Stories by Seth Arenstein

Companies sometimes struggle to connect CSR with their corporate values. The story below illustrates an innovative way a pharmaceutical translated its interest in offering patients creative solutions into a CSR effort.

It’s a loaded question to ask when a PR crisis ends. With some crises, reminders last indefinitely. In other cases, the actual crisis lasts for months. We begin a series that updates crises mentioned in previous editions of Crisis Insider and offers additional insights.

For some, transparency and trust took a detour recently. A marketing company dangled COVID-19 vaccine in front of employees to see if they’d bite on a phishing scam. Some communicators believe the move might be justified in an effort to ward off cyber crime. Let the debate continue.

As if we needed another illustration of the long tail of social media posts. Alexi McCammond seemed to have everything going for her: intelligence, a great job, youth and a well-connected beau. Her upward path hit a bump or two, but she’d recovered, until racist social posts she wrote as a teen resurfaced.

In the second installment of our “Young Voices” series about new communicators, we profile Michael Galfetti, a young PR pro with Mission North. A double major in government and philosophy in college, Galfetti tells us why he thinks writing is PR’s top skill and how companies can retain talented communicators.

Was there a recent time when communicators had a more confusing ecosystem in which to tell stories? US-based PR pros are working in a climate that includes political fragmentation, a year-old pandemic mired in those political divisions, an erosion of trust in public and private institutions and a meteoric rise in disinformation.

Late last year Yves Saint Laurent Beauty launched an ambitious, multi-pronged effort, Abuse is Not Love, around IPV. The program aims to educate audiences, including YSL employees, help advocacy groups get out their messages and fund academic research to bolster thought leadership around prevention and youth awareness.

PRNEWS interviewed Alan Sexton, Prudential Financial CCO, who believes PR pros, who work throughout the enterprise are vital to succeeding within business ecosystems. In addition, he’s tracking the employee experience in a WFH world, with an eye to avoiding cultural decay.

Have we turned the corner on coronavirus? If not, what dangers are ahead? How can brand communicators help spread accurate information to employees and the public about vaccination, mask wearing and the importance of doing as much as possible before variants go widespread, probably in mid- to late-March?

A key to media relations is treating journalists as human beings. A new survey, provided exclusively to PRNEWS, looks at journalists’ income, workload, mental health and preferences about pitching and video conferences. It concludes that some things have changed with the pandemic, but the basics of media relations endure.