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Tuesday, April 07, 2020

Cassandra 

In Greek mythology, Cassandra was a prophetess who predicted the future.  The trouble was the gods had arranged it so that no one would believe her. She was right but frustrated by a lack of acceptance.  This is a common problem in PR when practitioners and companies foresee a future but cannot get the media and market interested in discussing it.  Here is an example from Texas.  The owner of the company predicted loudly and clearly for years that the US needed a home-based source for personal protection equipment in the case of a pandemic.  No one paid any attention to him and kept ordering cheap masks from the Far East.  Now that he is proven right, he refuses to accelerate his production because he knows hospitals and healthcare providers will go again to the lowest bidder once the pandemic is over, and he will be stuck with equipment and personnel he must discontinue.  People might be upset with him but no one can blame him.  He is looking at the long-term market, and it doesn't favor him.  There is no good answer to the Cassandra problem.  It requires long, hard, ground-pounding work, and an organization can run out of time without succeeding.  One can celebrate the Texas business owner for his perspicacity, but he would rather get a contract.

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