This graph represents the volume of Google search results for a certain company. From April of 2013 until October of 2017, very few people were searching for this company.
Then, in late 2017, the company’s search volume exploded. What possibly happened in late 2017 that made this company such a trending topic? An IPO? A viral marketing stunt?
Not exactly.
This graph shows the search volume for the now-bankrupt Weinstein Company, which made headlines for all the wrong reasons in 2017.
In the best of times, there’s really no reason for this kind of film production company to be a household name. How many people in the US need to know where to receive funding to produce their blockbusters?
Here’s why most brands are better off staying out of headlines.
Unknown and Successful
In general, apart from consumer brands and a few large B2B companies, name recognition is usually not a factor to success. That’s why some of the best-run companies are the ones you’ve never heard of.
US News and World Report wrote an article on the best-managed companies of 2017. Among the top three were Mueller Water Products and Micron Technology.
Forbes listed KapStone Paper and Packaging as the best-run materials company of 2014, and Skyworks Solutions as the country’s top-managed semiconductor company.
Even if Skyworks Solutions quadrupled their sales, most people would still never hear of them.
Then again, most people had never heard of Travis Kalanick until a whistleblower named Susan Fowler ousted him and others by exposing Uber’s culture of harassment and misconduct, a disaster that continues to affect the company’s revenue.
Play It Safe
Respect in the workplace should be a fundamental value for any successful organization, because as the EEOC says, “workplace incivility often acts as a ‘gateway drug’ to workplace harassment.”
When your organization cares about how employees treat each other, and makes a point to address any concerns that arise about disrespectful behavior, you can keep steering your business toward success without ending up with lawsuits on your hands.
Training Helps, but You’ve Got to Mean It
An EEOC report from 2016 concluded that many training programs fail as a prevention tool for harassment and other misconduct because they are “too focused on simply avoiding legal liability.”
For training to actually have an effect on employees and serve as a guide for respectful and ethical behavior, your organization has to communicate respect as a top value and hold everyone accountable for upholding that value. Take a look at your culture and how training plays into that – if your compliance training is simply there to keep the business out of legal trouble, it’s ineffective. It’s missing the point.
Lisa Yankowitz, a management advisor and HR investigator, discussed how to make respect a priority in your company culture and make training an effective preventative measure for harassment issues.