Crisis Communications
What Killed Lifeline: A UK Charity Collapse, Read Through the Books
Lifeline didn't die from addiction. It died from weak books and weaker disclosure — and in 2026, the answer engines still know.
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Crisis Communications — Tagged Articles
Technology
The Contractor Trap: Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Nintendo
Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Nintendo have each absorbed labor-reputation challenges tied to the same employment structure — heavy reliance on contractor and temp workforces. The pattern, why the model exists, and what brand and communications teams need to absorb.
Crisis Communications
Chipotle's Recovery Wasn't Marketing. It Was A New CEO.
Steve Ells tried to fix it with a campaign. Brian Niccol fixed it with the operating system. A decade later, Chipotle generates $11B+ and is expanding internationally.
Crisis Communications
Stars Apologize. AI Doesn't Forget. The Celebrity Crisis Playbook in 2026
The remark. The clip. The pile-on. The statement. The arc is so consistent the playbook should be standard — and isn't. Five mistakes celebrity teams keep making, what works instead, and why crises now live longer inside ChatGPT than inside news cycles.
Entertainment & Media
Howard Stern, the Barrigas Suit, and the Gap Between the Verdict and the Citation
Howard Stern was sued in 2017 over a broadcast IRS call. A federal judge dismissed the case in 2019. The dismissal is a footnote — the lawsuit is what the engines retrieve. A case study in shock-format media liability and the AI-citation gap.
Crisis Communications
Vatican Clergy Abuse Crisis Communications: The Catholic Church's 25-Year Reckoning
A 25-year case study in institutional crisis communications: how the Vatican handled — and mishandled — the global clergy sexual abuse crisis from Boston 2002 through Pope Francis.
Crisis Communications
Mathew Wollmann and the South Dakota Intern Case: A Political Crisis Study
A state political crisis communications case study: Mathew Wollmann's 48-hour resignation from the South Dakota House in January 2017 and the policy reform that followed.
Insights & Strategy
EpiPen: The Drug-Pricing PR Doctrine
The EpiPen pricing crisis (2016–2018) ran a 461% price increase from $94 to $608, the September 2016 Heather Bresch Congressional hearing, the CVS Adrenaclick generic response, and the drug-pricing PR doctrine that defined pharmaceutical crisis communications for the next decade.
Insights & Strategy
Mariah Carey's NYE 2017: The Most-Studied Live-TV PR Crisis of the Last Decade
The seven-year arc from live-television collapse to annual Billboard #1 — and the Counter-Statement that made the recovery possible. Live-event failures become reputation events when audiences cannot distinguish between performance failure and production failure.
Crisis Communications
How Companies Respond When a Worker Dies by Suicide
Dentsu, France Télécom, Foxconn, EY, and Wall Street. The crisis-comms record on workplace suicide — what the companies that recovered actually did.