Friday, July 30, 2010
Sudden Crisis
The insurance industry has been plunged into crisis in the last two days on the strength of one newspaper article. Investigations have already begun into how the companies handle death benefits for the families of deceased soldiers. Did the insurance industry see this coming? Should they have seen it coming? The industry is absent from early reports, which indicates that they were not prepared and had no defense ready. Now, however, they have the attorney general of New York State and the Defense Department looking into their affairs. That is never good and should they be held at fault, it would be cost costly to the industry's reputation.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Self-Deception
As more and more studies indicate, one should never underestimate the extent to which we can deceive ourselves. In this case, those who fake mental illness come to believe that they are ill. Self-deception has no limit. We can believe just about anything. This is why in PR work we need to rely on facts, what can be independently verified, rather than beliefs. Every PR practitioner knows at least one client who has fallen in love with a product or service and is convinced that it is the best in the market. The client is unhappy if anyone dares point out that the product or service might not be any better than competing offerings and in fact, might suffer in comparison. There is an old newspaper cliche that states, "If your mother says she loves you, check it out." We can rarely be certain in PR. There is always the possibility of unknown evidence that can change the interpretation of what we think we know. We assume that even if we don't know those facts, others do, so we proceed cautiously. Whether or not our clients appreciate such respect for evidence, the media do.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Propaganda
News that the US military has been paying journalists in Afghanistan to write positive stories about America has been dismissed as PR. Actually it is propaganda, but the reporter who wrote the story cannot tell the difference. It is a reminder to PR practitioners that few understand what we do even yet. It is true that in the early days of modern PR, practitioners paid editors to write and/or run stories, but that went away decades ago. With the internet, pay-for-play will return to some lesser web sites, and some PR practitioners will put money down to get their messages out. Most PR practitioners will continue to use persuasion. Now if the media would only learn that...
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
When A Program Stalls
This story is instructive. It is a report of the aftermath of a public affairs program that has stalled and might have failed. The utility industry spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying Congress for a cap-and-trade system to handle climate change. Then last week, the Senate balked because the Democrats realized they don't have the votes for legislation. Everyone behind the program is exhausted, discouraged and ready to quit, but there is no choice but to play the rest of the effort out. The story highlights that even the best and well-funded communications programs sometimes fail, and there is little one can do about it. Senators struggling with a slow economy and joblessness aren't about to pass a law that might impact the economy negatively. Cap-and-trade might be the right bill but it is the wrong time. Every PR and public affairs practitioner can tell a similar story. It has happened to all of us. The difference this time was the size of the effort.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Taking The Sword
In a none-too-subtle way, the board of BP has let it be known that it will throw over its CEO tonight and choose an American to run the company. This is a delayed response to a disaster that will define the company for the next 10 to 20 years or even longer. It has been pointed out in the news media that BP relies heavily on US operations for its revenues and earnings. The rumored American successor is now in charge of day-to-day operations in the Gulf. While this is a move to salve the outrage of the American public, it comes under the headline of "too little too late." BP has joined Union Carbide and Exxon as case studies of industrial disaster that needn't have happened. There is still an open question whether BP can survive this. Although the company has stated publicly that it can absorb the costs, that assertion seems hollow in light of the lawsuits and cleanup operations still to take place. An American as CEO isn't going to make those expenses go away.
Friday, July 23, 2010
Future of News
These long, insightful and brilliant comments from Google to the Federal Trade Commission on the future of news are essential reading for PR practitioners. Google recites the history of technological change and newspapers, points out what it is doing to help find new economic models for news gathering and dissemination and calls for reasonable business approaches to ultimate solutions. As one commentator noted, Google takes the Commission to school on the subject. As if to verify Google's approach, this innovation from ABC News for Apple iPads is an innovative approach to providing global news to readers. It provides a graphic approach that engages the reader's interest at the same time as it provides information.
Google is right. News cannot stay the same nor should it be subsidized in the internet era. Newspapers will find new economic models after a period of shrinkage and pain, but that should not be done by fighting the present and future. Rather, one should accept change and move with it. This is something that newspaper publishers have always found hard to do.
Google is right. News cannot stay the same nor should it be subsidized in the internet era. Newspapers will find new economic models after a period of shrinkage and pain, but that should not be done by fighting the present and future. Rather, one should accept change and move with it. This is something that newspaper publishers have always found hard to do.
Thursday, July 22, 2010
How?
How do you communicate to a rogue state that glories in its belligerence? This is the constant challenge the world faces in talking to North Korea. North Korea holds its own counsel, plays games with China, South Korea and the US and gets away with appalling behavior. Yet, because it is a nuclear state and a highly armed one, the rest of the world must tread carefully about North Korea's borders. If there is any one state that deserves to fall in the world today, North Korea would be it. No one is ready to take on that mission so the rest of the world jawbones North Korea's leaders who play one country against another. It is frustrating and not productive, but not much else can be done. North Korea is an example of the limits of communication.
