Member Comment:

Below is my comment to Harold Burson’s blog on this subject.  These are, respectively, a partial explanation from Burson and an artful dodge by Bing.  My take: Cohen’s not far off; we should have from our own camp more honest reactions.

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Whether I read Harold Burson’s reflection on the CBS Andrew Cohen attack piece or Gil Schwartz’s rebuttal of it, I’m still not hearing from our industry’s highest dean and one of our best pundits any clear denial that our business is based on manipulation—the thrust of Cohen’s critique.  We’ve been happy to deny the lies that Cohen’s alleged.  That’s easy, because we don’t lie.  We embellish.  We advocate.  And by and large we do it without crossing the line of gross misrepresentation.

But what Cohen is surely getting at is the base requirement upon PR/comm practitioners that we are here to influence, persuade, and interpret at the behest of our employers and clients.  We do any less and, indeed, we are unemployed PR people.

Harold’s words, it has to be said, are artful filters.  Schwartz’s are as classic as McClellan’s deflects.  The shoe fits, and Cohen is right.

-- Alan Kelly
The Playmaker’s Standard

By Alan D. Kelly on July, 12 2008

Member Comment:

Thanks for your comments, Alan.  I reject embellish.  But I accept the rest:  We advocate, influence, persuade and interpret.  All with—if we are doing it well—strict adherence to the highest possible ethical standards.  How you get from that to “The shoe fits and Coen is right” I cannot fathom.

By Roger Bolton on July, 20 2008

Member Comment:

Roger --

Playing the ethics card is a red herring.

You reject “embellish” but accept “interpret.” I’m not sure I see the difference, and this goes to Cohen’s point:  That the the PR practitioner’s discernment of truth is quite liberal and invariably self-serving.  In fact, it has to be self-serving, lest the practitioner hopes to make a living as some kind of ombusman or independently-licensed information officer.  That, of course, won’t keep him or her at The Table for long.

We are in this business to advance the competitive position of our employers and clients.  Period.  We involve stakeholders as a “strategy” to do that, not as our defining purpose.  We hope to do it ethically, always, but that we have so many opportunities to fairly interpret and, yes, embellish the facts is what justifies the work as a progressive function.

I’m disappointed that Burson and Schwartz, both, chose to avoid the direct point of Cohen’s spear.  They didn’t speak to or deny the fact that this is what we do.  They walked right into his trap.  And that I can fathom.

By Alan D. Kelly on July, 21 2008

Member Comment:

From Merriam-Webster.com:

Embellish—to heighten the attractiveness of by adding decorative or fanciful details

Interpret— to explain or tell the meaning of : present in understandable terms

I think it’s critical that we do understand the difference.

Further:  We are in business to advance the interests of our employers and clients.  That includes their competitive position, but it does not stop there.  It also includes their permission to operate, their attractiveness as an investment, and, yes, their ability to advance the public interest.

By Roger Bolton on July, 21 2008

Member Comment:

This is an interesting dialogue. I hear Kelly’s point that corporate communicators can and do embellish and serve self interest.  Some no doubt do.  But Bolton, with great experience on the job inside a company, is right that corporate communications is ultimately tied to stakeholder permission. 
That reality--that condition in an open, advanced democratic society--is a natural and effective limit on manipulative, self-serving communication. 
Arthur Page figured that out many years ago.
Harold Burson and others (count me in) keep reminding people who think they can manipulate or slavishly serve selfish interests that they can’t get away with it.  One of the best things Harold has said is that companies are full of truth tellers—or at least a level of truth that somebody outside the company believes; Harold said that every employee is an expert to somebody on the truth about the company.
Peter Drucker said business management’s primary job is to create customers.  Without customers, it’s obviously not a business.
My definition of public relations is the process of creating stakeholders in the organization and its success.
CCOs’ ongoing, number one job is to create stakeholders.
Some CCOs may try manipulating, self-serving, truth-shaving stuff but in a democratic society, with 24/7 media, with blogs and everlasting Web exposure, and --better yet—with all the evidence that bad behavior and loose communication is a noose that hangs, and that stakeholders are intelligent and constantly comparing their self-interest with the companies—well, “doing what it takes” becomes pretty clear.
All smart, successful, realistic CCOs realize, without fingering an ethics card that they know is playable (and maybe burning a hole in his or her pocket), that this means being a trustworthy straight-shooter.
If there is any example of a truly, un-nuanced authentic corporation, it is one in which the communications process, internal and external, aligns the company with stakeholders who expect and get nothing but the truth they need to decide whether to hang in there as customers, employees, investors and other self-interested stakeholders.  Fanciful details are poison in this process.

By Bruce Harrison on July 24, 2008

By E. Bruce Harrison on July, 24 2008

Member Comment:

I too reject the concept of “embellish”.  There is a great deal of difference between “interpreting” the truth and “embellishing” it.  I have found some of my greatest battles internally against people who wanted to embellish our position, adding in extraneous “fantacies” that would enhance the position but would have little basis in fact and ultimately would be found to be false.  I once interviewed a candidate who told me that he believed that PR should embrace the idea of “embellishment” because we would move on by the time the media and other stakeholders caught up with the issue, if they ever did.  I did not hire the fellow and rejected his position.  It would not only be dishonest externally, but also would “foul the well” internally.  We need to “walk the talk” (boy, I’m using a lot of quotes...).  I believe that communications needs to be the one challenging anyone who attempts to do the opposite (talk the walk), not be the prime mover of this.

We try to win over stakeholders to our view of the truth, but we need to do it with an eye toward the consequences of our words and actions.  Those who would advocate without looking toward enhancing the internal organizational capabilities to act accordingly are doing a disservice to their organizations, and those who would “embellish” the truth are doing the same.

By Elliot S. Schreiber, Ph.D. on July, 27 2008