Up the Creek!
A podcast to save your reputation. Icon Reputation can help you build, protect and enhance your reputation. Learn more at https://iconreputation.com.au/ Reach out for a confidential conversation Phone 03 9100 3191 Mobile 0419 583 892 contact@iconreputation.com.au
Episodes
Feb 12, 2024
Feb 12, 2024
31 min
Mark Forbes and Benjamin Haslem dissect crises and recovery attempts, revealing the 2023 Reputation Eye awards, including the infamous Brown Eye for the PR fail of the year.
Feb 13, 2024
Feb 13, 2024
33 min
We dissect the ongoing controversy over invading Iraq based on false warnings of weapons of mass destruction, resurfaced by the mysterious disappearance of key intelligence assessments. We hear new revelations from Mark Forbes, who, as a journalist, was enmeshed in the affair after reporting an intelligence chief said the WMDs didn’t exist.
Apr 17, 2024
Apr 17, 2024
21 min
Our verdicts on the remarkable media revelations and reputational carnage from Bruce Lehrmann’s failed defamation action against Channel 10.
Jun 7, 2024
Jun 7, 2024
24 min
Up The Creek! dissects Gina Reinhart’s enlistment of her sponsored swimmers to demand the removal of an “offensive” portrait from the National Gallery - demonstrating the ‘Streisand effect’ where attempted suppression only publicises. We also observe the Liberal Party scoring another own goal with women, and the sodden schmozzle of the UK Conservative’s election campaign.
Icon Reputation can help you build, protect and enhance your reputation.Learn more at https://iconreputation.com.au/
Reach out for a confidential conversationPhone 03 9100 3191Mobile 0419 583 892contact@iconreputation.com.au
Jul 9, 2024
Jul 9, 2024
23 min
Up The Creek! Analyses Peter Dutton’s pitch to take Australia nuclear and why Labor is responding with 3-eyed fish memes, the circus of Julian Assange’s flight to freedom and the debacle of Joe Biden’s presidential debate - asking ask if Americans will choose the clown or the cadaver?
Icon Reputation can help you build, protect and enhance your reputation.Learn more at https://iconreputation.com.au/
Reach out for a confidential conversationPhone 03 9100 3191Mobile 0419 583 892contact@iconreputation.com.au
Aug 19, 2024
Aug 19, 2024
27 min
This month Up the Creek! examines current media conflicts including Four Corners targeting Channel Seven and the reputational implications of constant media conflicts over culture, coverage and high-stakes defamation cases. We dissect Australia’s most besieged organisation, the CFMEU, and racism complaints casting a shadow over the AFL.
Dec 12, 2024
Dec 12, 2024
22 min
Crisis experts Mark Forbes and Benjamin Haslem reveal their 2024 Up the Creek! awards, including the coveted Golden Eye for turning a pr sow’s ear into a silk purse and the Brown Eye for fail of the year.Across the PR and media landscape contenders include airlines, supermarkets, a rock icon, high profile radio stars and a disgraced shock jock.
May 15, 2025
May 15, 2025
25 min
In our new podcast Icon Reputation Director Mark Forbes and Benjamin Haslem to unpack where the Federal election was won and lost, How comedian Austen Tacious’s direct approach to tour PR earns the ire of the ABC, and how tech giant WiseTech’s problems are a throwback to scandals past.
Jun 13, 2025
Jun 13, 2025
22 min
In the latest episode of Up the Creek!, Icon Reputation Director Mark Forbes and Benjamin Haslem are in the trenches dissecting the gas lobby's attempts to turn the courts, and public opinion, against the greenies. Meanwhile, Rio Tinto is attempting reputation recovery by sponsoring Aboriginal activists, and how the AFL has flipped Tasmania’s political scene on its head.
Aug 8, 2025
Aug 8, 2025
22 min
Do politicians deserve any right to privacy, how the other internet giants pulled YouTube into a social media ban on children, and the reputational risk of attending a Coldplay concert, all in the latest episode of Up the Creek!Crisis experts Mark Forbes and Ben Haslem discuss the disappearance of privacy, with the Coldplay Kiss Cam that had the world, and Gwyneth Paltrow, talking.They discuss how a Victorian Liberal leader was effectively accused of beginning a relationship when his now wife was 17 and he was her tennis coach. A defamation case is looming.






