Law Firm Responses to War in Ukraine

From Randy Labuzinski, writing for Law.com…

The Russian invasion of Ukraine sheds new light on the pattern of law firms speaking out about social causes and events with significant societal implications. A law firm’s actions can have PR implications, particularly when it comes to what is or is not communicated to stakeholders and the media.

This discussion is not even about whether a law firm should divest itself from doing business with Russian entities — that’s a business issue (although overwhelming public pressure has the winds blowing in a clear direction). This is about how a law firm’s actions can have PR implications, particularly when it comes to what is or is not communicated to stakeholders and the media.

Case in point …

Bloomberg’s Vivia Chen pointed out in a recent article how one major law firm got slammed with negative PR for asking its lawyers not to express their personal views about Russia. The firm had to reverse course — which ended up shining an even brighter spotlight on its original transgression — and ultimately learned a hard-fought lesson about how not to navigate this turbulent issue from a PR perspective.

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