Category: PR

White House press secretary Scott McClellan had one of those days yesterday. By one of those days, I mean the kind where a PR professional knows he’s/she’s going to get asked challenging questions. McClellan’s day at the podium responding to Vice President Dick Cheney’s accidental shooting of a fellow hunter was definitely one of those days.

Watching from the sidelines, I think McClellan will be remembered as one of the better presidential press secretaries. I say this because (a) he’s had to face some of the world’s top reporters often with limited or incorrect information — and fought his “clients” to do the right thing, and (b) because of classy exchanges like yesterday’s with NBC’s David Gregory:

“‘David’s a good guy and a good reporter,’ McClellan added. He said that yesterday was ‘one of those days where I knew exactly what to expect.’”

McClellan took his hits and upheld his respect for the important role journalists play in a free democracy. It is that thick skin and ability to see the bigger picture that, in my mind, makes McClellan (and people like him) professionals.

Ron Torossian responds somewhat quickly to yesterday’s gaff-pearance in Gawker. Rather than take the opportunity to explain the rationale behind his crass marching orders to his staff, Torossian instead responds with his own personal celebrity missive.

Paul Holmes over at The Holmes Report nails it in a post today on the difference between unadulterated spin and relationship-building. You’ll have a hard time finding a better example/definition than the one Paul offers up.

I’ve worked with some of the top PR people in the business. People who lead communications functions for multibillion dollar global corporations. The reason they are at the top of the profession is because they have class.

Which brings me to Ronn Torossian, leader of the high-flying pitch palace, 5W. By all accounts, his agency’s recent string of success should push him higher up the PR influence scales. However, an e-mail he sent out to his troops yesterday timed to the death of Coretta Scott King should push Torossian deep into the depths of pariah-ville:

From: Ronn Torossian
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 1:52 PM
To: Email-Everyone
Subject: CORETTA SCOTT KING

Died today – we shld have plenty of clients we can pitch on the King legacy, etc.

Ronn D. Torossian
President & CEO
5W Public Relations

The fine folks at Gawker got the scoop on the story. It will be interesting to watch how — and if — Torossian handles this personal and professional crisis in his recently launched blog.

I’ve worked with some of the top PR people in the business. People who lead communications functions for multibillion dollar global corporations. The reason they are at the top of the profession is because they have class.

Which brings me to Ronn Torossian, leader of the high-flying pitch palace, 5W. By all accounts, his agency’s recent string of success should push him higher up the PR influence scales. However, an e-mail he sent out to his troops yesterday timed to the death of Coretta Scott King should push Torossian deep into the depths of pariah-ville:

From: Ronn Torossian
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 1:52 PM
To: Email-Everyone
Subject: CORETTA SCOTT KING

Died today – we shld have plenty of clients we can pitch on the King legacy, etc.

Ronn D. Torossian
President & CEO
5W Public Relations

The fine folks at Gawker got the scoop on the story. It will be interesting to watch how — and if — Torossian handles this personal and professional crisis in his recently launched blog.

There have been so many corporate scandals over the past couple of years that it’s hard to keep up with all of them. One that continues to make headlines is the case against former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy, who was acquitted last year of his involvement in a $2.7 billion accounting fraud. Today, word is coming out that he paid a local journalist $11,000 to write flattering stories about him. Apparently, Scrushy funneled the $11k through a local PR firm, The Lewis Group. This is another black eye for both the PR and journalism professions. Andy Lark is also calling this out on his blog (which gets a ton more traffic than mine, so it might make sense to follow any comment threads there) and expresses the frustration that many of us in the PR industry have with unethical, amateur professionals and agencies.

The Media Guerilla, Mike Manuel from Voce Communications, expands on Shel Israel’s advice for early-stage startups that are considering hiring a PR firm. It’s a post worth a read, as it speaks more to the changing nature of communications than it does to decisions facing startups.

Not sure why I saw this on The Consumerist, but the topic is ripe for front page news. It seems the federal chief of AIDS research is on record saying that any HIV vaccine will not be made by a pharmaceutical company because there’s no financial incentive for them to develop such a drug. OK, fair point. The last I checked, Pfizer, Sandoz, Merck and the others were in business to make profit (remember that capitalism thing we learned about back in school?). That is what they do. And, given the sorry reality of lobbying and influence peddling that has unfortunately become the norm in the pharma industry, we might as well throw the FDA into the for-profit discussion.

However, I think the FDA, universities and Gates Foundations of the world have an opportunity to change the way drugs with no commercial profit potential are developed: Follow the open source model that has shaken the technology industry at its core.

Think about it. The open source movement in the technology industry was fueled by a passion to put power back in the users’ hands. It was built on a belief that communities of developers could re-design, re-build and repair software based on the needs of the community, not the financial needs of a single company. It changed the way companies looked at their information technology infrastructures.

I was at a client seminar a couple of weeks ago and heard a speaker — the chief information architect for a non-profit health organization — say emphatically that they would not be able to do as much as they are currently able if they had to rely solely on commercial software. The funding just wouldn’t allow it. So he mixed some open source technology into his infrastructure to plug the funding gaps.

The federal chief of AIDS research’s comments highlight the funding gaps society today has in the world of medicine. The system — as philanthropic as we want it to be — is a system based on profit, not philanthropy. A smart pharmaceutical company that understands that corporate reputation and societal contributions are as important to the bottom line as selling billions of pills each quarter will understand the opportunity. That company will establish a global research and development infrastructure for drugs and vaccines modeled after the innovation eminating from the open source community in Silicon Valley. They will call on world leaders — people like President Clinton, President Carter, Bill and Melinda Gates, Bono and others — to lead this community-based movement. They will use their immense lobbying power to enlist the FDA to create a dedicated safety review board for community-based pharmaceuticals.

Is there a pharmaceutical company that has the corporate guts to take this on? Use the comments section to let me know your thoughts.