The #MeToo movement has created a genuine crisis for brands, and most are handling it badly. Not because they don't care (many do), but because the playbook for corporate response to cultural moments is fundamentally broken.
The two default modes are silence ('we don't want to get political') and empty solidarity ('we stand with women' posted from the same company that just settled a harassment lawsuit). Both are recognized instantly for what they are. Silence reads as complicity. Empty solidarity reads as hypocrisy. There's a narrow middle path that almost nobody is walking.
There's a narrow middle path that almost nobody is walking.
WeWork's S-1 filing used the word 'community' 150 times while describing a real estate sublease business. The gap between language and reality was the entire cautionary tale.
The brands getting it right are the ones doing the boring work: changing policies, funding programs, promoting women into actual leadership positions, publishing pay equity data. The ones getting it wrong are posting graphics while changing nothing internally.
What I keep telling clients: a cultural moment isn't a campaign opportunity. It's a mirror. Whatever you say publicly will be immediately checked against your internal reality. So before you craft a statement, ask yourself: can we survive the scrutiny that statement will invite?
This isn't an advertising question. It's an organizational one. And the agencies (including ours) that are honest about where that line is are going to build more trust than the ones who say 'we can help you with your #MeToo response' as if it's a brief to answer.
Truffles and Barnaby are both asleep right now, which means I have approximately twelve minutes of uninterrupted writing time before chaos resumes.