Tag Archives: Business Insider

Reputation Case Study, , , , , , , , , ,

Outdoor apparel brand Patagonia was in the news last spring, and not just for designing a bikini that always stays in place. Business Insider reported that the company is poised to fight the Trump administration’s threat to America’s national monuments. No wonder Patagonia is a role model for reputation-building in the corporate world. 

“We’re watching the Trump administration’s actions very closely and preparing to take every step necessary, including legal action, to defend our most treasured public landscapes from coast to coast,” said company CEO Rose Marcario. According to Business Insider, “The executive order would specifically put 25 national monuments — named protected lands under the 1906 Antiquities Act — under review, in danger of losing their status. A national monument has never had its protected status rescinded before, and it’s unclear if the laws allow such a maneuver.” The move is classic Patagonia, and illustrates why the company enjoys such strong support from its loyal customer base. Its reputation is enviable…and strategically earned.

Five years ago, Yvon Chouinard, the company’s founder, published The Responsible Company: What We’ve Learned From Patagonia’s First 40 Years. Chouinard offers not just a story about how to create a responsible company. It is also a story about creating a company that is known for that responsibility.

A Passion Project Patagonia’s beginnings can be traced back to a California falconry club, where a young Chouinard discovered his love of climbing. Unsatisfied with the equipment available for climbers, he began making his own. He and his new wife Malinda soon ventured into apparel, founding Patagonia in 1972. “The point was not to focus on making money; focus on doing things right, and the profits would come,” according to a 2007 Fortune cover story. That mentality has been a defining part of the company’s image.

Environment First Patagonia became a leader in environmental responsibility by giving it an equal priority to profits—reportedly without sacrificing profits. In 1985 the company began donating one percent of its revenue to environmental organizations, a move that has since inspired more than 1,400 companies to join its 1% For the Planet initiative. It was also one of the first companies to switch to more environmentally friendly organic cotton, despite its higher costs.

Limitations Following accelerated growth spurred by the unintended trendiness of its brand, Patagonia’s limits were revealed when the early 1990s recession hit. Growth skidded to a halt and the company was forced to lay off a fifth of its employees. Rather than yielding to the economic circumstances, however, Chouinard doubled down on his original mission. “I decided the best thing I could do was to get profitable again, live a more examined corporate life and influence other companies to do the same,” he told the Wall Street Journal‘s Seth Stevenson.

Beyond Transparency Since that crisis Patagonia has placed even more emphasis on its environmental agenda. Chouinard started “The Footprint Chronicles,” a soul-searching online project dedicated to “exhaustively cataloging the environmental damage done by his own company,” as the WSJ described it. Taking a stance against consumerism, one holiday season Patagonia even ran a Black Friday ad asking people to buy less of its products. At the same time Chouinard’s perspective has rubbed off on other, larger corporations. Through all of this Patagonia has been consistently reported as profitable, despite its large donation programs, the extra costs it imposes on its supply chain and other activities whose direct effect on the bottom line would seen to be negative. And other companies have seen the value in Patagonia’s approach. The Wall Street Journal detailed how even Walmart turned to Chouinard, seeking his advice and working with Patagonia to form the Sustainable Apparel Coalition, which has attracted other top brands.

Hopefully, this is part of a growing trend.

 
 
Crisis Management, , , , , , , , , ,

New York magazine’s cover story “Cosby: The Women” is drawing a broad and powerful response—from the Chicago Reader calling it “required reading” to Business Insider describing it as a “bombshell.” And it is certainly a powerful story—one that people have been trying to tell for over 40 years.

So why is it finally being told now? It seems to have been kicked off by comedian Hannibal Burress’ comment during a set. But there is of course much more at work. It has become much harder to conceal patterns of criminal behavior: money and power are no longer effective shields.

Cosby was for decades able to block attempts by his victims to go public. But that is impossible in this new age of transparency.

New York article interviewee (and Cosby victim) Tamara Green expresses the change most directly: “In 2005, Bill Cosby still had control of the media. In 2015, we have social media. We can’t be disappeared. It’s online and can never go away.”

 
 
Online reputation management, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

As we discussed in March, Wikipedia was considering an amendment to its terms of use that would require more disclosure from editors that are paid to contribute to the online encyclopedia. Now the Wikimedia Foundation has made its intentions even more clear. “We are reinforcing that paid advocacy is not welcome,” spokesman Jay Walsh told the Wall Street Journal’s Jeff Elder in an interview following the announcement of a new executive director, Lila Tretikov. A closer look, however, reveals that this issue still has many nuances.

One major impetus for the proposed changes was Wikipedia’s clash last year with Wiki-PR (an unaffiliated agency). Offering editing as a service, the agency has attracted major clients such as Viacom and Priceline. Last October, when Wikipedia banned more than 250 editors that it suspected were being paid to promote clients, Wiki-PR was the most visible firm associated with those allegations. It even received a cease-and-desist letter. In a January interview with Business Insider Wiki-PR CEO Jordan French offers a much different perspective. While pointing out that Wikipedia’s current terms of service don’t specifically address paid editing, French says that’s not the only way his firm helps clients:

There’s no reason to directly edit. We’re helping people with other ways to do it. [We are telling them things like] here are the editors and other people you should talk to solve whatever the problem is.

A Complex Issue

Wiki-PR’s experiences reflect the complexities surrounding the practices that fall under the umbrella of “conflict-of-interest editing.” “The act of accepting money or rewards for editing Wikipedia is not always problematic,” states current Wikipedia guidelines. But “paid editing for promotional purposes, or paid advocacy editing as we call it, is extremely problematic,” according to former Executive Director Sue Gardner. A FAQ accompanying the proposed amendment, however, acknowledges that “it is hard to solve the problem of paid advocacy editing without accidentally discouraging good-faith editors, like the various GLAM (gallery, library, archive, and museum) projects.” And even the practices of such institutions as “Wikipedians-in-Residence” have been called into question. 

Wikipedia’s Conflict of Interest Guidelines

The encyclopedia’s own “Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia” entry provides a helpful overview of the issue. It mentions the open-ended “Ignore All Rules” policy, which some have used to defend questionable editing practices. The entry also covers specific incidents, such as Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales making edits to his own biography in 2005. “If you see a blatant error or misconception about yourself, you really want to set it straight,” he explained at the time. But “people shouldn’t do it, including me,” he maintained. Wales struck a more serious tone after the Wikimedia Foundation fired one of its employees for engaging in paid editing this January, saying that he “very very strongly condemn[s] such editing, and this is no exception.”

In an op-ed for The Daily Dot, management professor Dariusz Jemielniak argues that “paid edits from officially registered PR accounts would more likely adhere to the rules and serve the purpose of developing Wikipedia.” The new disclosure requirements in the amendment under consideration could make that possible, but the Wikimedia Foundation sounds eager to quash most forms of paid editing, not institutionalize it. Still, Jemielniak seems certain of one thing: “Paid edits do and will take place on Wikipedia. Just ignoring this phenomenon will not make it go away.”