”We give ourselves license to play a little faster and looser than we normally would.”
Paterno in Happier Days
College football fans always wondered when Joe Paterno’s football career would begin to slow down. The answer came this week with a sudden, whiplash-inducing crash. From USA Today:
A little more than a week after legendary Penn State football coach Joe Paterno got his record-setting 409th win, the view of his storied, 46-year career suddenly is undergoing a stark revision — tarnished by a child sexual abuse scandal at Penn State involving a former assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky.
Paterno initially announced his decision to retire at the end of the year, but that was not soon enough for the school’s board of trustees, who announced late yesterday that college football’s winningest coach was fired, along with Penn State President Graham Spanier.
The following morning brought news of nightime riots, as thousands of Penn State students took to the streets to protest the firing. “Joe Paterno broke no law,” said one rioter. (Curiously, the students decided to smash street lamps and turn over a television news van in order to make the righteous case that no laws were broken.)
Of course, a savvy marketer or university communications officer would be the first the point out that compliance with the law is not the gold standard for protection of your brand reputation. Kevin Burke of The Daily Gamecock explains why:
[Paterno] fulfilled his legal obligation of notifying someone of the allegations involving former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky… Paterno, a man of noble stature, seemingly accepted the Penn State athletic director’s decision to simply ban the offender from bringing kids to the facility.
Common sense says this was not enough. The fact that Paterno or anyone else with knowledge of the situation neglected to think that true authorities — the police — needed to be involved is baffling.
This is case in point where the law falls short of our obligations to society.
Paterno isn’t the only “good and noble person” who has come up short when it is time to do the right thing, whether in a football program, a corporate boardroom or a congressional meeting room.
