Objectivity - Lesson Learned Courtesy of Tim Hortons

"Tim Hortons backs out of anti-gay marriage event"
http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2009/08/10/tim-hortons-marriage023.html

Here's a perfect example of why an objective, critical mind is sometimes your best asset. Insiders frequently lack perspective and are simply too "close" to see potential public relations landmines.

At its most innocent, someone at Tim Hortons got a request to supply coffee to a group of people celebrating "families". But for some, this situation has turned into something quite different. To that audience, it is a peek into the corporation's allegedly heretofore hidden social agenda.

Lesson learned: have your community relations strategy and communications plans reviewed by an outsider, specifically, a communications professional. An objective "best-case/worst-case" analysis can be worth its weight in gold.