ENTENTE CORDIALE
‘How do I get this past legal?’ Pfizer’s Amy Schulman and Sally Susman tell Brunswick’s Jennifer Lowney that, for them, this isn’t an issue and describe how they make their relationship work
In the midst of a slew of unprecedented corporate crises some months ago, The New York Times revisited the question of how companies should manage such situations and asked, “Are some crises so dire that public relations victory is simply not on the menu? And, if so, what’s an embattled company to do?” The piece examined those particularly troublesome cases where companies face competing demands for swift and complete public disclosure on the one hand, together with the need to avoid a potential legal liability down the road. “In times of crisis, communications professionals and lawyers often pursue conflicting agendas,” the Times article pointed out. “Communications strategists are inclined to mollify public anger with expressions of concern, while lawyers warn that contrition can be construed as an admission of guilt in potentially expensive lawsuits.”
The fact is that lawyers and communications executives often come at problems from very different perspectives. That is true even in non-crisis situations. Indeed, it is seen as a routine part of the process that, after all the draft materials have been assembled for a strategy that the communications team believes will succeed, one of them must then ask, “How will we get this past legal?”
