The sheer magnitude of the disaster in Port-Au-Prince is such that I think we’re all still trying to process it, days later. And of all the public pronouncements made in reaction to the news, two stand out for me, at polar opposite ends of the scale. Governor-General Michaelle Jean showed equal parts of heartbreak and determination as she fought back tears in the National Press Theatre in Ottawa while making an official statement to the media. Jean was born in Haiti, and her pain was evident as she gamely kept speaking, pausing only slightly to hang on to her composure as she expressed her sorrow for and solidarity with the people of her homeland – and reflected the hopes and prayers of the people of this country. It was as powerful as it was genuine. In stark contrast, we had evangelist Pat Robertson – can you believe he actually ran to be President of the United States once? – going on bible-belt television and pronouncing the catastrophe to be some kind of divine retribution for a deal with the devil brokered to drive the French out of Haiti over a century ago. It was as asinine as it was shocking, and it will assuredly be remembered as the moment Robertson not only shredded any semblance of credibility he might have still had, but when he gave the religious right a black eye in the process. Fumble just doesn’t seem a strong enough call.

What’s your call?

Family feuds are always awkward, and especially so when they play out nightly on television. But at the same time, it’s fascinating to watch the spin battle that seemingly every late night talk show host is engaged in around NBC’s plan to move Jay Leno back to 11:30 following the Winter Olympics. Front and centre are Jay and the man in the middle, Conan O’Brien, who took over the Tonight Show just seven months ago when Leno left the post in advance of his ill-fated adventures in prime time. O’Brien has been Touchdown-worthy both in his monologue snipes at the network and especially in the “People of Earth” statement he released earlier in the week, making clear that he has no intention of acquiescing to NBC’s suggestion that he host a truncated Tonight Show at 12:05 to make room to bring Jay back to late nights again. “I sincerely believe that delaying the Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn't the Tonight Show,” Conan wrote. O’Brien, like David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel and Howard Stern among others, has also made clear his distaste for Leno’s “wants” – and Leno, for his part, has earned a Fumble for his relative silence on that front. Sure, he has played along with some fairly tame barbs against the network, but he has failed to make any real comment about the perception that he’s ultimately the core of the “problem” that NBC is trying to gerrymander a solution for. He already had ratings problems – the last thing he needs is any kind of viewer backlash or boycott.

What’s your call?

Google Inc.’s motto is actually “Don’t Be Evil” – which says a lot about how hard the company had to swallow starting in 2006 when the Chinese government started demanding that it censor search results on Google.cn to remove things like images of the Tiananmen Square massacre, Falun Gong protests etc. This week, Google announced it wasn’t going to comply anymore, and that it will discuss operating an unfiltered search engine in China with the government. “Perhaps now the principled approach makes more sense … it’s perfectly reasonable to do something different, to say, ‘Look, we’re going to stand by the principle against censorship and we won’t actually operate there.’ That’s an alternate path,” said Google co-founder Sergey Brin. The company was projected to do $600 million (US) worth of business in China this year. Putting that at risk is no small potatoes – but apparently the company has decided that consistency with its core belief that the internet’s ability to enable the free exchange of ideas makes the world a better place is of even greater value.

What’s your call?

Officials with grocery giant Loblaw have been doing a lot of apologizing this week. The company is desperately trying to make amends after it dropped a communications bomb into a community still reeling from tragedy. Last week, just days before the two year anniversary of a horrific crash involving the Bathurst High School Basketball team, news broke that Atlantic Wholesalers Ltd. and Loblaws Inc. had filed a lawsuit against Wayne Lord, the driver in the 2008 crash that killed seven members of the team and the coach’s wife. Hundreds of people responded in outrage calling for a boycott of Loblaw’s stores, prompting the company to apologize and drop the suit immediately. From a specifically legal perspective, Loblaw was likely going by the book in the decision to launch a lawsuit. From a communications perspective, the company was way off the mark. This crisis will no doubt bruise Loblaw’s reputation, however the company is taking the right steps to try to redeem itself. Officials issued immediate and sincere apologies describing their actions as a “significant misjudgment.” Allan Leighton, president and deputy chairman of Loblaw Companies Ltd. also called the Bathurst Mayor offering to do something to make it up to the community such as helping to fund a permanent ‘Boys in Red’ memorial park. It’s a long road, but Loblaw is heading in the right direction and because of their swift and thoughtful response, I’m inclined to give them a Touchdown. This situation offers an opportunity to provide a little food for thought: in any company, communications is not limited to the communications department. Every department in the organization must look at its decisions through a communications lens. A legal filing is public and therefore public response should have been considered because while the lawsuit might only be seeking about $40,000 in damages, the cost of such a communications crisis could be much greater.

Aliya Jiwan is a former TV journalist and communications consultant. She is now an Account Manager and Media Coach at Veritas.

What’s your call?

Less than three weeks ago, Chris White was like many other Canadians, recovering from the holiday feast, planning a New Year’s Eve celebration and contemplating the next phase of his studies. For its part, the federal government was no doubt relying on Canadians being otherwise occupied and in any event, who really cares about the arcane rules of Parliament, right? So, on the penultimate day of the decade, Prime Minister Stephen Harper went to the Governor-General and obtained a prorogation of Parliament until March. It seemed like a good bet by this usually savvy government - the sort of issue that is of interest only to political pundits and constitutional scholars. But they hadn’t counted on Chris White and the power of social media. Within hours of hearing about the prorogation, Chris White formed a Facebook group to show his displeasure. Canadians Against Proroguing Parliament started out with a few members and a simple “get to back to work:” message. At first, White’s page was dismissed as chatter and for being non-representative of the Canadian population. Wrong. In a matter of days, White built up over 180.000 members, keeping the story alive, influencing the views of pundits and mainstream media and coming to be seen as representing the sentiments of Canadians. By the beginning of this week the PM and cabinet ministers were offering themselves up for every interview they could get in order to counter the damage. Lo and behold, when the pollsters went into the field to assess public opinion they found the same sentiments, with a corresponding hit to the government’s standing in the polls. As EKOS President Frank Graves said in a statement "Canadians have noticed, they do care and this having a very negative effect on Conservative fortunes." As we enter a new decade, this story is emblematic of just how important social media has become as a communications tool and potentially, as a big mobilizer and aggregator of public opinion. It helped that Chris White had a simple message that resonated with Canadians who are now increasingly comfortable in using the web as a place in which to express their views. In both the message and the medium he used, White showed himself to be more in touch than Canada’s political elites. Touchdown!

What’s your call?

Orli Giroux Namian is an Account Director in Corporate and Public Affairs at Veritas.

Social media tools, most notoriously Twitter, have long been known to spread news and images of Iranian protests, plane crashes into the Hudson river, or other unfortunate disaster faster than any other medium. In the wake of the disastrous earthquake in Haiti this week we’re seeing a higher prevalence of action than we have in past. “Slacktivism” (where news is actively shared, but little to no action is taken) remains an issue, however, non-profit organizations have never seemed so prepared for the quick attention and awareness driven by social media as we’re seeing in the wake of the Haitian earthquake. Thankfully, many Canadian charitable organizations like Plan Canada (a client of ours – Text HAITI to 30333 to donate $5) have been quick to leverage “text to donate” services, whereby Canadians can send a text message and have their donation added to their monthly phone bill. This service circumvents any fees incurred by 3rd party intermediaries such as PayPal. They’re also using Twitter and Facebook to get their “donate here” links posted and re-tweeted far and wide. In the 24 and 48 hours since the earthquake, not only has a great deal of awareness been spread about the horrible circumstances in Haiti, but hundreds of thousands of dollars has been raised. Finally, social media is being used as a conduit for action and awareness.

What’s your call?