Law And More

Crime and Narcissism

Carlos Ghosn, former Renault chief executive officer and Nissan chairman, had been well-compensated. Surely he didn't need to allegedly pilfer from corporate funds and under-report his income.  

Then, what could have been the motivation which triggered allegedly crossing the line from legal to illegal?

In Bloomberg, Leonid Bershidsky rules as greed.

Instead he positions and packages Ghosn's alleged behavior as a classic example of CEO narcissism. That tends to go with the territory of becoming a Celebrity CEO. Once in that space it's easy for business leaders to delude themselves that they are beyond the reach of the law. 

Of course, this syndrome is not restricted to corporate power figures.

It can and does occur among those professionals who perceive themselves as even a cut above. That explains how many lawyers lose it all through embezzlement, domestic violence, sexual misconduct, and even murder.

In coaching several lawyers who had been to prison for financial crimes and had lost their license, I found out that they hadn't crossed the line because of absolute need or because they assumed they could get away with it.

Instead, they figured the rules didn't apply to them. They were special. After all, they had plenty of education, were smart, had been able to get results for clients, and were in demand on their networks.

Can crime be reduced among professionals if, from the get-go, we are socialized that we are not a cut above? Instead we merely fit into a slot that requires analytical skills and that pays relatively well. Plumbers fill the slot that mandates mechanical skills and those can pay as well as or better than white-collar jobs. In addition, in this volatile economy, that line of work is more secure. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

Film-Maker Jay Roach - Yet One More Interpretation of the Fall of Roger Ailes

Outsized media genius Roger Ailes will live on among the ambitious and creative. Like film-maker Jay Roach they will find material in Ailes rise and fall to create or enhance their own Brandnames.

Currently for the stars playing in the Roach movie the stakes are high. That's what Hillary Busis introduces in her article in Vanity Fair. For example, John Lithgow depicts Ailes himself.

Most of us will pony up the ticket price to see the movie because we are eager to find out how Ailes, his loyalists, and his enemies are portrayed. No human being is really knowable. So it's interesting to reflect on how others position and package the minds and hearts of celebrities like Ailes. 

Busis' round-up of characters in the movie does not include Ailes' personal public relations representative. That was Bob Dilenschneider.

In many ways a dead ringer for Ailes, Dilenschneider was outed by the media for purchasing $15,000 in advertising promoting a vanity biography of his client.

The trouble was this: That bio had been published a year earlier. Duh.

Also, the promotion was perceived as a stratagem to distract from Gabriel Sherman's negative take "The Loudest Voice in the Room."

However, the caper backfired, boosting interest in Sherman's book. Here is the media analysis of all that. 

So, one wonders if Dilenschneider is part of the movie. In Sherman's book he makes a cameo appearance. His firm provided an internship to Ailes' pre-teen son Zack who arrived for duty in a limo. At Ailes' memorial, Zack, then all grown-up, defended his father against the allegations of sexual misconduct. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

Bullying the 65+ - One for Congress

Somehow we made it through multiple economic downturns, including the whopper of 2008.

We did what it took to accommodate a workplace gone tech.

Many of us came from under debt.

Yet, some economists and many financial planners have been labeling us "Brand Dumb."

Come 65, announces the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis, 40% of us who are middle class will tumble into poverty. Read all about it in MarketWatch. 

That assumes we're relying primarily on Social Security. After we receive our 2.8% boost in the monthly payment, the average benefit will be $1,461.

Annually, that will total $17,532. Well, the supposed experts concede, that puts us way over the official government threshold of $12,060 for poverty.

However, the experts reply with this: Even at $17,532, many of us will be living in poverty.

But, will we? Or, more to the point, are we?

There are plenty of those in America 65 and over whom I coached who are living a fulfilling middle class life on their Social Security. They are doing that because they made it their personal finance business to adjust and keep adjusting to cost of living realities. 

For example, they knew to sell the family home when the real estate market was near the top. No, many of them haven't been caught in what could be another housing bust, especially in the northeast.

They shed a few tears about leaving all they knew but did the deed: They relocated from high priced locales to much lower priced ones such as Sierra Vista, Arizona, and Youngstown, Ohio. Renting isn't cheap but they know how to shop around in Landlord Nation. 

That's reality number-one.

Reality number-two is that not too many of us are winging it on Social Security, alone.

As The New York Times reports, more than half of us plan to or are already working beyond 65. Some have no intention of retiring at all.

In fact, the two age groups - 65 to 74 and 75 and older - have the fastest rate of growth in the U.S. labor market. That's why I have been a busy career coach for those over-50 who are determined to continue to earn income from work. The aging recognize that full retirement was their dad's and mom's game. A career path may end at age 65. Working rarely does in the current time.

No, we're not dumb. 

And, collectively, we should send this collective message to the economists and financial planners: We won't be bullied into assuming we played it all wrong during our peak working years.

Then and now there were problems. Often big ones, such as the collapse of our industry or medical bills.

But, we have emerged as The Scrambling Generation. Here is my guide, free to download, on how to make a buck, no matter what  Download Outwitting ageism.

And here is my e-book, also free to download, on how to keep finding the exit out of our comfort zone. 

Meanwhile, Congress should be investigating the tactics by professionals trying to establish reputations for brilliance or developing new business - at our expense. You bet, I will testify.

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Aging.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gamil.com.

The Jell-O "Curse" - Bill Cosby as Spokesperson Was Least of It

Public relations representatives and marketing communications experts warn clients about the downside of human spokespeople and influencers. 

The human kind, as opposed to a made-up mascot, can get involved in all sorts of scandals.

The classic example had been Bill Cosby. America's Dad had been the face of Jell-O.

However, that actually was a small part of the "curse" which has plagued Jell-O.

In the new book "Jell-O Girls: A Family History," Allie Rowbottom chronicles how the purchase of the Jell-O patent in 1899 had brought down extreme suffering to her family. 

It had been her great-great-great uncle who bought the patent for $450. Twenty-six years later it was sold for $67 million.

Along with the wealth that created for her family in LeRoy, New York, there has been a sustained history of premature deaths, suicide, alcoholism, drug use, sexual abuse, mental illness, and a predisposition to cancer. In connecting the dots, Rowbottom theorizes that the boredom generated by privilege helped bring the family down. 

It was Allie's mother Mary who began a memoir about the curse. But she died relatively young from cancer before getting all that organized. So, Allie took that up as a mission.

When a child Allie's mother had been sexually molested by teenage friends of her brother, raped by a cousin, essentially ignored by her parents, and did lose her own mother to cancer when very young. Later she suffered from hysteria, had bouts of drug use and alcoholism, spent time in a psychiatric facility, and was betrayed by her husband.

As Allie tells it, Jell-O has also inflicted a cultural curse on America. After World War II, its commercials reinforced the role of women as stay-at-home housewife and caretaker. Serving creative versions of Jell-O was positioned and packaged as helping those women be perfect in that role.

Later, low-calorie Jell-O was part of the ethos of extreme body consciousness by females. Allie herself got caught up in that and had to receive treatment for an eating disorder. 

In addition, the one-time corporate home for Jell-O - General Foods - also became cursed in complacency. After Philip Morris purchased it to diversify into food, eventually The General, as it was called, was gutted. Later the parts of it which were marketable were merged with Kraft. 

Of course, this isn't the only chronicle of the peril of wealth. In fact, with all the recent suicides in BigLaw, one might wonder if there is any correlation between the high compensation and self-destructiveness. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

Brands in Play: Sheryl Sandberg, Larry Summers

Success in Silicon Valley isn't just a matter of brains and talent.

The network, that is the ability to reach the right people, also factors in.

And, Facebook chief operating officer (coo) Sheryl Sandberg is being factored out.

The New York Times expose functioned essentially as the force escorting her out of the inner circles of the tech community.

The door was open. Diverse constituencies let loose on their negative assessments of her. In Vanity Fair, Nick Bilton applied the label "vicious."

Bilton recounts this anecdote. She had been waiting for the cameras to pan on her and former president Barack Obama at a White House kind of tech meet-up. At that moment she touched the president's hand. Of course, that catapulted the photo-op to the top of digital coverage. Many technies seethed. But, the timing wasn't right for starting to toss rhetorical grenades at the Sandberg positioning and packaging. The brand still was intact.

No, Sandberg isn't America's high IQ sweetheart. At least, no longer. 

Like Megyn Kelly, who had been ousted from NBC, she has been outed as a seeming self-absorbed empire-builder whose ambition might have outstripped her ability.

How would security analysts rate her as a coo? Overall, the consensus might become that she, along with Mark Zuckerberg, are in over their head when it comes to the leadership and management of Facebook. But unlike "Zuck" who fesses up to flaws, she assigns blame to others. 

Will shareholders, like the powers that be at NBC did with Kelly, push Sandberg out? There may be a collective sigh of Good Riddance.

If so, like other fallen saints in tech, such Elizabeth Holmes, she may Become Wunderkind Erased.

There is one more question: Will the collapse of the Sandberg brand throw shade on that of her mentor Larry Summers?

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

On @fine_freedom, BigLaw Attorney Champions FIRE (financial independence, retire early)

The frugal ideology of FIRE (financial independence, retire early) has seeped into the corridors of a Manhattan BigLaw firm.

The attorney endorsing FIRE remains anonymous.

The missionary's views come to us through the twitter account @fine_freedom - and an interview with Law.com. 

Like many followers of FIRE, this professional is not unhappy with working in general or with the line of work chosen as a career path.

Instead, there is a recognition that the money made - in this situation big money - shouldn't be wasted. Also, through radical saving it's possible to gain control over the terms and conditions of one's career. Those include when to leave it for whatever. This attorney might downshift financially to working at a non-profit. 

@fine_freedom is critical of the big spenders in BigLaw. However, they are not unique. Conspicuous consumption is epidemic at the middle and top rungs of the food chain. Actually, it's almost necessary.

In settings such as the Gold Coast of Connecticut, professionals (and therefore their children) are judged on the location and size of their houses, the brands of their clothes, whether the offspring attend private or public school, model and year of their cars, where the second home is, and club memberships. 

Not maintaining that lifestyle can wind up penalizing a career. Information, notices of job openings, and referrals don't come one's way. Instead there can be a scary isolation. 

One disbarred lawyer I coached for a career change assessed that he embezzled to simply keep up with the spending that he was expected to do. That included having on his payroll in-laws his wife demanded he hire. When The Great Recession hit his real estate niche business hard he didn't lay off the help. Instead he stole. 

Today it's too late for him to embrace FIRE. He lives off Social Security and the profits of the small music tutoring business I helped him establish. But he takes pride in describing his new lifestyle as "minimalism." And he sadly smirks recounting how he spent $10,000 joining a network from which he never derived any business. 

On the other hand, a 62-year-old lawyer I coached to land another good job, despite her age, has no intention of cutting back on her spending. She positions and packages that non-FIRE ethos as compensation for a difficult childhood. 

Reflection: Could a version of FIRE have helped prevent the suicide of bankruptcy lawyer Gabe MacConaill? 

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Aging.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gamil.com.

 

Dartmouth - Alleged Professor Version of "Animal House"

Recently, ivy league academic institutions, such as Yale, have been sued by students, current and past, alleging sexual misconduct. 

However, the $70 million lawsuit filed today against the trustees at Dartmouth College is, well, in a unique category.

What the seven female students contend about three professors mirrors the ethos of film "Animal House." Here are all the juicy details from Daily Mail. 

The alleged misdeeds are by three professors who had retired from the Department of Psychology and Brain Sciences. They are Todd Heatherton, William Kelley, and Paul Whalen.

The lawsuit claims the college opted for retirement, not punishment for the three. Moreover, it is claimed that the college allegedly covered up inappropriate and what might be found to have been criminal behavior. In addition to the lawsuit, the New Hampshire Attorney General is conducting a criminal investigation. 

The high-jinx allegedly included rapes, use of cocaine in the classroom, hot tub parties in professors' homes, encouragement of heavy consumption of alcohol, leering, groping, and sexting. 

Among the plaintiffs are Kristina Rapuano and Vassiki Chauhan who claimed they had been raped. 

The lawsuit - "Kristina Rapuano, et al. v. Trustees of Darmouth College" - has been filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire. It is a class action one and requests a jury trial. Here is a copy of the complaint. 

Of course, this brings bad publicity to the ivy league institution.

But the odds are against its having any impact on the number of applications for admission. Blind faith in higher education continues and the more prestigious the college or university the more fervent the belief. This is the unofficial religion of America, dating way back to when the Puritans established Harvard in 1636.

Litigation Communications

Making points of law, policy issues, and politics accessible and engaging for the public, media, investors, and more. Complimentary consultation. Please contact janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Planet Lead Paint - Shift from Advocacy to (Big) Money

When I was blogging the iconic Rhode Island lead paint public nuisance class action trial, the formal public relations focused on advocacy. That was November 1, 2005 until February 22, 2006. 

The defendants promoted public policies such that the landlords were responsible for making the residue of lead paint safe. Another was that federal and state initiatives had already addressed most of the hazard.

The plaintiff and the child activists supporting them argued that children were not safe where they should be: their own homes.

When I interviewed jurors after the verdict went against three of the defendants, including Sherwin-Williams, one woman hammered that stance. She felt so strongly that children must be safe where they live. 

Years later, the RI Supreme Court threw the whole case out. 

That was then.

More recently, both the California Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review the conviction of the defendants, including Sherwin-Williams, in the west coast version of a lead paint public nuisance class action lawsuit.

As expected, that has opened the door to other municipalities and plaintiff lawyers working on contingency filing similar lawsuits. Currently two have been filed in counties in eastern Pennsylvania. Here are details. More are anticipated, not only in PA but in other states.

This time the rhetoric, on both sides, seems to have a lot to do with money.

For instance Jones Day, representing Sherwin-Williams, contends that lawyers are motivating county officials to file the lawsuits because of the contingency fees. Those can reach one-third of the verdict or settlement. Here those statements, part of Sherwin-Williams' lawsuit to halt those two PA lawsuits, are quoted in Forbes. 

Meanwhile, municipalities can certainly use the lead-paint abatement funds from litigation to fix that problem in older stock housing. Otherwise, homelessness can increase, which can hurt the economy of those counties. In San Francisco, the homelessness situation has discouraged conferences from choosing that city. 

Money will become even more prominent if there is an international economic recession. Today, a headline in The Wall Street Journal reads: Global economic slowdown deepens. That, the article goes on to assert, can put U.S. robust growth at risk. The current stock market is hurting the portfolios of too many. 

As for money and the lead paint defendants, such as Sherwin-Williams, they will require a great deal of it for legal expenses as well as verdicts against them and any settlements. Currently Sherwin-Williams is among the CA trial losers which has to collectively pony up $400 million. 

Those public relations firms officially handling the positioning and packaging of the lead paint defendants will have to transcend platitudes. Money as money has a crass image. 

This is Phase Three of the lead paint public nuisance class action litigation. Together the lawyers and the public affairs experts have to prevent it from mutating into "Another Tobacco" or "Another Asbestos." Yes, the courts of law and the courts of public opinion intersect. 

Litigation Communications

Making points of law, policy issues, and politics accessible and engaging for the public, media, investors, and more. Complimentary consultation. Please contact janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Michael Avenatti Arrested for Alleged Domestic Violence

Today, lawyer Michael Avenatti was arrested in Los Angeles for an alleged domestic violence incident which occurred yesterday.

The alleged victim had been his estranged wife. The New York Post reports that when in custody Avenatti claimed that his spouse had "hit him first."

As the world knows, Avenatti represents Stormy Daniels. She contends that in the past she had been Donald Trump's alleged mistress and had received "hush money" to remain silent about the relationship. That contention reached all the way to "60 Minutes."

Given Avenatti's high media profile, it has been bouncing around that he could run for U.S. president in 2020. This incident, if he takes a plea or is convicted, could end that supposed dream.

In addition, if this all proves sticky, it could hurt his legal branding representing female victims of whatever.

Litigation Communications

Making points of law, policy issues, and politics accessible and engaging for the public, media, investors, and more. Complimentary consultation. Please contact janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

"Caroline Ruiz, et al. v. New Avon and Avon Products" - Filed as Class Action

Distressed Avon should be braced for lots more stress.

This time it will be on its branding as a business that empowers women.

Eventually, the pressure also could be financial if there is a verdict against it in a jury trial or if it ponies up a hefty settlement. 

In addition, there could be a massive shakeup at the top. Male leadership could be replaced with females attuned to the specific needs of employees who are mothers or are in the process of becoming a mother. 

For a while now,  legal and business media outlets have been covering the initial litigation by Caroline Ruiz. She had been recruited by Avon for a procurement position. After a short time with the corporation she requested special accommodations such as working partly from home because of a high-risk pregnancy. She intended to continue fulfilling all her duties. Long story short, soon she was fired, allegedly for performance reasons. She had come to Avon with a great track record. 

What grabbed attention is that Avon supposedly is supportive of women. The reality, though, it came out was this: Its leadership is primarily male. And, according to Ruiz it was operating on the male experience at work as the default standard. 

Since then, the Wigdor law firm, representing Ruiz, has expanded that individual lawsuit into a putative class action, which had been filed yesterday. It requests a jury trial.

The amended complaint  has two clients and three other possibilities, so far. Many more could participate. 

All plaintiffs contend they suffered professional discrimination and some were actually penalized because of issues associated with maternity and child care (e.g. breastfeeding). Here are more details from Jason Grant at Law.com. And, here is a copy of the amended lawsuit. 

The timing of this lawsuit couldn't be worse for Avon.

Not only is it struggling for a turnaround in a changing global cosmetic marketplace.

This, of course, is the era when employment matters related to females are totally high profile.

#MeToo is just the tip of the iceberg. 

More a symbol of the changing values in the workplace is the risk top professional women have been taking in filing gender-bias lawsuits against their well-known employers. That kind of risk-taking is relatively new. But it is being embraced by more female players. 

For instance, brandname employment-discrimination lawyer David Sanford currently is representing, among others, female partners in law firms who contend gender-based bias. That ranges from compensation to promotability.

Sanford had been a pioneer in that, taking on GE in 2007. Unthinkable then, lawyer in the GE legal department - Lorene Schaefer - claimed gender discrimination.

That litigation, requesting $500 million in damages, sought class action status. Here are more details. GE settled before the complaint went to court.

More recently, Sanford's Sanford Heisler Sharp has been the law firm which achieved the settlement for Kerrie Campbell, who had been forced out of her law firm when she sued. Since then, she has launched her own boutique law firm and had been a guest speaker at Harvard Law School, discussing that experience.

Avon also has to anticipate a probable informal boycott. I have already steered clear of purchasing its whatever. Like most baby boomer female professionals, I put up with horrific gender bias, standard back then. Litigation wasn't considered an option by us "good girls." Instead, we would cry. 

Currently, more female professionals have been socialized to think like a lawyer. 

Litigation Communications

Making points of law, policy issues, and politics accessible and engaging for the public, media, investors, and more. Complimentary consultation. Please contact janegenova374@gmail.com.