What I loved about PR ethics this week is learning about two campaigns that are focused on ethics and addressing key issues of our time – disinformation, licensing and trust. There were also ethics examples around disclosure, sustainability and whistleblowers.
Joining me on this week’s episode is Jen Cho, the founder of Pivot and Swerve. She discusses a number of important ethics issues, including:
1) Where should businesses start first in diversity initiatives?
2) How to most effectively deal with microaggressions?
3) Ethical issues with Battle Rap – what to do when your ethics and the industry’s standards diverge?
4) How far back should we go with regards to cancel culture?
5) The rise of Asian American hate crimes
This week, Gov. Cuomo continued to provide myriad examples ripe for ethical discussion. A global PR firm was questioned on it if was staying true to its purpose, and the EU took a different approach to whistleblowers than the US.
Donald Singletary, the president at Singletary Group Communications and an adjunct professor at a number of universities, including Syracuse University and Baruch College, discusses:
1) Ethics of expense reports in the Mad Men Era and today
2) How societal changes are impacting ethical practices
3) How rationalization leads to ethical failures
4) Are we really making progress against systemic racism?
I like to tell my students that just because something is stupid, doesn’t mean it is unethical. But most stupid things can lead to great discussions on related ethical issues – and boy do we have a lot to talk about this week. From Royals to Racism to Fast Food and Kant, it was tough for me narrowing it down to just a few issues this week
Troy Brown, the President of one50one, discusses a number of key ethics issues, including:
1) How to respond when people try to marginalize you
2) The unethical myth of we can’t find diverse candidates
3) Ethical issues with influencer marketing
4) Ethics of Blockchain and Digital IP
This week in public relations ethics, there was a great ethics case study from Harvard Business Review, a scandal in Japan over gift policies and an explosive debate on social media over Dr. Seuss and McElligot’s Pool.
Thomas Bennett III, discusses:
1) What to do when you are stuck in a toxic work culture
2) Why we need more honesty and transparency
This week there were a number of interesting ethics stories on a wide range of topics. Ethisphere reported that world’s most ethical companies outperform the market by 7.1%, showing you can do well by doing good. There was also a call for Jeep to drop the name Cherokee and questions about ethical issues with charitable giving.
Dr. Holly Overton, Associate Professor at the University of South Carolina and a senior research fellow with the Arthur W. Page Center for Integrity in Public Communication discusses:
1) What to do when you are on a toxic team at work
2) The changing landscape of business advocacy and what it means to PR
3) The rise of corporate social advocacy
4) What we can learn from the Page Principles