You Screwed Up - Lay Low, Don't Run, Keep Working

 "We are all screwups."

When we start out in our professional lives (my first step was a major oil corporation) if we are blessed there is a wise and caring mentor. That guide will make a mantra of the above. Then the next line from that man or woman will  be:

"And, it will all come down to how you handle the mess."

Well, from here on the outside it looks like Paul Weiss associate Matteo Godi has been able to navigate the early screwup in his career quite well.

I doubt if I can get inside on this again. When news of his hacking crisis broke, I was able to reach him by phone at Paul Weiss. Unfortunately I didn't get anything.

Background: Recall that he had gotten into the Wiki pages of the competitors for the SCOTUS nomination. He had determined it would have been beneficial to position and package those as less liberal than Judge Jackson. At one time he had clerked for her. 

So, now I can only speculate what might have transpired post-hacking.

It could have been that Godi might have been collectively showered with tender mercies. The sources could have been both inside Paul Weiss and externally. Yes, he has become The Forgiven. 

Not only did he hold onto his job at Paul Weiss. Incidentally, there he had made a strong start. Most recently he had been part of the legal team who won for the client in the SCOTUS ruling in Cummings v Premier Rehab.  Here is Law and More's analysis of that decision.

Also the storms of public opinion have moved out to sea. At one time his contact information - email and phone number - had been removed from his website profile. Now that data is back. 

What can we myopic human beings learn from this play-out?

William Shakespeare describes our state of being as "cankered in the grain." The Roman Catholic Church has the doctrine of "original sin?"

At the top of the list is to lay low. Had Leon Black done that he might be at least 70% percent there in reputation restoration. But, instead, he set himself up to be eaten alive by the media machines. That was, I assess, through a countersuit he launched against his former mistress who had sued him

As I explain in this article I published yesterday in O'Dwyer Public Relations, before entering any kind of litigation it is necessary to calculate the publicity risk. In the legal sector, lawyers now consider guiding their litigation clients through that as a best practice.

Both Black and Johnny Depp might have had their professional brand significantly damaged as a result of filing a lawsuit.

However, I also point out in the article that filing a lawsuit can be a career-enhancer. The iconic example is Gretchen Carlson's against Roger Ailes.

In addition, there had been mixed impacts from the lawsuit Ellen Pao v Kleiner Perkins. The plaintiff who lost in court likely will never land a good job in tech again. But she is making a living from the diversity-champion profile she developed before, during, and after the trial.

For Godi, part of that laying low was that the law firm held back contact information. Smart. 

Another takeaway is to keep working. Obviously Godi has done just that. That's the Protestant Ethic: salvation through hard work. When I was doing my doctoral work at the University of Michigan I wrote a paper which got attention on the universal solution in early America, as demonstrated through its art, to every form of screwup had been to engage in a frenzy of work.

A third is not to run. He stayed. 

This blog wishes Godi well. He has a book in this. That can give Paul Weiss unique exposure.

After all, we are nothing but a bunch of screwups. In this recent podcast - for which I won an award from MediaDimensions - I shared the times the business for my communications boutique fell off a cliff. Incidentally, I made one of those situations worse through panic. I ran. That is, I accepted a full-time position at a process-oriented insurance company. But, a version of tender mercies had been bestowed on me. A public relations agency noticed what I was publishing on the side and put me on retainer. 

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com. She helps businesses conjure up magic in their storytelling. One client said, "She makes shipping containers ‘sexy.’"