Harry & Meghan change their surname

[Gottseidank]

… from Mountbatten-Windsor to ‘Sussex’.
Apparently it’s to strengthen their brand.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/prince-harry-meghan-sussex-archie-lilibet-children-name-royal-title-cnvf7d9jf

Maybe the palace expected that, given they had not wanted the titles granted to them at birth,and given the reason cited for this was to give them a “normal childhood“ the Sussexes would reasonably have been expected not to want to upgrade their children’s master and miss status to that of Prince and Princess. The now Duke of Edinburgh was entitled to style his children as Prince and Princess, but he did not do so, preferring to allow them to have the option to take up the title if they wished when turning 18. His children were styled with their lesser titles. Harry and Meghan didn’t even do that. So why would the palace have automatically assumed they would want to use Prince and Princess? I think that’s a bit of a reach. Why would the palace be expected to guess that they would want to do this on the basis of the Oprah interview, given that they had previously shunned titles.?

Oh, and @Serenster one thing I would say is that I take everything Omid Scobie says with a pinch of salt. Yes, there's an aspect of being H&M's mouthpiece, but my god, it's done badly!

The palace couldn’t win with that one imo.

if they changed the names then it’s presumptuous and rude.
if they ask they risk a “we already told you when they were born” reply
if they waited, as they did, they’re ignoring the children

Maybe the Palace made mistakes - actually, I'm certain they have - but in this instance they needed to be clear about the children's titles before announcing them. See @Serenster above.

@smilesy because this is what basic, high quality BCP is about: considering the various options, preparing for the worst one, and rolling out a plan accordingly.

So yes, in my family, if my brother hasn't spoken to my dad in 15 years it's not unreasonable perhaps for me to assume that he probably won't then come along to the funeral and to plan accordingly.

In THIS case however, not nailing it down and/or planning for the uncertainty is poor. Understanding what variables exist, and how that might impact things, is a key part of strong BCP and the palace has no excuse for not considering it.

Not to mention, if you were minded to see the one of the Sussexes’ tactics as looking for narratives that paint them as victims wherever they can be engineered, they may not have wanted it to look like the Palace would have happily recognised the children’s new titles the moment they confirmed their wishes.

In THIS case however, not nailing it down and/or planning for the uncertainty is poor. Understanding what variables exist, and how that might impact things, is a key part of strong BCP and the palace has no excuse for not considering it.

Yes, but you are assuming that the other party is playing with a straight bat. That is demonstrably not the case here.

(Their comms plan may have had to be reactive, not proactive, because the Sussexes were refusing to confirm or deny their wishes)

Well maybe they were aware that they had to walk on eggshells and didn’t want to offend the Sussexes. Communication with them
was obviously already difficult and the place didn’t want to second guess. I agree it wasn’t ideal, but I didn’t think the palace were being petty as others have also said. I think they were genuinely caught on the hop. There was a lot going on after they late Queen died and, rightly or wrongly, the Sussexes children’s titles were not uppermost in people’s minds

This is what I wondered. There are conversations on social media going on (whether based in fact or not I do not know) that the Sussexes are sailing too close to the wind retaining royal titles whilst using their "brand" to make money. The Queen forbade this and famously would not allow a half in half out policy. There is speculation (again no idea whether based in fact) that for this reason H+M could have royal titles removed if they go too far down this road.

No idea if this would/could ever happen, but this change of name prevents even the possibility. Because it's now their surname/ family name and therefore can't be removed. It's now part of their brand (and I note for this reason some of the papers are using the phrase "rebranding their children" too).

No, I'm afraid I disagree. A key part of crisis communication planning is anticipating this exact issue and the fact that you may be seeing poor behaviour elsewhere.

To be clear, I am not saying the Palace is to blame for any long term issues - I genuinely have no real opinion on that except in that I think that mistakes have probably been made on both sides and of course, we'll never know.

However, from a communications perspective, yes, the palace has made simple errors that, as a professional who has spent a large part of my career managing crisis communications, I see as either incompetence (unlikely) or pettiness.

For example, in the case of the titles, if H&M were being wishy washy, passive aggressive etc, then the palace had options for that eg, "The children of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are now entitled to be styled HRH Prince and Princess but the decision on this will be taken by the Sussex family in due course." or similar. It's really not complicated.

Actually, thinking about it, I guess it COULD be incompetence after all because now that I consider it, while they've had to do BCP planning for 100s of years, the've also usually been in the position of being able to 100% control everything, including the narrative. So perhaps they are complacent and I have been making assumptions about the level of crisis planning skills they actually have in a modern world.

Interesting.

I cannot understand why and I don’t think I ever will on why they went down the route of titles for their children in a country without a monarchy, especially as in all other ways they try to keep their childrens lives private. If the children themselves choose as adults fair enough but this names and titles is just ridiculous whilst simultaneously separating from the monarchy.

And from my experience of dealing with parties who you can’t control and who are likely to be hostile if given a chance, you give them as little opportunity as possible to take your words or your stated position and use them as a springboard. Two different approaches!

if they took away Sussex they become HRH Prince and Princess Henry
Didn't they agree to no longer using HRH when they made their bid for money freedom? But of course, they don't feel bound by any of that.

They’re still officially HRH so that would be their official title.

Even if they just used Prince and Princess the point about the optics and media still stands

Is your experience in crisis communication? Genuine question because I think in crisis comms, we would agree with this basic point which would mean that any statements we make would need to be clear and simple statements of fact as per my suggestion above. No commentary, no judgement. you don't speak for the other party at any point, but you clearly articulate your position. Leaving it hanging is a mistake. always.

Of course, it's' more nuanced in terms of actual relationships between real people. But when it comes to actual communication via public channels, they could have handled this a LOT better even if H&M were behaving appallingly.

Believe me, I know because I have had to deal with crisis comms issues related to stark blatant accusations aimed publicly at the firms I have worked for, as well as those linked to the management of activities at times such as the London bombings or other major external crises.

"The children of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are now entitled to be styled HRH Prince and Princess but the decision on this will be taken by the Sussex family in due course."

I think that would have been taken by certain media elements as Charles actively pushing for the titles to be used

@GingerIsBest it’s a major part of my job. Though I’m the one instructing the communications experts and assessing their output - but clearly, we work as a team.

The whole Whistler nonsense has made me think non-working members of the royal family shouldn’t have royal titles at all… maybe William will remove them

All of this just blows my mind.
Lilibet is American born and raised. Archie has dual citizenship.
They live in a republic.
A country that fought and defeated the British.
How weird that the children are being bought up in the cradle of the system that fought and lost to the place of their birth.

It's the ultimate juxtaposition surely?

Its utter madness.

The children should be free to chose what titles they want to be adorned with when they are old enough to understand their history and that of their family surely?

I'm confused by their rationale so god only knows how the children will approach this as they come of age

The new CEO of Invictus has stated that H and M like to be addressed as Sir and Ma’am.
What happened to Call me Harry ?

I think it’s really wrong… especially ahead of a postponed royal tour.

Their fake royal tour makes no sense, they are not delegates representing the head of state or country, it’s not a coordinated effort with the UK foreign office, they are just random members of the public. Insisting on royal protocol, sir/ma’am, being serenaded with the UK National Anthem… it’s totally inappropriate.

I am surprised you don't think the palace comms are a bit off then! But I guess we're all different.

I've had some pretty hardcore things thrown my way over the years - suicides of staff members, accusations of fraud/illegal dealings etc so I do take a fairly robust view of crisis comms and I continue to feel that the palace has made a lot of mistakes that could have been headed off at the pass!

I am coming round to my new theory though that the palace is perhaps not as competent as I assumed as the BCP planning for a monarch's death had always previously been done in a very different environment so it is possible that there was little consideration. I can easily imagine some of their mid-level traditional comms team being absolutely infuriated at the poor planning though - I've definitely been that comms person who is standing there waving my arms and saying, "if we do this, x will happen" then tearing my hair out when the business is all outraged that x happened after they refused to take my advice!

On a lighter note - in my last 3 days of one job that I was leaving because my boss was a complete and utter wanker (and they'd offered me a generous package in exchange for me not taking it further), I did get to enjoy a certain smugness when I had flagged, repeatedly, an issue, and had suggested a solution but been shot down repeatedly with my (wanker) boss and the person who'd somehow been promoted to "oversee" my work (haha - cost them a fortune) telling me that their approach was the right one. In fact, their approach was, a bit like the Palace, based on wishful thinking and how they think the world SHOULD be vs how it actually was.

The result was that the very last meeting I attended at that organisation, on my last day in the office, was a very very senior banker yelling at both my bosses (and me - but it rolled off me as 1. I agreed with him and 2. I was out the door in about 2 hours). The banker was upset because "we" didn't seem to understand how these things work.

I'll give the "new" boss some credit - my last ever conversation with her was her acknowledging that perhaps she should have listened to me after all!

i find threads like these really interesting.
if harrys duke title is higher than prince. what about a duke like the duke of norfolk? is his duke title the same or different?

Royal dukes are different to other dukes. I think it's the ones who are HRH are the royal ones but someone else probably knows more about this level of detail.

So down the line, I assume that the Duke of Sussex title just becomes a normal hereditary title not a HRH title? ie Archie's son would just be a regular duke, not a royal duke?