Judged by the company you keep

I was at a charity event last night. As the night’s major sponsor was announced at the commencement of the evening their table was pointed out and we all applauded them for their support.

Great PR right?

Well… not so much. Throughout the night, one of their team members got louder and louder, more obnoxious and then finally, became somewhat offensive. When they left the table that night it was a mess with rubbish littered underneath it.

Someone at my table commented – I know where I wouldn’t go for XXX (insert their type of business).

What could have been an amazing PR opportunity and what started as a fantastic act of generosity ended up being the worst kind of negative publicity for this business.

While this is an extreme example, I’ve seen it to a lesser degree often.

A great company uniform which could be reinforcing the branding of an organisation instead gets tarnished when an employee is seen smoking around the corner during work hours. A sales agent who shows up five minutes late for a real estate open home with a shirt untucked and appearing disorganised.

I know I’ve even been guilty of it myself – when we were sponsors at a charity event a few years ago and they thanked just me and not my business partners I leaned over to someone and was complaining about the mis-mention when that friend (very wisely) said to me – you’ve just been announced as a sponsor, everyone’s looking at you, be gracious and smile and sort the rest out later.

We’ve all heard the saying that you’re judged by the company you keep.

But what about your company being judged by the YOU it’s keeping?

Kirsty Dunphey is the youngest ever Australian Telstra Young Business Woman of the Year, author of two books (her latest release is Retired at 27, If I Can do it Anyone Can) and a passionate entrepreneur who started her first business at age 15 and opened her own real estate agency at 21. Now Kirsty does lots of fun things which you can read about here. Her favourite current projects are Elephant Property, a boutique property management agency, Baby Teresa, a baby clothing line that donates an outfit to a baby in need for each one they sell andReallySold, which helps real estate agents stop writing boring, uninteresting ads.