Last week there was “outrage” over the bonus awarded to Stephen Hester, chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland. This week we are set for another moral outburst when Barclays announces expected profits of more than $9 billion, which will result in its CEO Bob Diamond pocketing around $3 million. In the midst of a global crisis that heralds austerity for many, what strategy should be adopted by PRs tasked with defending banks, bankers and bonuses? Read on ›

Here’s a PR manifesto offering a post-credit crunch reality check that sticks up for maintaining the primacy of shareholder value in business. Read on ›

Thanks to Richard Edelman I’m flagging an upcoming book every PR should read: Capitalism 4.0 by The Times economics analyst Anatole Kaletsky. Here’s a preview. Read on ›

Being socially aware didn’t make Big Pharma innovate. Here’s a risky piece reminding us that profit matters more than seeming nice and safe, whatever the Davos savants pretend or their mantras might say. Read on ›

Financial Times (FT) research suggests that the public trusts itself to look after savings and investments more than banks, building societies or independent financial advisers. Yet most respondents said that, despite their lack of trust, they had not reduced their risk levels in these bodies. Read on ›

Initial reports suggested Gordon Brown’s Labour Party gained three percentage points in the opinion polls after last week’s G20 summit in London. However, a poll in today’s The Times suggests that the “New World Order” bounce for Brown was lost in the row over MPs’ expenses and in the post-summit analysis that exposed Gordon’s spin. Read on ›

There’s a timely call in today’sTimes for bank bosses to take the lead in restoring the reputations of their own institutions. Some have, but the message remains valuable. Read on ›

The Financial Times’ management columnist Stefan Stern and others have been assessing the point and meaning of this year’s Davos. Much of it comes to the need for capitalism to express itself differently. Read on ›

PR Week reports that the British Bankers’ Association (BBA) executive director of communications Lesley McLeod says the banks are getting a bum rap because of “inexperienced’” reporters who “fail to understand the crisis” or the “issues” it presents. What, and the BBA has to sit idly by? Why doesn’t it get stuck in? Read on ›

Barclay’s Chief Executive, John Varley, has been brilliant on Sky TV, the BBC Radio 4′s Today programme (and later this week on Panorama). Not a moment before time, we have a senior current banking figure not only talking (that’s very rare) but talking like a human being. Read on ›