Corporate Social Responsibility

A well-known PR adage is, ‘If you don’t tell your story, someone else will.’ A bevy of major retailers has paraphrased that aphorism to fit the moment: ‘If the government doesn’t protect our employees and customers against coronavirus, we will.’ By requiring masks, these iconic brands have become healthcare policy wonks.

It’s July and we’re still stuck in a pandemic. By most measures, things are getting worse, not better. The country seems to be confused. We asked a group of healthcare communicators how PR pros can help at this moment. Most said the industry can and should.

As the virus continues to impact every business across the globe, there certainly are no right answers on how to tackle different companies’ economic issues. While Airbnb’s heart may have been in the right place, it also may have benefitted from some sort of interior plan instead of placing the burden on the consumer, much like Verizon’s training rollout.

PRNEWS surveyed an outstanding group of entries for this year’s Top Places to Work in PR. Here are the honorees.

It was a hot Friday in July. The perfect slow news day. But not for the world of PR, where some of the major teachings of the craft seemed to be thrown to the dustbin. See what happens when a brand CEO steps directly into politics, a brand disregards optics and the computer system of a mega-retailer goes whacky.

We’re living in difficult times. Yet, the events of 2020, for good or ill, are shaping up to be storytelling gold. It’s a time for brand storytellers to gather and capture real-time history and to think more broadly about how these stories can be used.

In honor of Pride Month, the Museum of PR held a forum where PR pros who are members of the LGBTQ+ community discussed how the industry has helped raise awareness around Pride. In addition, they spoke about their experiences being PR pros and members of the LGBTQ+ community.

As part of our series of interviews with senior PR pros in new positions, we spoke recently with Emily Graham, FleishmanHillard’s first chief diversity & inclusion officer. During her 15-year career, Graham says she’s seen no evidence that PR has made strides toward diversity. Actions not words are needed now, she says.

In March, when COVID-19 was declared a pandemic, many communicators realized that they faced a problem that required an immediate PR response. How could the government quickly educate the public about ways to fight the novel coronavirus? Television broadcasters helped provide an answer.

A group of several civil rights organizations banded together last week, launching a campaign against Facebook in response to the allowance of what they define as hate speech. The NAACP, Anti-Defamation League, Color of Change, Sleeping Giants and Common Sense Media have all called for advertisers to halt all paid-post spending for the month of July.