Companies quickly jumped on the #BlackLivesMatter bandwagon after the tragic murder of George Floyd at the end of May. Online expressions of empathy and support, black boxes on social media profile pages and other messages proliferated as PR pros and executives tried to support a growing call for change.
Many brands’ messages were well received. Others were quickly called out, however, as audiences saw a significant disconnect between words and actions. Marketing and PR pros worldwide are struggling with how to position brands in the wake of growing calls for action on a wide variety of cultural issues.
Stakeholders increasingly demand companies take a stand on issues of social justice and other culturally divisive topics like climate change. No longer can executives and boards sit idly by and say what they believe are the “right” things if they are not willing to do the right things.
Executives argue that their job is to maximize return for investors. With this parochial view they may fail to acknowledge responsibility to employees, customers, communities and society at-large, unwittingly fanning smoldering issues that may soon explode into full-blown crises.
What can PR professionals do to help guide management to take meaningful action that can mitigate or avert a crisis? We must be business people first, and communicators second.
1. Listen and Learn. Invest in social media scanning and analysis and report results regularly. Develop ‘early warning systems’ that can identify a crisis in-the-making by cultivating regular dialogue with colleagues. If you don’t want to be the last one to know about a potential crisis, start asking people to share their input.
Look outside the window, too. Understand how competitor actions and messages are being received, and don’t make the same mistakes.
2. Know vulnerabilities. Evaluate potential crises by a) how likely they are to happen, and b) how damaging they may be when (not if) they do. Identify potential problems and rate them on a scale of least-to-most probable and impactful. Prioritize risks that fall on the high end of the scale and develop communications strategies to address them.
3. Scan trends. Share data and build a business case. For example, many corporate boards not only lack diversity but fail to recognize that diversity—of people, of culture, of viewpoints—improves performance. Study after study have concluded that diversity pays big dividends.
Quantitative data can be a powerful tool to persuade management of the merits of a particular approach to an emerging issue. In my experience, C-suite executives are more receptive to data that support a position than they are to anecdotal evidence.
4. Focus on the right actions. Brands have been quick to issue supportive messages over the past several weeks, but many have been criticized as self-serving attempts to avoid negative attention. For example, Amazon is running an ad boasting its investments in environmentally friendly things like electric vehicles and carbon neutral operations. And while these are worthwhile endeavors, the company appears tone deaf to stakeholder concerns like a living wage for employees, recycling programs for Amazon packaging and products and content on its sites that are viewed as overtly racist. Focus on fixing the right problems, at the right time, and stakeholders will notice.
There are no easy answers, either for executives or for PR pros. But there are countless opportunities to listen, learn, and make the case for doing the right things, for the right reasons. In so doing, we can help build better companies that in turn build a better, stronger society for us all.
