BulletProofBlog the blog on crisis communications

A few days ago, we discussed how making allies of your public relations adversaries can significantly neutralize their attacks. By engaging NGOs and other interest groups that question your business practices, you not only mute their criticisms, but annex part of their leadership position for yourself as well.

Today, we' d like to look at another approach that achieves the same result. It' s called the jiu jitsu strategy - and it' s all about using an opponent' s strength to your own tactical advantage.

Total victory for corporations in struggles with accusatory NGOs and other resolute activists seldom comes from proving the adversary wrong, unless their allegations are unsubstantiated. Denying meritorious accusations only guarantees that you will give the story substantial news coverage. The more accurate their allegations, the more foolish your denials will appear.

Total victory, however, can be achieved by making an adversary' s legitimate issue your own.

We saw it last year when JetBlue responded to its Valentine' s Day massacre - when it stranded 100,000 customers all day - not just with apologies and rebates, but with leadership, addressing not only their own problems, but the entire industry' s by introducing a Customer Bill of Rights. We saw it a few years prior when Gap answered accusations of sweatshop labor with a rating system for producers that set an industry-wide standard. We saw it in likely its most famous iteration, when two decades ago, Johnson & Johnson responded to fears over the infamous Tylenol tampering with caplets and childproof packaging.

And today, we are seeing it in De Beers reaction to activists' attacks on the issue of "conflict diamonds". By working with the governments of diamond-producing countries to establish the Kimberly Process and stem the practice of using diamond proceeds to fund conflict, De Beers can now boast that 100 percent of its diamonds are conflict free.

Now, De Beers' detractors have been defused and its competition is playing catch-up. What once was the opponents' strength is now its own. Even the most seasoned martial artists would be proud.