Aamer Madhani

USA TODAY

The early days of Donald Trump's presidency has crystallized one thing for corporate America: Doing business in the shadow of the 45th president is going to be a delicate balancing act.

Facing pressure from anti-Trump consumers and the presence of a commander-in-chief who wields a Twitter account from which he has already sent market-moving tweets, corporate America is trying to to adapt to an increasingly unpredictable and hyper-politicized business climate.

“I don’t think there is any way for companies to hide or run away from this political scrutiny anymore,” said Daniel Korschun, an associate professor of marketing at Drexel University in Philadelphia. “My advice to CEOs is to have the difficult conversations about what you stand for as a company. They need to figure out where do they have consensus among their constituents on key political issues, so they are ready for the inevitable.”

Already, top executives are finding a tricky playing-field when offering their observations about Trump or coming under unsought attention from the president.

Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank and the company’s star endorser Steph Curry were awkwardly at odds in public after the executive of the sports apparel company described Trump as an “asset” to the U.S. The basketball player retorted that he agreed with the Plank description “if you drop the et.” Celebrity Under Armour endorsers, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Misty Copeland, followed with their own criticism of Plank for his comments about Trump. Plank on Wednesday followed up with a full-page advertisement in The Baltimore Sun, saying his words last week "did not accurately reflect my intent."

Shares of H&R Block fell Wednesday after Trump singled out the tax preparation company in his pitch for his upcoming tax revision-and-simplification plan. "We're going to simplify the tax code," Trump told a group of retail company CEOs in a morning meeting. "It's too complicated. In fact, H&R Block probably won't be too happy. That's one business that won't be too happy."

After Trump's comment, the stock fell nearly 3% in late morning trading before rebounding. Shares ended the day down 0.8%.

The Under Armour brouhaha followed Trump's Twitter rebuke of Nordstrom for dropping his daughter Ivanka Trump’s line of clothing and shoes.

Trump blasts Nordstrom after it dumps Ivanka's fashion line

Nordstrom said the decision to drop the first daughter’s line was simply a business move that reflected slumping sales. That didn’t stop Trump from blasting the retailer for “unfairly” treating his daughter or White House press secretary Sean Spicer to suggest that the Nordstrom move was a response to Trump’s policies. Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway also publicly urged the nation to buy Ivanka Trump fashions online — advice that prompted ethics criticism and admonitions.

After initially dropping 1% after Trump’s tweet on Wednesday, Nordstrom shares rose more than 4% for the day, and ended the week 2.5% higher at $45.

John DiMarco, an associate professor of communications at St. John's University in New York, said that Nordstrom deserves points for attempting to use a very Trump-like message to justify their move. "How could Donald Trump argue with a company acting on poor performance?" DiMarco said.

Motorola Solutions experienced how simply raising the specter of raising Trump's ire can have ramifications.

The Chicago-area based company's stock dipped by more than 5% last week after a short seller urged Trump — who has previously taken to Twitter to rail against government contractors he feels are overcharging — to scrutinize the telecom company’s pricing of radios to U.S. law enforcement agencies. (In December, the then president-elect sent shares of Boeing and Lockheed Martin tumbling after tweeting complaints about government contracts with the aerospace companies.)

Further complicating the terrain for corporate executives, Trump backers and opponents are running increasingly aggressive campaigns on social media, pressuring companies to get in line with their political ideology or face the prospect of consumers shopping elsewhere.

The anti-Trump #GrabYourWallet campaign currently lists more than 60 companies that either are owned or operated by Trump’s family, sell Trump-branded products or whose top executives supported the president’s run for the White House.

On the other end of the political spectrum, the conservative group 2nd Vote is pressing companies, such as retailer Macy’s, to resist calls to dump Ivanka Trump products. The group is also encouraging coffee drinkers to ditch Starbucks after its founder Howard Schultz rebuked Trump’s executive order restricting travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries and vowed to hire 10,000 refugees at shops worldwide.

Starbucks does not appear to be fearful that its stance is hurting its bottom-line.

“We’ve been very pleased and energized to see the strong response from customers in support of this effort,” said Starbucks spokeswoman Linda Mills, who compared to refugee hiring pledge to Schultz’s earlier campaigns to hire veterans and high-risk youth. “Our stores are as busy as ever. That said, we make decisions based on our mission, values and heritage and we recognize that sometimes there are some who may disagree with us.”

After Citron Research’s Andrew Left accused Motorola of price gouging last week and suggested that the company’s practices wouldn’t sit well with Trump, the company quickly fired back that “Citron has made numerous false and misleading statements.”

It doesn’t appear that Trump, at least yet, has taken notice of the Citron salvo. Motorola’s stock, however, which had gained about 30% in the year prior to this week, saw its biggest intraday trading dip since May following the publication of Left’s analysis.

Motorola CEO Greg Brown said in an interview that Trump has added a new, sometimes unpredictable, dimension to the U.S. business climate — one which he said he’s cautiously optimistic will be a good thing. He praised the president for consistent rhetoric on tax reform and relaxing regulations.

“I think what Trump has been saying (to the business community) is, ‘You have to be on your toes,’” Brown told USA TODAY. “I personally like that -- not be paranoid or on edge, but on your toes. We should be.”

Following Trump’s signing of an executive order restricting travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries, Uber Technologies faced the ire of users of the ride-hailing app, when it announced it would cut surge pricing at John F. Kennedy International Airport, after taxi drivers had gone on strike to protest the Trump travel ban.

The hashtag #deleteuber surged in popularity, as customers who saw the move as undercutting the taxi drivers' protest cancelled their accounts in protest. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick faced further scrutiny for agreeing to participate in a White House economic advisory council. Last week, in the midst of the growing storm, Kalanick announced he was quitting the council and sought to distance himself from Trump’s immigration stance.

Starbucks will hire 10,000 refugees, starting in U.S.

Trump lauds Intel's $7B plan to finish closed plant

Jonah Berger, an associate professor at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, says that some corporations might do well by approaching Trump as a “marketing channel for their own use.”

Berger pointed to Intel, whose chief executive Brian Krzanich who last week used a meeting with Trump to announce the company was investing $7 billion to finish building a factory in Arizona.

That project was conceived in 2011. President Obama even visited the site in 2012 when construction had begun, but the project was mothballed in 2014 as sales of personal computers declined.

Krzanich, who has criticized the Trump travel ban as bad for business, said that the decision to restart the project was in part driven by “the tax and regulatory policies we see the administration pushing forward.”

Berger expressed skepticism that Trump’s tax talk was much of a driver in the Intel decision. But giving the newly-elected president some credit gave the Intel project much greater exposure than it would have otherwise received.

“Did they restart it because of Trump? Maybe.” Berger said. “Or was this something they were already doing and said, ‘Let’s hold on. This is a great photo op for us, and we can let Trump amplify our message.’ This was an example of a company not changing its behavior, but using Trump as a smart PR opportunity to get more mileage for stuff they are already doing.”

Follow USA TODAY Chicago correspondent Aamer Madhani on Twitter: @AamerISmad