Did You Take a PPP Loan

Did your firm, company or client take a PPP Loan? That information is now public.

Did you apply for and accept a business loan from the?Paycheck Protection Program?(PPP), the business loan program established by the?US Federal government’s?Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act?(CARES Act) to help certain businesses, self-employed workers, sole proprietors, nonprofit organizations and tribal businesses continue paying their workers ?

If so, the fact you accepted that loan is public information. And that means you must be prepared to answer questions about your acceptance of that loan if asked about it.

Frankly, we don’t have any problem with this disclosure.?The SBA routinely makes public information about the dollars loaned to small businesses, so why should PPP dollars, disbursed from the U.S. Treasury Department, be any different?

What’s different this time is the sheer size of the PPP program and the fact that an extraordinary number of organizations received these “forgivable loans,” in some cases worth multi-millions of dollars.

While there are scores of reasons – all 100% legal and ethical – why your organization took a PPP loan, crisis management specialists know that optics often overshadow facts.

And it isn’t just reporters who will shine a spotlight on loan recipients.?Social media activists may also seek to highlight businesses and organizations in the community that received the dollars – with a direct or implied demand for justification.

If your organization applied for and accepted PPP dollars in good faith, you must be prepared to defend the loan if questioned by the media or other stakeholders – without looking defensive.

As our good friend, Richard Levick, has said repeatedly, “Use peacetime wisely.”?Levick recently suggested making sure you’re ready to answer such questions as:

• Did you easily fall within the PPP guidelines or did you have to manipulate the rules to fit?
• Exactly how was the money used?
• Did you have access to other funds?
• Specifically for schools, what has been your historic commitment to scholarships, diversity and economically disadvantaged students? What would the absence of PPP money mean for the future of these programs?
• How do you currently support your community and the small businesses within it?

Levick further suggested that companies and organizations that come across more sympathetically in this equation will more easily deflect criticism than those who appear to have profited from this stimulus plan.

Now is the time to think about those optics, about how your partners, clients, employees, customers, friends – as well as traditional and social media outlets – are going to think when they find out how much you received.

We are not recommending spin.?We’re talking, instead, of the exact opposite – transparency. If you took the dollars, we’re suggesting the creation of clear, succinct, direct messages and talking points that answer the questions most likely to be asked.??

Additionally, once these questions are asked, you’ll probably have just minutes to provide an answer to reporters who are on deadline or social media speculation that will increase by the moment.