Welcome to Paul Seaman’s blog. I am a PR and love my trade – challenging it too. PR needs a reality check. We're about helping clients speak honestly, even robustly. People who run things have a lot of explaining to do in the next few years, so PR is crucial. I want a lively debate and I hope you’ll make it so. More »

Latest posts

Mssrs Blair and Hague, and sex and risk and leadership…

Posted by Paul Seaman under Political spin / Reviews on 2 September 2010. 2 comments.

Tony Blair’s memoirs are the most confessional in years from a world leader. The devout Catholic convert explains why politicians stray from their wives (not him so far as we know), escape to the loo for peace, and seek comfort in drink (in his case shockingly little of it). More »

Being grown-up in the goldfish bowl

Posted by Hugh Curtiss under Hugh Curtiss on 31 August 2010. No comments.

We need a culture which allows two-timing, over-sexed, effective, loyal CEOs to behave as they like in private, provided they don’t fiddle the expenses. In short, the public needs to stop muddling-up the bedroom and the boardroom. PRs should lead the way (with their advice). More »

Voodoo PR versus “Voodoo Academia”

Posted by Paul Seaman under CSR reality check on 27 August 2010. 5 comments.

Richard Edelman’s Voodoo Academia replies to Professor Aneel Karnani of the University of Michigan’s Business School’s WSJ article The Case Against Corporate Social Responsibility. But who’s voodooing whom? More »

“UN exonerates Shell in Niger Delta”

Posted by Paul Seaman under CSR reality check / Energy issues on 23 August 2010. One comment.

According to The Guardian’s John Vidal, the UN is set to report that Shell is responsible for just 10% of the oil spilt in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region over the last 40 years. Time to lay off Shell, or time to wheel out conspiracy theories?  More »

Musing on PR, privacy & confidence – part 2

Posted by Paul Seaman under Trust and reputations on 19 August 2010. 3 comments.

What are we PRs to do with the troublesome issue of privacy? We certainly have an interest in leading this debate because reputations are linked to the public’s perception of its protection. More »

Musing on PR, privacy and confidence – part 1

Posted by Paul Seaman under Trust and reputations on 19 August 2010. One comment.

Google’s Eric Schmidt says we should be able to reinvent our identity at will. That’s daft. But he’s got a point. Most personalities possess more than one side. More »

Wired’s Chris Anderson says Web 2.0 is dead!

Posted by Paul Seaman under Media issues / PR issues on 18 August 2010. 2 comments.

Remember when Web 2.0 was all about creating, sharing and collaborating to produce Long Tails that favoured small players at the shallow end of the bitstream? Well, now Chris Anderson says the World Wide Web is dead. Goodbye “Free”, hallo value. More »

Tony Blair got the PR for his book right

Posted by Paul Seaman under Political spin / Reviews on 18 August 2010. One comment.

There’s been a hullabaloo about how Tony Blair’s gift of £4.6 million profit from his book to fund a Royal British Legion rehabilitation centre backfired. So allow me to defend Tony Blair’s acute sense of aligning his PR with the public mood. More »

HP, Hurd, soft porn & the morality game

Posted by Paul Seaman under CSR reality check / Crisis management on 16 August 2010. 6 comments.

What happened to Mark Hurd at HP was the stuff of Hollywood. Michael Moore or Oliver Stone to the fore? More »

Real-life boss tops Martin Lukes for silliness

Posted by Paul Seaman under Trust and reputations on 13 August 2010. 5 comments.

Here’s a tale highlighting why the C-suite requires speechwriters. Lucy Kellaway at the FT was accused of moving too far from reality when she covertly inserted the words of a true-life financial services chief into the mouth of her satirical character Martin Lukes. More »

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