Gracie Communications

Like the rest of you, I’ve watched with horror as more details emerge about Jerry Sandusky’s alleged crimes against children, both on and off the Penn State campus.  As a parent, I’ve been sickened by the charges and the grand jury testimony. As a communications specialist, I’ve been appalled at the delayed and often confused response by the Penn State trustees.

Yesterday, the university took the long-overdue step in of appointing someone with no ties to the university, former FBI director Louis Freeh, to lead an internal investigation of the “governance, protocols, decision-making and oversight within the university.  While Freeh has reportedly been given free rein to take the investigation in any direction needed, other members of the special committee have many ties to Penn State. Only time will tell if the committee will make the difficult recommendations needed to both move the university past this ugly chapter of its history or get mired in the university politics and finger-pointing.

Interestingly only one student, Rodney Hughes, a doctoral student in higher education, was included on the special committee. More on this later.

As the committee begins its work, there are several issues they can and should consider.

1. This is an opportunity for Penn State to not only address the horrors of the child sexual abuse that happened on its campus, but to take the lead and spearhead a national effort to address childhood abuse.  Penn State students have already created a “support wall against child abuse” and are leading prayers and candlelight vigils. University trustees now need to create a system-wide awareness and support mechanism not only for the Sandusky victims but for all child abuse victims. And they should do it before the U. S. Senate mandates it.*

2. Pennsylvania media have reported that one victim has been forced to leave high school after classmates blamed him for Paterno’s firing.  This is unacceptable and Penn State should be the first to say so. Continued silence only condones a culture of bullying and implies they support a “blame the victim” mentality.

3. Vera Greene, a junior at Penn State and a guest columnist for The Daily Collegian, addressed the issue of loyalty in a recent column. As she wrote, “we need to take a step back and understand the societal efforts, the natural human tendencies that come into play when a decision [that breaks the bonds of loyalty] has to be made.”  Penn State should involve its faculty and staff in creating a forum to discuss the role of loyalty and the conflicts it can create.

4. The state of Pennsylvania is consideration legislation to remove the exemption for state-affiliated universities from Pennsylvania’s Right-to-Know law. Penn State shouldn’t wait. It should increase transparency now even though it doesn’t have to. Set the good example.

From a communications standpoint, it has taken Penn State far too long to respond, not just to the general public, but more importantly to students and alumni. While I am not privy to the university’s e-mail communications system, it has been reported that local alumni chapters acknowledged the crisis days after the story broke in the media.  As far as I can tell, University President Rodney Erickson, publicly addressed the university family for the first time in a November 21 message. (If I am mistaken, please let me know.)

I understand there are legal concerns that Penn State is grappling with, but it must make every effort to keep alumni, donors, faculty and students apprised of its efforts to address past wrongs and to put new systems into place to ensure this doesn’t happen again. Reach out beyond the university family as well. High school counselors are getting questions. Let them know what is going on and how to answer.

Back to the special committee. While I appreciate the inclusion of a graduate student and former student trustee in the special committee, allow the process to be open to the greater student body. This is a teaching moment.  Students should be allowed to audit the process and ask tough questions of their own. Healing takes hard conversation.

Please Mr. Freeh and company, use this special committee to make recommendations on how to move forward, not just to duplicate the efforts of the grand jury or devolve the process into a blame game.  Yes, this is the time for scrutinizing what went wrong. But Penn State can regain its national reputation by demonstrating a campus-wide desire to right the wrongs and leading the conversation to make sure other children don’t suffer at the hands of coaches, teachers and other adults they trust.

* The U.S. Senate has scheduled for Dec. 13, the first congressional hearing in the wake of the Penn State case. Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey requested a hearing by a panel of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee to examine how well the nation protects children from abuse and neglect.

This may come as a surprise, but there are still communications folks out there that forget to work with their clients to make sure there are no surprises in the communications process. These same experts then act surprised when their strategic plan presentation is met with stony silence instead of cheers and celebration.  

Like my clients, I hate surprises. (Even birthday parties.) That’s why I forewarn all my prospective clients that the Gracie Communications planning process is extremely time-consuming for them as well as for my communications team. In fact, I tell them we are part of their team and they are part of ours. They have valuable insight and knowledge, and by sharing it they not only keep research costs down, they develop a buy-in to the finished product that results in a working plan instead of a plan that collects dust on a shelf.

Communications pros may know marketing and PR, we may have a general understand of the clients’ industry, but we don’t know their businesses. We may understand how to reach their audiences but we don’t know how they really interact with these audiences currently. We can’t because we don’t live in the day-to-day of running their businesses (or non-profit or charity event, etc.).

We also don’t really know the dynamics that govern our clients. Do they answer to a board of directors? Investors? How do they want their staff involved? Any strategic plan stands a much better chance of getting implemented if the client is able to champion it to his or her internal audiences. To do that, the client has to be involved in the process and given the opportunity to ask questions – prior to the big reveal.

It can be time consuming to include clients in every step of the strategic plan, but isn’t it harder to present a plan cold and have it rejected? Here are seven different phases during the planning process when you can – and should – interact with your client, rather than present to them:

1. The beginning. Explain the planning process. Make sure they understand the timeline AND that it fits with their business calendar.

2. Discovery and research. Involve them. They may be able to connect you with sources you couldn’t reach otherwise.

3. Communications objectives. If your communication objectives aren’t in line with their business objectives, it is better to find out early in the process.

4. Creative brief and/or talking points. This is a guiding document for communications professionals that is often misunderstood by clients. Since it sets the key messages and tone for a marketing campaign and the related PR, make sure you review it.

5. Target audiences. Again, make sure your suggestions are in line with their needs.

6. Strategies and tactics. This one goes without saying, right?

7. Creative/implementation.  Just like with #1, make sure the timeline and creative process leaves room for other business deadlines and needs.

Whenever possible, also try to meet with the client’s boss or board as well to introduce yourself and your goals so all the decision makers know what to expect and can put a face with the actions they will review later.  Yes it is more work, but it’s not called account management for nothing.

Bottom Line: If you want clients to trust your recommendations, you must respect their input and guidance. If you don’t, the one who will be the most surprised by their reaction may be you.

A good friend of mine once told me that he liked to surround himself with people smarter than himself. He said we’d all be in trouble if he were the smartest person in the room. While there is plenty that this friend is the smartest about, I have taken that advice to heart and try to hang out with ubersmart people. I’ve found the really smart ones are also the ones most willing to share what they know.

That was definitely the case at Blog Indiana 2010. The two-day conference was filled with smart presenters who gladly shared their knowledge and expertise with everyone in the room.  With 35 speakers, I wasn’t able to attend every session but there were two in particular that stood out. (more…)

If you are under 18, you aren’t reading this blog post. But if I texted it to you, you might.  Texting is the single most popular way for teens to communicate. Earlier this week, a few Indy area teens helped me understand why. (more…)

I was on vacation last week, which meant I had plenty of time to catch up on all the books I’ve been meaning to read. One of them, “How the Irish Saved Civilization” by Thomas Cahill, has been on my To Read list for five years. Since the rest of the book deals with how the seemingly uncivilized Irish preserved great literature and history after the fall of the Roman Empire, I was surprised to read a passage that dealt with marketing and public relations. (more…)

It’s been two weeks since my last blog post. I’ve spent a lot of that time with kids. My own, who have invaded my home office since it is summer vacation, and a great group of teenagers who are sharing their thoughts with me about youth obesity. While I love to talk about my kiddos, today’s post is about what a group of teenagers recently taught me. (more…)

This post continues what some of my colleagues are calling my “Communications 101” series. Today’s installment: What is a conduit and when should I use one. (more…)