Say what you want about the governor of New Jersey — and many do — but he knows how to handle an emergency. He was all over the airwaves yesterday telling citizens what to do as Hurricane Sandy bore down on the state. He was firm but not hysterical. He counseled preparedness then relaxation while […]
Posted on October 29th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 47 Comments »
Even if the PR practitioner who wrote this was being funny, it was a poor way to approach the media. There is a level of respect that reporters deserve whether one likes it or not. This is insulting, and I would fire the individual responsible for it. The idea that one can dictate to a […]
Posted on October 26th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 184 Comments »
Mitt Romney must feel like he is snakebit with friends like these. While I understand how Richard Mourdock came to the conclusion he expressed, and it is his right to say what he thinks, he has not gauged the publics to whom he is speaking. That does not mean one should pander to the public, […]
Posted on October 25th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 178 Comments »
Amazon may have created a PR disaster for itself with this action of wiping a woman’s Kindle clean of all its stored books. The move already has sparked negative commentary on the web. Amazon apparently invoked Digital Rights Management to take the action but it smells of “1984″ when an all-seeing government rewrote history to […]
Posted on October 24th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 178 Comments »
This story is interesting and instructive. It is a reminder that in an era of Big Data with nearly everything being tracked, it is still necessary to observe people directly to see how they behave. No surprise there. However, it highlights a certain laziness that can creep into management. That laziness is over-dependence on numbers to […]
Posted on October 23rd, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 177 Comments »
Goldman Sachs has been suffering for several years from bad publicity. This interview and the book from which it comes don’t help. It does little good that Goldman Sachs has portrayed the author as an egomaniac with outsized ambitions. Who will the public believe? Large financial firms today are looked upon as monsters who have […]
Posted on October 22nd, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 182 Comments »
Timing might not be everything but it is important. Just ask Google whose earnings release was filed three hours too early yesterday. There was no excuse for the mistake, and Google’s provider, R.R. Donnelley, might be looking for a new client. Google lost billions in equity value in minutes. There is no way to know […]
Posted on October 19th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 191 Comments »
PR practitioners talked constantly about reputation, the need to build it and most importantly, protect it. Sometimes it is difficult to point to the results of a lost reputation but the case of Lance Armstrong is textbook. Here is an athlete whose arc has been stunning in both rise and fall. From a near death […]
Posted on October 18th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 901 Comments »
Yesterday’s resignation/firing of the CEO of Citigroup was yet another reminder to company leaders that they no longer control their fates. Boards do, and boards have become more activist. Vikram Pandit, by all accounts, is an intelligent man but he couldn’t get the bank moving to the satisfaction of its directors. There is speculation that […]
Posted on October 17th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 199 Comments »
This is an optimist’s view of the fate of journalism presented with an historical perspective. The long look back is important because it reminds us that opinion journalism was the norm until the 20th Century. What is happening today with viewpoints expressed in news stories is simply back to the future. What was new to […]
Posted on October 16th, 2012 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized | 207 Comments »
