I found five public relations and communication ethics issues of note this week that could also lead to some interesting discussions. The topics ranged from Facebook fights back, to positive stories from Page, Paula Pedene, Deloitte and Malawi.
Mark McClennan, APR, Fellow PRSA
Mark W. McClennan, APR, Fellow PRSA, is the general manager of C+C's Boston office. C+C is a communications agency all about the good and purpose-driven brands. He has more than 20 years of tech and fintech agency experience, served as the 2016 National Chair of PRSA, drove the creation of the PRSA Ethics App and is the host of EthicalVoices.com
José Manuel Velasco, the Past President of the Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management discusses global ethics and taking care of the truth. Specifically, he addresses:
1) How to respond ethically when your company is caught making illegal payments
2) The most important PR job: Taking care of the truth
3) The importance of emphatic listening
4) How to ethically deal with emotions
5) What skills do PR pros need to be great advisors
This week we discuss ethics flowcharts, consequence scanning, libel, and Nicomachean ethics
Karen Swim, APR, the President and CEO of Words for Hire discusses:
– What to do when your friend acts unethically
– What to do when your organization values results over ethical behavior
– Why every PR person needs to step up and be an ethics champion
– Why ethics cannot be a uniform you wear
A few of the more interesting communication ethics topics of the past week: Journalist double standards, The transparency/trust contradiction and greenwashing.
Deirdre Breakenridge, an author, speaker, professor, and communication professional shares some great ethics insight, including:
– What to do ethically when two supervisors give you conflicting orders
– Why FEELing is essential to ethical behavior
– How Millennials, GenZ, GenX and Boomers FEEL differently and what it means
– Why we often fail when we make choices alone
Ethics never rests, and neither do great posts and discussion topics. Following are a few of the more interesting ethics articles of the week that look at everything from the downside of trying to appear ethical, ethical double standards, and what happens when you stand up for ethics at work.
Garland Stansell, the Chief Communications Officer for Children’s of Alabama, and the 2020 National Chair of PRSA shares his insight on a number of key ethics issues, including:
• Why sharing the bare minimum is often not the best course
• Why you must address issues head on when you are considered guilty by association
• Why we must resist the tyranny of urgency
• How every ethical PR professional can counteract negative perceptions of the profession
On Monday, I thought it might actually be a quiet week in terms of PR and ethics challenges. Boy was I wrong. This Week in PR Ethics (2/6/20) looks at spruiking, Iowa, plagiarism, free speech and censorship
Joining me on this week’s episode is Craig Silverman, a reporter at Buzzfeed, who along with two of his colleagues in January wrote one of the most chilling articles I have read in a while, “Disinformation for Hire: How a New Breed of PR Firms is Selling Lies Online”. I wanted to have him as a guest to discuss the article and its implications for communication professionals and society.