Law And More

Bayer & Roundup - Will It Settle?

To many constituencies, ranging from management experts to investors, the leadership at Bayer seems like a Ship of Fools. Meanwhile the stock has been on a sustained downward trajectory. 

Here are more details from The Wall Street Journal.

Less than a year ago Bayer purchased Monsanto, maker of Roundup. Not soon after, in a U.S. courtroom, Roundup was associated with a death from cancer. The verdict, which was reduced, had been $289 million.

More recently there had been a jury verdict of more than $2 billion. There remains 13,400 total plaintiffs. In terms of the stock, Bayer currently is worth less than the $63 billion it had paid for Monsanto. 

The question, as the WSJ, points out is: Will Bayer settle?

Essentially, Bayer is waiting to see how the appeals go - yes, it is appealing all verdicts - in order to get a clear picture of the legalities.

Also, a win could significantly affect its perception of where it stands legally.

There is also the reality that around the world, regulatory agencies find the active ingredient in Roundup - glyphosate - safe. That includes the EPA in the U.S. 

In addition, investors want to have put on the board those who understand U.S. litigation and crop science. 

Also, the elephant in the room is that Roundup is still being sold. There are commercials for it on U.S. network television.

For now, leaders of the company will probably keep their jobs. That's primarily because the financial and branding situation is so severe that it would be more risky to have a management shakeup than just cruise along.

The Bayer perfect storm, to use the cliche, is one which would make a fascinating case study for U.S. public relations crisis experts. 

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The Media Innovator's Dilemma - From Ted Turner to David Lat

They build something that disrupts the media industry. 

The innovation works.

The experience is totally heady, with great influence. After all, it's said that media - not government, business or even technology - is the most powerful force in civilization. 

Then they sell that media outlet or simply move on to try out another role. What could play out next could be labeled The Media Innovator's Dilemma. 

For creator of 24/7 cable television news - Ted Turner - there was no next after he sold CNN.  He became just another businessperson whose former outsized presence went poof. Publicly, he indicated he regretted the sale. From then on, Turner seemed in mourning. And for a while, CNN's ratings plummeted. 

In the niche - legal media - the innovator had been creator of Abovehthelaw (ATL) David Lat. That began in 2006.

Officially he has left that role and become what is really a salesperson's job at headhunting firm Lateral Link. Its playing field is the legal sector.

Of course, that also constitutes a shift from being the boss to being an employee.

So far, Lat seems not to be able to totally let go of the legacy. He posts on ATL. It's in connection with his current headhunting  role, leveraging the aura of the innovation in hopes of developing new business. But, still, a clean break might have signaled amazing confidence in what is next.

As an employee, Lat won't be in charge. Instead he had to get the hang of fitting in to someone else's organizational culture. That's challenging.

In more rigid times in business, corporate employers hesitated hiring former entrepreneurs. They were wary that the transition might be impossible. That was the time of the Organizational Man (and Woman).

Since then, of course, careers paths have become less linear. More founders are parachuting into organizational functions. 

At best Lat could become a thought leader in the world of career strategies in the legal industry.

That's different than being a presence in media.

In his current role, his success depends on body count: How many placements he can make. Yeah, it's business, not mission of changing how news and commentary are positioned and packaged. The organization measures success in terms of that business metric. Either you make the sale or you don't make the sale. The game is binary. 

Lat could succeed at being a headhunter. He could adjust to employee status. He could also make more money than he had in media. But gone with his choice to give up ATL is the unique influence he had.

Media is the loudest voice in just about every context. That "loudest voice" is how journalist Gabriel Sherman summed up Fox News founder Roger Ailes. Here that book can be ordered from Amazon. According to some reports, after being ousted from Fox, Ailes was conferring with deep pockets such as Peter Thiel, who funded "Hogan v. Gawker," to fund launching a competitor to Fox. No, Ailes didn't plan to get a job in someone else's media outlet. 

Also, there is the issue if ATL, like CNN, will shift into a downward trajectory after the founder leaves. Part of the innovator's genius is a good head for the business of media. Are those business smarts embedded in ATL? The ATL DNA was Lat's genetic engineering. 

My hunch is that Lat could have moderate success in the headhunting space. But it's the media innovator's dilemma not to be able to make peace with the decline in influence.

Meanwhile, it would be shrewd reputation management for Lat to let go of ATL, in rebranding himself as a leader in executive search. Turner seemed incapable of that kind of reimagining his professional identity.

As for ATL, the niche of legal media seems ripe for another innovation. It could or could not come from the folks at ATL. A severe downturn can create demand for a fresh kind of analysis and presentation of issues. 

Full Disclosure: Since the late 1980s, I have been an entrepreneur. There I found extreme success versus organizational life. Recently I had a negative experience with Lateral Link. 

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Former WWE Perfomer Ashley Massaro, 39, Reported to Have Committed Suicide

Can a failed lawsuit "kill?"

Maybe.

All too often litigation becomes an obsession. When the legal system dismisses it those who had filed it could tumble into emotional despair and/or rage.

For former WWE performer Ashley Massaro the response might have been hopelessness.

In November 2016, she had participated in a class action lawsuit against WWE.

It contended WWE did not warn its performers about possible head injuries which could result in concussions. In addition, Massaro claimed she had been sexually assaulted when engaging in a WWE event.

The lawsuit had been dismissed.

Allegedly as a result of her injuries she suffered clinical depression and addiction to pain killers.

Now, it is reported that her death had been a suicide, at age 39, had been a suicide. Here is coverage by the media.

WWE has long been controversial. This death might prompt politicos to authorize a comprehensive investigation of the health and well-being of the performers.

There are those, however, who claim that the performers should be aware of the risks they take when entertaining. As with football, this sport may just continue on, as is. It's big business.

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ABC's "For the People" Put Out of Its Misery

It's official.

That clunker of a legal drama "For the People" won't be renewed on ABC. From the get go, it was a disaster. That was much like that other legal drama "The Deep End," which only lasted a few months in 2010.

Both were unbelievable because the lawyers didn't look sleep-deprived.

Also, the plot lines were ham-handed.

There was no depth in the characters.

The acting was worse than insensitive high school freshman would put together.

"For the People" had the supposed cute device of housing in close proximity to one another in the Department of Justice prosecutors and legal aid. To add to the cute, a prosecutor and one of the legal aids were sleeping together. The cute went off the charts when the plot line involved one lawyer's wearing a bow tie. 

Sure, some programming gets off to a slow start. And that was true of "For the People." But it never began to pick up steam in "For the People," as it had finally "FBI" and "A Million Little Things."

Meanwhile, how we miss "Boston Legal." Denny Crane was Everyman who once had been brilliant and powerful and was losing pieces of himself.

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Alcoholics Anonymous Meetings - Code in Television for Depicting Character as "Troubled"

It's a lazy producer's standard trick: Panning the camera on Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meetings to signal that character X or Y is troubled. 

Tonight the camera doing the AA meeting panning was on "Chicago P.D."

That's how the episode kicked off. A member of the elite unit was in attendance. A woman's voice was discussing the Fourth Step, that is taking a fearless inventories of one's wrongs. Also articulated was the AA meme that members are as sick as their secrets.

Launched in the 1930s, AA has become the universal symbol for the struggle of dealing with problem drinking. Opioids are getting much media attention. However, as CNN reports, one out of eight people abuse alcohol.

Leveraging AA as a quick way of referring to all the ramifications of excessive drinking has gone on and on. That is despite the pile on of critical articles about the overall ineffectiveness of the approach. The most influential analysis of what is out of date with the AA assumptions and treatment plan had been published in The Atlantic. Here it is.

Among what's wrong with the AA way of recovery is that it is time-consuming. Those new in recovery are advised to attend 90 meetings in 90 days. In addition, it is also recommended they confer regularly with an AA sponsor. They are also encouraged to do service work. 

However, the success rate is low.  Severe critics put it at a mere 5%. Addiction specialists estimate it to be between 8% and 12%. That is still low.

Since the 1930s, science has come a long way in understanding the brain. Addiction experts have also created alternates to the standard provided by AA. 

However, pop culture is stuck in the past. So are many courts which still "sentence" DUIs to AA meetings. They have to get papers signed by the AA facilitator to document attendance.

It would be a public service if producers begin showcasing other kinds of recovery models.

In addition, those on the front lines of reforming sentencing might establish a committee to operate a pilot study comparing different types of recovery options which will be provided by courts. Addiction experts could loop in and explain the pros and cons of the choices to the defendant. 

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M&A - CBS Employees Should Start Thinking Reduction-in-Force

From the employee point of view "Mergers & Acquisitions" is code for redundancies.

The joint entity doesn't need two investor relations departments. And with the legal and other expenses involved with any M&A, costs will also have to be downsized.

Therefore, employees, usually at both former companies, have to be braced for a massive reduction in force. That happens all the time. 

It seems in the cards that CBS and Viacom will become one again. As William D. Cohan explains in Vanity Fair, one signal that will happen is that no A-Lister had been appointed as CEO of CBS. As we recall, Les Moonves had been forced out.

Instead Joe Ianniello has a contract to serve in the post on an interim basis until the end of 2019. Those in the know know that the CBS of today won't be the entity which will emerge in the future. 

Apparently the boards of both CBS and Viacom have been discussing the merger. And Shari Redstone, whose family owns 80% of the voting stock, has the upper hand in all that. She has been pushing for the merger in order to enlarge and diversity CBS to compete with the titans ranging from Disney to Amazon.

But, according the Cohan, most employees at CBS seem consumed with the daily tasks and politics. They are not shaking in the boots about a reduction in force.

Maybe it's denial. But that's nutty. From the get-go in an entertainment player such as CBS you recognize you are on short time.

When I enrolled in a seminar to learn television scriptwriting, the instructor warned us how insecure employment was in that world. He repeated that enough through the course for me to stick with executive speechwriting and ghostwriting. 

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.

"Good Girls" - Did We Have Beth All Wrong?

On Sunday night's episode of "Good Girls," FBI Jim makes a provocative assertion: Beth is a bad human being.

That is something many of us devoted to this series probably have not considered. Is Beth not simply a mother who needed money, was introduced to crime, and found she loved the scene? Could it be more than that?

FBI Jim makes that statement to Noah, undercover agent who had pried damaging information loose from Annie. That's why, he explains, the two of them need to dig up the really bad stuff Beth is doing. If they go only with what they have now she will get "Martha Stewart time."

FBI Jim may be on the money, pun intended. Dean and Beth have a heart-to-heart. She admits she can't give up the life of crime. She is proud that she is so good at it. She also can't give up sex with GangBanger (who we learn had the real name of "Chris.")

Because she can't "stop," Dean has drawn up divorce papers. She signs them, even though she may or may not lose her four children. Isn't it terrible for a mother not to do whatever it takes to remain with her children?

An alternate explanation for Beth's decision-making may be that she is simply an addict. She has become hooked on the high of planning, committing, and then concealing crimes. 

Other developments Sunday night:

Annie trails Noah and finds him conferring with FBI Jim. That confirms her hunch that he is not what he seems. Unfortunately she had already told him too much. However, Beth and Ruby mandate that she now leverage her relationship with Noah to feed him misleading information. The FBI will be thrown off-track.

The lawyer Ruby wants to hire to defend Stan seems highly competent - and crooked. He demands extra payment from her because he suspects the money came from illegal sources. Instead of a retainer of $10,000, Ruby has to pony up about $30,000. She is using counterfeit funds.

The three assume that they have recovered Boomer's body. Therefore, GangBanger can't hold that over them. However, the body in Beth's front yard may not be Boomer's.

In the next episode crazy Mary Pat parachutes back into the action. How we missed her outstanding acting.

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.

Raw Reflections on Mother's Day 2019

Supposedly timely for Mother's Day, USA Today provides a feature on outsourcing parenting. The tasks farmed out range from potty training to childproofing the residence. None of that comes cheap.

However, outsourcing parenting is nothing new in the history of civilization.

The most warm and fuzzy symbol of performing that important duty in society is nanny Mary Poppins.

From the days of Old Manhattan, anyone who cruised by the parks in Manhattan spotted benches filled with outsourced labor chatting among themselves as they keep a watchful eye on what was going on in the elegant prams.

Let's face it, childcare has always been a time-consuming tedious undertaking. Those with the resources to farm out most or all of that out usually did.

For example, in the 2019 book by Tracy Borman on Henry VIII, what's discussed as totally normal was housing royal offspring away from the family. That went on until the child could provide a useful function in court. The chronicle is "Henry VIII: And the Men Who Made Him" and here it can be ordered from Amazon.

But wealth and power are not required in that particular kind of outsourcing.

Extended families usually took on the role automatically. Given the necessity of searching, finding, and holding onto work, children usually were a bad fit. As infants through their teenage years, they were placed in the full-time or part-time care of grandparents, aunts, and even other young children.

That's practically the norm in parts of China as the economy changes. Parents flock from rural areas to the cities to work and live. 

Essentially that was a commonplace dynamic in the immigrant tenements of downtown Jersey City, New Jersey during the 50s. Sometimes a risk-taker would go out to California to escape factory work or cleaning offices. The offspring were left behind, usually for years. Neighbors who were scheduled for the night shift had the children sleep in the apartments of other neighbors. That's the way it was.

Of course, just as now, there also was plenty of total inability to care for children. Probably I never had children, always preferring rescuing and caring for dogs and cats, because my younger sister's care was outsourced to me.

My mother had been mentally ill. My father had two jobs, mostly to steer clear of the domestic tragedy unfolding. As an infant and toddler I was cared for by my grandmother and aunt.

From the get-go, the majority of my colleagues and clients had live-in nannies. They had to. With such a hyper competitive work world they couldn't risk not sleeping through the night. That would have been career suicide.

Meanwhile, with farming out childcare so expensive in major metro areas, it's no surprise fertility rates are plunging. Right now it's at a 30-year low. Also, in some sectors being a mother is perceived as a negative. One current lawsuit dealing with that alleged brutal reality in the field of law is "Doe v. Morrison & Foerster."

And those into pop culture will recall that Katherine on television series "A Million Little Things" felt forced to turn down the invitation to be partner.

The terms and conditions wouldn't allow her to run home to have dinner with her son every night. She indicated that after dinner she would return to the office.

That, the partners responded, would be a lack of commitment to the firm.

Soon enough, upscale neighborhoods in the United States will be overrun with dogs. There will be few or no children.

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

"SWAT," Starring Shemar Moore, Gets 3rd Season on CBS

Shermar Moore took a big risk leaving the role of Derek Morgan on "Criminal Minds." 

But, it is paying off, at least right now.

The series he stars in as Hondo - "SWAT" - has been renewed on CBS for a third season.

That new drama about an elite law enforcement unit in Los Angeles seemed to start out on a rocky note.

The character of Hondo was not well-drawn.

He was supposedly in great conflict. He was to be torn in his loyalty to the people in hood with whom he grew up and to law enforcement in which he was now a leader.

But Moore wasn't depicting that.  There were even clunky attempts for attention as when Hondo would appear without his shirt. We didn't get that sort of stuff on "Criminal Minds." We didn't welcome it on "SWAT."

But gradually things came together. And members of the audience let go of their memories of Moore as Morgan. 

"Criminal Minds" will have its last season for 2019 -2020. So had Moore stayed with it instead of going off to star in his own show he would have wound up on short time.

But there is no predicting if "SWAT' will be able to make it for a fourth season.

Overall, the plot lines, writing, and acting aren't as strong as those in the recent Chicago programming produced by Dick Wolf who had been the mastermind for "Law & Order."

The most powerful of Wolf's three Chicago franchise is "Chicago P.D." The central character - Hank Voigt - even surpasses Wolf's other major creation. That was Jack McCoy from "Law & Order." Voigt is more emotionally complex and a shrewder game player than McCoy had been. Also, he has raw sex appeal.

This blog wishes Shemar Moore great success in his third season. May Hondo become as memorable as Derek Morgan had been.

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.

Chicago - Platform for the Dick Wolf Franchise Replacing the "Law & Order" One

The last part of the "Law & Order" franchise still creating new episodes is "Law & Order SVU." It's been renewed for a 21st season. So bravo for its creator Dick Wolf.

But, essentially, Wolf has been off in another direction. He had put together a franchise which exceeds the one he launched with the "Law & Order" series. 

The platform for that franchise is the city of Chicago. There it is: Chicago in all its rawness, corruption, racial tensions, points of transition, crime - and big heart. 

So, far there are three Chicago series. They run on Wednesday night, New York Time, from 8 PM though 10 PM. They are:

"Chicago Med"

"Chicago Fire," and 

"Chicago P.D."

The latter is the most amazing. That's because the lead character - Hank Voight - is even more emotionally complex and a shrewder game player than the iconic prosecutor Jack McCoy from the original "Law & Order."

Voight heads the elite intelligence unit in the Chicago P.D. His signature is his raspy voice. An old-line police guy, he prefers to make up his own rules. When he can get away with it he ignores the law. 

Of course, that generates lots of tension. And tension makes for good drama. 

The kinds of series that endure and become memorable also zero in, close-up, on relationships. We will never forget the painful one on "Without a Trace" between shut-down Jack Malone and vulnerable Samantha. When that series was a wrap, we sensed that Malone would find a way to get back into Sam's life. She was doomed.

Voight's relationships are all over the place. They range from brutally direct to downright volatile. As yet, we can't figure out what makes him tick. Other sub relationships also play out. The actual police action seems to be props for the interactions to take their intense twists and turns.

"Chicago Med" and "Chicago Fire" lag in quality behind "Chicago P.D." But, in time, they could gel. 

Wolf's legacy might come from what he is doing now with "Chicago P.D.," not what he had done with the "Law & Order" series. 

Exactly the right tone and content for all your communications. Complimentary consultation janegenova374@gmail.com.