as to show images from actual BP cameras on all the crisis centre screens, rather than having two of them blank (I read somewhere that the blanks were feeds from equipment that was undergoing maintenance when the shot was taken). A BP spokesperson is quoted as having admitted that the photo was altered, and having shared the original photo when the alteration was pointed out.

Was this an attempt to deceive the public about BP's crisis response?

I doubt it. Whoever did the editing likely just thought the photo would (objectively) look better with all screens showing images -- which of course it does (again, objectively). That person's job is to produce quality images; he/she isn't necessarily a PR person, and isn't necessarily thinking about the potential perceived implications of altering an image in this way.

I once had a designer Photoshop the open eyes of a woman over the closed eyes of a man, for an annual report. The male subject was a member of the company's Board of Directors, with a very full schedule: the designer just figured it'd be easier to Photoshop in some open blue eyes (hey, who's gonna notice? Blue eyes are blue eyes!) than to try to get on the guy's calendar, replicate the lighting, etc. etc. in the short timeframe we had available before going to print. Of course, this gentleman was now wearing a thick layer of mascara, but still...

Fortunately, I noticed it before the report went to print, and we found an alternate solution (also involving Photoshop: we put the previous year's open-eyed picture on the current year's background). But if I hadn't noticed, it would've gone to print that way, and I'm sure I'd have had a little PR crisis of my own as a result, even though no harm was meant by the photo edit.

(I also learned an important lesson, and from then on, wrote a clause into all agreements with designers that no changes were to be made to any images or text without our express agreement.)

Did the photo editor have bad intentions when he/she made the change?

I doubt that too.

As in the case of my well-meaning if judgmentally-impaired designer, I suspect this photo editor just wanted a better image. He likely didn't see the alteration as material to the message communicated by the photo, and probably thought he was doing his client a favour.

Does the incident exacerbate BP's already enormous PR problem?

You bet it does.

I've already seen a number of posts from online commenters equating the doctored photo with dishonesty in BP's crisis response in general -- the overall theme being "if we can't even trust that their photos are real, after all this time, why should be we believe anything they say?" The msnbc.com story linked above quotes Americablog reporter John Aravosis as having said "I guess if you're doing fake crisis response, you might as well fake a photo of the crisis response center."

Ouch.

BP is taking it on all fronts. Its crisis response has been condemned at all levels (both in terms of its actions to stop the leak and its communications), and what may be well-intended actions of people on its own team are making it worse.

I have to admit, a part of me is feeling sorry for BP's corporate communicators.

Can you anticipate the bad decisions your team members are going to make? Sometimes yes, but usually, no.

All you can do is to keep everyone involved in your crisis communications response as tightly-knit as you can, do what you can to ensure everyone understands the stakes and is plugged in to the existing and changing perceptions "out there," and communicate openly both within and outside the organization.

And keep your fingers crossed. And if it's what you do, pray.

If you're lucky, no-one on your team will do anything that'll make a very bad situation even less flattering to your client.

If you're not lucky, at least now you'll know that, once upon a time at BP, someone likely had it worse.

How PR can return Mel Gibson to his former glory

That's a trick title. It can't*.

*Even in the seemingly unlikely event that the latest Mel Gibson violent tirade recording doesn't turn out to be authentic.

[Photo from smartdogs.wordpress.com]

A recently-released recording, purported to be of movie star Mel Gibson spewing hateful, violent, racist vitriol at an ex-girlfriend over the phone earlier this year, has renewed interest in the Mel-Gibson-is-a-hateful-jerk storyline, both online and in the mainstream media.

The AP story I linked to above (and again here) says that Radar Online, which broke the story, claims to have confirmed the authenticity of the recording, and says that Gibson has (so far) refused to comment on it.

A sequel even more action-packed than the original

In 2006, Gibson was reported to have gone on an anti-semitic tirade while being arrested on suspicion of drunk driving (an aside: if you Google "Mel Gibson anti-semitic tirade" today, you'll get 1.9 billion results).

Gibson may have recognized after the 2006 incident that his career could be in peril as a result. He apologized publicly, issuing statements including the following:

"I acted like a person completely out of control when I was arrested, and said things that I do not believe to be true and which are despicable. I am deeply ashamed of everything I said."

While I agree that reports of the incident portrayed what seemed to be a person "completely out of control," and that what he said was despicable, I never buy apologies in which people claim to have said things when drunk which they don't actually believe when sober. From what I've observed, people are more honest when they're drunk, not less.

To my ears at least, that statement sounded like Gibson was lying even as he sought to be forgiven for his racist remarks. In fancy PR terminology, we call that "not good."

Gibson's image has carried the stink of that incident ever since. Kim Masters, editor at large for The Hollywood Reporter, says that in "the mainstream Hollywood community" Gibson is "a pariah."

What will movie fans think this time around?

As bad as Gibson's 2006 statements were, his reported 2010 performance, which denigrates more groups in repugnant terms, is even more offensive (the recording is now available from a number of sources online, but do yourself a favour and take my word for it).

With that said, some people will still want to go see his movies because they like his movies, and don't care what kind of a person he is.

Yet others are racist and/or misogynist, and may be more likely to consider seeing his movies because they'll respect him for having expressed views similar to their own.

But if this recording is authentic, I suspect Gibson will have a much tougher time getting the rest of us to forget about this (now) pattern of hateful outbursts, and to want to support him by seeing his movies.

Is there anything he can do to improve his PR?

Of course; there are always things you can do.

• He can get some help -- if not for continued alcohol abuse issues, then at least for anger management and sensitivity training -- and then come out the other side and be open about it. He doesn't have to (nor should he) go on at length and share every gory detail, but he should honestly admit to having been wrong, apologize publicly, and encourage others who share his problems to get help.
• He can use his wealth, influence and profile to do good things; for example, contributing to the fight against racism and domestic violence.
• And of course, he can change his ways and make good movies, in the hopes that, with time, people will gradually put their disgust on the back burner (Americans are, on the whole, a pretty forgiving lot).

But PR can't fix everything.

While some people may be able to excuse one racist/violent outburst, I suspect many more won't be able to ignore two. Mel Gibson now appears to have shown that his reported 2006 tirade wasn't an isolated incident; it's an alleged pattern of behaviour which would seem to reflect the way he really sees the world.

If he does get help, admit to/apologize for his hateful speech, and make some attempt to atone by helping combat the kind of thinking he reportedly espoused, I suspect a fair number of his former fans will admire his guts, even if they aren't ever able to entirely like him again.

Good, honest PR, reflecting an earnest effort to deal with his issues and to change, could do Mel Gibson's image a lot of good, and could help mitigate the damage at the box office.

But if this latest recording really is what it appears to be (and, frankly, even if it isn't), Gibson won't ever be able to fully restore the good-guy, family-man image of his Lethal Weapon days. His name will always have an asterisk next to it, which I don't think any amount of PR will be able to completely erase.

Air Canada shows impact of customer-facing employees on PR

This isn't another I-hate-Air-Canada blog post - there are many of those already (don't believe me? Google it).

This is a blog post about how a company's customer-facing employees are just as important to its PR as its PR people (if not more).

The back story (OK, a bit of a rant)

On Sunday evening, my family and I had the misfortune of having to fly home to Winnipeg from Ottawa. (For the record, that's a misfortune because of the circumstances of the travel, not the destination!)

It was a terrible night weather-wise in Toronto, which was the site of our connecting flight. Terrible weather is out of the airlines' control, and I completely understand that flights sometimes have to be delayed as a result. But how an airline handles its customers when things get hairy has an enormous impact on how they see the company.

Our flight to Winnipeg was originally scheduled to leave Toronto at 9 p.m. Because of weather-related delays elsewhere, our Ottawa-Toronto flight arrived late, and we were worried we'd miss the connection. We asked about it as we exited the plane, and were told to ask the customer service agent who'd be waiting for us at the top of the jetway.

That agent told us to go to the same gate for the same time as she'd provided the man in line in front of us, who'd given a different flight number. I asked her to confirm that was right; her response: "Here, I'll write it down for you."

We arrived at the gate she'd indicated, and it was indeed boarding another flight. I asked the woman working that gate, who told me her job was to load that flight, and that I'd have to find the departures board to get my answer; she was also too busy to tell me where that board was.

As I looked for the departures board, I saw another employee on the phone at a gate which didn't have any flight listed. I stood there for a few minutes while she pretended not to see me, and was then told "Look, I can't help you. I was just passing by here and needed to use the phone."

I found the board, and our gate. When our flight finally boarded an hour late (not Air Canada's fault: remember, weather), it was approximately 10 p.m. When our flight actually pulled away from the gate for our flight, it was midnight.

In between, our Airbus 320 full of hot, cranky customers sat at the gate, without air conditioning on, waiting. And waiting.

Every 20 minutes or so, we'd get an announcement over the PA system reassuring us that the delay "shouldn't be too much longer now" or something to that effect. At one point, they added that we were just waiting for the pilot.

Waiting for the pilot?

After well over an hour, another pilot who was on our flight to travel home to Winnipeg after a 15+ hour day of his own came on the PA, and explained that our pilot's previous flight had been diverted to Ottawa due to Toronto weather, and they'd only found this out as we'd finished boarding.

More than an hour earlier.

While we were grateful that someone had finally respected us enough to tell us what was going on, the content of his announcement was infuriating: somewhere along the line, someone had decided that while these poor suckers on the plane were going to have to sit through a very uncomfortable couple of hours, it was better to leave them all there on the plane than to go to the trouble of letting them off and then re-boarding.

It's not like we'd pushed away from the gate and would have to drive back in: the gate door was open, and we could easily all just have walked off. (At least, that's how it seemed to us as we got progressively angrier: if there's some Transport Canada regulation preventing it, they could have done themselves a favour by telling us that.)

A woman sitting behind me began to sound panicked about an hour into the wait, telling the flight attendants she was about to pass out from the heat. Their response: "We'll be coming through the cabin shortly with a water service." The temperature in the plane got so hot that when the pilot did finally arrive and turn on the air conditioning, we could see the condensation in the air, like when you exhale on a cold night.

The best timing of the night award went to the flight attendant who, immediately after the announcement that we were waiting for the pilot (without explanation yet as to why he was delayed), came through the cabin offering headphones so we could enjoy the on-board entertainment system while we waited... for three dollars. Credit cards only, please, we don't take cash. I'm not making this stuff up.

What does all this have to do with PR?

I attended a presentation years ago at an IABC International Conference in New York City, by a Swedish PR guy who talked about the role of customer service in defining your company's brand.

He gave an example that struck home, and has remained with me since. He pointed out that his wife doesn't love him because he issues a news release every morning at breakfast extolling his own virtues: she loves him because of the way he treats her. He shows concern, he takes out the garbage and helps with the kids, he is interested in her and what interests her, he makes her laugh -- it has little to do with messaging or positioning or tactics.

His excellent advice: corporate PR departments need to realize that our customers' relationships with our brands work the very same way. As he put it, if your customers are having a bad experience of your brand in your stores or at your events (or in your airplanes), nothing you can say in a news release is going to change their perception of the brand.

So, pack up the PR department and go home?

Of course not; rather, his advice was for PR to realize that our customers have far more interactions with our front-line employees than they ever do with the products of the PR department -- so we should prioritize employee communications in our corporate communication strategies.

Employees who understand their role in defining the company brand, who understand what customers need, want and expect, who are motivated to give those customers a good experience, and who are empowered to do so, will have a far greater impact on your company's reputation than anything else your PR department will ever do.

It's entirely possible that there were reasonable explanations for all the decisions my fellow travelers and I cursed Sunday night; but even if there were, no-one told us. So our impression of Air Canada's customer service was set.

Customers are a fickle bunch. Over the years, I've had plenty of uneventful (i.e. good enough) flights on Air Canada, and have even experienced excellent Air Canada customer service for myself (a flight I try to forget, on which my then-infant daughter threw up all over me and flight attendants did everything they could to help me and mitigate the mess for my fellow travellers).

But Sunday night, as my now-three-year-old looked at me, eyes glassy, little face red as a tomato and hair soaked with perspiration, and said "We coming down for a landing?" before we'd even left the tarmac, none of that mattered.

Unfortunately for the companies which serve him/her, a customer's impression of a brand is only as good as his/her most recent interaction with it. So PR folks are well-advised to make sure employee communications is at the top of their strategy list.

Ann Curry: How to recover from a public gaffe

I caught a Yahoo! News story today about NBC news' Ann Curry having given a commencement speech at Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts last Saturday, in which she created a bit of a PR problem for herself.



Oops.

As a respected journalist, Ann Curry's reputation takes a bigger hit over this kind of error than someone else's might; she's expected to do her research, and to get the facts right. That's why we listen to her.

But with that said, we all make mistakes; and the more public our profile, the higher the likelihood they'll come with public embarrassment. So, if you (or your client) is a public figure, what's the best strategy? Do you make excuses? Do you pretend it never happened?

In the social media age, neither of those is going to work.

As far as making excuses goes, they rarely get you any sympathy. It's entirely possible she had a researcher put notes together for her -- or even employed someone else to write the speech. But when you're invited to give a speech, the audience expects that you're providing your own insights in your own words. Laying the blame somewhere else won't cut it: the buck stops with you.

And as for pretending it never happened, you could, but you'd be the only one doing so. A quick Google News search on "Ann Curry Wheaton" this afternoon returned 435 news stories.

So, what do you do?

Own it.

When you make a mistake, admit it, apologize, take the hit you earned, and move on: just like Ann Curry did. As the Yahoo! article reported,

"For her part, Curry penned an open letter to the Wheaton community expressing that she was "mortified" by her mistake. She wrote, in part:

So it is with a heavy heart that I ask you to forgive me for mistakenly naming graduates of the other Wheaton College in my address.

I now know I should have named National Medal of Science winner Dr. Mary Ellen Avery, former New Jersey Governor and former EPA Director Christie Todd Whitman, literary agent Esther Newberg, Oscar-nominated actress Catherine Keener and Ken Babby, the youngest senior officer in the history of the Washington Post, among others. Thank goodness I got Leslie Stahl right.

I am mortified by my mistake, and can only hope the purity of my motive, to find a way to connect with the graduates and to encourage them to a life of service, will allow you to forgive me."

Then, she used her Twitter account to proactively own up to her mistake (her tweet links to the news video above).



I don't know whether she addressed it on The Today Show this week (I couldn't find any video online), but I wouldn't be surprised if she did. (If you can answer this question, please do so in the comments!)

Now, to add embarrassment to embarrassment, a commenter on Gawker.com noted that Curry had misspelled Lesley Stahl's name in her apology... but still.

Curry's apology letter (sent on Monday) is humble and sincere and makes me, at least, feel badly for her. In this situation, I think that's the best she could have hoped for.

We all make mistakes; the rest of us should just be thankful ours don't become fodder for 435 news articles.

To The Winnipeg School Division: the correct answer is "thank you."

Last week, when news broke about two judgmentally-impaired Winnipeg high school teachers apparently simulating a lap dance and fellatio at a pep rally, the story roared through both the social and mainstream media. It began with a short video posted to YouTube by a student who recorded it on a cellphone, and quickly garnered international media attention including coverage on Fox News.

In case you missed it, here's the video:



In PR class, we talked about how the school might have been well-advised to reach out to parents the very day the dance happened, even before being “caught” by the YouTube video, to explain that two staff members had made a very poor decision, to underline its commitment to providing a safe, comfortable and appropriate learning environment for their children, and to promise to deal with the teachers involved.

The foundation of good PR is a healthy relationship based on openness and mutual respect. Given this case, we discussed how one of the school's most important audiences, the parents of its students, might have appreciated the administration's proactive admission of the incident. Between the lines, such an act would have said "keeping our relationship with you healthy means more to us than the possibility of avoiding public embarrassment."

That doesn't mean parents would be happy to hear the news, and it doesn't mean parents would be any less outraged. But they would at least know that if something bad happened in their child's school, the school would have the integrity to come forward and let them know about it.

Yesterday, the Winnipeg Free Press reports, "school board chairwoman Jackie Sneesby refused to rule out punishment for the students" who posted videos of the incident to YouTube, since the school board has rules against the use of cellphone video cameras in school.

Sometimes, the rules should take a back seat.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m big on rules. I like making them, I’m more comfortable following them. I think they create order out of chaos; and I think that environments in which (reasonable) rules are followed can be more productive than those in which they aren’t.

But.

This story hasn't shown The Winnipeg School Division in its best light.

1. It hired teachers who exhibit this kind of judgment in the first place, and put them in a position to set an example for Winnipeg teenagers.
2. It hosts the kind of high school environment in which at least some people feel this kind of dance might be acceptable.
3. It hosts the kind of high school environment in which this kind of dance can play out without any other responsible adult intervening.
4. It remains unclear what repercussions the teachers involved will face, beyond "suspension with pay."

Given all that, I’d advise The Winnipeg School Division to let this cellphone infraction go – and to clearly say so if anyone should ask. Yes, rules are important – but one of their key audiences, the public whose children they’re employed to educate, may legitimately feel that had these students not broken the cellphone rule, the teachers involved (and school administration) mightn’t have had to answer for the behaviour. And accordingly, that this sort of thing might have been allowed to happen again.

So, just ignore a blatantly broken rule?

Of course not. But there are many ways the school's administration could address the issue with students that wouldn't involve punishment for the "offenders," while making it clear that the rules exist for a good reason and will be enforced in all but extraordinary circumstances.

Today's Free Press story drew a number of comments from readers who felt the students should be punished because they posted the video to YouTube rather than taking it to the principal or the school board. Personally, I wouldn't expect high school students to understand the bureaucracy of the educational system; I think it entirely possible that from their perspective, the show was sanctioned by the administration since some of its "officials" (i.e. their teachers) attended, witnessed the incident, and didn't stop it. If that's the case, I couldn't blame them for thinking it was fair game for public consumption.

Opening the lines of communication with students could help with that, too. If school administration told them unequivocally that its door is always open in case of student concerns, it might find itself better-equipped to address future issues before they become PR nightmares.

Whistleblower or attention-seeker?

Today's story in the Free Press also bears a number of reader comments taking issue with the characterization of the students who posted videos to YouTube as whistleblowers, painting them instead as attention-seekers whose objective wasn't to expose wrongdoing at all.

Maybe they're right, maybe not... but it doesn't matter. The effect of the students' action was to bring attention to bad behaviour that hadn't otherwise gotten out. To punish them now could seem like retaliation for the public embarrassment, the blame for which rests squarely on the shoulders of the school no matter how you slice it.

If a whistleblower breaks the rules in exposing wrongdoing, an organization committed to the best interests of its audiences shouldn't concern itself with ensuring a price is paid for the broken rule.

Even if the whistleblower's motivation wasn't to blow the whistle, the correct answer is "thank you."

[yellow tail]: No good deed goes unpunished

PR Daily this morning alerted me to an issue brewing for Australia’s [yellow tail] wine company, which reportedly accounts for "almost half the Australian wine purchased in the U.S."

Last week, the company announced a $100,000 donation to The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), in a campaign called “[tails] for tails”. According to [yellow tail]’s news release, “[yellow tail] will make use of social media and in-store advertising to spread the message that consumers can "pick up a bottle of [yellow tail] and help a tail-wagging friend."”

Sounds nice, right? Kudos to [yellow tail] for sharing its success and putting some of its profits back into the community, right?

Not so fast, say American meat producers and members of associated industries, who are all too familiar with HSUS’s history of undertaking campaigns to interfere with their business.

In an article called “Yellow Tail stubs its toe” this week, beef industry magazine Drovers outlines the backlash [yellow tail] has drawn in the U.S. The opposition has grown quickly online, with a Facebook group called Yellowfail already counting almost 2400 fans. A YouTube video featuring a South Dakota cattle rancher (below) has more than 5800 views, and the #yellowfail hashtag on Twitter has been buzzing.



What’s a company to do?

Frankly, it’s impossible to keep everyone happy. Every corporate donation has the potential to irritate someone – whether it’s because they disagree with the cause you’ve supported, or because they feel your support would have benefited more people elsewhere.

But a full situation analysis can help a company make the best choices:

• it will help you understand what’s important to your customers (like, for instance, support for American farmers and all the associated industries)
• it will help ensure you have a full appreciation for the activities of the group you’re supporting (and who their opponents are likely to be), and their impacts on your customers

Industry journal Pork re-printed [yellow tail]’s response to a request for comment from sister publication Bovine Veterinarian magazine; it includes the following:

"We’ve listened to your recent feedback and it was very helpful to us – in fact it prompted us to specifically choose the areas where we’d most like to celebrate animals. Here’s what we’ve decided: We’ll still honor our monetary commitment to the HSUS, but now we are specifically directing our $100,000 donation to HSUS’ Animal Rescue Team, which launch on-the-ground missions to rescue animals in peril. The HSUS Animal Rescue Team is a leading disaster response agency for animals, contributing millions of dollars to rebuild animal shelters destroyed in natural disasters, responding to floods, fires, and other disasters.

We may not always agree with 100 percent of what an organization represents, but rescuing animals displaced from natural disasters is a cause we support."

I’m certain [yellow tail]’s support for the HSUS was pledged with the best of intentions; as they learned, though, sometimes the best of intentions aren’t quite enough.

Audi: volunteering for a black eye

A story running the rounds on Twitter last night drew my attention:

The link led me to a blog by Danny Brown, which outlined the PR nightmare Audi may be about to enter with its Super Bowl ad campaign.

Audi is reportedly using its Super Bowl airtime to advertise its "A3 TDI diesel, which gets 42 mpg highway," and is priming the pump for the ad with a series of YouTube videos like this one, introducing the "Green Police."

In his blog, Danny Brown cautions about a potential PR backlash against Audi:

"The campaign is based around a new creation called the Green Police, who will spearhead a social media program to build interest in Audi’s ad at this year’s football showcase. The Green Police enforce ways to protect the environment, and encourage people to a better understanding of environmental issues. There’s currently a series of YouTube mock education videos as part of the program, as well as a Green Police Twitter account.

The problem is, there’s already been a Green Police enforcement organization, but not one that you’d want to be associated with. This Green Police was part of the Nazi persecution and execution of millions of Jews in the Holocaust of the Second World War.

The implications of Audi’s choice of name for their campaign could be huge, especially since Audi is a German company. The first question is obvious – didn’t anyone at Audi’s PR or advertising arm/agency do any research?"

Since that blog post was first published yesterday, it has received more than 100 comments and has been tweeted more than 275 times (including a re-tweet by me, with the introductory note "Really?"). A debate has grown up around whether this actually constitutes a major issue, as Brown suggests, or whether it's not really a big deal.

The arguments I've read against this being a big deal include:

• The Nazi "Green Police" were commonly called that because they wore green uniforms; it wasn't their actual name
• Many people are unaware of a link between the name "Green Police" and the Holocaust
• A number of environmental groups internationally call themselves "Green Police," including, according to answers.com, a task force comprised of law enforcement groups "assembled to crack down on emissions in large US metropolitan cities"
• The enforcement officers of Israel's own Ministry of Environmental Protection, according to one commenter on Brown's blog, are called "Green Police".

So, is this a big deal or not?

Even if you don't personally think so, from a PR strategy perspective, it doesn't matter. As soon as someone takes reasonable exception to anything an organization does (and especially if that someone has an audience), you've got a potential issue on your hands.

Can you always predict what will offend people? Of course not.

Can you reasonably predict that a campaign with resonances of the Holocaust will offend people? I think so.

But you can't avoid obstacles you don't know about.

Before getting too far down the road with creative, research whether there are any historical or cultural connotations to a proposed campaign/company/product name that might create issues. A quick Google search would have turned up the Nazi reference, and I have to believe no member of Audi's PR/marketing team would have considered that and decided to go ahead with it anyway.

Audi's "Green Police" message was supposed to be about environmental stewardship (and, ultimately, the A3 TDI diesel); now, at least in some corners, the public discussion it has inspired is about the company's either disregard for or ignorance of the dark history attached to its new campaign's name.

I'm sorry

I ran across a couple of stories online this week that got me thinking about apologies. Not the kind of apologies we share with one another every day, for accidentally bumping into someone or forgetting to return a call, but the kind that are called for when we’ve really messed up.

I’ve blogged before about how important it is for people/companies who’ve done wrong to come out right away and admit to their mistakes – and our old friend Tiger has been doing a fair job of driving (har, har!) that lesson home in recent weeks. But to come out and admit you’ve done something wrong isn’t always enough; especially when someone has been hurt by your mistake, you also need to apologize.

Head over to YouTube and you’ll find apologies galore: from R&B stars alleged to have abused their girlfriends, to media outlets caught misleading their audiences, to governments, trying to acknowledge and atone for the sins of their predecessors. And while we’re on the topic of big-ticket apologies (and sins), we have to mention the Catholic Church’s 1992 apology to astronomer Galileo, for having condemned him for his blasphemy that the Earth revolved around the sun; it may have been 359 years too late, but at least it finally came.

Would you hire a PR guy to defend you in court?

In his public apology for his treatment of girlfriend Rihanna, Chris Brown said he had wanted to apologize sooner, but had been advised against it by his lawyer. In the eyes of the law, an apology can been seen as an admission of guilt; and so lawyers, whose job it is to keep us out of jail, will often advise silence in the face of our own wrongdoing.

Sometimes, it's sad to say, that may be the best way to go; unless you’re willing to go to jail for your transgression, you might be better-served by remaining silent, and taking the scorn of the world (or your own audiences, at least) in exchange for your freedom.

But there are times when lawyers’ advice to remain silent can cost their client more than the settlement they’ll eventually be ordered to pay. Think of it this way: if your apology engenders customer goodwill, the business you’ll be able to continue doing after the crisis could be worth far more than a few million paid in damages and settlements. If your refusal to apologize costs you all your customers, you may save a few million in damages, but your business won't last long.

Now, that may sound cold and calculating, but the fact is that companies (especially publicly-traded ones) have to do what's best for their owners' investment. It just so happens that when it comes to apologies, oftentimes what's morally right and what's "right for the business" are one and the same.

In an interview with The Globe and Mail during its listeriosis crisis in 2008, Maple Leaf Foods’ CEO Michael McCain said “Going through the crisis there are two advisors I’ve paid no attention to. The first are the lawyers, and the second are the accountants.” McCain, as PR and business opinion leaders have attested ever since, handled his company’s response to the crisis almost flawlessly; the approach was anchored by a timely, public, multi-media apology.



As a result of its quick, sincere and customer-focused response (involving far more than the apology, it must be said), Maple Leaf's customer confidence ratings rebounded quickly – a fact which I'm sure relieved its lawyers and accountants.

People can forgive imperfection. They’re less able to forgive arrogance.

If you have anyone in your life who refuses to apologize, even when they clearly know they’re in the wrong, you know it’s infuriating. And it’s no different in a relationship between a client and a business than between two people. If you do something wrong, you need to acknowledge that it was wrong, and apologize for having hurt whomever you hurt. It might’nt fix the problem, but it can help.

There’s a great example of exactly this on Steve Farnsworth’s Digital Marketing Mercenary blog this week: “Searskilledmydog.com: The Anatomy of a Social Media Nightmare Averted – Case Study.” It’s a great read, and shows exactly how an apology can get you back on the road to a healthy relationship.

They're not going to run out of angles...

I've been good about restraining myself on the whole Tiger Woods debacle; frankly, over the last couple of weeks, you could have been blogging day and night on the PR aspects alone, as new allegation followed new revelation over and over again.

There have been thousands of voices by now, I'm sure, singing the same tune: Tiger Woods should have just admitted to whatever he had to admit to, so there'd be nothing left for the media to discover, and then gone away and hid for a while until some other celebrity did something shocking and/or stupid to distract us.

More angles

But Tiger didn't listen, and two weeks later, we're still hearing about it. Every day or two there has been another addition to what is now a "string" of alleged mistresses; in the absence of Tiger's own statement, those women become a focus for the media, who can't resist the opportunity to keep feeding the public appetite for this scandal.

So, we hear about who's claiming an affair with him and who's not. We hear analysis of the state of the Woods' marriage and children. We hear conjecture about children conceived as a result of Woods' affairs. We hear about who reportedly hired which powerful celebrity attorney. We hear about mistresses' claims of having taken drugs while with him.

As they say, the media abhors a vacuum: if the story has the public's interest and you refuse to talk, they'll fill in the blanks. Not responding doesn't mean there won't be any stories -- it just means there won't be any stories reflecting your position.

And now, a new angle. Oh, Tiger.

I caught the national Headline News version of this story on TV this morning, which is what prompted me to write this post.

We've now moved past the salacious affair details (even if only until the next mistress is revealed), the marriage breakup conjecture (even if only until his wife is spotted meeting with an attorney), and the corporate sponsors' positions (they can say they're sticking with him all they want, but just watch: eventually, money has to talk...), and we've now moved on to:

Tiger Woods' affairs have prevented little children from going to Disney World.

Yes, you read that right.



This story won't be going away any time soon... unless Tiger does something about it. And even then, it's become so huge that it'll take some time.

Here's a good article on what Tiger should consider doing from here, from ESPN.com; thanks to Jarrett Moffatt for pointing it out to me.

Tiger?

Mainstream media and the blogosphere alike have been ablaze over the American Thanksgiving long weekend about Tiger Woods' early Friday morning car accident -- and Woods' stubborn refusal to talk about what happened.

As the media stories go, Woods crashed his vehicle into a fire hydrant 50 feet from his own driveway around 2:30 Friday morning. Depending on which story you read, either he received facial lacerations in the accident, possibly when his wife used a golf club to smash a window to get him out of the vehicle, or he received facial lacerations in an altercation with his wife, which led to the accident.

Woods reportedly had interviews scheduled with the Florida Highway Patrol on both Saturday and Sunday to explain what had happened, but cancelled both interviews -- the second, by having lawyer Mark NeJame turn officers away at his door as they arrived for the meeting.

In PR, as I've discussed before on this blog, there's a standard three-part approach to dealing with embarrasing news:

1- Tell the truth,
2- Tell it first, and
3- Tell it all.

Time and time again, celebrities, politicians and lesser mortals alike have proven that trying to cover something up invariably leads to worse trouble than the initial embarrassment likely would have (if you doubt that, ask South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford if he might've done a better job of dealing with his extra-marital affair earlier this year).

Dealing with an embarrassing issue quickly and completely is like taking off a bandage: there's a sting when you pull if off quickly, but then it's over. If you drag it out, and leave some parts stuck (and needing to be removed at a later time) you're just asking to prolong the agony.

Now, I don't know if Tiger is even hiding anything -- and if he isn't, the PR response will turn out to have been even worse than if he had been. In the absence of a statement between the accident and Sunday, when he made a brief statement on his own website, the headlines went something like this:

Tiger Woods injured in minor car accident

Was Tiger Woods' car crash related to cheating on his wife?

Questions Swirl Around Tiger Woods's Car Crash

20 questions about Tiger Woods' accident

Tiger Woods' Alleged Mistress Denies Affair

Tiger Woods 911 call released, Woods, refuses to talk to police

For 3rd time, Woods cancels meeting with police

Experts to Tiger Woods: Come Clean

"Come clean" isn't exactly what Woods did in today's website statement:

"As you all know, I had a single-car accident earlier this week, and sustained some injuries. I have some cuts, bruising and right now I'm pretty sore.

This situation is my fault, and it's obviously embarrassing to my family and me. I'm human and I'm not perfect. I will certainly make sure this doesn't happen again.

This is a private matter and I want to keep it that way. Although I understand there is curiosity, the many false, unfounded and malicious rumors that are currently circulating about my family and me are irresponsible.

The only person responsible for the accident is me. My wife, Elin, acted courageously when she saw I was hurt and in trouble. She was the first person to help me. Any other assertion is absolutely false.

This incident has been stressful and very difficult for Elin, our family and me. I appreciate all the concern and well wishes that we have received. But, I would also ask for some understanding that my family and I deserve some privacy no matter how intrusive some people can be."

While I do feel badly for celebrities when they have to deal with difficult personal situations and can't get any peace, the fact is that celebrities knowingly give up some privacy in exchange for the millions they earn from their fans (whether directly through album sales, or indirectly through endorsements). Whether or not we think it's fair, it is what it is. And until Woods comes out with the facts, for the time being, at least, there are many people who'll be delighted to profit by making them up for him.

There's a tough way to handle a situation like this -- which is to get out right away and tell the whole, true story, warts and all, then go away and wait for something else to take over the public's insatiable need for controversy -- and then there's a tougher way.

Tiger's way.

Imperial Tobacco’s smokescreen

A Canadian Medical Association Journal article published yesterday by Dr. David Hammond and a team of researchers at The University of Waterloo has unleashed a bad PR story that’s been decades in the making: Imperial Tobacco Canada’s alleged destruction of millions of pages of scientific studies, conducted between 1967 and 1984, which concluded that smoking is detrimental to our health.

According to the Globe and Mail,

"The tobacco industry did not make the findings public, instead denying for decades the effects of smoking. As the review notes, Jean-Louis Mercier, the chairman of Imperial Tobacco Canada, testified at a House of Commons legislative committee in 1987: "It is not the position of the industry that tobacco causes any disease. ... The role, if any, that tobacco or smoking plays in the initiation and the development of these diseases is still very uncertain.""

The Canadian Press reports that the files on the 60 studies were destroyed in Canada in 1992, on the direction of Imperial Tobacco’s head office in the U.K. – but that the information remained on file in the corporate headquarters. The CP also points out that the internal code-name for the buried research projects was “Janus” – a reference to the two-faced god of Roman mythology.

The tobacco industry has long had a tough row to hoe, PR-wise. While its product is legal, it’s known to be dangerous to tobacco customers – and to those who share the air they breathe (not to mention everyone else who pays for and relies on an overtaxed medical system). Collectively, the industry spends billions on lobbyists who work to keep government regulation as friendly to their business as possible (as do many other industries), and on initiatives that position the tobacco companies as good corporate citizens.

I attended a presentation on stakeholder engagement by John Clayton, Vice-President of Corporate Affairs at Imperial Tobacco Canada, at the CPRS National Conference in Halifax last year. Clayton spoke earnestly about the challenges of communicating on behalf of a tobacco company, and deftly managed emotional opposition from some members of the conference crowd – leaving his audience with the overall impression that, while Imperial acknowledges that there are health risks associated with smoking, the company is committed to helping minimize those risks, while continuing to provide its customers with the legal product they want.

As much as I hated to admit it, the argument was reasonable; as long as the government allows the sale of a product, why shouldn’t someone sell it?

Now, however, Imperial may be running out of arguments. We can't hold a company accountable for decisions it makes (and products it sells) in good faith. But if this week’s reports are true, this is a textbook example of bad faith: the company not only sells a dangerous product, but it knowingly hid evidence that proved it and willingly misled its publics for decades, putting profit before people's lives.

If any of Imperial's goodwill relied on its ability to convince its publics that it’s open about the health effects of smoking and committed to looking out for its customers’ interests, it may now be heading back to the drawing board. The Globe and Mail story indicated that an Imperial spokesperson didn't return calls for the story; I'll be interested to see how the company positions itself.

Regardless, though, Imperial and its peers are lucky that their product has its own built-in relationship-builder – more effective than any stakeholder engagement strategy – that will keep customers coming back, and pressuring their governments to keep it legal. Nicotine.

On recovery, rehabilitation and redemption

My last post on public image rehabilitation following moral lapses has had me thinking about Michael Richards’ quest to restore his name after a racist outburst at a comedy club in 2006.

Michael Richards played Kramer on Seinfeld for its entire run from 1990 to 1998, and was a key element of the ensemble show’s enormous appeal. The show, which its producers and stars insisted was “about nothing,” was nevertheless able to ridicule appalling social realities ranging from racism to homophobia, using a light but intelligent, comfortable, comedic environment.

That enlightened wit is part of what set Seinfeld apart from its peers, and what made Michael Richards’ racist tirade against a couple of comedy club hecklers particularly upsetting to some of his fans.

The cellphone video of Richards’ outburst was played ad nauseam in the days and weeks after it happened. I’m not posting it here; you can find it on YouTube if you’d like. What interests me from a PR perspective, though, is whether Richards has, in the three years since the incident, been able to live it down. Will his fans put it behind them when he joins the cast of Seinfeld for a reunion on HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm this season?

Richards would appear to have done all the right things:

1) He quickly and (apparently, anyway) sincerely apologized for the outburst.



2) He did a number of appearances and interviews related to opening a dialogue about racism, notably Jesse Jackson’s syndicated radio program, Keep Hope Alive.

3) He disappeared for a while, presumably in the hopes of giving American audiences a chance to remember his decade of brilliant work more prominently than one evening’s outburst. (He may have had some help with this one – I’m not sure the offers continued to pour in in the immediate aftermath.)

But will it be enough?

When politicians are able to come back from sex scandals, I think it’s because their audiences accept their apologies, and consciously decide to accept that their politicians are capable of poor personal judgment. I think they also consciously decide that poor personal judgment has a limited impact on professional decisions – or, “he/she’s not perfect, but I can accept these flaws because they’re not related to what I need him/her to do for me.”

When celebrities spew hate speech, it can be more difficult to separate the personal behaviour from the job they do; their job is to entertain us, and it can be harder to be entertained by someone you think is a jerk.

With the Seinfeld reunion on Curb Your Enthusiasm this season, it'll be interesting to see whether audiences are able to get past Michael Richards' one terrible night – or at least, believe that’s all it was. As Extra reported, Larry David, creator of both Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm, indicated that even three years later, Richards wanted to address the issue on the show:

"He wanted to," David explained when asked if Richards felt comfortable addressing the drama onscreen. "He made a terrible mistake." David added that Richards deserves a second chance after being shunned in Tinseltown the past three years."

Is racism a tarnish that can be polished away over time? We'll see.

John Edwards: the redemption clock may have to be re-set... again

Politico has an interesting story today about politicians’ return to public life following scandals. The article reiterates conventional wisdom about the best way to communicate a politician's bad behaviour: get the story out – all of it – honestly and quickly; and then have them disappear for a while. It's an approach that relies both on Americans' willingness to forgive, and on their confidence that the wrongdoer has come clean, having recognized his/her actions were wrong. As Politico points out, it’s a strategy employed by politicians of all stripes:

"On Tuesday, former Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.), who resigned less than three years ago following a scandal involving a congressional page, debuted as a radio talk show host on Florida’s WSVU-AM. Congressional Quarterly reported: “Mark Foley Leaves Door Open for a Run.”

Former Rep. James Traficant (D-Ohio) — just a few weeks out of jail after serving seven years in federal prison for racketeering, bribery, obstruction of justice and tax evasion — told Fox News host Greta Van Susteren that there’s a “50-50 chance” that he may run again for Congress.

Ousted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who still faces federal corruption charges despite his pleas of innocence, told The New Yorker that he’s “not ruling myself out or writing myself off as getting back in the business of serving the public.”

All of which comes in the wake of former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s return to the public eye. Spitzer, who stepped down in March 2008 following a sex scandal, is a regular commentator on MSNBC and writes for Slate. In political circles, hardly a day goes by without someone pondering Spitzer’s aspirations."

Edwards’ refusal to admit to the allegations against him drew out the negative media coverage and public attention to his failings (see my earlier blog on that topic here). And to dredge it all up yet again, as The New York Times pointed out earlier this week, a grand jury investigation is currently underway (with a decision expected relatively shortly) as to whether there was any criminal wrongdoing in Edwards’ efforts to cover up the affair.

So while these other fellows may be able to begin planning to their respective returns to public life, Edwards has a ways to go.

You can't put it behind you until it's actually over.

One of the key requirements for moving on after a scandal is that the scandal has to be over. PR professionals advise their clients to get all the embarrassing details out right away, in part, because doing so ultimately deprives the media of fresh “news” on the topic. A lack of new angles can shorten the “legs” (or ongoing newsworthiness) of a story.

Edwards made his ultimate downfall far messier than it had to be, by lying to the media and allegedly spending a great deal of time, energy and money covering up his affair. The story dragged on and on as the media dogged him and his lover, documenting mounting evidence that his denials were false. Only when he finally came out and admitted to the affair did Edwards put an end to most of the speculation – and the daily media coverage.

You might think that having admitted to the mess didn’t help Edwards' PR much – but at least we stopped talking about it for a while.

And even then...

The grand jury investigation is news, so we likely would have been talking about the story again about now, anyway. However, if the Times’ report that Edwards may publicly acknowledge that he fathered his lover’s baby is true – constituting a full reversal of all his previous statements on the matter – he’ll be back at square one in the court of public opinion.

If that's the case, he'll have to re-set the clock on redemption yet again – and you have to wonder whether he'll ever be able to salvage his credibility. Yes, he may get whatever bad news remains out with the inevitable grand jury coverage, but his publics will nevertheless be faced with the reality of yet another lie.

How many times can you go back to the American people asking forgiveness for dishonesty, and still be believed? Edwards may be just the man to find out.

VisitDenmark: when your ads cause bad PR

Advertising folks have it tough, having, as they often do, to find the line between "edgy and new" and "offensive." This is especially true when their clients' audiences are wide-ranging, and collectively have a broad definition of what's acceptable.

I can remember many a time in my corporate career when I engaged in spirited debate with my ad department colleagues over proposed campaigns I knew were going to offend people in our target markets. They usually fell into the "humour" category; that is, they would have been very funny to some people in our market, and offensive to others. The fact that more people would likely be entertained than offended by them was irrelevant, from a PR perspective: the proposed ads were disrespectful of certain groups, so I knew the inevitable complaints would have news value.

In Denmark last week, the national tourism authority got a little taste of what happens when "edgy" ads cause bad PR.

The Danish tourism department, VisitDenmark, had to pull a video it had posted to YouTube less than a week earlier, following outrage among Danish citizens about the image of Denmark the video portrayed. In the video, an attractive young woman speaks to an anonymous man with whom she had a fling a year and a half ago, remembering fondly the Danish attractions they enjoyed, and letting him know their evening together had produced a beautiful son.

Denmark Wants You to Sleep with its Loose Women | Viral/Other | SPIKE.com

The video became a quick sensation on YouTube, reportedly attracting 800,000 hits in the few days it was posted (likely because it wasn't clear the whole thing was staged). Once it became known that VisitDenmark was behind the video, however, the news quickly turned to Danes' insulted reaction.

As The Huffington Post reports, VisitDenmark manager Dorte Kiilerich explained the ad was meant to tell "a nice and sweet story about a grown-up woman who lives in a free society and accepts the consequences of her actions." A sociologist quoted in the same article had a different take on it, echoing the perception that embarrassed and outraged some Danes: "you can lure fast, blonde Danish women home without a condom."

VisitDenmark is affiliated with the Danish government; and in this case, it appears its communicators forgot about one of their client's key audiences: the Danish people. This is a key issue that presents a struggle for many organizations: reconciling the needs, tastes and expectations of different audiences. The ad team may have been focusing on the target audience for the spot -- that is, non-Danes with the potential to travel there -- and forgotten its client's most important audience (the taxpayers of Denmark).

While Denmark is known to be a liberal country, it appears the ad team misjudged the public's tolerance level for casual sex; accepting a certain behaviour in your society is one thing, and being characterized and identified by that behaviour is quite another. It might even be true that opposition to the campaign came from a relatively small segment of the population -- but it doesn't matter, because the news value of a government-supported international message suggesting Danes are promiscuous is clear.

In advertising and PR alike, it's important to really know your audiences. The better you're able to predict their reactions to issues and situations, the more likely you'll be to create messages they find compelling -- and to avoid ticking them off.

Winnipeg firefighters’ new public service: lessons in crisis management

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about the Winnipeg firefighters’ union president’s response to the salacious tale about a firefighter who had been caught “kissing” a young woman in a shed behind the Osborne Street fire hall. At the time, Alex Forrest's response seemed appropriate, given that one of his union members had clearly crossed the line and the union and management both appeared to be acknowledging it and taking action to address it.

It now appears that may not have been entirely true.

In Friday’s Winnipeg Free Press, the young woman involved in the shed incident came forward with her side of the story: she claimed to have been taken advantage of, she contradicted the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service (WFPS) firefighters’ union's public statements that nothing more than kissing had taken place during the encounter, and she recounted having been ignored when she came forward to complain to fire officials shortly after the incident.

Now, I’m in no position to decide who’s telling the truth in this case – I wasn’t there, and I don’t know any of the people involved. But the Free Press story contains some direct quotes from fire department officials which provide some insight.

Ken Sim, the deputy chief of operations for the WFPS, said Thursday the woman's claims are alarming and contrary to what the firefighter at the centre of the controversy claims happened.

"It certainly would shed some different light on this if in fact she was taken advantage of. If that's the case, I would certainly encourage her to get in touch with the Winnipeg Police Service," said Sim. "We dealt with the information the firefighter provided us at face value."

If, indeed, the woman's complaint had been swept under the rug and kept from WFPS brass, they would have had to base their decisions on how to discipline the offender, and to respond to media, on the information they had. The same goes for Forrest: in terms of the response to the initial “what happened” questions, if you believe he didn’t know the woman had ever come forward and had no way to find her, he had to base his response on what the involved firefighter told him. We can’t hold people responsible for things they couldn’t have known.

However. Making definitive-sounding statements about what happened in a controversial incident when you know you've only got one side of the story is asking for trouble.

Friday's Free Press story gave Alex Forrest the opportunity to revisit his earlier statements given the new allegations, which he called "troubling."

Forrest questioned her motives for only coming forward now, through the media, and whether her claims were accurate.

Logically, if the woman’s claim is true, then she isn’t only coming forward now – she came forward earlier, and was ignored. And how could using the media be somehow suspect, if she had tried to complain directly (and privately) to the WFPS and been sent away?

Again, we can't know who's telling the truth. But from a PR perspective, it doesn’t matter: the fire department now looks like it has engaged in a cover up. We have a brand new round of media stories; and what was initially one employee with bad judgment has grown into a potential conspiracy.

If we turned back the clock and looked at the media coverage from when the story first broke, do you think the stories would have been much worse for the WFPS had they reported sexual relations in the shed? I don’t, really. I heard a number of Winnipeggers react to Forrest’s suggestion that, at only 5-8 minutes, there wasn’t time for more than kissing, with “yeah, right!” It was inappropriate behaviour no matter how you slice it – kissing, sexual relations, whatever. It wasn’t what heroes do on the job – that’s why it was a story.

Now, however, because the allegedly silenced victim is here to share her side of the story, the WFPS and its hundreds of hard-working men and women get treated to another round of humiliating coverage.

It’s tough to say whether any of the spokespeople could have done anything differently when the charges first came out, other than to acknowledge they were going solely on the firefighter's word.

But this story does illustrate once again why good crisis communications follow three key rules:

- Tell the truth,
- Tell it first, and
- Tell it all.

Had the WFPS and/or the firefighters’ union had the whole story, and told it right off the hop, there wouldn't have been anything new for the media this week. They, and their employees, might have been able to continue the job of moving on from this embarrassing incident, rather than re-living it yet again.

At this point, the WFPS has a lot of work to do before it's done with this file. It needs to somehow get to the bottom of what really happened – both in the shed, and potentially in its offices when (and if) the young woman initially came forward. Now beyond a single "bad" employee issue, the WFPS has to address the appearance of a corporate culture of deception, in which firefighters are willing to cover up their buddies' bad behaviour at the expense of the public they're supposed to serve.

I sure hope that fellow enjoyed his 5-8 minutes.


Winnipeg's high-profile romantic getaway.

When employees work against you

The president of the Winnipeg firefighters’ union, Alex Forrest, has a big job. He’s the guy tasked with speaking on behalf of the city’s firefighters, working both with and against City management to protect what his members feel are their rights, and to fight for the tools they feel they need to do their job well.

To be effective in that role, Forrest has to be credible with the public at large; without that credibility, his union would have a steeper hill to climb come negotiation time. Especially since 9/11, firefighters are generally seen as heroes, as selfless saviours who put themselves in harm’s way to protect us. An image like that makes it tougher for any city to turn down requests for funding without public backlash; it's worth protecting.

But what if the image of the local firefighter was to become that of an adolescent lout, spending his on-the-clock time flirting and making out with a woman in a shed behind the firehouse?

It sure wouldn't make Forrest’s job any easier.

While firefighters do indeed put themselves in harm’s way to save people’s lives, pets and homes, they also spend quite a bit of time hanging out in the fire hall waiting for an emergency. Now, it’s not in the union’s best interests to talk about that side of it, but Forrest's members get to spend quite a bit of their time at work doing things like playing cards, sleeping, making dinners, playing music, etc. – things most people could never get away with doing at work. But it’s reasonable. We pay them to be there and at the ready in case of emergencies.

With that said, playing cards and making chili are not the same as making out in the shed.

This morning’s Winnipeg Free Press contains a story by Gabrielle Giroday called “Firefighter sorry for shed tryst,” with the sub-head “’Horrible indiscretion’ no danger to public, union boss says,” which outlines an incident that took place at the end of July. It recounts how a local firefighter met a woman near Station No. 4 on Osborne Street, “showed her a nearby shed,” and then “the two began kissing until an alarm came in” a few minutes later.

Must’ve been some shed.

The fact is, every organization has employees who are, let’s say, less than professional. Or even, short on personal integrity and judgment. But when your organization’s “brand” is anchored by notions of heroism, these employees are particularly problematic for your communicators (would this have been a media story had the employee caught kissing in the shed been sneaking out on his bartending job? Likely not.)

In talking to the media about this case, Alex Forrest had a number of audiences, and a communication objective for each.

1. Citizens of Winnipeg (and specifically those served by Station No.4): reassure them that public safety wasn't affected; that it was an isolated incident, which is not supported by the union or its members; and that the union is reasonable, and willing to accept punishment for a member if it’s warranted (this helps with future negotiations, when taxpayers remember the union’s reasonableness).

2. Union members: show on the one hand that the union will stand by them if they mess up, while simultaneously working to prevent them from having to “wear” a colleague’s indiscretion.

3. City management: show that the union is reasonable in its positions, and won’t stand in the way of appropriate handling of a personnel issue (again, this can serve as “currency” in future negotiations).

The reader comments at the bottom of the Free Press’ story online suggest that not everyone is buying Forrest’s (and the firefighter’s) position. But from my reading of the story, Forrest has done about as good a job of each of those objectives as he can, at least publicly.

The firefighter did what he did, and there's no excuse for it; so the best thing to do is to admit it, denounce the action, reassure the public the incident didn't interfere with public safety, and accept the punishment.

Another PR lesson from Nike: don’t put yourself in the penalty box

Last week, we thought the story about the dunk heard (but not immediately seen) ‘round the world was finally over.

But it wasn’t – because one of the parties most (presumably) embarrassed by it, sportswear and equipment giant Nike, decided to volunteer for one more media lashing.

Some quick background: on July 6th, Xavier University sophomore Jordan Crawford “dunked on” NBA MVP LeBron James at the LeBron James Skills Academy in Akron, Ohio. Shortly thereafter, Nike officials confiscated video footage (both James and the Skills Academy are sponsored by Nike) from two witnesses who were videotaping the pick-up game. There are conflicting reports as to what prompted that:

- some reports (including this one from ESPN) suggest that James instructed Nike officials to seize the tapes;
- others repeat Nike’s statement that it took the videos because they contravened its media policy.

Either way, it wasn’t Nike's greatest PR move. It made James look petty and vain, and made Nike’s PR machine look a little tone-deaf, if not behind-the-times: in this age of automatic uploads to YouTube, did Nike really think there wasn't at least one more video in the crowd? I'm frankly amazed we haven't seen video of the Nike officials taking the tapes.

Whereas the dunk provided a great opportunity polish James’ reputation as a sportsman, had he chosen to congratulate the student player on a nice dunk, the appearance of trying to sweep it under the rug created a PR problem that had mainstream media and bloggers alike gossiping about it for days.

Then, on July 22nd, the inevitable happened, and two more (unauthorized and, we have to assume, unknown to James and Nike) videos of the dunk came to light. Along with the highly-anticipated videos came a new round of mainstream media and web coverage, as everyone checked out the dunk and waded in as to its relative quality… as well as how badly the whole affair had reflected on LeBron James and Nike.

So… phew. It was finally over, and both LeBron and Nike could go back to what they do best, leaving this embarrassing little incident behind them.

But not quite.

This past Friday, Nike announced it was going to return the confiscated videos of the dunk to their owners.

A former boss of mine used to warn us against “putting ourselves in the penalty box” – that is, proactively doing things that would bring us bad PR. If you’re dealing with an issue that isn’t reflecting well on your organization, get rid of it – all of it – as quickly as you can, and move on. It’s not that different from the rules for getting out bad news, as I discussed in an earlier post about John Edwards’s extra-marital affair: tell the truth, tell it first, and tell it all. That approach will feed far fewer media stories than a drip, drip, drip approach, in which new details spawn new rounds of media coverage, speculation, and general discussion of how you’ve messed up over and over again.

Of course, I don’t know the background on Nike’s decision here – maybe I’m missing something. But surely if they planned to give the tapes back, or if there was even any latitude for them to give the tapes back, they could have done it two days earlier, when the other two unauthorized videos came out. That would have made the return of the videos a footnote in all the excitement about the dunk footage – as opposed to the catalyst for another round of media coverage of this less-than-shining moment in Nike's expensive sponsorship of LeBron James.

For the sake of posterity, here’s the dunk (from ebaumnation.com, not the Nike-confiscated video, which I haven’t yet found on YouTube). It comes about 35 seconds in, and is repeated in slow-mo around the 1:00 mark.