Introduction

This is “What Just Happened?,” the podcast that looks at the biggest brand crises of our time, what they meant for organisational strategy and behaviour, and their lasting impact on our approach to crisis communication.

I’m Kate Hartley. And I’m Tamara Littleton. And together, we’ll delve into what happened, why it mattered, and whether it could happen again.

Episode

Tamara Littleton: I’m really looking forward to getting into this crisis, because this is a crisis that, in many ways, set the template for activism on social media. And even though it happened more than 10 years ago, it’s still so relevant today. I remember it so well, and it involves a brand that I’ve always loved.

Kate Hartley: Me too, and it’s really, really relevant, I think, today, with the massive rise in activism against organisations that we’re seeing, especially those that don’t take any action on the climate emergency, which is what we’re going to be talking about a bit today. So today we are going to talk about LEGO, Shell, and the Everything is Not Awesome campaign by Greenpeace against LEGO.

TL: Now, first up, I love LEGO. It’s a great brand. Let’s dig into how they came to be caught up in a campaign by Greenpeace against Shell.

KH: It does seem a bit odd, doesn’t it? On the face of it, it doesn’t seem very likely, but LEGO and Shell had a commercial relationship since the 1960s, which I think might surprise some people. I was really surprised to learn that – I hadn’t realised they went back that far. But I think maybe what was more surprising was that in 2012 LEGO was renewing its partnership with Shell, and that was well after Shell and various other oil companies were facing huge opposition for drilling for fuel in the Arctic.

Of course, the main opponent was Greenpeace. So Greenpeace created a campaign against LEGO to stop the partnership, and of course, more broadly, to highlight the issue of Arctic drilling – which I have to say, it did absolutely brilliantly with this campaign.

TL: So it sounds like, I mean, LEGO could have predicted the response potentially, and it doesn’t seem like a natural partnership. But what do we know about it?

KH: So basically, for the best part of 50 years, LEGO had been doing things like distributing LEGO toy cars at Shell petrol stations and also selling Shell-branded LEGO sets. That’s very hard to say, by the way. So, for example, you could buy a little Shell petrol station LEGO set, or a Shell-branded truck – you know, those kinds of things.

And you can sort of understand why LEGO wanted to do that, because it’s obviously a distribution channel for them. But I think it gets a bit weirder when you think about why Shell might have wanted to do that.

TL: So what did Shell get out of the relationship? Because it’s, I mean, it’s not like children are the ones paying for petrol and filling up at petrol stations.

KH: They’re not the ones paying for it, but I remember – me too – filling up the car, used to love doing that. Exactly! So, you know, it’s not a natural fit in some ways. But I think it’s more about the association of LEGO being a really family-friendly company, which is obviously something that Shell presumably wanted to portray as well.

Shell would get some of the benefit of some of the absolutely amazing brand loyalty – including from you – that LEGO has.

TL: Yeah. So it worked. But of course, it does go two ways, doesn’t it? And this is now a case study for when brand partnerships go wrong. It’s fine when everything is awesome – to coin a phrase from The LEGO Movie – but when your lovely, playful brand is associated with Arctic drilling and the climate emergency, that’s not a good look for LEGO.

So Kate, how and when did it start to go wrong?

KH: So it started to go wrong in July 2014, and it’s worth looking a little bit at the context. Shell and LEGO had signed another partnership in 2012 for two years. Interestingly, in January 2014, Shell had said it would suspend its Arctic exploration programme – but it did that based on a bad financial year, rather than for any kind of moral reasons.

It was expected to restart that drilling in 2015. So I guess the timing was really to stop LEGO and Shell renewing that partnership in 2014, when it was due to run out, and to put pressure on Shell not to start more drilling in the Arctic.

TL: Do we know what that deal was actually worth financially?

KH: So there are some varying amounts recorded – we know roughly, but different places say slightly different things. I think it’s been reported it was worth between £68 million and £116 million, so it was pretty significant, I would say, for LEGO. LEGO also said it was primarily about getting LEGO in front of as many people as possible, basically.

TL: So let’s talk about the details of the campaign. What actually happened? Social media and creative images and videos were so important. I think it’s really one of the first campaigns where an activist group could do a few very smart physical things – like sending Greenpeace people down to LEGOLAND Windsor – but then use social media to generate incredible awareness and coverage, with some very creative use of LEGO images, for example.

KH: And it is about creativity, isn’t it? Because LEGO is all about creativity, and sadly in this case – for LEGO – it lent itself really well to some very creative images that actually worked against it.

So Greenpeace started, as you say, by sending people to LEGOLAND in the UK and handing out LEGO figures to people who were visiting. They created these tiny protests by putting LEGO climbers on the LEGO Shell petrol stations – or gas stations for our American audience – with little tiny signs saying “Save the Arctic” and “Stop Shell”, which is creatively brilliant.

Of course, the media absolutely loved it. They then involved children – again, an absolute stroke of genius – because of course, they’re the generation who’d be most affected by the climate emergency. There were lots of images of groups of children who were making Arctic animals out of LEGO outside Shell’s London headquarters. Again, this was absolute media gold.

TL: And then, of course, there was the ultimate campaign, which we all remember – the Greenpeace film Everything Is Not Awesome, which was a take on the LEGO Movie song Everything Is Awesome.

It was slowed down, wasn’t it? It was the slowed-down version of that very catchy song in The LEGO Movie. And for those who don’t know it – and please sing it – it’s a particular earworm. I mean, it’s that sort of “Everything is awesome…”

KH: You really want to sing it, don’t you? Go on.

TL: “Everything is awesome… when we’re living our dream.” There might be copyright reasons I can’t sing it! And that was all set – it was slowed down – and then it was set to a film, sort of a LEGO version of the Arctic being slowly covered in oil, and then the Arctic animals were drowning.

< music excerpt >

KH: It was an incredibly… it was a brilliant, brilliant film. It was created by an agency called Don’t Panic. And there’s a moment in that film – and I’m not going to sing, for other reasons, the copyright – but there’s a moment where the lyrics say, “We’re the same, I’m like you, you’re like me, we’re working in harmony.”

That’s the point in the film where you see these LEGO children with tears on their faces, clutching teddy bears. You see a polar bear clutching the last remaining LEGO iceberg. And then the oil rises, and the only thing still visible above the oil is a LEGO Shell flag. It’s really powerful.

TL: It was so emotive. I can genuinely – just as you’re talking about it – I can see it all still. You know, it was like… high-quality campaign. Yeah, it really was.

And it’s worth looking at the public response to the campaign, because the video was the most viral video in Greenpeace’s history – but it was briefly taken down from YouTube on copyright grounds, which never ends well, does it? You and I covered that in the Nestlé and Greenpeace podcast episode previously, which is worth a listen. So yeah, of course, it went even more viral after that.

KH: I mean, just that heavy-handed legal approach – it never ends well, does it? Of course, Greenpeace made a thing about it, saying, you know, “Why are they trying to silence us?” And it just went straight up on another channel, and that increased views.

The campaign was so successful. I know that views and numbers don’t always mean anything particularly, but Greenpeace said the video had 6 million views – which, if you were a TV programme, I think you’d be pretty happy with. Given the fact that this was 10 years ago – so before TikTok – that’s quite a significant number.

Even before the video came out, 250,000 people had signed a petition for LEGO to drop the partnership with Shell within just a week of the campaign. So the numbers were pretty impressive. And I think, as you said, the video was really the killer – and it had the effect Greenpeace wanted.

Because after three months of that campaign, Greenpeace said more than a million people emailed LEGO to end the deal with Shell. I mean, my inbox isn’t bad, but can you imagine a million people emailing to stop that programme?

TL: Eventually, of course, LEGO reacted to the backlash. They said they wouldn’t renew the partnership when it came to an end at the end of 2014. How do you think LEGO actually responded to the campaign?

KH: To be honest, I think they responded quite badly initially. They definitely wanted to keep the partnership – and you can understand why, it was very lucrative for them – and they were really trying to distance themselves from the issue at the root of it, which I totally understand.

But it is worth talking about the money, because LEGO CEO, Jørgen Vig Knudstorp – very difficult to say, sorry if I pronounced that wrong – basically turned around the company from making a loss to being very profitable. He took over as CEO in 2004 when LEGO was nearly bankrupt. We think of it as a very successful company, but it wasn’t always.

He sold off some of the assets, including LEGOLAND, interestingly, and got the company back into profit. So you can see why he wouldn’t want to walk away from a deal like this. I’m going to read out the statement he put out initially, because it’s worth listening to how LEGO distanced itself.

The first statement said: “The Greenpeace campaign focuses on how Shell operates in a specific part of the world. We firmly believe this matter must be handled between Shell and Greenpeace. We are saddened when the LEGO brand is used as a tool in any dispute between organisations. We expect that Shell lives up to their responsibilities wherever they operate, and takes appropriate action to any potential claims. Should this not be the case, I would like to clarify that we intend to live up to the long-term contract with Shell, which we entered in 2011.”

So what changed? It’s interesting, because LEGO has some really strong values, and learning is one of those, along with helping children develop to their full potential. My feeling is that the film must have made the difference, because in October 2014, the CEO said in a statement that LEGO would not renew the partnership with Shell.

Then again, that statement kind of reiterated the previous one, so I’m just going to read a little bit out of that too. It said: “The Greenpeace campaign uses the LEGO brand to target Shell. As we’ve stated before, we firmly believe Greenpeace ought to have a direct conversation with Shell. The LEGO brand, and everyone who enjoys creative play, should never have become part of this dispute between Greenpeace and Shell.”

He went on to say that LEGO didn’t agree with the tactics used by Greenpeace – which I think is interesting – and, I quote, “may have created misunderstandings among our stakeholders about the way we operate.” So again, he’s very much trying to distance the brand.

He said he wanted to ensure that LEGO’s attention wasn’t diverted from its commitment to delivering creative and inspiring play experiences. Which I think sounds a little bit like, you know, when a politician says, “I’m not resigning because I did the bad thing – I’m resigning because I don’t want to distract from the good work the government is doing.” It sounds a bit like one of those statements to me.

TL: I mean, definitely trying to remove LEGO from the debate, as you say.

KH: Exactly. And I suspect they didn’t love the fact that a lot of the media articles included a line about LEGO’s own green credentials. It’s important to remember that LEGO is made of plastic – which, of course, is made using fossil fuels. So it was a bit… complicated for them.

But having said that, LEGO is really clear that it’s trying to reduce that reliance on fossil fuels, and it’s aiming to make bricks only from renewable, recycled plastic by 2032. Which is still quite a long way away, but it is meeting its commitments to that.

Although, interestingly, I found out that LEGO actually started as wooden toys when it was launched in the ’30s, which I hadn’t realised – and they only started being made out of plastic well after the Second World War, when it became more available.

TL: Well, of course I did know that, because I’m such a massive geek. And I’ve actually seen some of the early wooden duck toys in the LEGO Museum in Billund. But anyway, back to this – back to the backlash.

That is so common with campaigns like this – that the narrative shifts. And also, you sometimes get this second wave of backlash too. I remember Greenpeace also faced a bit of criticism at the time of the campaign.

There were some comments about one of the executives commuting to work by plane, because he was living in Luxembourg but working in Amsterdam. We see this so often – when an organisation holds itself up as a beacon for a cause, it always faces real scrutiny. And if they haven’t been behaving in a way that really fits their values, they’re also going to come in for criticism.

KH: They are, and there are always going to be people who try and criticise, as you say. There was criticism as well from the London Science Museum about the campaign – from a former director, who said the campaign was far too simplistic and didn’t really make any significant difference to the core issue.

But it is worth saying that that’s the same person who had got sponsorship from Shell for a Science Museum exhibition on – guess what – climate change.

TL: I’m not sure a sponsorship like that would get signed off today.

KH: Can you imagine? I’m sure it wouldn’t.

TL: But ultimately, did the campaign by Greenpeace work?

KH: Well, I think… I mean, it’s hard to say really, but Shell did say in 2015 that it was going to abandon its Arctic drilling programme off Alaska. Greenpeace took that as a massive win for the campaign. But it may not be quite as straightforward as that.

Shell said it was because they hadn’t found enough oil and gas to warrant more exploration for the cost it would take to do it. And bear in mind, they’d had a really bad year the previous year financially. Although Greenpeace claimed that, at the time, Shell execs were saying privately that they really hadn’t expected so much public opposition to the programme.

Shell officially said there was a “challenging regulatory environment” – their words. And of course, regulators can be influenced by public opinion in the same way that any of us can be.

TL: And presumably, we can’t pin all that on the LEGO campaign. It was part of a massive campaign by all sorts of campaigners. But it did really get the issue in the news in a way that was very creative.

As you mentioned, it involved children – who, after all, would be the people most impacted by the climate emergency. It was a real tipping point for how activism campaigns can capture the public imagination. And we’re going to dig into the impact it had with our guest in just a moment, and how organisations need to be prepared for this kind of activism in their crisis plans.

Break

TL: Our guest today is the brilliant Sara Collinge. She’s a PR consultant, creative director, and the founder of Most Contagious. She specialises in helping brands be unapologetically honest, culturally relevant and engaging – and is particularly involved with brand activism campaigns. Welcome, Sarah.

Sara Collinge: Hello, thanks for having me.

TL: So Sara, I’m going to actually kick off with: what was your view on what was it about this campaign that worked so well, and why did it capture the public imagination?

SC: I think it’s just a bit of a masterclass in modern activism. I love the way that Greenpeace has this kind of brand attack playbook. The way they work is they almost weaponise a brand’s biggest assets, invert them, and turn them against them.

The really smart play around all of this was taking LEGO’s fantastic slogans and lines – like Everything Is Awesome, the iconic song from the movie – and turning it into something that could highlight the inadequacies in the way LEGO was behaving through its partnerships and supply chain.

KH: They also turned it from being a really irritating song into something that was actually kind of quite hummable. I really liked it.

SC: I liked the original song, Kate – I won’t lie!

KH: Me too!

SC: The slowed-down version was good. My inner child was so happy the whole time I was listening to that. But yes, yours is the more grown-up interpretation of that, sure.

KH: Do you think there’s stuff that other activist groups can learn from this campaign, in terms of how it actually changed public opinion?

SC: Yeah. If you think about the historical context – it was 2014, wasn’t it? That was before virality became almost impossible to achieve. So the way they leveraged and used social media was incredibly smart.

The creation of a really high-quality, creative brand asset in the film was fantastic. The way they managed to tread the line between highlighting the hypocrisy and targeting LEGO’s very young audience – without pushing it too far – was very clever.

They managed to apply just the right amount of pressure and focused it entirely on LEGO. They used absolutely every single asset they had against them. I just think that’s a really clever way to activate an activism campaign like this.

KH: It was absolutely brilliant, wasn’t it? Perhaps not so brilliant – well, leading question – but what did you think about LEGO’s response?

SC: Oh, it was textbook corporate deniability, wasn’t it? Deflection at its best. As a comms professional, you can’t go into a crisis response and claim to have absolutely nothing to do with the partnerships you’ve negotiated.

It showed a complete lack of humility. As a corporate statement, it really needed to acknowledge some degree of agency, because obviously LEGO was active in this decision-making process. It wasn’t as if they were just the victim.

The optics of the response made it seem like they were trying to play the victim. That just doesn’t come off as very credible when you’re a giant like LEGO. Acknowledging your agency and your role in creating the conditions that led to the activism campaign is just so important.

You can’t go straight into denial. It comes across as really disingenuous. And I think, if anything, it probably galvanised public opinion against them quite quickly.

KH: I think that’s exactly right.

TL: Let’s talk about partnerships – because brands need to think about even historic partnerships being in line with their values. So how should they choose new partners, or maybe evaluate old ones?

KH: Sounds like a relationship, doesn’t it?

TL: Yeah. What’s your criteria? What are you manifesting in your partnership? What are your red flags?

SC: I think that’s such a good question. I would answer it more at a strategic level, because I think that when brands say they want to be purpose-driven and stand for something bigger than themselves, what they forget is that this isn’t just about gaining something – it also has to be about giving things up.

You can’t go into a space where you stand for fun, education, the future, children’s minds – nurturing them into a better future – and then, in the background, have partnerships with some of the most destructive organisations on the planet. It just doesn’t work. I know – sorry – I have a tendency to be blunt, but I just think that brands always treat anything purpose-driven as a marketing activity, when in reality, it’s an organisational activity.

You need to look at absolutely everything you’re doing and ensure there’s a values alignment. Because if there isn’t, then ultimately someone’s going to come along at some point and hold a mirror up to that and say, “Hey, listen, this thing you’re doing over here with Shell – that’s not actually very ethical.” In reality, you shouldn’t be profiting from environmental damage.

So I think absolutely – it’s important to examine historical partnerships, because being historical isn’t a good enough excuse. If it’s still active and it’s still there, then it needs to be revised and looked at. That’s the thing that organisations don’t want to hear, isn’t it? They don’t want to hear that they need to do the hard yards and work to ensure that how they’re acting in private is the same as how they’re performing publicly.

I think those two things need to be aligned. Otherwise, this kind of thing can easily happen – as evidenced in the case of LEGO. It almost sounded like they were surprised when Greenpeace came to them and said this – and they shouldn’t have been, really. They should have been aware of those partnerships.

Also, the idea of reviewing those on a regular basis just needs to be baked into any business plan and strategy, I think.

KH: I was about to ask you what advice you give to brands about staying on the right side of history and how to do the right thing. But I guess, in a way, you’ve kind of answered that, which is to look right the way back through your business – not just at what you want to do in the future, but what you’ve done in the past, and how you address that as well.

SC: Yeah, historical context is really important in terms of communication, isn’t it? You can’t communicate in the present day if you’re not learning lessons from the past. Demonstrating that is really important – for communication across every sector of life, not just corporates, but the public sector too.

You have to acknowledge what’s happened in the past. You have to acknowledge – nose to tail – the entire organisation, from what you’re doing on the ground through to your advertising and marketing campaigns. I think it’s very much about taking a holistic approach.

TL: Sarah, I know that you’ve been involved in a number of activism campaigns yourself. Are there any great campaigns that you’ve seen – and why do you think they worked?

SC: Obviously, all the ones I’ve done have been exceptional.

TL: Award-winning.

SC: Award-winning, yeah. Absolutely. Multi award-winning, in fact.

No, I think actually there are the great ones that everybody knows and loves – like the Patagonias of this world, and Ben & Jerry’s. Patagonia’s “Don’t Buy This Jacket” was, for me, a brilliant one. That was a brand being proactive and pushing something out.

But in terms of a reactionary response – which I guess is more relevant in this discussion – I did see, and I hate to give a pharmaceutical example, but I’m about to… wow. I saw an amazing reaction to an activism campaign in the US. I admit I don’t know exactly which pharmaceutical company it was, but it was the makers of Tylenol – which for UK people is paracetamol, the biggest brand in the States.

They had some significant issues – a huge crisis – where some bottles had been contaminated.

KH: We did a podcast on it, actually.

SC: It’s just brilliant, isn’t it? The idea that you would take the feedback on board – obviously it was a huge issue and a danger to public safety – so that was a tremendous thing that needed to be acted upon.

But the fact they internalised something like that to the point where they changed their packaging or made a fundamental change to demonstrate commitment to doing things differently going forward – that’s incredibly powerful.

So I think brand activism campaigns like those we see from Patagonia are fantastic – but they’re proactive. Sometimes when you do things that are reactionary and thoughtful, they make a genuine impact. Those are even more powerful. They look more impressive in comparison, I guess.

KH: I’d never thought of the Tylenol example as a brand activism campaign, but I guess it is, isn’t it? It really did change lives, potentially. It was brilliant – and it was for no real profit benefit to them. They raised the whole standard of the industry. That’s a really interesting way of looking at it.

SC: I think that brand activism should hurt. I genuinely believe that. One of the fundamental problems we have is that people still see it as a vehicle to make them look like they care in public.

But in reality, if you’re not looking at what you’re doing behind the scenes – your packaging, your stakeholder map, everything happening in your supply chain – then you’re not really doing it. It’s just so performative, isn’t it?

Again, I keep going back to Patagonia, but I think the founder gave away his company. That hurts.

In order for brand activism to really work and be genuine and fully exercised, there needs to be something you’re giving up. It doesn’t have to be huge – it doesn’t have to knock however many points off your share price – but there does have to be a pound of flesh.

For me, those are the best activism campaigns by a long shot.

TL: You were talking about the sort of reactionary approach. So let’s just say a brand is targeted and they realise they’ve got it wrong. How would you actually advise them?

KH: I would advise them to go and speak to you.

SC: I think that – yeah, certainly PR crisis comms 101 would indicate that if you’ve done something wrong, then you ought to admit that publicly. Acknowledging the role individuals or the organisation played in what happened is fundamentally important – but also demonstrating empathy.

I’m a massive fan of exercising emotional intelligence in these situations, because what often happens is things feel very clinical and cold. Corporate statements often don’t acknowledge the impact of their actions. You have to acknowledge that, and that your organisation had agency in this.

Then carve a path towards a constructive way forward. Show how you’re going to change. Publish a roadmap. Give an indication of when that might be available. Provide a commitment to do something by a certain date – and it should be timebound.

Because otherwise, you can kick the can down the road really easily, can’t you?

So for me, being quick to acknowledge and respond to something, showing empathy, and creating a meaningful action plan – those are the three tenets of a good crisis comms plan.

Obviously, there are many different layers behind that and lots of precursors too. People should be listening for this stuff well before anything hits. The worst thing is to be surprised by a crisis, because that feels very time-pressured – and people can make poor decisions in that environment if they’re not prepared.

If you’ve listened sufficiently beforehand, acknowledged the landscape you’re operating in, and really know your organisation, you might even be able to predict when these things are going to crop up. In doing so, you can prepare yourself.

I think it’s inevitable that any brand in the public eye will come in for criticism at some point. You can’t avoid activism campaigns.

KH: Can you?

SC: No, I don’t think you can at all. That’s so true. The acknowledgement part is so interesting – you have to look at long-term impact, not just short term.

People tend to think about the impact of what’s happening today, tomorrow, next week. But long-term impact is important too. Taking this back to the LEGO and Shell situation – there’s no more long-term impact than the climate emergency.

As you said, if LEGO had been listening more effectively, they might have spotted that public thinking on this stuff was changing. Really interesting.

SC: And also they were, you know, meanwhile, they were busy publishing their impact statements, weren’t they? And their impact reports, and committing to fully recycled plastic bricks by a certain date.

The climate emergency is urgent. And so the idea that, you know, we’ve got, like, three years left, haven’t we, before we get to 1.5 degrees? There’s urgency in that.

KH: So yeah, committing to something 10–15 years in the future, with different shareholders, probably a different CEO.

SC: Exactly. Yeah, very, very easy to do. Very easy to do.

So I think, you know, looking at what you can do in the here and now to make sure that your publicly facing values are aligned with what you’re doing internally has to be critical in terms of preventing an activism campaign – or at least mitigating the impact of something like that.

KH: Is there one thing that you think brands should be doing right now so they don’t become the target – or don’t get something so wrong that they do become the target – of an activism campaign?

I mean, what’s the thing everyone should go away and say, “Right. God, I need to go and do that right now”?

SC: Just be honest with yourselves about what you’re doing. Stop pretending like there is no evil in your organisation. There certainly is.

And I just think being authentic and being honest about where the risks are for something like that – doing a risk map, looking at the areas where you do have exposure, identifying the issues that are being talked about publicly and privately behind the scenes – and trying to figure out where you potentially could become a target for something like this, and what those issues are.

Really upskilling the people in the organisation who are responsible for reacting to something like this as well. You have to acknowledge your failures before you can start to move forward.

And just… don’t do bad stuff. I mean, it sounds really simple to me – like, why can’t people just stop doing bad things? But I understand that shareholder value and stakeholder value are two things that are not necessarily aligned in a lot of organisations.

But I think being honest, being open, doing a risk assessment, figuring out where those gaps are and where you’re exposed, and then preparing for that – that’s got to be the first thing.

It’s probably quite a big project. It’s probably quite a tricky thing. But definitely, you know, humility, authenticity – ensuring that the way you’re being perceived publicly is broadly in line with what you’re saying privately, and the way that you’re acting privately as well – because those inconsistencies will definitely be those pressure points that people start to come along, take a look at, and hold a mirror up to you.

Outro

You’ve been listening to “What Just Happened?” with Kate Hartley and Tamara Littleton. If you enjoyed the podcast, please subscribe, rate, and review.

Introduction

This is “What Just Happened?,” the podcast that looks at the biggest brand crises of our time, what they meant for organisational strategy and behaviour, and their lasting impact on our approach to crisis communication.

I’m Kate Hartley. And I’m Tamara Littleton. And together, we’ll delve into what happened, why it mattered, and whether it could happen again.

Episode 

Tamara Littleton: Today we’re talking about an event that was seen by millions of people on live television. It triggered a massive backlash against sexism in sport and sparked a major debate about consent.

Kate Hartley: So today we’re talking, of course, about Luis Rubiales, who is the former boss of the Spanish Football Federation. He was found guilty of sexual assault after he kissed World Cup winner Jenny Hermoso on the lips after Spain won the Women’s World Cup on 20th August 2023 in Australia.

TL: I remember watching that game and the celebration afterwards, and feeling really uncomfortable at the time when I saw the kiss. He had his hands on both sides of her head and kissed her full on the mouth.

KH: It was really, really uncomfortable to watch, wasn’t it? And later, he said that he’d asked her permission and that she’d said yes, but she said in a statement on social media that wasn’t true, and that the kiss was not consensual. There’s also a video that went out on Instagram Live right after the kiss, where the team’s celebrating the win, and somebody said, “He kissed you,” and she said, “I didn’t like it,” twice.

TL: This was part of a much bigger issue and conversation about women’s rights in general, wasn’t it, and particularly in Spanish women’s football.

KH: It was just amazing to see how the women stuck together on this. So, 81 players said they wouldn’t play for Spain’s women’s team until Rubiales was removed from his post, which I think was really amazing. What I think is really interesting is that right after it happened, literally the day after, on the 21st of August, Rubiales apologised – or sort of apologised.

TL: I mean, yeah, “sort of” is the key here, because that was a pretty inadequate apology. It was terrible. He didn’t really say sorry to her – more saying sorry for other people not understanding what had happened.

KH: Yeah, it was really bad. He basically said in a video on social media that this was the greatest day in Spanish women’s football – which, you know, it was amazing – and that this had somewhat tarnished the celebration. And of course, this is a translation, but he said he somewhat regretted it and that he had a magnificent relationship with Hermoso, and it was all done without any intention in a moment of celebration, basically, is what he was saying.

So he then said he didn’t understand the controversy. He said, “We saw it as something natural and normal, but outside it seems there’s been a cohesion.” Then the actual apology bit sounded something like this – again, this is a translation – but he said something along the lines of, “If there are people who have felt damaged by this, I have to apologise. I have no other choice.” And also, “I can learn from this – that when you are the president of an important institution as the Federation, in ceremonies of this type, you need to be more careful.” Now, that’s a rough translation, and my Spanish isn’t perfect, but you get the idea. And there are a lot of caveats in that sentence, aren’t there? A lot of kind of “ifs” – if people have been damaged, if you’re in a job that’s important – it’s not great.

TL: And it’s a good job that we’re on audio only, so you’re not going to see my massive eye roll. But there are a couple of things here that I think are really interesting. There’s a bit of “here it’s okay – it’s everyone else outside that thinks it’s a problem,” first of all. And then, “when you’re in a position like this, you need to be careful.” He doesn’t say anything about consent, or that you need to respect the wishes of players or women more generally, but just focuses on taking care when representing the Federation. It’s very obvious to me that he didn’t think it was a problem.

KH: I totally agree with you, and his demeanour in that video was pretty nonsense. I thought he was almost shrugging it off, and there were times when he was almost smiling about it. It’s like this really isn’t an issue. But then you fast forward a few days, and there’s a video online of him addressing the General Assembly of Spain’s Football Federation after there had been calls for him to resign, which had happened pretty much straight away.

There was a big kind of outrage on social media, and his demeanour had completely changed from that initial video. He talks about the fact that he’s done the best job for Spanish football and he asks, “Is this issue so serious that people think I should resign?” And there’s a really, really deeply uncomfortable moment – at least for me – where he shouts, “I will not resign,” over and over again. He says it five times in total. And if you look at that video, all the men in the room are clapping, and the women are mostly staying very, very still. It’s really uncomfortable to watch.

TL: So uncomfortable to watch. Yeah, it’s horrible.

KH: In that speech to the Federation, he said that Hermoso lifted him up and held his hips, and when she put him on the floor, they hugged. He says he asked her for a kiss, and she said yes. He then goes on – and this is really interesting and we’ll maybe come on to this – but he talks about false feminism, which he describes as a great scourge in our country. So he’s painting himself as the victim of a social assassination – which are the words that he used. I think that’s really interesting, because he’s almost been entrenched in his view by that backlash against him.

TL: And the kiss wasn’t the only controversy, though, was it? I remember seeing pictures on social media that showed Rubiales grabbing his crotch as he celebrated the win. Nice. And that’s, yeah, very Michael Jackson-esque, and that’s bad enough on its own. Also, a lot of people on social media pointed out that he was in the VIP area with the Spanish royal family. He was standing next to the Queen and near her 16-year-old daughter, and people quite rightly said that it was disrespectful.

KH: Yeah, and again, he apologised for doing that in front of the Queen and her daughter – although I completely agree that’s not exactly the only problem here. But he also lifted one of the other players over his shoulder after the game was over, which was, I think, pretty inappropriate. There were some other allegations against him as well, of harassment. This wasn’t the first time he’d been accused of it.

He’d been accused by a former colleague of asking her about the colour of her underwear, for example, and also joking – again, my eye roll, you can’t see – joking in the loosest sense of the word about wearing knee pads in meetings. So, pretty dodgy stuff.

TL: And it does now start to look less like an impetuous moment of madness – which is how some people tried to frame it – and more like a trend.

KH: I think that’s really, really important, because I know at the time there were a lot of people who – particularly, probably our generation and above – maybe said, “Oh, come on. It was just a kiss. It was a celebration. It was just a moment of not thinking.” But the point is here, it was non-consensual, and it followed a pattern of behaviour and a culture that was absolutely rife in the game.

Now, the good thing, I think, is that FIFA – who I don’t think necessarily are known for being really good about this stuff – did see pretty quickly the direction that things were going. On the 26th of August, so just a few days later, Rubiales was suspended by FIFA – the body that governs world football. But the Spanish Federation was still saying he’d done nothing wrong.

They were even saying they would take legal action against Jenny Hermoso or – and this is again a quote from them – “anyone spreading lies on her behalf.” They said categorically, “Mr President has not lied.” But there were calls for him to resign from all areas of sport, including the Spanish men’s team, which I think is great. The Spanish government also got involved.

There was a quote from the acting Labour Minister, Yolanda Díaz, who said on social media, “We stand with you, Jenny, and all women.” And I think that’s the crux of it. This became a case for all women. It became Spanish football’s Me Too moment.

TL: And other things came out too, didn’t they? Jorge Vilda, who was the Spanish head coach, was accused of inappropriately touching a colleague. It was very telling, I thought – and again, I remember this at the time – that the team ignored him when he went onto the pitch after they’d won. You’d think he’d be celebrating with them.

KH: I remember being really struck by that as well – that the natural thing would have been to go straight in and celebrate with your team, and that really didn’t happen. Again, I think this is part of a bigger picture. There’d been lots of complaints about the culture that he’d created – that he was very controlling, and he was doing things like not allowing players to shut the doors of their rooms until he checked in on them at night. Some really strange things.

To the point where a number of players refused to play under his leadership and complained to the Spanish FA about him.

TL: Now that’s a huge thing – to turn down the opportunity to play for your country in order to make a stand against someone is very brave. It kind of completely goes against your instinct to want to represent your country.

KH: It really does, doesn’t it? It’s incredibly brave, I think. And ultimately, it worked. Vilda was also fired on 5th September – although I think he was fired as part of restructuring. But this was a really, really important moment for Spanish football.

Tamara, you mentioned earlier, players were boycotting the game until there were changes made – and those changes really were made. The Federation sacked the Secretary General and a number of senior officials as well, some of whom had actually been named by the players.

But until absolutely the last minute, the Spanish Federation was fighting. They were threatening players with fines for the boycott, and the Spanish government had to step in, saying players who still refused their call-ups wouldn’t face repercussions. But eventually, the Federation had no choice, and they had to backtrack.

They said in a statement that they were aiming to create a safe, professional environment for players, and that they would support players. They also apologised to players for the enormous damage caused by Rubiales, which they said was completely unacceptable. The Federation also said they’d take down their original statement that accused Hermoso of lying and of defamation.

TL: It sounds a bit like the Harrods case we talked about recently with Anne-Marie Blake. So the Federation is trying to distance itself now from Rubiales and not focus on the culture that allowed that behaviour to happen – and even supported it.

KH: Yeah, I think that’s exactly what they’re doing. But then on the 6th of September, Jenny Hermoso did something that, again, I think is incredibly brave. She filed a legal complaint, and two days later, that complaint was filed in the high court against Rubiales for sexual assault and coercion. Three weeks after the World Cup, on 10th September, he eventually resigned, and he showed absolutely no contrition for what happened.

In an interview with Piers Morgan – interesting choice – he talked about how he needed to walk away with dignity and not damage those around him, nor the sport he loves. Nothing at all about the fact that he has damaged those around him and the sport he loves. In October, FIFA banned him from all football-related activity for three years, which I guess probably effectively ends his football career. In court, Jenny Hermoso said – and there’s a quote from her – “I think it was a moment that tainted one of the happiest days of my life.” She went on to say, “For me, it is very important to say that at no time did I seek that act and much less expect it.” She said, “My boss was kissing me, and this shouldn’t happen in any social or work setting.”

TL: That’s really critical, isn’t it? It’s the balance of power here. By bringing it back to work language – talking about her boss – perhaps she helps draw those lines for others who did see it as part of a post-sport celebration. I think that wording really matters. I’ve got so much respect for her bravery.

KH: I totally agree. I do think that wording really matters as well. It’s not acceptable in any situation for your boss to behave like that. It’s not acceptable for anybody – but particularly not, as you say, with that balance of power.

As we now know, of course, Rubiales was found guilty of sexual assault. He was fined 10,800 euros – around £9,000 – and told to give Hermoso 3,000 euros. He was also banned from contacting her for a year or even going within a 200-metre radius of her. Now, obviously the amount of the fine is not a lot. To put it into context, he’s estimated to earn around 675,000 euros a year – so that’s about 1.5% of his salary. But the verdict itself is actually, I think, what really matters here.

TL: Yeah. I’m sure he’ll make lots of money going on chat shows with Piers Morgan, maybe.

KH: But it is so sad that this should have been such an amazing moment for her and for the team, and it’s been overshadowed by this assault. Hermoso faced scrutiny and criticism for nearly two years, with people saying that she shouldn’t have brought the case. People around her have said it has had a huge emotional impact on her.

KH: It’s such a familiar story, isn’t it? Sadly, we know that women just are not taken seriously when they report this stuff. Much was made of the fact that, because it was beamed around the world – because people actually saw the kiss and saw what happened – that’s potentially the only reason that this was taken seriously. There was such a backlash against his assault of her because it was so public.

But the fact that she eventually was taken seriously – by the courts, by the Spanish government, by FIFA and by the Spanish men’s team as well – gives me hope. I think things are changing, slowly. There were some amazing things to come from it. I think there was a huge conversation around consent, and there was also the renaming of the national team, which I thought was really interesting.

Previously, the men’s team had been called the Spanish national football team, and the women’s team was the Spanish women’s national football team. Now they’re both the national football team. So again, it’s kind of sparked this conversation about equality in sport.

TL: Well, there’s so much more that we can go into here, and to do that, we’re going to be talking to our guest, Emma Woollcott, who will join us after this short break.

Break

TL: We’re joined by Emma Woollcott, partner at Mishcon de Reya and the head of the Reputation Protection and Crisis Management Group. Thank you for joining us, Emma. I already know that you’re going to have a lot of opinions on this crisis, so I’m going to kick-start – if this is okay – by asking: what is your view on how this changed the conversation around consent?

Emma Woollcott: Hello, thank you so much for having me. It’s a real pleasure. Yes, I don’t know that this example changed the conversation around consent, because actually it was quite clear for most people watching the video that she didn’t consent. It was quite odd that he claimed that she did.

I think it was clear to many people that it was a non-consensual advance. What perhaps kept the conversation running was: what does that mean? What does that mean in criminal law – to be forcibly kissed on the mouth? What offence is committed, and how should Rubiales, the criminal law, and the club and the FA have reacted?

KH: I just want to lead on from that, because this might sound like an odd question, but can we talk about what the legal position is in terms of what is and isn’t okay? I mean, I think – hopefully – we would instinctively know what that is. But my feeling is that this exposed a bit of a split in understanding about what constitutes assault, and whether that split was along gender lines or possibly age.

There were a lot of people going, “Oh, it’s a fuss about nothing,” or, “Does it matter?” Those are the kind of conversations I certainly heard being had, and I think it would be really interesting to hear your view on that – on what is legally acceptable, what isn’t, and whether people generally understand where that line is drawn.

EW: To answer the last point first – it’s clear from the debate that surrounded it that those sorts of acts, non-consensual advances, are unclear in criminal law and in public perception as to where the line’s drawn and what’s actionable. But the criminal court – the criminal system in Spain – convicted him. It was clearly a crime committed.

What I think is really interesting is I suspect that if Rubiales had acted differently, she would never have brought that complaint. These sorts of non-consensual advances sometimes can be a result of people misreading the situation or acting impulsively, but the police don’t tend to take action unless there’s a complainant. I suspect that this victim felt so aggrieved by how he reacted to the situation that that played a huge part in what motivated her to push forward with the complaint and support a conviction.

KH: I think that’s such an important point, because I think when she said afterwards, “This would not be okay in any workplace,” that was a really hard-hitting thing, wasn’t it? Because you think, actually – this is a workplace for her, and he was her boss. As you said, that’s a huge abuse of power.

In that way, it suddenly became very, very clear. The point you make about impulsiveness was sort of his argument, wasn’t it – that this was an impulsive moment, he just acted on the spur of the moment. And actually, that’s not okay.

EW: It’s really not. What’s very interesting is that a lot of his reaction afterwards was about being forced to apologise because of his position. I think leaders and businesses have to take very seriously and understand that dynamic in the workplace – that position of power and authority over others – it has to be very carefully used, and there’s a lot of scrutiny over it.

The Financial Conduct Authority – the regulator for financial services – has spent a lot of focus on increasing individual and firm accountability, and putting an active duty on businesses to create cultures which minimise abuse of power. Unfortunately, I’ve spent a lot of the past several years dealing with allegations of and investigations into what we call “non-financial misconduct” – allegations of this nature within workplaces.

There’s a real need for businesses to learn the lessons from these situations, to know that not only are they understanding what information is coming from their workforce – knowing how employees feel about management – but also that if something like this bubbled up, there wouldn’t be this undercurrent of frustration and dissatisfaction, and there wouldn’t be several other examples that come afterwards.

One of the things that struck me from the Rubiales case – to use a kind of football metaphor – is that he had a huge own goal. He had an opportunity in the moment to apologise and be really contrite, and because he refused to do that – refused to say, “I got carried away, that wasn’t okay, I’m sorry” – he opened the door to other complaints.

Journalists kept digging. There was the social media swirl. Ultimately, I think that led to the criminal complaint and him being fired. If he had reacted better, quicker, and apologised sooner – and meant it – a lot of that might have been avoided. I suspect it wouldn’t have made the headlines it did or had the consequences it did.

One of the biggest problems he had was that room of men clapping when he said, “I will not resign.” They were all of the same mind. They all wanted to dismiss it. No one was there holding a mirror up to him, saying, “If you actually take the temperature here and listen properly, there is a lot of sexism and there are a lot of issues with the culture you’ve overseen.” And because no one said that, he didn’t make the decision in the moment to apologise and hopefully move on in a more constructive way.

TL: And let’s just stay on the concept of risk and maybe think about other companies, because how do you spot this as a risk? You were talking about culture, but how do you spot it? Because what we saw here was a pattern of behaviour by an individual.

Can companies truly prepare for their leaders going rogue? For example, I’m trying to imagine a conversation where the internal team, or a legal team, would talk to the CEO about crisis preparation in case they sexually harass someone. So how do you actually advise clients on being prepared for leaders going rogue?

EW: I think it’s difficult to prepare for people going rogue. But perhaps this isn’t someone going rogue – this was an example of someone behaving as they had always behaved. It was an exaggerated example, but it wasn’t new. On the same day, wasn’t he seen rubbing his crotch or something?

It wasn’t rogue behaviour for him. It was accepted, tolerated behaviour. And I think that is something you can spot and prepare for. So often, when we’re talking to clients about reputational resilience, we do talk about culture and the way that challenge is made, and the opportunities they create for honest feedback.

Here’s a massive shout out to internal comms – and the connectivity between HR, executives, and the board is super important. Businesses need to know that they are getting data and information from their organisations – that they’re regularly doing engagement surveys or taking the temperature of how people feel – and that they’re listening to and responding to that.

Because if they don’t do that, they lack the information they need to make good decisions. Part of making those decisions is to know whether something is rogue behaviour, the tip of an iceberg, or symptomatic of a wider issue. Often, if you have good information flows between people teams, comms teams, and executives, they’re alert to the right amount of information.

We’ve had examples of executives who have been very affronted and surprised when they’ve received feedback that their manner is not what they expected, or that they’re perceived as oppressive or even a bit pervy. When you dig deeper, there have often been investigations and complaints that have been managed by HR but haven’t really bubbled up into their consciousness.

So actually, I think it’s really important for leaders to ask for, accept, and listen to feedback – so they’re not starved of the information they need to truly understand how they’re perceived – and to be able to reflect on that and change their behaviour.

KH: It’s kind of sad in a way, isn’t it, that we need that clarity for people – but we really do. There is probably a generation of people who think, “Well, this is how we’ve always done things.”

We’re all of a generation where we put up with things that we absolutely wouldn’t expect people to put up with now – which is obviously a good thing, in terms of change. But we do need that clarity. We need people to say, “This is acceptable, this isn’t.”

We say that a lot in crisis training, don’t we, Tamara – that giving people guidelines alone isn’t enough. You need examples of what’s okay and what isn’t, so that you can teach people until it becomes so embedded that they instinctively know what’s okay and what isn’t.

EW: And you need to listen to different perspectives. There’s an example that we use in my team quite a lot – and the female lawyer who was in this story hates me telling it – but I think it’s a really important one.

I was on a Teams call with a senior male executive who was answering questions about having put his hand on the back of a young female colleague’s neck. My colleague flinched – she’s in her early 20s.

KH: She flinched – well, we both flinched. Yeah, it’s such an intimate thing. The neck is such an intimate area.

EW: Exactly. It’s an intimate place. I’m slightly more weathered to these things, and I didn’t flinch, but the client saw the young woman flinch and said, “What was that? Let’s talk about that.”

Rather embarrassingly for her, he said, “Well, what was going on there?” And she said, “Well no, that’s an intimate thing. That’s not a casual touch. I’m not a man you’re playing sport with that you can tap on the shoulder. Touching my neck is really quite intimate and intrusive.”

She said, “I’ll offer you my hand to meet in a business environment – you can shake that. But don’t touch any other part of my body.” He looked genuinely shocked. I think he had been non-consensually touching people’s necks for years and none of them had flinched or told him not to.

So he wasn’t aware that time had moved on. That was his blind spot. It was a surprising example, but unless you’re seeing the reactions of people with different perspectives – if you’re only surrounded by people who have the same mentality as you – you’re never going to get that flinch. You’re never going to get that moment of reflection.

TL: Yeah, it’s an ongoing conversation. And I think it’s also really important that this is included in the risk register as well. I’m so pleased to hear you talk about culture and how that really matters, because I know that in a previous episode, when we were talking about the Harrods crisis, it all came back to culture there as well.

So it kind of does make me happy that companies are really looking at culture as a key area to avoid these kinds of crises. And obviously, people need to constantly learn and educate themselves as well.

Outro

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