From The New York Times… A story can entertain and inform; it can also deceive and manipulate. Perhaps few stories are as seductive as the ones we tell ourselves about ourselves — those reasonable, principled creatures so many of us presume ourselves to be. As Annalee Newitz writes in “Stories Are Weapons,” propaganda is premised […]
From Tom Weidlich at PRCG | Haggerty… Former Washington Post media reporter Paul Farhi has a piece in the Columbia Journalism Review this week highlighting the trend (he has numbers) of companies and others not even responding to reporters’ calls for comment. His examples concern crises. Farhi did Nexis searches and found that mentions of the phrase “did not […]
From our good friend in Australia, Tony Jaques, at Issues Outcome. Check out his website here. With universities tying themselves in knots over free speech and campus protests, and corporations struggling to decide what to say on high profile issues, it’s time to revisit whether management should speak up or shut up. Despite the headlines […]
By Henry Cooke for PRNews One of the best things about going to live conferences and other events is meeting the media who attend them. In my past career as a political reporter in New Zealand, I spent untold hours standing around bored at such events wishing someone in the pertinent industry would offer an […]
Published by Tony Jaques for Managing Outcomes When responding to a crisis or a major issue, CEOs need to speak clearly, with authority and empathy. What then to make of the latest advice from consultants McKinsey, whose expert on “go-to-market and omnichannel strategy, agile sales and marketing transformation” proposes that Chief Executives should be their […]
Why ‘meaning-making’ matters In every crisis, it is essential that government and public sector leaders provide a compelling story. A good crisis narrative teaches the public about the realities of the predicament. It conveys what leaders know, do not know and cannot know, and what they are doing to figure out as much as possible. […]
An article from Security Magazine For many organizations, it was déjà vu this March. Meta’s platforms Facebook and Instagram experienced outages on Tuesday, March 5th that lasted approximately two hours, coinciding with Super Tuesday voting in 16 states. And today, LinkedIn experienced an outage impacting thousands of users around the globe. It’s not the first time outages of this magnitude […]
By Philip M. Napoli and Asa Royal for Nieman Lab Here’s a term you may be hearing with increasing frequency: “Fact-based journalism.” The Associated Press uses it in fund-raising appeals, as does ProPublica, and our local NPR affiliate. The National Association of Broadcasters and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting both describe themselves as purveyors of “fact-based journalism” in their public relations materials. Even […]
By Constantinos C. Markides and Andrew MacLennan for Harvard Business Review A pilot once told us a story about an accident on an early morning flight in the 1950s. As the aircraft accelerated to take off, the captain noticed his flight engineer’s sullen expression and called out, “Cheer up, George.” But in his sleepy state, […]
By Matt Petteruto for PR News As the media landscape continues to change at a dizzying pace, it can be difficult for PR and communications pros to keep pace. Layoffs continue to mount, while the manner in which news is delivered and consumed by audiences is constantly evolving. Despite these rapid changes, one thing remains for […]