Your PR Architect

I don't want to talk about Matt, Harvey, Kevin, Charlie, or Bill. Recent headlines have created a Sargasso Sea of sexual misdeeds and dismissed journalists. It's not a great climate in which to send news releases about vague "solutions" and nude cooking. But if you need a break from the misadventures of fallen media giants, the PR world can offer a brief respite. If you're willing to wade through some challenging prose. After reading this one from Gold Stream Solutions -- an agency that includes PR among its areas of expertise -- I'm starting to understand what's killing news releases. Lousy writing. News-free copy. Vague information. Quoting a CEO with no last name. I didn't realize CEOs qualified for the federal witness protection program. If that's not sufficiently amusing, consider this release, received by my friend Tracy Schuhmacher, who writes about food and drink for the Rochester (NY) Democrat & Chronicle. It's from th...

By Dan Altuz (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons An old magician's trick -- "look closely, nothing up my sleeve" -- threatens to alter our perception of what constitutes real news. Unless we wise up, and fast. In stage parlance, the word was legerdemain . Derived from a French expression for "sleight of hand," it describes a magic trick, or some other deceit. Screenwriters and journalists don't use the word much anymore.  But, in an era of false news, dusting it off would be a fine idea. Because we're looking at a year or more of childish sniping and Tweets whose true purpose is to distract editors and too-lean reporting staffs from digging at harder stories. Legerdemain isn't limited to the next occupants of the White House. In some cases, PR people have performed their own version of "here's an oversized check to charity" to obscure the less-than-charitable d...

A few retailers recently gained some media praise for deciding  not to open for pre-Black Friday sales on Thanksgiving Day. Nordstrom, A.C. Moore, Barnes & Noble, and Costco are among those choosing to pass up quick-buck opportunities and rampant doorbuster-ism and allow employees to celebrate Thanksgiving with their loved ones. Bravo to them for choosing family over profits. But REI did them all one better. Recreational Equipment Company -- REI, the big sporting goods retailer -- took it even further: they won't be open on Friday, Nov. 27, actual Black Friday. They earned national TV coverage, telling NBC News among others, that employees would be paid for Nov. 27, even though the stores would be closed. "We're paying our employees to go outside," they said. A great move, earning REI plenty of free publicity. Except when the CEO took his message to social media via the "Ask Me Anything" forum on Reddit.com . While Jerry Stritzke, REI's chi...

One of the classes I teach involves helping students understand the concept of Big Data . And it gives me a headache to think about it. Big Data describes all the digital transaction information organizations acquire about us. Our health records (supposedly safe) are part of Big Data. When I buy kosher hot dogs, orange seltzer, and Tums (don't ask) at Wegmans, the loyalty card I carry tags my purchase in some data file. That becomes part of Big Data. By Thierry Gregorius (Cartoon: Big Data) , via Wikimedia Commons Taken together, an immense database contains our online purchase histories, our health histories, our online tussles with Microsoft, and so on. Most companies struggle to sift and manage this trove. And few can explain how hackers get into their computer servers and swipe it. In 2013, Target experienced a major data breach. They were hacked. The chief information officer resigned. A few months later, after Target experienced an awful fourth quarter, the CEO qui...

Scenario: You build a $50 million transit center where commuters can change buses in the warmth of a modern, heated terminal. And you have an $11 million contract with the city school district to transport students on your transit authority buses, often via the transit center. RTS Transit Center, Rochester, NY. Photo by David Kassnoff. Something disturbing takes place. There's a fight between students. And another. Then, an assault. And a stabbing. Some of these injure taxpaying commuters who indirectly helped build your $50 million wrestling/transit center. Perception: your transit center is a dangerous place. Even the mayor says so. Publicly. Your response? If you're the transit company, you blame the offending high school students. If you're the school superintendent, you keep repeating: "We can't fix it alone. Parents need to be involved." My response? You both were absent when the class on "Leadership" took place. Ther...

I didn't know you could buy surplus animatronic figures from Disney parks. Let alone install one from the Hall of Presidents as a company CEO. Animatronic at Disney Hall of Progress By SteamFan (own work (Nikon D80)) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) via Wikimedia Commons You'll read countless New Year's resolutions in the coming week. Some will be preposterous or hard to keep. But if you're a CEO or executive director of an organization, and you don't wish to be mistaken for an animatronic historical figure, there's an easy resolution to keep -- one that will help your internal communications far more than any newsletter or video message. It's simple: Be authentic. Be human.  Not every CEO is a "people person." The leader I'm describing -- call him Gerry -- was a good strategist and a charismatic sales leader. But he was never at ease talking...

By (WT-shared) Inas at wts wikivoyage  (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons If you're a CEO, President, Executive Director, etc. -- or one day wish to be -- please read this message from the head of Raindrop Products. It's a perfect example of how to treat customers, take responsibility, spell out a path forward, and do public relations around a thorny problem: Dear Citizens of Webster, Earlier this year the town of Webster officials made a decision to provide a new Spray Park on the grounds of the Webster Recreation Center. In addition to providing the citizens with a new community gathering place offering a fun, safe aquatic play experience, the officials decided to honor the town’s police officers and firefighters by theming this spray park with custom made spray toys with a “first responders” theme.  The purchase order was issued for the manufacturing of the custom made pieces with the hopes of having the equipment in place for a July 4th Grand ope...

By Oregon Department of Transportation (Diversity Uploaded by AlbertHerring) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons Wow. Say what you will about Google's massive  Internet presence,  but when they mess up, they're not shy about it. A few days ago, Google admitted its workforce was overwhelmingly white. And male. They shared some metrics here . This is unusually forthright, because there's no major litigation facing Google regarding workforce inequities. Instead, they got out in front of their problem, defusing potential negative publicity before criticism or litigation arose. But dig deeper and you find their statistics are somewhat worse when it comes to the diversity of the company's leadership. Google's overall workforce is: 30 percent female, 70 percent male.  61 percent white,  30 percent Asian,  2 percent African American, and  3 percent Hispanic. Google's leadership demographics are less fo...