Foxconn Hires Top Spinners To Defend Its Image

An anonymous reader writes "Foxconn is insisting that it has done no wrong. But it has hired Burson-Marsteller to deal with the press failout from recent child labour allegations. Burson-Masteller is a PR heavy hitter called in when outfits have big image problems. It handled Tylenol poisonings, and, according to Corporate Watch, the Bhopal disaster, and Three Mile Island. It represented the private military group Blackwater after Baghdad allegations. Its clients have included the Argentinian military junta led by General Jorge Videla and Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu and Saudi Arabia after it was pointed out that most of the September 11 attackers were from that country."

Comments

If you need PR firms, you've failed.

[sethstorm]

Foxconn has done plenty of wrong - consulting with this(or any) PR agency only affirms it. There's only one option that should be on the table - confess the truth no matter how bad it is, correct the wrongdoings of slave labor and mistreatment of their workers, and then make sure it never happens again.

It's kind of hard to justify your actions when people catch you doing not-so-good-stuff (to say it lightly) and then catch your lies as well. That, and it's even harder to do it when people keep on catching you do it.

Re:If you need PR firms, you've failed.

[DaveGod]

Foxconn has done plenty of wrong - consulting with this(or any) PR agency only affirms it.

No it doesn't. All it indicates is that Foxconn perceives advantages from improving it's public relations. Anything else you wish to take from it is merely reaching from your personal subjectivity and preconceptions.

Maybe Foxconn has done wrong and seeks to spin the story to it's advantage. Maybe.

Or maybe it's done wrong and seeks to do right - PR firms don't only offer consulting for public communications, they can help guide genuine change within a company. Often "bad guy" companies have such a corporate culture because the board have a lack of expertise and influence on how and why to be a "good guy" company, a PR firm can fill in that gap. Any year one, nay, week one marketing student

Or, maybe the media have got it wrong and Foxconn seek to get the truth out there. Perhaps Foxconn are good guys and these reports are all lies. Well OK, probably not, but it's entirely plausable Foxconn's failings and their lack of response have at least been exaggerated in the media. When was the last time you read an article or watched a news report on something you have a very high level of knowledge about, and shook your head about how completely they'd got it wrong? Maybe I should re-phrase that: can you recall the last time they got it right?

I'm not trying to argue any of the above is the case, merely outline a few of the possibilities. Slashdot generally has a healthy respect for science on issues that clearly fit within the realm of science, but it would be easy to read the submissions and comments and conclude it's readership is totally incapable of applying any of it's lessons for any other topic.

Re:If you need PR firms, you've failed.

[ozmanjusri]

You can replace the name "FoxConn" with any corporations name and still be as correct.

Sort of.

Burson-Marsteller should be familiar to all Slashdot denizens - they've been long-term astroturfers here for both Microsoft and Facebook. Both companies have been caught using them for smear campaigns against Google.

Now it looks like Apple/FoxConn have joined the pack, I'd say the Axis is complete again.

Re:Track Record

[Anonymous Coward]

Saudi Arabia is run by religous conservatives

No, Saudi Arabia is run by clever, worldly people whose preferred tool for oppression is religious conservatism. If you believe that the Saudi Arabia is ruled by the religious, the USA by bastions of freedom and USSR was controlled selfless communists then the PR has worked on you too.

Religion is a symptom, not a cause.

Failed? Define failed?

[coder111]

If you screwed your employees or raped the environment or society and walked away with millions or billions in profits, in what way have you failed?

Remember, corporations have no morals. They cannot have morals by definition. Their only goal and measure of success is profit. If did some bad things and hired a PR company afterwards and still profits are up, you haven't failed.

--Coder

Re:Quitting: Technically possible, not feasible.

[UnknowingFool]

Do you actually live in China because you seem to profess much about a situation you have no clue? These people can quit. No one will hunt them down. The problem is that a competitor is likely only to have the same or worse conditions.