Meghan Markle’s team shake-up raises concerns about Hollywood brand

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry have skilled yet one more shake-up inside their group.

Emily Robinson, communications director for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, has stepped down simply 4 months after taking over the function. People magazine reported.

“Ms. Robinson oversaw the challenge work for a extremely profitable season of ‘With Love, Meghan’ and extra help for the manufacturing firm,” a spokesperson for Archewell, which manages the workplaces of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, advised Fox Information Digital. “She did a superb job and accomplished these tasks with nice success.”

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Meghan Markle is seen right here on the Balenciaga Womenswear Spring/Summer season 2026 present as a part of Paris Trend Week on October 4, 2025. On October 24, it was reported that Emily Robinson, the communications director for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, left 4 months after taking over the function. (Arnold Jerocki/Getty Photos for Balenciaga)

Robinson couldn’t instantly be reached for remark.

The sudden departure has reignited consideration to the Sussexes’ enterprise empire in Hollywood, particularly as Meghan, 44, tries to model herself as an entrepreneur.

“This newest departure solely provides to the continued instability and model confusion throughout the couple’s discombobulated operations,” the spokesperson stated. British royals expert Hilary Fordwich advised Fox Information Digital.

“It’s a clear indication that Meghan Markle’s ambition to overtake her public picture with a sophisticated group is failing,” Fordwich stated. “The optics are terrible as a result of, at greatest, it reinforces the unfavourable picture of chaotic model management, in addition to Meghan’s declining affect.”

The Duchess of Sussex’s way of life sequence, “With Love, Meghan,” premiered on Netflix on March 4, 2025. (Jake Rosenberg/Netflix © 2025)

Earlier than becoming a member of the couple’s group in late Might, Robinson labored as a senior publicity director for Netflix, Individuals reported. Robinson is one in every of a number of staffers to have left the Sussexes’ group in recent times, elevating eyebrows.

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A supply advised the newspaper that Robinson “left of his personal accord.”

Meghan Markle arrives on the Paley Honors Fall Gala on December 4, 2024 on the Beverly Wilshire Resort in Beverly Hills. (Richard Shotwell/Invisie/AP)

Regardless of the nice farewell, Fordwich famous that it’s uncommon for a communications director to go away such a high-profile place after lower than a yr.

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex and Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex attend Challenge Wholesome Minds’ Third Annual Gala at Spring Studios on October 9, 2025 in New York Metropolis. (Michael Loccisano/Getty Photos)

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“Communications administrators merely do not depart such a high-profile, world PR function after only a few months,” she stated. “Such deviations are uncommon and suggest persistent private incompatibility or some type of strategic disagreement over technique or picture growth.”

Robinson is in a rising firm.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex reside within the rich coastal metropolis of Montecito. (Dan Charity – WPA Pool/Getty Photos)

In June, 4 of the couple’s employees left, together with their Los Angeles deputy press secretary, Kyle Boulia, and their British press secretary, Charlie Gipson. Each had been appointed final yr. Fox Information Digital reached out to Archewell for remark on the time.

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The Duke and Duchess of Sussex stepped again as senior royals in 2020 and moved to California. (Eric Charbonneau/Archewell Basis through Getty Photos)

Royal skilled Richard Fitzwilliams beforehand advised Fox Information Digital that round 20 individuals have left their positions with the Sussexes. The couple stepped again as senior royals in 2020 and moved to California.

“There may be mounting proof to help rumors that Meghan Markle is having issue following the instructions of her advisors,” royal skilled Kinsey Schofield of YouTube’s “Kinsey Schofield Unfiltered” advised Fox Information Digital.

Meghan Markle will probably be seen throughout Paris Trend Week on October 5, 2025. (Andrea Cremascoli/Getty Photos)

“Former staff inform me she appears receptive to recommendation, acts as if she is going to implement it the best way it was offered, after which does the other,” Schofield claims. “Meghan blames the media and the general public for misinterpreting or misunderstanding her. It is an exhausting cycle, and for a lot of who’ve labored along with her, in the end an unsustainable cycle.”

When the Duke and Duchess of Sussex made their royal exit, they cited the insupportable intrusions and racist attitudes of the British media, in addition to a scarcity of help from the palace, as causes for stepping again. (Chris J. Ratcliffe/Getty Photos)

Doug Eldridge, founding father of Achilles PR, advised Fox Information Digital that the newest turnover solely brings extra consideration to the couple.

“It is unclear how a lot this might actually damage the model,” he stated. “What they lacked is continuity – whether or not it is staffing, message self-discipline or inventive focus. It is laborious to construct a stable, steady basis when you could have a turnstile of staff leaving your ‘constructing’ all through the method. Stability requires continuity.”

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, speaks on stage in the course of the TIME100 Summit 2025 at Jazz at Lincoln Middle on April 23, 2025 in New York Metropolis. (Jemal Gravin/Getty Photos for TIME)

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Royal commentator Amanda Matta identified to Fox Information Digital that departures like Robinson’s will not be “uncommon” in leisure, particularly since tasks transfer shortly and the roles are contractual.

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In 2025, Meghan Markle launched her way of life model As Ever and her Netflix way of life sequence ‘With Love, Meghan’. (Heathcliff O’Malley – WPA Pool/Getty Photos)

“As a result of it is Meghan and Harry, each departure is handled as a part of a sample,” Matta defined. “In actuality, the Sussexes have solely been working independently for 5 years and are nonetheless refining what their long-term tasks seem like.”

“As their work shifts from start-up power to extra targeted, sustainable tasks, some turnover is inevitable,” says Matta. “It does not essentially point out dysfunction, however a pure realignment as they construct a group match for his or her subsequent chapter. If something, the skilled tone of their spokesperson’s assertion underlines that this was a deliberate and optimistic transition, and never a disaster.”

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are seen right here in the course of the closing ceremony of the Invictus Video games Düsseldorf 2023 on the Merkur Spiel-Enviornment on September 16, 2023 in Düsseldorf, Germany. On October 9, 2025, they acquired the “Humanitarians of the Yr” award. (Chris Jackson/Getty Photos for the Invictus Video games Basis)

“It is uncommon, however not not possible,” Eldridge stated. “The function that Emily Robinson left Netflix to tackle with Harry and Meghan was described as project-specific and associated to outlined inventive automobiles, that are acknowledged to have been accomplished. But when that’s the case, there may be actually no cause for dismissal or termination; it’s merely the completion of the contractual time period.”

Meghan Markle starred within the authorized drama ‘Fits’ earlier than marrying Prince Harry in 2018. (Chris Jackson/Getty Photos)

“The actual drawback right here is the optics,” he stated. “Despite the fact that it was the logical completion of a short-term, narrowly outlined project, it comes after quite a few layoffs in latest months, all of which create the impression that this can be a lower than fascinating work atmosphere. Once more, that might not be the fact, however it definitely creates the notion.”

In 2021, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex spoke to Oprah Winfrey about their struggles with royal life. (Harpo Productions/Joe Pugliese through Getty Photos)

Fordwich famous that such frequent departures solely carry again recollections of bullying allegations towards the Duchess. Royal reporter Valentine Low broke the story in 2021, simply days earlier than the couple’s tv interview with Oprah Winfrey aired. Meghan’s group has strongly refuted the claims.

Schofield stated it goes again additional.

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Kinsey Schofield advised Fox Information Digital how Princess Diana disagreed along with her personal secretary Patrick Jephson. (Tim Graham Photograph Library through Getty Photos)

“Princess Diana’s former press secretary Patrick Jephson as soon as wrote in regards to the breakdown of his skilled relationship with the late princess,” she defined. “He described the way it began when Diana started to imagine her personal publicity, when the headlines she had fastidiously crafted started to provide her a false sense of invincibility.”

“Harry and Meghan seem like affected by an identical type of fatigue,” Schofield stated. “They rely closely on a small circle of sympathetic media to create flattering reporting, and Meghan particularly appears to view these tales as affirmation of her worldview.”

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“The truth is that Meghan Markle is a deeply polarizing determine,” Schofield continued. “A seasoned communications skilled would acknowledge that and develop a long-term technique to reshape public notion. However endurance has by no means been her robust swimsuit. As a substitute of coping with criticism constructively, Meghan appears to desire the phantasm that everybody is on her aspect, and that her haters are secretly making spaghetti from one frying pan at house.”

A vacation particular of the Duchess of Sussex’s way of life sequence, “With Love, Meghan,” is within the works for Netflix. (Samir Hussein/WireImage/Getty Photos)

Eldridge famous that Meghan and Harry should now discover an ally who is not going to solely stick to them, but additionally assist them seem genuine and thriving in California in the event that they need to silence the persistent rumors for good.

“The simple half is hiring a brand new particular person,” Eldridge says. “The toughest half will probably be hiring a gifted particular person and, most significantly, retaining them. It is Halloween season and all of us keep in mind that one spooky home that youngsters would not stroll previous — not to mention cease — whether or not it was trick-or-treating or some other day of the yr.

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, leaves the Balenciaga present on October 4, 2025 in Paris. (Pierre Suu/GC Photos/Getty Photos)

“If this sequence of mass departures continues, Meghan dangers changing into the equal of that scary home: certified professionals merely will not cease there anymore.”