The Tragedy of Ryan Holiday

I was reluctant to write this.

I didn’t want to contribute to the noise about Ryan Holiday and his much discussed book, Trust Me I’m Lying (if you haven’t heard of it, here’s a review and some other coverage).

However, after watching a Google Hangout that featured Holiday, Peter Shankman of HARO, John Janstch and several others, I can’t hold back.

Let’s get my personal, highly biased, impressions of Holiday out of the way. He’s an out and out phoney. A relatively inexperienced 25 year old, who has had, by all evidence, a less than distinguished career at unprofitable firms. Throughout the Hangout, he came across as all stunt and flash, and no substance. Most irksome was that Holiday portrayed himself as a servant of the people bent on “exposing” media’s failings. ‘Disingenuous’ is not enough to describe his shallow play to sell books.

Holiday’s criticism of HARO (Help A Reporter Out) was downright bizarre. He posited that the service, which links reporters up with sources, was at fault for connecting him to the journalists he eventually lied to. As one of the panelists mentioned, this logic would mean Monster.com should vet all resumes posted on its site. HARO, as Shankman said several times, has never suggested that journalists abdicate the vetting of sources when they issue queries via the service. Indeed, it is one of the most important aspects of a reporter’s job.

As the Hangout unfolded, it became clear that Holiday is a master of generalization and bad social science. Undeniably, he managed to lie his way into coverage and manipulate a system that can be manipulated. However, as anyone who knows anything about case studies knows, a few examples are not enough to make sweeping statements.

There’s always been bad journalism and there always will be. The internet and current business realities of the media industry mean that manipulation might be easier today than ever. But that doesn’t mean, as Holiday asserts, that manipulation is everywhere or that the lion’s share of journalists are bad at their jobs.

The reality is that being shifty doesn’t pay over the long term. It is a hit and run strategy and no way to build a successful or sustainable PR program (Holiday is very candid about the hit and run nature of the stunts he pulled using HARO). I hope none of my clients read this guy’s book and end up believing that lying for coverage is a solid tactic.

You only need to watch and hear Ryan Holiday to understand that he’s a young, inexperienced guy with a lot to learn. The tragedy is that the razmatazz, punchy way his book and arguments are packaged have set the PR profession back years. People are gobbling this shit up.

It’s crying shame. After coming out of the closet as a liar, Holiday’s no longer going to work in the field. But the rest of us – who never did a damn thing wrong – will be stuck dealing with the damage he’s caused to our profession’s rep. Thanks, Ryan!

I’ve never felt that universal accreditation should be required to practice PR. Holiday has me rethinking my position.

If you want to see Holiday in action on the Google Hangout hosted by Duct Tape Marketing check this video.

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