{"id":3558,"date":"2025-07-08T15:58:35","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T15:58:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aomtodayprod.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=3558"},"modified":"2025-07-08T15:58:35","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T15:58:35","slug":"media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\/","title":{"rendered":"Media Magnify Scandals of Big-Name Companies"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Daniel Butcher<\/a><\/p>\n

Companies that dominate their industries also have to deal with increased scrutiny. Any negative news, from layoffs and unethical conduct to data breaches, get amplified and can easily become scandals, according to Academy of Management Scholar Tim Pollock<\/a> of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.<\/p>\n

Media attention is drawn by the accused or guilty party\u2019s prestige, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the perpetrator is high-reputation, they may get the benefit of the doubt for less severe misconduct as some kind of one-off thing, and the media may be less likely to cover it,\u201d Pollock said. \u201cBut if the misconduct is severe, then the media is even more likely to scandalize the high-reputation firm\u2019s misconduct, because we don\u2019t expect that from high-reputation firms; it violates our expectations.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we have high expectations about a firm\u2019s behavior, whether because we expect them to be more competent or act with more integrity, it\u2019s a bigger deal and more disturbing when they violate that expectation,\u201d he said. \u201cThat makes the incident more newsworthy to the media, increasing their coverage of the misconduct.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are sorts of things that we\u2019re looking at and trying to understand: What are misconduct aspects and firm characteristics lead the misconduct to become a scandal?\u201d<\/p>\n

Pollock and colleagues compared the reactions to data breaches at two different companies of vastly different levels of prestige and name recognition: Facebook and Chegg, a U.S. education technology company that provides homework help, textbooks, online tutoring, and other student services.<\/p>\n

\u201cFacebook had a data breach of 50 million accounts; it was covered widely in the media and got lots of attention\u2014thousands of articles were written about their data breach and the problems with it,\u201d Pollock said. \u201cAnd literally on the same day, Chegg, which is an academic software company, had a similar data breach\u201440 million accounts were breached, but it was barely covered outside of the the specialist media on data security, and a little bit in the in the education sector.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo why Facebook and not Chegg? Facebook is better known,\u201d he said. \u201cMore people use Facebook and have given them their data, so the expectancy violation is greater and possibly more personal.<\/p>\n

\u201cJournalists recognize this, and thus are more likely to scandalize the incident, because it attracts more readers.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Daniel Butcher Companies that dominate their industries also have to deal with increased scrutiny. Any negative news, from layoffs and unethical conduct to data breaches, get amplified and can easily become scandals, according to Academy of Management Scholar Tim Pollock of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Media attention is drawn by the accused or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":3560,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[71,72,74,78],"tags":[],"sp_smart_badges":[],"ppma_author":[70],"class_list":["post-3558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-communicating","category-ethics","category-hr","category-policy"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMedia Magnify Scandals of Big-Name Companies - Academy of Management Today<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Daniel Butcher\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Daniel Butcher\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/d1297a59039d9ca7bac9d9f0952e508c\"},\"headline\":\"Media Magnify Scandals of Big-Name Companies\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-07-08T15:58:35+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":390,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2025\\\/03\\\/carlos-ghosn.webp\",\"articleSection\":[\"COMMUNICATING\",\"ETHICS\",\"HR\",\"POLICY\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/media-magnify-scandals-of-big-name-companies\\\/\",\"name\":\"Media Magnify Scandals of Big-Name Companies - 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You can reach him at dbutcher@aom.org or via LinkedIn.","sameAs":["https:\/\/aomtodayprod.wpenginepowered.com","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/danielbutcher\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/author\/daniel-butcher\/"}]}},"authors":[{"term_id":70,"user_id":4,"is_guest":0,"slug":"daniel-butcher","display_name":"Daniel Butcher","avatar_url":{"url":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/DanButcher_Academy-of-Management.webp","url2x":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/DanButcher_Academy-of-Management.webp"},"0":null,"1":"","2":"","3":"","4":"","5":"","6":"","7":"","8":""}],"rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn.webp",1080,720,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn.webp",1080,720,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn.webp",1080,720,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn-150x150.webp",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn-300x200.webp",300,200,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn-1024x683.webp",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn.webp",1080,720,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn.webp",1080,720,false],"owl_elementor_thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn-600x400.webp",600,400,true],"owl_elementor_team":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn-350x450.webp",350,450,true],"owl_elementor_testimonial":["https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/carlos-ghosn-100x100.webp",100,100,true]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Daniel Butcher","author_link":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/author\/daniel-butcher\/"},"rttpg_comment":1,"rttpg_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/category\/communicating\/\" rel=\"category tag\">COMMUNICATING<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/category\/ethics\/\" rel=\"category tag\">ETHICS<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/category\/hr\/\" rel=\"category tag\">HR<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/category\/policy\/\" rel=\"category tag\">POLICY<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"By Daniel Butcher Companies that dominate their industries also have to deal with increased scrutiny. Any negative news, from layoffs and unethical conduct to data breaches, get amplified and can easily become scandals, according to Academy of Management Scholar Tim Pollock of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. 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