Los Angeles 
Whether it’s grown men stealing hats from kids, grown women taking baseballs from kids, or married CEOs behaving badly with married employees, scandal isn’t just for rappers and movie stars anymore.
So now that literally anyone could find themselves at the center of a PR firestorm, let’s review the three rules I used to reserve for my media-facing clients.
Always be ready for your close-up!
The woman now known as “Phillies Karen” should have known she was on camera when she accosted a fan who had scooped up a home run ball for his son, and demanded he hand it over to her. Now Loan Depot Park holds 37.000 people, which means it’s safe to assume there were 30,000 cameras there. Even if TV cameras hadn’t captured the ugliness, dozens of quick-thinking fans with I-Phones likely would have.
Between cell phones, security cameras, and ring doorbells, in 2025, the question is never, “I wonder if there’s video of that?” The question is always, “Who has the video, and how fast can we get it on the news?”
Always behave as though there’s a camera pointed your way, ready to document your bad behavior.
Apologize (and quickly)!
When a Polish CEO snatched an autographed hat from a boy at the US Open, the outrage came faster than a rocket serve. Undeterred, the cap thief waited days to issue an apology. And by that time, a defiant statement had already been posted in his name saying, “It’s just a hat. If you were faster, you would have it.” The CEO denied making that initial statement. But if he had been faster with the apology, it never would have been an issue.
Pro tip: Excuses never work. And apologies with creative language work better than hackneyed phrases like “the man in the video doesn’t reflect who I am in my heart,” or “I’m going to take some time to reflect on my behavior.”
At that brings us to the Coldplay cuddlers, a CEO and his HR chief, caught mid-embrace by the Kiss Cam. You could argue that a public apology would be overkill in this case, but it’s just as important to get in front of the story with employees, board members, and investors (not to mention spouses).
I don’t know how quickly or effectively they did that, and I can’t be certain they could have saved their jobs anyway. Only one thing would have been certain to do that:
Don’t do stupid things in the first place (especially in public)
Don’t steal things from kids at sporting events, and keep your private affairs private. Because whether you’re a senator or a civilian, avoiding bad behavior is the only sure-fire way to avoid bad PR. We media trainers can help you out of the hole you’ve stepped in, but your ankle will still be broken.
