Are we in recession again? Weak recovery? Heading for Financial Crisis 2.0? No wonder more than a few CFOs and IROs have been wringing their hands over what guidance to provide investors as part of the second-quarter reporting season. If you’re looking for an example of softening guidance by widening the range, Procter & Gamble [...]
Often the investor relations job revolves around corporate news, and sometimes timelines get compressed so we must get it out quickly. This kind of breaking news puts the IR professional on deadline – a short deadline. This morning, for example, a client got in touch just after 7:00 and asked me to write a news release on [...]
As the Q2 reporting season winds down, a nightmare scenario for investor relations professionals comes to mind: accidentally leaking your company’s earnings release or M&A announcement by inadvertently posting it online. Such a leak spreads easily into a widespread spill into social or traditional media. Can’t happen? Well, it does. A panel discussion at the NIRI [...]
Tom Hoenig, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City and a skeptic on loose monetary policy and the state of the world’s biggest banks, is convinced the United States still hasn’t heeded the lessons of the last financial crisis. During an otherwise happy gathering in our hometown, the “CFO of the Year” awards [...]
To gain a seat at the table with senior management, investor relations people must talk their way into helping their companies formulate strategy, George Barrett, chairman and CEO of Cardinal Health, told several hundred IROs today in a keynote address at the 2011 NIRI Annual Conference in Orlando. “I really do feel that you’ve got [...]
Gaining access to the C-suite is critical for investor relations professionals, both to know what we need to know about the company for effective communication with investors – and to build personal success in our own careers – according to NIRI‘s June/July 2011 issue of IR Update. The tips and ideas on raising your professional profile apply [...]
A contrarian approach to messaging for investor relations is to ask yourself, “What’s wrong with this company?” Then, in IR reports and presentations, address the weak points of your business – what causes investors to turn up their noses – along with your solutions. This offbeat idea was prompted by an interview with Anne Gudefin, a [...]
As the new reality of “say on pay” votes by shareholders settles in, a guiding strategy for companies should be to have your own say. Investor relations professionals (and senior execs) need to learn how to communicate more clearly and proactively on pay and governance. By last week, 20 U.S. companies had lost (failed to get [...]
Among several bits of wisdom shared by Jane McCahon last night at a NIRI Kansas City meeting is the idea that investor relations, at its core, still has the mission of building a base of long-term investors who believe in your company and its future. McCahon is VP of corporate relations for Chicago-based Telephone and Data [...]
As an investor relations person, I love this time of year. I enjoy working on clients’ year-end reporting, of course – but it’s also a time when I get to experience IR from the other side, as a member of the audience. Believe me when I say I am a small shareholder of a few [...]
