Category: management

‘Employee Relations’ Should Assume Collaboration, Not Conflict

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This past summer, when most faculty were off contract and not regularly attentive to emails and the administrations of the university, an email went out from my employer to announce a division called Labor and Employee Relations.

A serious business meeting with a man and a woman discussing documents at a conference table.
AI generated image of tense work relationship.

Why labor AND employee? Apparently labor includes unionized segments of the workforce and employees are non-unionized. But they never made that clear.

What is clear is the basis for the Labor and Employee Relations division is predicated on conflict, not collaborative relationships.

The administration set up a new page on the website to explain the distinction between human resources (HR) and labor and employee relations (LER). The distinctions are flawed, and indicative of an administration that perceives an “us-them” mentality with employees. Consider the list of duties of this so-called employee relations division helps with in their own words on the website:

  • “Management of reported policy violations including Standards of Conduct
  • Consultation on approach to faculty and staff misconduct concerns
  • Management of formal complaints and grievances
  • Oversight of workplace investigations
  • Consultation on corrective or disciplinary action
  • Oversight of consistency, and compliance of employee actions with policy and law
  • Labor, grievance, and collective bargaining matters”

The context of this new division is revealing. Earlier this year, several hundred faculty, staff and students sent a letter to the university board stating their dissatisfaction with the president and administration due to lack of respect, inclusion in decision making, and communication. The board responded by extending the president’s contract by two years, three years prior to its current term ending. The board and administration did not see the letter as an opportunity for course correction in process and restoration of relationship. They saw it as a call to escalate the conflict.

This new division was not needed in previous presidential administrations for the entire history of the institution. Now the faculty senate — the institution has a history of “shared governance” and has not had a faculty union — is moving toward a formal vote of no confidence in the president. Union representatives are contacting faculty. The president is on a path to seal a legacy of employee dissatisfaction and conflict and to be a catalyst for the first faculty union at the institution.

All of this could have been avoided had the administration practiced actual employee relations. What they have put forth is not relational at all, it is about compliance and enforcement. In PR terms, employee relations is about building and maintaining mutually beneficial relationships with employees. It involves actually listening to them in symmetrical fashion, adjusting administrative behaviors and not just monitoring employees. It would  mean working with employees, not seeing them as working for the administration. Actual employee relations would not measure obedience to administration goals—devoid of  faculty and staff input—but instead would measure employee loyalty, retention, morale, and engagement, all scholarly and professional terms of actual employee relations.

But the administration presses on in its arrogance and ignorance of actual employee relations, and the multiple positives of practicing it well. Instead, they double down on bad employee relations by announcing new initiatives publicly before internally. They invite the campus to get to know new administrators instead of them getting to know faculty and staff who have worked at the university for decades and have valuable history, insight, perspective, and proven practices. The descriptions of the employee relations division never mention relationship; instead the key words are discipline, compliance, grievance, policy. It presumes conflict instead of collaboration, and it is a set up for a union mentality rather than a culture of unity.

I was recently at a large community event where I ran into two former presidents of the university. One asked me about how my work is going. The other introduced me to someone else as his former colleague. Both showed a genuine interest in the work of faculty and an egalitarian view of  faculty and administration relationships. Those days are gone. A culture built over decades is being dismantled in a few years.

This is what happens when there are no bonafide public relations professionals advising the administration, when the board chair is a labor attorney and the top communications staffer is also a lawyer. The resulting relationship between employees and administration will be one to endure, not one to celebrate. Employee relations will be contractual rather than collegial, tense rather than productive, litigious rather than legitimate.

Businesses Can Look Up When Looking Ahead

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Purpose statements have been increasingly common for corporations. You would think mission and vision statements would be enough. But with the cultural expectations and social pressure for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Corporate Social Advocacy (CSA), more companies are going a step further.

A wall sign displaying the purpose and values of an organization, highlighting commitments to honoring God, serving others, pursuing excellence, and growing profitably. The values listed include accountability, consistency, humility, and more.

Whereas as vision is a conception of an ideal future state, and a mission is what a company will do to get there, these are entirely focused on the business. A purpose statement articulates what a company can do to benefit society beyond organizational objectives.

Southwest Airlines has a purpose statement that stresses how the company benefits people by what it does: “To connect people to what’s important in their lives through friendly, reliable, and low-cost air travel.”

Similarly, Kellogg’s has a purpose statement that connects its product line to a benefit for people: “”Creating better days and a place at the table for everyone through our trusted food.”

These are good examples, but they remain somewhat vague and still company focused. Perhaps that is entirely appropriate. 

But I recently came across an example of a corporate purpose statement that reaches even higher, bringing God into the statement, as well as the concept of “serve” to mean meeting people’s needs and not a product or service for sale.

I was attending the Christian Business Men’s Connection (CMBC) conference, and one speaker with a long history of corporate management shared the purpose of his employer, Coca Cola Consolidated, the larest Coca Cola bottler in the United States. Their purpose statement is:

“to honor God in all we do, to serve others, to pursue excellence, and to grow profitably”

This statement does not back away from the corporate growth and profit objective. And pursuit of excellence is often a management method for motivating employee quality and productivity. But the first two parts of the statement mention honoring God and serving others—definitely going beyond the walls of the company.

It demonstrates a way of looking up when looking ahead.

Some might contend that such a bold faith-oriented statement is inappropriate, given that not all who read this have faith. However, many companies affirm one form of identity or another in their statements and marketing and management. This is a statement of identity with God. I’ve written about the importance and validity of identity with God if there are so many other identities in our culture. 

The executive from Coca Colla Consolidated also pointed out that such a statement is actually not uncommon and in fact goes beyond a statement with their faith in the corporate culture. The company is publicly traded and so investors as well as employees and customers are well aware of the purpose to honor God and not only do not object, but embrace it.

“Many companies have chaplains and other programs bringing the gospel to the workplace,” he said. “The media just doesn’t cover it.”

He noted the values the company instills in everyone to support their purpose include accountability, consistency, courage and conviction, discipline, honesty and integrity, humility, morality, honesty, optimism, respectfulness, and supportiveness. Anyone would be hard pressed to argue with those values. Nor can anyone argue with the success of the company.

I would add one more distinction. Many companies have purpose statements that seem to follow and try to please society, which makes it a cultural statement. A purpose to honor God above everything else is a statement of bold leadership, and as a statement it is divine.  

How University Boards Should be Selected and Act

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Many people do not give a lot of thought about boards, particularly university boards, until there is a crisis. But they are critical to a well-functioning organization whether situations or routine or challenging. 

A professional man in a blue suit gestures while speaking during a meeting at a conference table, with attendees seated in the background.

How people get on university boards is currently at issue in Michigan. A recent article in Bridge about whether Michigan’s governor should appoint board members for all of Michigan’s state universities. This would be similar to most other states. Currently voters in Michigan elect boards members for the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, and Wayne State University. Given some issues at those universities such as sudden departures of presidents, and the facts that voters are not informed enough to select university board members, there is a proposal to have the governor appoint boards.

But appointed boards are not necessarily a guarantee of better boards. Some boards can exercise their role more with arrogance than competence. 

This was evident recently when more than 200 faculty, staff and students wrote a letter to the board of the university where I teach. They expressed displeasure with the direction of the university and its current president, who among other things, has never taught a class and does not seem interested in faculty perspective. The board responded by extending the president’s contract three years before it was even up for renewal.

This shows a problem of appointed boards. Candidates for university boards are often brought before the governor from the universities themselves, often with the president’s involvement. This sounds more like perpetuating a cabal than a judicious selection of a board.

In my own research on public relations capacity on corporate boards and nonprofit boards, I grounded the studies on board theory. There are essentially two schools of thought on boards. Resource Dependency Theory says that board members provide resources from outside the organization needed for survival or growth. Meanwhile, Agency Theory says the role of boards is monitoring the executive and acting in the interest of stakeholders, Often organizational boards are a blend of both, providing external resources and knowledge as well as ensuring the executive acts in accordance with stakeholder expectations.

It is clear in the example above from GVSU that the board did not monitor the executive in the interest of the stakeholders. They were more concerned with their personal relationship with the president than their professional responsibility to stakeholders.

My research focused on public relations capacity in board members of both corporations and nonprofit executives. There is, sadly, little evidence of it. Most board members are selected in accordance with Resource Dependency Theory to provide resources other than public relations. This includes an expertise in finance, law, and whatever it is the organization does.

Board members who understand that public relations is not mere publicity but all about mutually beneficial relationships with stakeholders would better serve both the organization and the varied stakeholders it must serve. If board members are appointed or elected, they should have a grasp of their oversight role and that the work not for the president and institution but they oversee it to ensure it serves the taxpayers, faculty, staff, students and other stakeholders. 

The focus on relationships is more than a public relations perspective. It is essential to good leadership and management. At my institution, there was a sudden leadership change at multiple top executive positions. I was at a meeting where they introduced themselves and when they started and none had been at the university more than 18 months. I was sitting near faculty like myself who had been at the institution more than 20 or 30 years. But the new executives addressed this by having events where faculty could learn about them. They never attempted to learn about the faculty and how they had contributed to the growth of the university for so long. 

Recently the university had an event at which the current and four past presidents spoke and reflected. The oldest and longest-serving president recalled how he would walk around campus and drop in on offices on a regular basis to get to know people better, learn what they were working on, hear their ideas and concerns. I personally remember that. The culture has changed. A board, especially if a member or two is savvy to public relations, could insist that the president and executive team work harder to get to know long-serving faculty and staff and institutional history before trying to impose their new imprint on the university.

What will be important more than how board members are selected is how board members serve. Also, there needs to be a mechanism not just to select board members but to remove those who do not act in the interest of stakeholders. 

Diversity is at the Heart of ‘Pushback’ Against DEI

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In recent months, there has been lots of movement on the topic of DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion). Some companies, such as Target, have reduced their DEI efforts. Others, like Costco, have announced a recommitment to DEI. 

The Trump administration has moved to eliminate DEI in federal agencies and any organizations that receive federal funding. Universities have reacted to this with concern.

Meanwhile, professional associations in the public relations industry have also weighed in. For example, the Association of Educators in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) has a panel in the next few weeks addressing DEI “pushback.” Recently, the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) released a position affirming its own commitment to DEI. The position was discussed at a Member Monday session, in which PRSA 2025 Chair Ray Day insulted those with alternative views to DEI as “being confused.” But leaders like him have not bothered to eliminate their own confusion about the pushback to DEI. Much of it is well-reasoned.

All of the above turmoil about DEI is evidence of diversity. That is to say, there is a diversity of opinions about diversity. 

Diversity, as well as equity and inclusion, are general concepts for which there is a large majority of people in favor. But DEI as it manifests itself in some cases as a specific program to achieve diversity is where there are legitimate differences on the nature of the problem, the causes of the problem, the scope of the problem, and its attendant solutions. DEI, as a set of assertions, attributions, assumptions, programs and policies, in many organizations violates the very principles of diversity, equity and inclusion. This is why many people—including many persons from what would be called minority groups (examples listed below)—object to DEI even as they endorse diversity.

I heard from several veteran PRSA members who were upset about PRSA’s statement. It assumes there should be one perspective on DEI, and that all members do or should share it. It expects compliance. Comments on PRSA’s social sites showed that there are differing opinions on the many nuances of DEI. But the responses showed that  other PRSA members violated the premise of diversity—as well as PRSA’s previous statements on ethics and civility—by descending into gaslighting, stereotyping, ad hominem attack and other emotional and childish rhetoric that showed no consideration given to inclusion of multiple opinions and equity of expression. 

I have experienced the same form of hypocrisy from PRSA when leadership denied me a seat on the national board saying I had violated its diversity policy when I expressed my Christian worldview on my personal blog. Read more about that episode here. 

So what are the objections to DEI? Not all DEI programs manifest themselves in the same way. But many do claim to champion diversity even as they stifle it. Here’s a list or problems:

  • It is based on anti-American values, namely critical race theory, which stems from critical theory, which emerged from the Frankfort School populated by Marxist philosophers. DEI’s roots are in the philosophy of Herbert Mercuse and his student Angela Davis, who basically claimed that dividing people by social class didn’t work so they would need to try division by race and gender. The whole point is division to gain power. Independent journalist Christopher Rufo does an excellent and objective summary of this—in which you can take Mercuse, Davis and others at their word—in his book “America’s Cultural Revolution.” 
  • The insistence on the false dichotomy of seeing the world as if everyone is ether an oppressor or a victim. Another socialist philosopher, Paulo Freire, wrote a book called “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” to indoctrinate the next generation through school curriculum. Paradoxically, this curriculum was tried and was rejected in socialist nations yet has its advocates in the United States, more of a “land of opportunity” than many countries around the world. Many of the people who reject the false “oppressor-victim” perspective are the very people DEI oppressively insists are victims. Take for example Blexit, a grassroots organization of Black Americans who are taking a “Black exit” from the victim mentality. 70% of its members are formerly of the far left. Or look at the rampant rise in anti-Semitism on college campuses—the sad outcome of this false perspective.
  • It favors category over individuality. Not only does DEI place everyone on a scale of either oppressor or victim, it maintains an unethical stereotypical categorization of people by race or “identity.” As such it does not acknowledge significant variation based on individual experience, condition, values and other individual attributes. In other words, it violates the central aspect of diversity. 
  • It favors representation over competence. For this reason, some have proposed MEI—merit, excellence, intelligence—as an alternative to DEI. Professor Victor Davis Hanson elaborates on the 10 problems with DEI. 
  • It makes unempirical assertions. Stemming from the above flaw, critical theory, unlike empirical theory, is based on speculative reasoning and not evidence. Thus, we have critical race theorists and others in DEI propagating false notions of universal “white privilege,” “white fragility,” “unconscious bias” and other fabrications. It would be insulting and preposterous to say all Africans are the same. Even in a single country like Nigeria, there are more than 300 languages spoken with associated tribes and cultures. It would be similarly preposterous to claim that all Asians are the same, all Hispanics are the same and so on. In the country from which my mother immigrated there are significant differences among provinces. Yet DEI insists on being prejudicial towards persons of a Caucasian heritage or white skin, without regard to actual experience, values, thoughts, behavior and other variables academics would study before making generalizable claims. 
  • It seeks equity over equality. This is another result of the socialist roots of DEI. It seeks the same outcome, as opposed to the same opportunity for all. This is the hallmark of socialist central planning, which has worked exactly never wherever it has been tried. The lessons of Friedrich Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” have been ignored here. The fallacy of equity (not equality) produces disincentive, loss of industry, disappearance of innovation, and a personal loss of any sense of accomplishment including for the people DEI programs claim to champion. 
  • It yields division, not unity. Numerous examples from diversity training show that the outcome often does not meet the objective. Employees or other members of a group come away divided, angry, silent, resentful, and offended. 
  • It favors certain perspectives over others. In the case of sex and gender, DEI seeks to affirm and promote one perspective, that of the LGBTQ and transgender communities, over those whose worldview of sex and gender is different and based not on culture but on faith or science. Such differing worldviews can coexist in an attitude of mutual understanding. That would exemplify actual diversity. But compelling all to accept one singular worldview is the antithesis of diversity.

These and other complaints are borne out in scholarship and other research. The Heritage Foundation has pointed this out in a commentary on its website that also was published in the Washington Times: “Research has already shown that (1) diversity training programs have failed to improve attitudes and behaviors for years, and (2) attempts to reduce bias through measuring just how much each of us has stored away in the recesses of our mind have been a spectacular bust. Anthropology Now reports that “hundreds of studies dating back to the 1930s suggest that anti-bias training doesn’t reduce bias.” The National Association of Scholars has determined that ‘implicit bias’ training hijacks justice.

Hal Arkes, an emeritus professor of psychology at Ohio State University, points out in an op-ed that typical DEI “training” has tests for “implicit bias” that fail tests of validity and reliability that any academic would consider. These trainings also do not accomplish more than awareness of flawed concepts because  the companies that do and profit from such “trainings” never measure to see if there were changes in racial attitudes, an elimination of so-called “implicit bias,” or tangible result of any kind. What really happens is a perpetuation of an unproven myth that America is systemically racist. Studies have found that DEI training causes people to find racism where none exists.

The negative effects of DEI seeping into scholarship are also documented in the book ‘Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity―and Why This Harms Everybody‘ by Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay. They blame the postmodern principles embedded in DEI orthodoxy, including knowledge (radical skepticism of objective truth) and politics (society is formed by systems of power hierarchies). In addition, DEI has damaged American higher education’s purpose and practice with its four themes of blurring boundaries, asserting the power of language, creating cultural relativism, and encouraging the loss of the individual perspective and universal truth.

As noted previously, many people in minority categories whom DEI would claim to support have started speaking out to resist the advance of a DEI system that is singular in focus and damaging to the very nature of diversity. They offer their own alternative perspectives and prescriptions, based on experience and evidence. Here are summaries of a the work and perspectives of some of them:

  • Candace Owens, “Blackout”—In this book, Owens, a Black woman who grew up in poverty, argues with evidence how the liberal policies intended to help Black Americans actually works against them, how the left ignores the importance of faith in the Black community, and how fathers in the home is the key to Black Americans rising out of the cycle of poverty.
  • Carol Swain, “The Adversity of Diversity” — Swain is a prominent Black political science professor, recently retired (and plagiarized by Harvard President Claudine Gay), who speaks against the billion dollar DEI industry that, in her words, “has become an aggressive force that takes organizations away from their core missions and often transforms them into divisive and disruptive institutions that openly violate the rights of members of disfavored groups.” Swain’s recommended alternative of Real Unity Training Solutions entails a return to core American principles that embrace nondiscrimination and equal opportunity in a meritocratic system that recognizes individual effort rather than group rights.
  • Teresa Manning, policy director for the National Association of Scholars, strongly insists from an academic perspective that DEI is a ‘false religion that will destroy America’:
  • Thomas Sowell, “Social Justice Fallacies” — The prolific Black Stanford Professor and economist’s most recent book points to the fact that “many things that are thought to be true simply cannot stand up to documented facts, which are often the opposite of what is widely believed. However attractive the social justice vision , the crucial question is whether the social justice agenda will get us to the fulfillment of that vision. History shows that the social justice agenda has often led in the opposite direction, sometimes with catastrophic consequences.” 
  • John McWhorter’s book “Woke Racism: How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America” details how “claims to “dismantle racist structures” is actually harming his fellow Black Americans by infantilizing Black people, setting Black students up for failure, and passing policies that disproportionately damage Black communities. What is called “antiracism” actually features a “racial essentialism that’s barely distinguishable from racist arguments of the past.”
  • Shelby Steele, a Black New York Times columnist, argues in his book “The Content of Our Character” (invoking MLK’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech) that our culture has been trapped in putting color before character, or considering only racial categories and not individual attributes.  (Also see his son Eli Steele’s Substack newsletter ‘Man of Steele’)
  • Coleman Hughes, a young Black intellectual wrote “The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America.” Hughes argues for a return to the ideals that inspired the American Civil Rights movement, showing how our departure from the colorblind ideal has ushered in a new era of fear, paranoia, and resentment marked by draconian interpersonal etiquette, failed corporate diversity and inclusion efforts, and poisonous race-based policies that hurt the very people they intend to help. 
  • Robert Woodson, a contemporary of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King in the civil rights movement, founded the Woodson Center to help underserved communities fight crime and violence and restore families by applying the principles of market economy, faith, and personal responsibility. Woodson also edited the book “Red, White and Black: Rescuing American History from Revisionists and Race Hustlers” which features prominent Black scholars telling the story of Black people “living the grand American experience, however bumpy the road may be  along the way.”
  • Bari Weiss, a Jewish woman who left the New York Times to start her own media company The Free Press, writes how DEI is a movement focused not on diversity but power in her poignant article “End DEI.”

It should be obvious that when it comes to diversity, there is a diversity of perspectives. Yet certain people, and companies or organizations like PRSA, are unwelcoming to alternative perspectives. I have asked diversity officers about the concept of including and welcoming a diversity of perspectives and they get visibly upset. Sadly, people who bristle at consideration of diversity of perspective reveal that they are not about diversity—they are about conformity. They are not about equality—they are about power. And they are not about inclusion—they are about control.  

Diversity programs should stress non-discrimination, and at the same time be non-celebratory. Individuals and organizations should not double down on oppressive persuasion, but work  toward common understanding of legitimate differences, including perspectives on diversity. PR is based on communication, and the root of communication is “common.” Creating environments where people can disagree on particulars but nevertheless work toward common general goals would be productive. This would be good, ethical and civil public relations. It is also a picture of true diversity.

Does Advertising Adjacency Affect Corporate Reputation?

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(Note: I have been on a sort of hiatus from blogging as I was on a sabbatical during the fall of 2024 to write a book on public relations theory. Then, based on previous academic articles I have published, I was asked by a book editor to contribute a chapter on corporate reputation. With the book in production and the chapter awaiting my presentation at a conference for feedback, I hope to pick up the pace on the blog again. More about both books when their publication dates near).

Public relations professionals use all forms of tactics, including paid advertising. Public relations professionals also are strategically concerned with the reputations of the organizations they represent. So an article in the Wall Street Journal (subscription may be required) about advertisers concerned with Meta’s allowing free speech being a threat to ‘brand safety’ caught my eye.

Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s president, gained lots of attention for recently saying Meta would back off on censorship and allow more free speech on Facebook and the company’s other platforms. There had been complaints that there was a noted bias against conservatives when some posts were given a lower push by an algorithm or accounts blocked entirely. There was even evidence that some of this was done in cooperation with federal government agencies. 

Of course, what is censorship to some is responsible monitoring of misinformation and hate speech. But there again, those are subjective judgements. A difference of opinions and values is not necessarily hate. And many comments labeled misinformation have borne out to be true, from Covid origins to the involvement of Russia in previous elections. 

I’ll leave that debate there.

But the WSJ article pointed out that advertisers are concerned that with the filters off, their digital ads could be adjacent to questionable content. I have wondered about this concept long before there was such a thing as digital advertising.

Brands have placed ads in newspapers and magazines for years, not exactly knowing what editorial or other ad content would appear on the same or adjacent page. If the ad is near content some reasonable people could see as objectionable, would those readers see it as associated with the brand?

Granted, in broadcast media, and magazines with a specific content and tone, ads are also considered sponsorship. There is a reputational factor to consider there.

But in print, and largely in social media advertising, I doubt that many viewers see an ad in their stream as an endorsement or sponsorship of other content in their stream. This is especially true because users can choose who to follow and select their own feeds (unless they just scroll “for you” posts). In other words, users have more agency over what they see than advertisers do.

Are users not savvy enough to realize that advertisers are there to reach them, not to promote others? I would venture to say that they are. 

Also, if professionals are worried about brand safety, what reputation impact would there be if the brand is known to be  encouraging subjective censorship? 

This might be something for brands to do their own research on. Do their key publics—from employees, to customers, to investors and more—factor in they content near corporate branding when they form their own view of the company, ie it’s reputation in their minds? An academic study on this would also be fascinating. 

Or perhaps Meta could use its resources to find an answer to this question. It may be in their own interest to do so.