Dear Leah,
I'm managing partner at a crisis PR firm and we're struggling with a client situation that keeps escalating. Three months ago, our client (a well-known consumer brand) faced allegations of discriminatory hiring practices.
We managed the immediate media response brilliantly—issued apologies, announced policy reviews, commissioned an independent investigation.
he news cycle moved on within a week. But on social media, the story won't die. Employees keep leaking internal documents that contradict our client's public statements. Customers are organising boycotts.
The CEO did media training and still comes across as defensive. We've delivered everything in our crisis comms playbook, but the anger is intensifying, not subsiding. Our client is frustrated that our strategy "isn't working" and threatening to move to a competitor. How do we explain that you can't PR your way out of a culture problem?
— Crisis comms without the crisis resolution
Oh dear!
You've discovered the limits of external reputation management when internal culture is the actual crisis. Your brilliant media strategy is being undermined by an organisation that hasn't addressed the root cause of the scandal.
DIAGNOSIS:
Social media keeps the story alive because your client's employees and customers can sense the disconnect between public promises and internal reality. You've managed perception, but the organisation hasn't changed behaviour. Every leaked document proves that your carefully crafted statements were performance, not transformation.
THE ROOT OF THE PROBLEM:
Your client hired you to make the problem go away, not to fix what caused it. They want reputation protection without organisational accountability. Meanwhile, employees who experienced the discriminatory culture are watching leadership prioritise external image over internal justice, which is exactly what caused the scandal in the first place.
THE PATH TO RESOLVING IT:
Stop trying to out-communicate the truth. Your client needs organisational repair work alongside your crisis comms strategy—internal dialogue about what actually happened, genuine accountability processes, and visible cultural transformation that employees can verify. When internal reality matches external messaging, the leaks stop because there's nothing to expose.
YOUR ROLE GOING FORWARDS:
Expand your scope: partner with organisational repair specialists who address the internal dysfunction fuelling external crisis.
Reframe client expectations: reputation recovery requires cultural transformation, not just better communications.
Protect your firm's reputation: being associated with clients who keep having the same crisis damages your credibility.
Offer integrated solutions: win larger retainers by solving the whole problem, not just the symptoms.
