the sPRint: The CEO Posted
July 30, 2026 | We talk about how employees can be your greatest brand ambassadors or your great reputational risk. Plus, the mindset shift you need before you go solo in a tough market. And, why is research so important for media relations? Ask a journalist!
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The Warmup
Fun Facts 🔎 New AI stats just dropped! Sprout Social published new data revealing that 76% of PR professionals use generative AI in their work, and 75% now use at least one paid AI tool (up from 57% year-over-year). We cover why you need to do your research in the Home Stretch in this week’s edition. See all the data.
A glowing testimonial 🌟 This week, the Spry PR team published a new video case study featuring Kyle Peacock, founder of Peacock Tariff Consulting, where he shares his experience working with the Spry team. Check it out.
New on the pod 🎙️Jill Lawrence Vaughan, APR, joins us to talk about her journey to solopreneurship and starting her own PR agency. Listen here.
Fast Twitch
Oh No, Why Did He Post THAT?
Employees can be your best brand ambassadors, but they can also ignite your worst reputational crises. And this week, there’s a five-alarm fire on Shopify’s PR team as CEO Tobias Lütke published a few controversial posts on X that are taking a lot of heat.
According to an article on the debacle from Fortune, Lütke’s (tweeted) position is as follows: “Pension recipients should have their financial futures ‘locked in and guaranteed,’ but in return would be reclassified as ‘dependents’ and lose the right to vote—the same way minors can’t vote.”
Regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum, no PR professional is going to be happy to get this request for comment. But the truth is that social media is deeply ingrained in the lives of your team members—including the C-Suite, and probably yourself. When it’s as easy as a thoughtless, quick reply like Lütke’s to damage your reputation, PR and comms leaders must be absolutely prepared to manage this type of crisis.
So, what should you do when an employee decides to rogue on social media (especially if that employee is a highly visible CEO)? Kessler PR lists several steps you should take when things go awry, including:
Delete the post (if appropriate) and do an internal investigation.
Decide on whether a public apology is necessary and, if so, outline the actions you must take to meet the conditions of the apology.
Figure out how you’re going to rebuild trust, and get started ASAP.
Read the full article on this subject from Kessler PR.
Slow Twitch
Going Solo in a Tough Job Market
It’s safe to say that the job market in 2026 is tough. If anecdotes from friends and connections on LinkedIn aren’t enough to prove it, just look at the numbers: in the first half of the year, U.S. employers announced more than 440,000 job cuts—the second-highest total since 2020.
When there’s an economic downturn, marketing and communications teams are usually among the first to feel the pinch. At the same time, many PR, communications, and marketing professionals have sought-after skills and Type A personalities that may (at one point or another) have led them to daydream about opening up their own shop, whether that’s as a freelancer or the founder of an agency.
So, we asked: When life hands you lemons, how do you turn it into lemonade?
Earlier this month, Spry PR hosted an award-winning agency founder and the former communications director for the Virginia lottery, where she won two silver anvils from PRSA for her work (that’s a big deal, if you’re new to the PR game). Jill Lawrence Vaughan, APR, is the founder and CEO of JLV Communications, and she spoke candidly on our podcast about her journey to found JLV.
Jill, like many of us in the PR and comms field, was the victim of a layoff. But she didn’t let that keep her down for long—and in this episode, she shares potentially the most important determining factor of success when you decide to go off on your own: Your mindset.
Listen to Jill’s story on the latest episode of Good Marketing with Stephanie, available on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.
The Home Stretch
Be Kind, Do Your Research
Yesterday, a journalist on the biopharma beat let off some steam on LinkedIn, sharing a message that so many other journalists relate to (and that PR professionals need to hear.)
“The nuisance PR pitches are getting out of hand,” wrote Mandy Jackson, managing editor of U.S. commercial news at Scrip. Is there any way to fight back against the huge increase in irrelevant news flowing into reporters’ inboxes aside from blocking certain PR firms’ email addresses?”
This is a huge problem and not the first LinkedIn post I’ve seen from a journalist exhausted by irrelevant pitches. AI has made it super easy for anyone to draft a spray-and-pray pitch and the PRMs (as much as we love Muck Rack) have made it even easier to pitch large numbers of journalists at a time. The daily pitch limit on MuckRack is like 1,000 emails or something crazy like that.
And look, I get it—we all need to secure coverage for our clients! But when AI and PR tools have made it possible to pitch hundreds (or thousands) of journalists at a time in only seconds, the research is absolutely essential. Understanding what journalists actually want and need from us is a requirement. And the spray-and-pray just needs to stop.
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