Win Some, Lose Some...

No Hall of Fame for PR rainmakers

As CEO of a pay-for-performance public relations firm, I spend much of my time on new business…accounts that will be both interesting and challenging to our army of pros as well as profitable to the company. And as many of you in this industry know, the two are not always compatible. Even if rainmaking has become more of sifting through referrals than cold calling, it’s still requires a skill set and mental discipline developed through experience and over time. Plus, finding that rare new client that is both fun to work on and produces solid revenue is often as difficult as hitting an inside curveball or as daunting as driving the lane clogged by an NBA center.

Sure, there are actually specialists these days that rent themselves out as rainmakers-for-hire; and most of the larger PR firms have at least a designated new businessperson or even a whole department dedicated to seeing the pipeline is always full. More often than not, these new biz pros know more about sales technique than PR, or how a new client might or might not fit the culture or business sense of the firm. They might win a game or two, but not sure they have the consistency for a whole season.

I remember a very successful ad exec and mentor of mine telling me when asked who handled new business for his global firm…”Me”, he emphatically stated. “I’m the guy with the passion and the name on the door…and most importantly, know the people behind it.” I’ve followed a similar philosophy for my firm over the years, and while it may not work for some larger more anonymous PR institutions, it’s worked for us in welcoming the kinds of clients that best fit us. We’re fortunate that referrals from current and past clients along with internet and social media inquiries make up the bulk of our prospects today, but each still has to be researched and carefully followed up with to determine whether the story is there, the compatibility exists, and if it can be a profitable relationship for both us. I happen to enjoy this and prefer not to delegate something I believe is this important to our survival and growth.

No matter the new business methodology employed however, the metrics of success are as clear as a ball game…you either win or you lose. Yes, you may go to extra innings or overtime, but there are no “kissing your sister” ties, only winning or losing. You land the account or you don’t. And when you do, it’s exhilarating and heady stuff. When you don’t, it sucks. Sound familiar? The big difference from this sports analogy of course, is that when the new business game is over and the celebrating has ceased, then the real work begins.

And, of course, there’s no Hall of Fame.

Time to Reinvent Our PR Selves

Yet again...

The beauty of the end of the old year and the beginning of a new one is that it gives a perfectly good and timely excuse to do something for ourselves and our profession that we should have been doing on a continual basis all along...re-evaluation and reinvention. Forget the clichéd New Year Resolutions thing...they never seem to stick beyond a few days or weeks at best regardless. We're talking wholesale reinvention, not some minor personal tweaking like quitting smoking or losing ten pounds. (For the sake of honesty, I must fess up to the fact that twenty-three years ago, a new year resolution to quit smoking not only held but also was the best thing I ever did for my personal health. Now, that ten pounds thing has been a bit tougher...)

Re-evaluation? Reinvention? Ok, the re-evaluation is the easier of the two...but not always. It's tough to take a hard look at ourselves and how we've conducted ourselves professionally...and be brutally honest in the examination. The PR profession is an easy target for others and most of us are used to being on the defensive against criticism. However most of this criticism comes from outside our professional ranks from those that have the least knowledge of either the business framework or the processes employed. The criticism generally falls in the category of some kind of "devious manipulation of the truth or the public good" through some nefarious campaign designed and executed by a bunch of suits in a corporate boardroom. There are times that every PR pro wished that that kind of absolute control were possible, but in my forty years I've never seen it...zip, nada.

But on a smaller more individual scale there is not one of us that cannot look back on shortcuts we've made, clients we've taken with less than noble causes to promote, disingenuousness (lies?) to get a reporter interested, or my continuing favorite...client fees (both hourly and otherwise) inflated for the bottom line (ours, not the clients'.) These, plus the one most abused...an exaggeration of our own self-importance...are the critiques we need to make upon ourselves and note. Ah, but correcting them, therein lies the real problem. Making and committing to that effort in a tough economic time when clients are scarce and PR budgets even scarcer is no easy challenge.

Given that each new year and decade opens with an attitude of self-renewal and a positive vibe for what can yet be accomplished, and that this year being even more so because of the depths of negatively from whence we have just come, why not give it a shot? I'm personally betting on the future more than ever... that my and our collective actions together can influence change this year. That clients, the media (old and new) upon which we depend for so much, and others in this profession will respond to difficult, but oh so simple, changes... like fairness in billing and in payment, promotion and coverage of real news not opinion, and a little humility and civility in our interaction with each other.

As my favorite politician said a long time ago...."Some men dream of things that never were and say, why? Others dream of things that never were and say, why not?"

Sounds like a good way to start this new year.

Tiger Dissappears

Does an 800-pound gorilla leave a shadow ?

Accenture, the global consulting firm announced this week it had the perfect plan for solving its current public relations problem, i.e., commercials, ads, billboards, posters, etc. touting its close and paid association with the world's most recognizable professional athlete, Tiger Woods. The plan, undoubtedly cooked up over several high priced meetings between management and corporate PR consultants, is a simple one...eradicate the cheating philanderer from our corporate life and pretend he doesn't exist! I can't imagine the number of high-priced hours that were charged against this winner.

Accenture, as if Tiger Woods Were Never There

How exactly...by removing the "Tiger brand" from all advertising, web sites, posters, internal displays, T-shirts, caps, tchotchkes...and, I assume from all jokes around the water cooler or board room table.

"The company's advertising campaign is about "high performance" and Mr. Woods 'just wasn't a metaphor for high performance anymore,' a spokesperson for Accenture said." Really? Juggling thirteen plus affairs while being married... and winning Athlete of the Decade, might cause some to doubt that, but that's fodder for others to debate.

Ironically, Accenture's Orwellian decision has caused even more focus to be put on the company's decision making and not for its decisiveness, but for its silliness and perceived pettiness. Rather than suffer a little self-effacing embarrassment, stand by their original decision, or at least judiciously move to a new marketing strategy, Accenture has chosen to come across as humorless, self-righteous, and a shade petty. Just the traits we all want in our high-priced corporate consultants, I guess.


For the record, I'm one of those naysayers that actually do believe that Mr. Woods' does not have a "public obligation" to come clean...to open his broken personal life to the public hordes that may or may not have purchased consulting services, a watch, a Buick (which he obviously doesn't drive personally) or a razor because of his face and scripted word. Mr. Woods is one hell of a golfer, arguably the best that ever lived...and as a golfing role model with his picture perfect swing, power, and single-minded on-course competitive intensity, he should be admired and imitated...and well-paid as a professional athlete. If these same attributes...some God-given but most learned through hours and years of practice...also attract advertisers, PR-types, corporate hanger-ons, fawning sports writers, and yes, beautiful adoring women...does that present an obligation for him to "go public" with an explanation or act of contrition so all can feel better about their own foolishness. The corporate sponsors and their PR minions are no different than the women that threw themselves in front of him...hanging out with Tiger so they can feel better about themselves and maybe add a little value to their lives (products, services, etc. etc.) They all got something in return.

The only people that Mr. Woods has an obligation to are himself and his family...and maybe his golf game that brought him the fame in the first place. The rest of us self-righteous souls need to get back to work.

So, where’s the value?

PR is worth real dollars, but only if it’s accountable …

I recently read an interesting blog post by Chris Brogan titled, "The Audacity of Free", wherein he expounds on the notion that in today’s tough economy, many people behave as if “free” is the watchword of the day. That the imparting of knowledge and information… in his example, it’s through conferences… somehow is often expected to be given away. “The sense of walking into somewhere and listening to sage words doesn’t seem like it should cost money….” But he argues, and rightly so, to, “Never apologize that something costs money if you’ve determined the value of it.” And, to not “ever feel embarrassed to charge for value.”

Well normally you won’t hear me do much supporting of something that seems to be closely related to charging for pure consulting, which can lead to hourly fees, which in my opinion can lead to nothing but mischief. But Mr. Brogan makes a point about what appears to be a trend in companies today believing that they and not the vendor (another term I dislike almost as much as hourly fee) are the sole arbiter of whether a service should have a charge attached, i.e., they determine the cost based upon their interpretation of value received. While I understand why today’s dreary economy and years of malfeasance and overcharging have brought us to this point, it is still a frightening thought… the inmates in control of the asylum? If only clients determined the price of our services, oh what a scary world this would be.

Or would it be? Maybe we deserve to have the moneychangers driven from the temple so that clients can once more believe that the cost of PR is directly related to value received. And most importantly, that this perceived value be determined on tangible results and not smoke and mirrors or spoken words alone. That kind of accountability leads not to mischief, but to a compensation model that is credible and just.

That is not to say that the clients determine the price of such compensation. I haven’t given total leave to my senses or control of the asylum. I agree again with Mr. Brogan when he says, “it’s not your buyers who decide this, no matter what we like to think in social media kumbaya-ville” We in PR must not be embarrassed to charge real dollars for the services we provide. But make sure these services are tied to the tangible, measurable results that our clients desire…not just our words. If we’re going to charge for “knowledge” be willing to demonstrate just how that knowledge provides such results. Once again to paraphrase Mr. Brogan with a modicum of literary license… “Free is beautiful, and costs are part of life.” But please… based on accountability.

The Clients Are Now in Charge...for real

And some of the big ones are real monsters…

If fighting for every client dollar amongst our own industry wasn’t enough, now we are fighting the clients themselves for theirs… as well as ours. A couple of stories this last week really brought this fact home. The Wall Street Journal "Thrift Darkens Industry Hopes" once again reported that this recession is causing big companies like American Express and Shell to cut back on the fees they pay their advertising agencies and thus, asking for equal or more service for the same or less. And "Advertising Age" reported this week that the biggest of all companies, Walmart, is actually asking many of the consumer companies marketing through this behemoth to divert some of individual marketing budgets back into Walmart’s budget…or else! (Walmart of course, doesn’t state it so overtly. They simply hide the threat with a wink under the guise of a “simultaneous push to clear their shelves of underperforming brands.”

So why should this concern me, a CEO of not an ad agency, but a PR firm that specializes in clients much smaller than any of the above? Because in this business of marketing and influence, what happens at the top eventually filters down…and in this current recession and 24/7 trade news cycles, that eventually is shortened to ‘very quickly.’ The big clients are now firmly in charge.

Yes, I know, we have all played to the cliché, “the client is always right” or some such platitude. But that usually only went so far as to acknowledge a client’s right as the “spending partner” to have final say in friendly, professional disagreements…sometimes financial, sometimes creative. This is a different animal entirely, and worst of all it appears to be a trend. Companies that only recently spoke of and often treated their ad and PR agencies, not as vendors, but as marketing partners, now in this buyer’s market have shifted completely into the “you’re a vendor” gear and are driving hard compensation deals where only they are the winners.

What’s an agency to do that wishes to work with the big boys and girls of the Fortune 500? Not much, unfortunately. You could always just keep quiet and go along believing it’s only temporary and once the economy has righted itself the compensation and partnership equilibrium will be restored. Do I hear snickers out there? You could of course, speak out and up at the injustice of it all…using what’s left of the media, trade or otherwise, to state your case. The end result unfortunately isn’t likely to be any more satisfying and, even more damaging to your bottom line.

Or, you can concentrate like many of us in this business have on the smaller entrepreneurial companies as clients. But you better know how to work smart… and for less here as well. Yes, we’re seeing even ‘more for less’ client demands among the smaller companies as well; but since we’ve never really dealt with monster budgets, incrementally it doesn’t seem as bad. And smaller companies don’t have the bureaucratic layers of internal marketing, advertising and PR managers professing to have the knowledge and wherewithal beyond that of their vendor agencies. Our clients, (well ok, most) actually act like they really respect and need what we bring to the partnership.

At least for now.

Age of Irrelevance

From left to right: Dick Grove,+++, Katy Leakey+, Philip Leakey ++
Relevant contributors on a global scale inspiring change

Where the media gets it wrong…

As many of us know, growing older is a double-sided coin. And those of us in PR, still laboring and not yet retired out of desire or necessity, know that this coin spins and lands heads up or down daily as a reminder of our vulnerabilities and strengths… as well as our irrelevance to many. This blog post will probably not resonate with those readers that don’t remember a world without MTV or for that matter, Michael Jackson…a time long ago when all great music on TV came from either American Bandstand or Soul Train. However, if you’re willing to indulge an inhabitant of what must seem like “the old days,” you might learn something.

That double-sided coin landed on both sides this week. My company, INK inc. PR, was in the final stages of being mentioned in a story being written for Entrepreneur Magazine when it was discovered in the fact-checking stage that the founding CEO’s age was sixty-four. Not a big deal and certainly never hidden since it was never thought to be relevant. Aha and alas! It may not be a big deal, but it is important…at least to the editors of Entrepreneur. It seems under the old regime that no CEO was profiled over the ancient age of 50 to 52. We await (with our pacemakers carefully monitored) to see if the new editors are more enlightened and understand that maybe, just maybe a great business idea might possibly be generated by someone older than the founder of Twitter.

The entire incident reminds me of the great song from the musical hit, Chicago, “Mr. Cellophane”…the ultimate paean of reaching a certain point in your life where you become irrelevantly transparent to the world you still very much inhabit. That is exactly how much of the media and pop culture treats us. We no longer fit the advertising demographics of greed. We’ve hit the “plus or and above” point. You know, that upper level in demographic metrics no longer worthy of a number…just a + or ‘and above’ notation. All of us are lumped as “seniors” or even worse, not lumped at all.

Then just when I’m about to take out my hearing aids and slink off to find a good nap, that fickle coin flips back to heads up. Invited to address an off-site client’s sales force that is facing a crisis of potential media negativity, my age is revered under the guise of “vast experience, knowledge, and gravitas.” I receive a standing ovation as much for the gray in my hair as the words I have spoken. It seems that when a crisis strikes, as they inevitably do, a little “been there, done that” (or a lot, as this case may be) can be more valuable than a whole legion of Twitter followers.

Touché’, Entrepreneur!

As a matter of full disclosure, I readily admit to being an avid if older Michael Jackson fan with no reservations, as well as a proud owner of the Thriller rock video. Of course I did purchase it in 1984 as a VHS tape...

Much ado about nothing. Seriously... nothing.

Too much PR spin about nothing…way too much.

Where exactly does it say, and in what great volume of proper human conduct, let alone some PR book of knowledge, that every thing written or visually presented absolutely must be given its fifteen minutes of fame?

I recently read two different pieces on two completely separate “news items” that made me aware all over again that not everything is worth my time of reflection let alone your time. But for the sake of discussion, I’ll discount that to another five or ten minutes. The first was the hoopla generated over a rather badly drawn political cartoon in the New York Post last week attempting to humorously tie together stimulus packages and dead chimps…and the second was a book review in USA Today on a new PR tome titled, “PR: A Persuasive Industry” . The former received considerable coverage over several days on national television while the latter was relegated to an interior page of the newspaper. Both however, suffer from the same identical maladies. First, the subjects of the criticism, a cartoon and a book, are inferior examples of their breed…and second, the criticism itself is ineptly presented.

Starting in reverse order, all of the critical comments pro and con surrounding the cartoon focused on the issue of suspect racism in it’s content by the media and the talking heads who were determined to take advantage of the potential controversy of the perceived subject. Give me a break! First and foremost, it was a stupid political cartoon, by an institution protected under the 1st Amendment for two hundred years. But more to my point, it wasn’t even close to being a good political cartoon…it was in fact, a badly conceived and drawn cartoon, not worthy of publication, let alone comment, based on its lack of aesthetics and humor alone.

The second example personally caused me more discomfort because it delves into a profession (Public Relations) and a skill (reporting and smart writing) I hold with some esteem. If the reviewer, Seth Brown, doesn’t do his research or write any more skillfully than is presented in this “review” than he should be eternally grateful for every check he receives while masquerading as a writer…. "Public relations doesn’t have great PR.” Wow…that’s insightful! “Perhaps the most alluring thing about being a PR consultant is that no formal training is required: no certification, no universally acknowledged test, no courses offered at many prestigious universities…” Really? Someone better tell that to the Northwestern’s, Boston University’s Cal State’s, KU’s or the PRSA.

The book itself as quoted in his review sounds a bit sophomoric and defensive…. "There is much more gray than black and white in the field of PR ethics.” Duh! The authors define PR according to Mr. Brown, as “the planned persuasion of people to behave in ways that further a sponsor’s objectives.” Makes us sound like ad agencies for breakfast cereal on Saturday morning TV.

But Mr. Brown does end well…”If you’re looking for a book to conclusively answer your PR questions, keep looking.” Hear, hear. (In difference to full disclosure, I have not read it, only Mr. Brown’s review, which does not make me want to spend the money or time to do so.)

Sometimes, some things just simply do not require nor deserve their fifteen minutes of fame nor to be reviewed. These people, these things, these attempts at art, at communication or aggrandizement are just inept. And that’s ok. Try again.

Sorry, Andy Warhol.

The new PR economy…let’s make a deal

I was recently in a luggage specialty store shopping for a rolling carry-on (one of the greatest inventions of the latter half of the 20th century…should any of us have thought of it first, we’d never be laboring in the PR mineshaft again.) As I asked the store clerk about various brands and sizes, I was struck by his not only giving me this information, but his insistence on disclosing the discounted price for each as well. I inquired as to why; and he said, “no one is paying retail any more, so why chance losing the sale. Better to cut to the chase.”

Indeed. Are we are all looking to play “Let’s Make a Deal” in our daily lives these days, even when it comes to PR?

The evidence is certainly pointing in that direction particularly in light of the fact that money is harder to come by (unless of course you’re a major financial institution) and therefore each dollar must stretch further in spreading your good word. The good news, if there is any, appears to be that the need and desire for PR is staying strong to a degree because of the recession, i.e., PR is often considered a credible promotion tool of lesser cost than advertising. Advertising Age magazine recently stated…“While the recession showed its teeth in December—the U.S. economy shed 577,000 jobs—the public relations industry added 1,200 jobs. Meanwhile, advertising and media companies eliminated 18,700 jobs in December. Ad and media industry job losses total 65,100 since the recession began” according to the publication.

And while PR is demonstrating a resurgence in attractiveness in these tough times, (if not in quality…please refer to my earlier rants on the PR’s wastefulness of the media’s time on Blago, Jessica, et. al.) the industry’s costs of providing it’s services are seeing a downward pressure commiserate with it’s increase in need. In many cases this is absolutely justified and is a natural reaction to years of bloated hourly fees and retainers. But I believe it is more than a natural pushback to traditional PR firm’s charging for their own self-designated importance than their client’s actual needs. This drive for a “deal” when discussing PR compensation is becoming part of the fabric of the recession itself. “Everyone is dealing these days, from auto dealerships and luggage stores to the government itself…so why not PR?”

It’s a valid question and is particularly relevant given the often abstract and obtuse nature of the service our industry provides. Thank goodness that there continue to be enough media left to receive our outreach, and we still seem to be a better “deal” than wasteful advertising. And those of us that have been preaching accountability while being compensated under a “pay-for-performance” structure all along, it’s even smugly gratifying to see clients demanding more “value” for their tightening budgets. But we can’t get too complacent congratulating ourselves with how much better our accountability factor is over those fat hourly fee folks. Value as it’s now being defined in recessionary terms means less cost but with the same service/result.

“Pay-for performance” PR may have to make a few deals of its own to survive.

Failure is divine and good for the mind…

To paraphrase Ol’ Blue Eyes… “When I was twenty-one, it was a very good year…” It was actually at twenty-three, but why hassle a year or two when you’re young and naïve. Fresh out of school with a graduate degree, a beautiful young family, a dream PR job in New York, and an unlimited future laid out before me...and most important, an attitude of nothing but success. Failure? Not in my world. No way. Businesses didn’t fail. Marriages didn’t fail. And certainly, personal failure (as in getting fired) was not even a passing thought. Failure was for losers…and to be shunned and buried.

But to paraphrase, with literary license, Bob Seger…”I’m glad I know now, what I didn’t know then…” As is well documented in today’s economy, businesses do fail, half of all marriages crumble, and people in this industry do get fired, usually more than once. Thank goodness and probably for good reason.

Whoa…before I alienate all the ‘invest in success’ do-gooders out there... I’m not denigrating nor ignoring the pain; or even that much failure could have been avoided with additional diligence or effort. But if I have learned nothing else in my forty years it’s that failure can and should be a precursor to success. I once worked with an extremely successful and wealthy technology entrepreneur that claimed in a Business Week interview that he had won big and lost big in business twice before his latest climb to the top. I had another client from a wealthy background that ended up on the street, homeless and an addict, before making a twenty-year rise to greatness… economically and personally. Most importantly, both these individuals state categorically, they will not hire nor invest in anyone that has not tasted failure. That “failures” ought to be a line item on any resume worth their time to review. For it is failure that tests us in ways not imagined nor taught. Failure teaches and corrects and fills in the unimagined blanks of our youth. Failure is painful and it’s from that pain that learning and change comes, but it should never be dehabilitating. If you’ve never failed, you’ve never been tested. And if you’ve never been tested, how can you grow.

Yes, there are those that seem to always get it right the first time. People that that seem to have the Midas touch in their business life or in their personal life. Someone with a life too good to be true…a well-suited career, great well-behaved kids, a loving devoted life-mate, loyal forgiving friends, a knack for being in just the right time and place for life’s twisting rope of fate to swing in front of them exactly when needed most to lift them from peril.

Don’t waste time envying them… Rather, wish them well and push on down the road you’ve been traveling… the one with the potholes and hazard signs… and that next great growth opportunity around the corner.

Boldness in the time of shrinking violets…

One of the great ironies of the business world is that when times become economically difficult and great voices of leadership are needed the most; the weak tend to withdraw and complain, the mild hesitate, and even the strong tend to go silent. And to add to the irony as this silence becomes more pronounced, it’s compounded by a rush to abdicate operational leadership to those least likely to have long term vision…the internal accounting and legal naysayers to which risk is the most profane of four-letter words. And risk tied to spending on (everyone whisper now)…. PR or advertising is close to sacrilegious.

Let me be clear in this time of crashing stocks, bankrupt auto companies, and failed political campaigns…risk is not inherently bad, evil or profane. Stupid, ill-conceived, and scurrilous risk is…and those that practice it are stupid at best and criminal at worst. But don’t get me wrong. The virtues of caution and hesitancy are well documented and do have a place in a successful enterprise. Our most recent presidential election, for example, where ‘gotcha’ politics could have spelled instant disaster. But even here, I think we pined on both sides for a little more bold, straight talk and a little less circumvention and caution.

But fortunately, we’re in business and not politics; where we hopefully try to appeal to the highest common denominator of our customers and stakeholders and not the lowest. Doesn’t it just make sense then, that when the economics of natural selection begin to dictate fewer and quieter voices in the marketplace, that those that have great products and services needed to move the economy forward, and a positive story to tell, be allowed to tell it…loudly and boldly? Instead, those companies both well-established and just emerging go silent because of a myopic but frequently held view internally, that the first place to cut spending is on those line items that will be the most important for its survival in the long run. Huh?

We have a real live crisis going on in this economy and in our free markets. If you’ve made it this far and haven’t been wiped out or reduced to the point of mere survival, this is not the time to abdicate operational responsibility to timid accounting and legal naysayers preaching the mantra that by pulling back you’re actually moving forward.

This is absolutely the best and most opportune of times to be shouting and preaching, and getting your message out. That is not risk no matter how you spell it and no matter who tells you. Your company can achieve a double positive hit in doing so…. because the channel is less crowded, the message content will be clearer; and bonus points earned with your audiences for bold action rather than timidity.

Change is a five-letter word…

As most of my friends and co-workers would acknowledge, change is not something that comes easily for me. Evolutionary rather than revolutionary decision-making, overly optimistic assessments of the status quo, and every so often a periodic anger based knee-jerk reaction …yes. I always have thought that if six decades of life experiences and forty years of being in an industry steeped in subjective analysis taught me anything, it’s that indeed, the more things change, the more they do stay remarkably the same. I believe however, it’s time that I changed my mind.

So what’s different now? Not the world…not the business cycles of bust and boom and bust again…and not one more presidential election. Rather I’ve come to that realization as probably everyone eventually does, but not everyone admits, that there is a time when younger minds translate to fresher minds and that translates to fresh approaches to the some of the same old problems…and some new ones. And even if the approaches may not always be unique, often the tactical execution of these approaches will be.

This, I believe, is just such a seminal time. A moment when we, once known as the ‘young turks’ of our generation, recognize a changing of the guard, and begin looking forward and not behind. A moment when the wisdom of experience not necessarily always be translated into tactical execution, but rather into counsel and advice to point the direction only and not demand leadership. A time to acknowledge that there are new solutions; or at minimum, new creative thinking not tainted by that old clichéd adage repeated above.

It’s time to let a new generation take their whack at running this country and move it forward on the high end. That’s not going to be easy, smooth or quick so all the more reason to get on with it while the rest of us older and wiser turks get back to making sure the base foundation is secure for them to do so. We’re not going anywhere and we’re not disappearing…at least not yet. We can teach, demonstrate, bestow, and maybe even inspire this new generation of leaders about accountability, about fairness, about compassion…and about making tough, hard and often unpopular decisions when optimism and freshness isn’t always enough.

Alas, the more things change, the more they stay remarkably the same.

Feeding the beast with our tax dollars…

A story broke in the PR trades this week that much criticized insurance giant, AIG, had decided that public relations was a better way to spend it’s money considering its current position of being between a rock and a hard place...

NEW YORK: Embattled insurance company, American International Group (AIG), has retained Burson-Marsteller for PR services. In doing so, it suspended corporate advertising and other paid outreach efforts to offset the cost, PRWeek has learned. Earlier this month, Bloomberg quoted an e-mail between AIG spokesman Nicholas Ashooh and George Sard, CEO of Sard Verbinnen, discussing the possibility of placing ads to explain why AIG was planning a company conference at a California Ritz-Carlton resort.

The New York Post estimated the amount to be paid to Burson-Marsteller at between $100,000 and $200,000 per month. Those are our tax dollars, friend. But blessed be the wise, the company was doing so because it was feeling under a little pressure because of the recent criticisms…

“To spend the taxpayer's money on an expensive ad campaign to apologize for how you used taxpayer money leaves you open to further attacks,” Bloomberg quoted from Sard's e-mail. In September, the Federal Reserve loaned AIG $85 billion; the company received an additional $37.8 billion earlier this month. Some members of Congress had criticized an AIG event that took place after the company received government help. Most recently, AIG was criticized for steep executive payouts , but the company announced on October 22 that the payouts, which included $19 million to its former chief executive Martin Sullivan, were suspended. And last week, AIG agreed to suspend all junkets and perks not justified by legitimate business needs.

An associate of mine here at INK inc. determined that this new PR “defensive” works out to approximately $10,000 per work day…$1,250 per hour. Nice work if you can get it. Even by any of the giant monolithic PR firms’ compensation standards, that’s a healthy hourly fee. Having worked for several of these large firms during my 37-year career, including the recipient of this particular largeness, one can assume that chances are high that the majority of the fee will go against the writing and disseminating of self-serving press releases as a “response to the high volume of requests for information from the media, etc.” Not exactly what I would call a great trade-off for the millions in advertising dollars they were spending on the same message. A press release has little more credibility than an expensive wordy ad unless the news media buys into it. And the likelihood of responsible journalists, who also happen to be taxpayers, doing that is zero to none.

Hey AIG, I have a wild and perhaps even blasphemous suggestion coming from a life-long PR professional… and it won’t cost you a dime. Just cool it for a while, and get back to work for your millions of customers first and your shareholders second. Show some common sense, restraint…and honesty in your dealings with the American public and the news media…not more wasteful spending of our tax dollars on PR consultants.

Chicken Little never had it so good.

Is it over? Is Armageddon finally upon us? Is the ‘free ride’ that so many of the media pundits describe as the last ten to fifteen years screeching to halt, and from here on we’re all going to have to pay for our indulgences, and pay big time? Jim Cramer, that great prognosticator of financial wisdom and wannabe business TV-star, has been all over the financial media this last week touting his doom and gloom “sell” scenario…and of course, his own shaman-like power of warning of the market downturn. And Cramer unfortunately, is not alone. Chicken Little himself would be crushed as road kill as all of those that were first to lead the charge into the irresponsible behavior now turn backward in their clarion call of retreat.

Where Mr. Cramer and his new doom and gloom buddies and I disagree is…”what free ride?” Maybe the pendulum will swing dramatically for those that were actually sitting very high in stock ownership, compensation and lifestyle over the last fifteen years, manipulating their finances like a game of cards. But for the vast majority of Americans, the rest of us that were working and not hedge betting for a living, there has been no ‘free ride.’ (No, I’m not referring to the mythical “Main Street” versus “Wall Street” misnomers of the political campaigns.) We’ve been paying our bills, paying our taxes, letting our 401-K’s ride, and not buying a second or third home as a quick rollover investment. Yes, we’ve taken some equity out of our homes to handle an emergency or tuition increase, or even some improvements…. and, we’ve probably bought a thing or two foolishly now and then.

None of which I call a free ride. More importantly, we’re used to sucking it in and tightening up periodically…even over the last fifteen years. As an independent PR firm we’ve seen budgets dwindle and client losses more than once. But we continued to serve our existing clients because more than anything they needed it then more than ever, even while we were laying off employees, and skipping paychecks. But we didn’t panic. We didn’t cash in 401-K’s, sell stocks, or switch banks. We managed. We worked. We survived. We grew.

Some might call it the “glad game” (from those of you that remember “Pollyanna.”) Some like Mr. Cramer might even call it foolish. But I’ve never understood how negativity and panic produced anything other than more negativity and panic. Here’s a drastic suggestion from someone in the PR business…maybe it’s time to turn off the news and count the things we have to be ‘glad about.’

We’ve lost our ‘why’ in a perfect storm.

So, what are we to make of this last thirty-day news cycle? The American people (indeed the world, considering the impact of both our economy and politics on everything global) are under media assault from the worst economic crisis in three-quarters of a century; and a presidential election that becomes more tumultuous and surreal almost by the hour. And that, more than anything, is what is driving this relentless barrage of changing news stories…the fact that both these stories have no staticticity. They are constantly evolving and changing shape, almost on an hourly basis. It’s a freefall news cycle. There is no time for deep analysis. No time for ‘why’…just ’what.’ We the consumers, the savers, the investors, the makers and the doers, and the voters, let alone the pundits and serious journalists, are left to watch with concern and even fright from the sidelines without the benefit of understanding. And without understanding, there is no sense of control. And without any sense of control, there is panic. Which then, ironically, becomes the third story of this news cycle…but still with more ‘what’ and very little ‘why.’

Something else is contributing to this news cycle of vertigo, the multiplicity and competitiveness of the modern media world itself. This is probably the greatest irony of all. There is no shelter any more from the news…that is, being told ‘what’ is going on and even opinions about the ‘what.’ While the printed page may be shrinking and even disappearing at times in this technology-based world, media sources have vastly expanded through broadcast outlets, the Internet, and now Web 2.0 social networks by the thousands. The choices have become infinite. The noise has become deafening. The competitive “gotcha” factor all-pervasive. It’s often who is first to tell the ‘what’ and not whether is been verified or not. The average connected citizen is bombarded with hundreds of reporting’s (true and untrue) and millions of opinions from all directions.

Thus, a perfect storm of an unpredicted and unprecedented news cycle of ever-tumultuous economics, politics, and panic…coupled with a multitude of sources of quickly assembled information, is hovering over us. The result is really frightening with a whole lot of ‘what’ and not much ‘why’ to give us comfort as the sky darkens.

However, being the optimist I am as well as old enough to know that news cycles are just that, cyclical, I recognize this time will indeed pass. And while we cannot necessarily alter events out of our immediate control, we can work toward better and more accurate, in-depth communications even as we expand our means of communicating. Sometimes less can be more; and less ‘what’ and more ‘why’ and even ‘why not’ can ease our journey through a crazed news cycle reporting on a crazed time.

Back to basics: how a financial crisis is good for business

I love recessions. They bring out the absolute best and worst in people and in business. When the economy slows, which invariably does after we have had a delightful run of greed on both Wall Street and Main Street…old terms with new political meanings we will explore in more depth in a later blog…life becomes much simpler. The choices become much more clear, and the consequences of those choices, much stricter. Marketing and PR budgets become leaner and decisions therein must demonstrate value and accountability. Wow! Really?…amazing concepts that have traditionally received plenty of lip service but little action at the height of a burgeoning economy; but now, oh my, are the cornerstones of every recessionary decision. And just how do companies and organizations define and measure value and accountability; and do these definitions change depending on the prevailing economic wind? While of course never overtly stated, they often do. Marketing and PR dollars spent against internal research and audits, strategic positioning, message development, et al, are highest during flush times. They provide an excellent way to spend money and reinforce the importance, the very value, of the synergy between bloated internal PR departments and bloated PR agencies…the very reason for their mutually dependent existence. Alas, with tough times and the shrinking of budgets, value turns more to accountability (not synergy nor size) and metrics not abstract concepts.

It’s almost a cliché that during an economic downturn, we return to those simple, most basic, tested vehicles of commerce. Flat-rate mortgages, not ARM’s, more cash, less credit, personal relationships, not virtual reality, and in the world of PR, positive publicity, not another meeting, lunch, or audit. What a concept…real measurable results against predetermined goals. But what if you went one step further and created a compensation model based on only being paid if this positive publicity actually appeared…not just that it is “in process” or an interview had been completed, but actually had been broadcast or published? Now we’ve really returned to a simple, most basic tenet of commerce…being paid for actually accomplishing a measurable result. Wow…now we’re edging close to revolutionary. But if paying for results-only PR catches on, what’s to happen to all those bloated internal PR departments and bloated PR agencies? Not to worry. Although it would benefit us all if they went the way of the subprime mortgage, unfortunately like these real estate derivatives, bloated PR will rise again like the cycle of greed that fosters it.