Deciding whether to post commentary during a severe and fast-moving crisis, such as the Russia-Ukraine war, can be a conundrum. Asset managers may be reluctant to make macro calls. Wealth managers may have qualms about commenting on changes to portfolio composition. For both, hesitations boil down to these three reasons: You don’t want to be wrong. You don’t want [...]
Although we are already nearly halfway through 2021, the critical issues that 2020 exposed remain at the forefront of many people’s minds. From social justice protests to the economic crisis and an augmented focus on climate change, many people are increasingly searching for ways to enact change in more areas of their lives. With more Americans receiving the COVID-19 vaccine, people are also contemplating what comes next. However, the concept of going back to “normal” is increasingly being met with the realization [...]
As vulnerability and transparency became a theme and “casual" became the new corporate, the historic implications of 2020 and COVID-19 will resound for generations. In a socially distanced year, we grew closer to our computers, and social media expanded engagement with our now distant communities. Greater screen time increased the desire to explore new economic realms and had an unprecedented effect on trading and markets, with many Main [...]
“Can you get me on CNBC?” This is a frequent request we get from advisors and financial experts who want media attention, despite the fact that most advisors can’t and won’t talk about the public company stocks that are the stock and trade of financial TV news. We’ve also heard many variations of the question, “How can I get the Podunk Journal to write about me?” We once [...]
It’s not exactly a trade secret that media organizations are working to make their newsrooms more diverse, with the ultimate goal of creating content that’s more representative of their audience. Through internship opportunities, targeted recruiting initiatives and thoughtful mentoring programs for underrepresented groups, the wheel is beginning to turn, albeit slowly. (Among the many challenges is the shrinking of news staff; how does a well-meaning editor or executive producer recruit for diversity when they are simultaneously being told to reduce headcount?) Obviously, the push [...]
I have absolutely no skin in this game – I have never owned GameStop nor have I ever shorted a stock – it is still instructive to speculate about the reputation management strategies of the various players in last week’s astonishing events. An internet inspired mob orchestrated a short squeeze that led to a maddening crowd of Main Street investors buying up the stock of a fundamentally struggling company and forcing a comeuppance on [...]
Theodore Roosevelt Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book, Leadership in Turbulent Times, draws leadership lessons from her presidential subjects. Best known for the bestseller Team of Rivals focused on Abraham Lincoln’s cabinet and her Pulitzer-prize winning No Ordinary Time about Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt during the war years, Kearns Goodwin has spent her life studying these and other [...]
Done. Ready to move on. But not so quickly. From the COVID pandemic and resulting economic shock waves to social upheaval prompted by George Floyd’s brutal killing to a divisive election that took weeks to resolve, we are ready to put 2020 behind us. But with the pandemic not yet under control and significant political and social uncertainty remaining, one can only tiptoe into 2021 waiting for the next vase to shatter. The standard PR [...]
In the past, in-person wholesaler educational events with advisors were at the heart of awareness building for mutual fund companies. Not anymore. A recent study from J.D. Power confirms the trend toward virtual and digital engagement with advisors. Asset managers “need to provide easy access to relevant content and resources across multiple digital channels, including content that can help them do their job more effectively [...]
This spring our inboxes were flooded with sympathetic messages and thoughts on the reckoning America is experiencing on racial inequity and justice, largely spurred by the death of George Floyd and the numerous effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. While some companies released public statements, others sent internal messages to employees. Still other companies didn’t chime in at all. Many [...]
