By Quentin Langley Let us suppose you run a chemical company and you are planning some crisis training. It could be any sector, of course. This is just an example. You prepare. You consider the main points of risk: spill, fire, explosion.  You already have plans in place for all of these things. You know…

By Quentin Langley Fake brandjacks are not new. They have existed in social media as long as social media have existed, and conspiracy theories have been around even longer than that. A fake brandjack is – as the name suggests – a false story spread about a company, person or organization designed to undermine that…

By Quentin Langley In my book I categorize all the 140 brandjacks in my case studies. The biggest categories are the Self Brandjack (corporate actions lead to the problem) the Staff Brandjack (caused by rogue employees) and the Ethics Brandjack (organization is criticized for the ethics of its decisions, eg, supply chain). Some cases come…

Unilever's Dove brand is in trouble, again, for insensitive advertising. This time it is harder to see the image choices as being an unfortunate accident. Let's start with the 2011 ad. That showed large swatches to demonstrate how people could improve their skin. The three models standing in front of it were progressively more light…

By Quentin Langley If you participate in a controversial political demonstration that is beset by violence – even if you didn't personally carry out any violence – you can reasonably expect that this will have an impact on your reputation. People may choose not to be your friend or your customer. Your employer might fire…

By Quentin Langley According to some research by Good, Burham and MacDonald of the mammalian mascots of clubs in the ten richest sporting leagues in the world 30% are endangered and 33% are critically endangered.  What a fascinating finding that opens some rather obvious solutions. Yes, of course, clubs could donate a dollar from every…

By Quentin Langley The UN has decided to end its controversial partnership with Wonder Woman in which she was an honorary ambassador promoting the UN's sustainable development goal of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls by 2030. Wonder Woman was actually the senior partner in this relationship. She has been defending the…

By Quentin Langley "€100k in used notes might make poppies less political, say FIFA" according to the satirical news site, Newsthump. Even FIFA is not usually this blatant, but it demonstrates the moral standing of FIFA that this barely qualifies as satire.  The row has arisen before. FIFA has a longstanding policy of banning "political"…

By Quentin Langley Recalls are never good news. You recall products because they are in some way defective. In the case of the Samsung Note 7 the product is also unsafe. The company is advising people to back up data and stop using the device, turning it off permanently. That's not good. But with any…