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Greentarget

Greentarget

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Smith’s arrival comes after more than two decades in journalism, including 10 years at The Wall Street Journal

Greentarget, a leading public relations firm focused on helping professional services firms establish positions of authority, announced the addition of award-winning journalist Jennifer Smith as Director of Content & Editorial Strategy. Smith, who spent more than a decade as a reporter covering a variety of topics at The Wall Street Journal, will lead Greentarget’s content team, which serves some of the world’s largest professional services organizations.

“Jennifer’s experience at such a prestigious publication will advance our embrace of journalistic principles. Her natural curiosity and creative energy make her a strong cultural fit and will further our mission to create unique positions of authority for our clients,” said Aaron Schoenherr, founding partner of Greentarget. “With content needs evolving so quickly – especially given ever-shorter attention spans and new information-consumption habits stemming from the pandemic – we think Jennifer is the perfect person to lead our content team in the years ahead.”

Smith, who will be based in Greentarget’s New York office, joined the Journal in 2011 and spent three years covering the legal profession, where she broke news on the biggest law firm dissolution in U.S. history. She then spent two years as a culture reporter before moving in 2016 to cover logistics and supply chain – an area that has taken on critical importance amid the ongoing pandemic.  

“I got to know Greentarget during my time covering the legal profession at the Journal and was impressed by the organization’s consistent professionalism, diligence and respect for journalistic principles,” Smith said. “While it wasn’t an easy decision to step away from journalism, I’m excited to approach the work from a different direction and join an organization with such a clear focus on creating compelling content that puts audience needs front and center.”

Before joining the Journal, Smith was a reporter at Newsday on Long Island, where she covered environmental issues and other topics. She also served as an adjunct professor at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

“Our content capabilities continue to be in high demand as the written word in particular carries significant weight among the sophisticated audiences our clients are trying to reach and influence,” said John Corey, president and founding partner of Greentarget. “Jen’s arrival is a tremendous step forward for Greentarget as we strive to preserve the principles of journalism in our approach to content while embracing what we know to be the fundamental attributes of compelling points of view – novelty, urgency, relevance and utility.”

Greentarget’s Content & Editorial service line has grown steadily in recent years to become an increasingly important part of the company’s offerings for a client base that largely competes on the basis of expertise and point of view. The team has an array of capabilities, including content strategy development, primary research reporting, op-ed campaigns, bylined articles, podcasts, audio storytelling and digital magazines.

Smith earned her M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and her B.A. from the University of California, Santa Cruz. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband.

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Challenge

In July 2020, just 7 percent of educators said they were prepared to address the social and emotional needs of students during COVID-19.

The Nora Project, a nonprofit devoted to providing high-quality social and emotional learning (SEL) and disability inclusion programming to schools, was there to help. But by the time they became a pro bono client of Greentarget in early 2021, the organization was struggling to get overwhelmed and overworked teachers to sign up for their vital programs.

Solution

Through discovery calls with TNP staff/partners and research of the current media landscape, the GT team developed a series of media angles that spotlighted why TNP’s programs were unique and hooked them to relevant news stories, including:

  • the imminent return to classrooms in fall 2021, and the SEL needs of students and teachers upon return;
  • the heightened importance of quality SEL programs (vs. standardized ones) in this moment of high anxiety and disruption;
  • how SEL and disability inclusion programs can lead to broader social justice awareness and education;
  • how easy TNP makes it for teachers to deliver this programming; and
  • the unique resources and capabilities TNP provides (free summer training camp, on-demand coaching, intraweb, etc.)

Greentarget also leveraged existing TNP materials and partnerships and identified key publication targets spanning local, education, and national top-tier media.

These tactics ultimately manifested in a number of different content and media relations efforts, such as promotion of a series of webinars; thought leadership opportunities for Lauren Schrero Levy, TNP’s Co-Founder and Executive Director; and a byline in connection with an educator who uses TNP in his classroom.

Results

As a result of Greentarget’s efforts, TNP had an “unprecedented number of program inquiries” with schools from across the country reaching out. In addition, following the article in Edutopia, TNP was invited to present at a large industry conference, where they hosted a session on integrating disability studies in the classroom. That presentation generated vast interest and led to numerous resource downloads from TNP’s website and several school sign-ups.

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2021 was a bountiful year for the legal industry. Surveys by Citi Private Bank / Hildebrandt and Thomson Reuters / Georgetown Law Center all predicted double-digit increases in revenue and profits. The stories about individual firm performance emerging on Law.com bear out the predictions – the revenue and profit-per-equity-partner gains in 20 stories published to date average 15 percent and 26 percent, respectively. Certain firms reported 50 percent-plus increases in PEP, truly astonishing advances. With demand for legal services at historic highs in 2021, the same rising tide is lifting all boats.

In this environment, strong financial performance is unlikely to distinguish a firm in the lateral market. So what will help your firm stand out? Frame your financial message around talent.

Missing in the Am Law financial performance coverage so far is meaningful emphasis on firm culture – as experienced by associates, professional employees and partners – and discussion of hybrid and remote work arrangements. These are the new key metrics, valued now more than ever within firms and by potential recruits.

To make an impression on lateral candidates and key audiences within your firm – two groups who keep a keen eye on Law.com at this time of year – prepare messages for your financial survey interview with the following points in mind:

  • Focus on Talent and Culture – The pandemic-fueled Great Resignation is driving greater attention to the key components of a firm’s culture – i.e., the expectations regarding performance, norms that govern behavior, and actions that display your values. How this cultural grist drives a firm’s approach to such critical issues as diversity, wellness, and work environment is meaningful to potential lateral candidates, now more than ever. Nearly every managing partner featured in Law.com to date claims to preside over a great culture, and that the culture drives the firm’s success. But few have distinguished themselves by describing the specific actions they are taking to strengthen their culture.

One firm stood out for bringing its chief diversity officer, alongside the managing partner, to its Law.com interview. She described how the firm is supplementing its compensation strategy with increased and tangible nonmonetary means to attract and retain talent. Another firm stood out for describing an innovation to address lawyer turnover – something confronting all top firms that has otherwise gone unmentioned by the firm’s peers.

  • Explain Return to Work Expectations – When are your lawyers and professional staff expected to be back at their desks? For how often and for how long? This has been a moving target for most firms. Current and potential employees accustomed to a new fluidity between work and life are closely following signals regarding a firm’s disposition towards remote and hybrid work arrangements. How a law firm responds to its workforce’s new expectations and preferences regarding work environments will impact the firm’s ability to attract and retain talent.

Further, how you plan to use space signals whether 2021’s historic profits will prove an outlier as the firm – and historic expenses – get back to “normal,” or whether a fresh reallocation of office space will permanently free up resources to sustain profits or fuel attractive investments in talent. Some firms have shared their evolved plans for space and hybrid work publicly; linking these plans to financial expectations would attract attention.

  • Discuss Financial Results (With Context) – Revenue and profit remain critically important, of course. Share and celebrate strong results. But take care to contextualize these results as a function of exceptional circumstances. Several firms were quick to point out that strong 2021 numbers affirmed their strategy. But given the historic demand for legal services recorded within every segment of the Am Law 200, everyone can claim a smart strategy whether they have one or not. Offices have been empty, and travel is rare, so expenses are down. And strong profits per equity partner were supported at many firms by a decline in equity partner head count – some of it strategic, some not. So, will 2021 prove to be an outlier or has the firm evolved in ways that will keep expenses down, and profits higher, in perpetuity?

The historic war for talent is continuing in 2022, and that is ratcheting up the pressure firms are under to recruit and retain talent. As Hugh Verrier, Chair of White & Case, put it, “What no one wants in our profession is a world where people are being driven by numbers at the expense of people. That is what is commonly known as an absence of culture.”

Verrier is, of course, right. This is the year to make it known how you are investing in the firm’s culture and managing return-to-office expectations to create an environment where lawyers and staff can succeed and thrive.

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Establishing true authority in a crowded landscape requires an effective PR strategy. One proven way to cut through the noise is research-driven thought leadership – a strategy that Littler, the world’s largest employment and labor law firm representing management, has effectively leveraged in partnership with Greentarget for a decade.

Since 2012, Littler and Greentarget have conducted an annual survey of in-house lawyers, C-suite executives, and HR professionals to understand the top regulatory, social, and technological issues impacting the workplace. However, the outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020 created a need for Littler to provide quicker and more frequent data. Companies of all sizes were facing unprecedented challenges and the firm’s clients expressed a strong desire for benchmarking data to help respond to a rapidly changing pandemic environment.

Solution

To stay ahead of the curve, Littler and Greentarget reconfigured their strategy by introducing shorter “pulse” surveys focused on time-sensitive issues. In the early months of COVID-19, team members across Greentarget’s Media Relations, Research & Market Intelligence, and Content & Editorial teams – led by Littler’s account team – developed a more efficient approach that cut down lead time before publication.

From March 2020 through the end of 2021, eight survey reports (six in the U.S. and two in Europe) were published, providing valuable insights for employers on such issues as vaccination policies, return-to-office expectations, hybrid working models, and safety protocols.

Results

The surveys have generated substantial media visibility, with more than 1,100 media placements stemming from the 2021 research in top-tier publications – including the Associated Press, Axios, Bloomberg News, CNBC, Financial Times, Forbes, New York Times, PBS Newshour, Politico, Reuters, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post – as well as in a range of industry trade and regional media.

The reports also led to a considerable increase in website traffic for Littler, including a five-fold increase in page visits to press releases related to the reports and almost double the traffic to report landing pages from 2020 to 2021. Additionally, the survey on the Delta variant’s impact was cited multiple times in OSHA’s Emergency Temporary Standard as part of the agency’s factfinding with respect to employer vaccine mandates.

Perhaps most significantly, Littler has received a plethora of direct feedback from clients who are relying on the data to help guide and support workplace strategies, as well as understand how their peer group is approaching emerging issues. More than 4,500 executives completed the surveys in 2021 – the highest response rate in the history of Littler’s surveys and another clear indicator that issuing brief surveys on timely and relevant issues is resonating with clients.

Taken as a whole, the research reports have further bolstered Littler’s standing as the go-to employment and labor law adviser and authority across a broad range of industries – all while providing critical insight to employers in uncertain times.

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Professional services firms are under more scrutiny than ever when it comes to the clients they represent. Employees are no longer reticent about protesting clients they consider unsavory. We’ve seen other stakeholders and the public actively lobby firms to drop certain clients, as well. 

Think about the way at least three law firms distanced themselves from representing the Trump administration after initially agreeing to help challenge election results. Public and internal pressures forced these firms to reconsider their willingness to be involved.

Controversial scenarios like this can land on the doorstep of any professional services firm.  To protect your firm’s reputation in an era of more aggressive social activism, you can mitigate risk by considering carefully which clients you’re willing to work with.

Professional services firm can do this by applying the logic investors are increasingly using – it’s associated these days with three letters: ESG.

ESG Minimizes Risk and Maximizes Long-term Results

In the financial services realm, investing with a fund manager who touts a strong commitment to environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices is not just about making a positive social impact. It’s also a way to reduce the likelihood that your investment will lose value while increasing the likelihood of positive returns over time.

Companies with weak ESG performance often find themselves in situations that can lead to a decline in valuation. If a company is cutting corners on safety protocols, harming the environment, or exploiting its workers, there’s a much greater likelihood it’ll eventually be sued, fined, or otherwise penalized, which can negatively impact its stock price. Activision’s shares have tumbled since revelations of sexual misconduct among its employees, a clear failure of governance. So an investor or fund manager may choose to benefit society by putting her money into a company or a fund with stronger ESG standards, sure, but it should also de-risk her investment.  

How is this strategy relevant to who professional services firms take on as clients? Like investors, they should weigh the short-term gains they stand to make against the long-term risks associated with their choices. Is the initial financial windfall of working with a client of questionable or dubious integrity worth a ding to your firm’s reputation?

Socially Responsible Investing is a Way for Investors to Live Out Their Values

There are firms who choose to represent society’s most controversial and polarizing characters as a matter of principle. In the legal industry, for example, firms rightly argue that everyone deserves skilled representation, even those who some may consider unsavory. That’s certainly true, and if the employees and stakeholders of those firms know that is how they make decisions, there’s less risk for those firms. But when a firm purports to hold certain values and then makes decisions that contradict those values, the firm takes on significant reputational risk.

Assuming you’ve taken steps to define your values, applying an ESG investment lens to client selection can help you live them out.

Ethical investing got started in the 1980s when students in the U.S. demanded that their colleges and universities divest from companies that did business with the apartheid government of South Africa. Over the years an investing strategy known as “exclusionary screening” became popular, wherein investment managers would screen certain industries out of their portfolios. Tobacco, firearms, pornography, fossil fuels, etc., were common targets. 

Investors have largely moved from screening out whole industries to selecting best-of-breed companies across all sectors of the economy.  Regardless, protocols aligned with your corporate values can help you make decisions about the types of clients you’re willing to represent or the kinds of projects you’re comfortable taking on. Failing to make decisions in this way can cause backlash among other clients, employees, and even law enforcement.

Google, whose motto remains “Don’t Be Evil,” faced intense blowback when employees discovered its plans to work with the Pentagon on a project using artificial intelligence technology. After workers spoke out, walked out, and even resigned in protest, Google abandoned the project. Executives recently announced they’ll be exploring another contract with the Pentagon — but this time Google took care to explain how this decision fits with its principles.

PR giant Edelman has been assailed recently by employees who decry statements it made praising COP24’s “new level of international consensus that climate change is an existential threat,” calling for “more scrutiny of corporate climate lobbying efforts,” and arguing that many pledges made at the conference “fall short of what is necessary to avert climate disaster,” all the while representing companies that exploit fossil fuels and the trade groups that lobby for them. 

McKinsey advised the pharmaceutical industry for years about how to increase opioid sales at a time when abuse of pain medicine was widespread. Sued by 46 states’ attorneys general for contributing to the opioid epidemic, the firm ultimately apologized for the work and paid a $573 million settlement to resolve investigations into it conduct, though the firm remains beset with fresh lawsuits. To avoid such entanglements in the future, the CEO Kevin Sneader struggled to draw bright-line rules around the kinds of industries from which it would no longer take clients, including defense, intelligence, justice or policing institutions in nondemocratic countries. Consensus among its partners on this has been difficult to achieve, and the divided opinions are said to have contributed to the Sneader’s ouster.

Investing in Funds with a Low ESG Index Can Influence Positive Change, Too

Sometimes, investors with a strong ESG commitment still invest in companies with environmental, social, or governance liability, but make this seemingly contradictory decision to encourage a company to change. For example, they might invest in an oil company to influence management’s decisions around replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy.

This logic might guide you to take on projects or clients that appear to be objectionable on the surface but have the potential to drive reform.

One example of this is impact litigation, which Harvard Law School defines as filing or defending lawsuits focused on changing laws or focused on the rights of a larger group of people than is directly involved in the suit. On the surface, such representations could beg the question, “Why are you doing this work?” But under certain circumstances, a firm may enter unsavory territory not only to earn fees, but also to make the world a more equitable place for more than just its client. Alan Isaacman’s work on behalf of Larry Flynt, published of Hustler in Hustler Magazine v Falwell, a landmark First Amendment decision, is a clear example. Indeed, John Adams’ defense of the reviled British soldiers who fired on colonists at the Boston Massacre in 1770 – rooted in his concern for the rights of the innocent and the rule of law – reveals how this practice has long been a feature of American jurisprudence. 

Make Business Decisions that Align with Your Firm’s Values

Whether you’re more concerned with mitigating risks to your firm’s reputation or using your talent and expertise to effect social change, the business decisions you make are most defensible when they align with what are commonly understood to be your organization’s values. Applying an ESG filter can help your firm make choices that maximize long-term earnings over short-term gain, enter boldly into social reform territory, or screen out clients and projects that don’t fit with your core principles.

It all comes down to who you are and what you want to represent. Define your values. Communicate them to your clients, your employees, and the community at large. And then commit to making decisions with those guidelines in mind.

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Journalists continue to feel they’re the last and best defense against the spread of fake news. Yet only 14 percent say their own efforts have a significant impact on improving the situation. And they’re skeptical that mitigation efforts such as media literacy campaigns and anti-fake news laws will do anything to turn the tide. 

According to our 2021 Fake News report, 84 percent of the 103 journalists surveyed agreed that the weaponized use of the term “fake news” — i.e., when it’s not being used to describe misinformation and disinformation — is contributing to the delegitimization of traditional media and news sources. Furthermore, 89 percent believe that actual disinformation is as dangerous or more dangerous than no news at all.

As a former reporter, I understand journalists’ cynicism — a sentiment common in newsrooms even in happier times. But I also think journalists are wrong to take such a bleak view. From my vantage point, there are two actions that would reduce fake news’ impact, at least over the long term.

We absolutely should support reform efforts around Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. And we must simultaneously invest in media literacy education efforts. Here’s why.

Lobby for Section 230 Changes to Hold Big Tech Accountable 

A thriving free press plays a vital role in speaking truth to power and holding people accountable for what they say and do. And that means disinformation and misinformation’s threat to journalistic credibility is a threat to the very fabric of our democracy. 

We asked journalists what, if anything, can be done.

Journalists don’t believe Big Tech’s efforts to police themselves will be effective. There are plenty of instances, including a Facebook insider-turned-whistleblower, to suggest they’re spot on about that. 

But when we asked journalists if the government should move forward with amending Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and enforce greater regulations on Big Tech, the response was lukewarm. Fewer than half believed reforms were necessary, and 38 percent remained neutral on the subject. Those who definitely did not support reform were more forceful in their responses. One respondent adamantly said, “Free speech shouldn’t be trampled on.”

It’s understandable and commendable that members of the press are protective of the First Amendment. But there are already limits to free speech that act as guardrails for society. And amending Section 230, if done right, can be another smart limit.

Section 230 currently grants broad protections to internet platforms — including social media giants — from liability associated with comments made by their users. But the law was written 25 years ago, long before the advent of the digital-first era and prior to social media’s ubiquity. It doesn’t — how could it? — account for the vast reach disinformation can have in today’s world. And it certainly doesn’t factor in the algorithms and machine learning that propagate fake news while turning a profit for the platform itself.

Given that both sides of the political divide have legitimate concerns about the power of Big Tech and its influence over our society, it seems feasible that lawmakers could reach consensus about reform. Holding social media and Big Tech accountable through greater regulation could be an important first step in stemming the tide of fake news and reducing its harmful impact.

Stay Active in Media Literacy Efforts 

All that said, I can understand cynicism by journalists and, really, most people about the government’s ability to regulate our way toward ending fake news. Gridlock has been a fixture in Washington for a long time to say nothing of how journalism’s very integrity was attacked by the highest office in the land for four straight years.

But it’s surprising that reporters and editors are also so cynical about the potential for education to make a difference. Only 33 percent of respondents felt media literacy efforts have a high or moderate impact on lessening the spread of fake news. One in five said they had no impact at all. 

Journalists should hold out a little more hope about the positive effects of education. This report found that media literacy intervention in the U.S. and India “improved discernment between mainstream and false news headlines” by 26.5 percent. Meanwhile, media literacy efforts are increasing across the nation. In fact, 14 states have taken legislative action aimed at teaching media literacy to K-12 students. Illinois recently became the first state in the nation to mandate all public high schools include media literacy as part of the curriculum. And in Colorado, lawmakers enacted legislation to create an online repository of media literacy resources that teachers can easily access and use.

It will take time, but media literacy efforts have the potential to help a new generation engage with media in a more responsible, discerning way. Only when audiences have the knowledge to help identify disinformation and misinformation themselves will they think twice before hitting that “share” button. They might even take time to debunk the bad information they see on social media if they’ve been taught how to do it. 

If Journalists and PR Professionals Don’t Take Up the Fight Against Fake News, Who Will?

We can’t afford to throw up our hands and give into cynicism when it comes to the future of our society. We must lean into opportunities that will make a difference. That means being open if not supportive to reforms to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act or other ways to leverage regulation so it can catch up with technology, like perhaps taking a different view on antitrust law.

But it also means not waiting for the government to act. We need to do our part to invest in media literacy efforts in our communities. That might mean supporting nonprofits committed to advancing this cause. Or it could involve volunteering to speak in a classroom and work with students first-hand.

In the coming months, Greentarget will be renewing and ramping up our investment in local media literacy education efforts. And we’ll continue to stand with journalists to combat the negative effects of fake news. 

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