Kids These Days – As If Dog Fighting Wasn’t Enough

Courtney Barnes

Apparently Michael Vick’s inhumane extracurricular activity hasn’t only wrecked his reputation; now his generation is taking a fall as well.  As reported by others around the Web, Vick’s Falcons teammate, defensive end Chuck Smith, offered the following explanation for his behavior, at the same time criminalizing Gen Y-ers as wayward decision makers due to the influences of online media:

“Michael Vick is the first generation of superstar.  I call it the ‘why’ generation – ‘why’ do they do what they do? They’re influenced by the blogs, YouTube, MySpace … For Michael Vick, it’s a gift and a curse – the gift of being the most publicized athlete in the world, but also it’s the curse when you get in trouble…”

 There are a few flaws with this rationalization.  First of all, Smith stepped in and played the blame game for Vick, who (finally) took responsibility for his participation in an underground dog-fighting ring last week.  In a reputation crisis, pointing fingers is risky business when it is impossible to obscure the real culprit – especially when you are pointing fingers at inanimate objects like YouTube.

But more troubling is Smith’s attack on the entire generation of 20-somethings, whose report with online communications channels apparently equates to being unable to make sound decisions.  This feeling has profound business implications, as managers are seeing their fair share of generational conflicts within their organizations.  After all, Y-ers climb the ranks and are managing their “elders” more and more frequently despite (or because of?) their “self righteous,” “entitled” and, according to widespread beliefs, generally distasteful personalities.

However, by ignoring talent management challenges, executives set themselves up to endure reputation crises as bloody and defacing as Vick’s current disaster.  Granted, it won’t involve the mistreatment of animals, but it will weaken their organizations by fueling tense employee relations.  Communications professionals are poised to step in and mitigate this challenge by encouraging senior managers to stop resisting these “cultural” changes, and by training Gen Y-ers to represent themselves in ways that command respect rather than resentment.

 As for Vick, suffice it to say that social media was never his problem, and that digging himself out of holes was never his strength.  He committed a number of cardinal communications sins when facing the allegations.  First, he rabidly denied the charges and defended his innocence.  When sickening details emerged in the investigation, Vick did admit guilt, but any redeeming qualities of his public statement were marred by his initial betrayal.  When at fault, the first words out of your mouth should be those of admission; the second should be those of apology.

September 3, 2007