PR Studies

Life, liberty and the pursuit of work

This is personal. While I wanted to write it ('I write therefore I think') I'm not necessarily so keen on you reading it.

(Here's how to do it well: a graceful statement showing how to move from one job to another.)

In my case, I'm leaving one job for several, and it's happening over an extended period. Had I been primarily motivated by money or by status, I'd certainly have stayed put.

Money first. Don't assume because it's not a motivator that I don't need it. I'm a borrower not a saver, and am still anxious about money most of the time. It's just that money doesn't go higher for me than the base 'food and shelter' level in Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It's not an end in itself; my self-esteem is not at stake. That said, will I have food and shelter should I live to be 90? Will people close to me be adeqately provided for should I die at 50 (it happens)?

Status next. This is very easy for me. I'm just not bothered at all about titles or name plates above office doors. They're not a motivator - especially in a world where it's easy for an individual to express an identity outside their organisational role. Again, I recognise that my attitude can be self-defeating. I was surprised at how many times I was approached by head-hunters when I was the (interim) PR manager for a very well-known software company. Others were evidently drawn to the title; titles are magnets attracting attention, fame and fortune even. But still I'm not motivated - I suspect because of the ties that bind.

So what's my driving force? In a university, I'm surrounded by people who respect left-side of brain reason (and sometimes undervalue emotional factors). For me, decisions about the future have to be emotional and intuitive because the future is largely unknowable.

One factor is longevity. Six years in one role feels a long time for me (it's longer than I've worked for any other organisation). Organisations provide security and community; they should provide constant new challenges. But they can also constrain the spirit in ways that have people longing for retirement.

Then there's the question of size. We often cite numbers of employees as an indication of success (on the assumption that big is best). It sometimes is - but look what happened to the dinosaurs. Evolution suggests that smaller organisms were more adaptable in times of change.

Change is happening (it always has). Again, its effects are unpredictable, but I can point to some trends. The years of easy growth in mass higher education are coming to an end, but education and training will play an even more important role across a working lifetime. Technology is a factor - both in delivery and in challenging the legitimacy of organisations. That more than anything was the message in Clay Shirky's Here Comes Everybody.

I have form. I left my first PR consultancy job after five good years and spent the following ten as an independent practitioner. I'd joined a small, specialist independent - Aeberhard and Partners which became A Plus Group during my time there. Subsequently it was known as Brodeur, then Pleon and now it's being merged with Ketchum. I'm sure this growth strategy brought benefits, but I knew that I was better suited to the early phase of this business.

Now for two breakthrough moments. The first was the advice from someone close to me to stop looking for jobs and to start looking for work. Good advice in a world in which jobs are becoming scarce but work is always abundant.

The second was the search for role models. When I think of the people I admire occupying a similar space in the PR educational ecosystem, many of them operate outside of institutions and job titles. They have work, but not necessarily jobs. They comfortably operate across the boundaries between university education, consultancy, professional qualifications and training - and they write books (and blogs) too. I greatly admire (for what they do and for the way that they do it): Michael Bland, Paul Noble, David Phillips and Heather Yaxley (to name just a few, in alphabetical order).

This is a long preamble to stating that I'm leaving a full-time job at Leeds Metropolitan University for a part-time job at the much smaller University of Gloucestershire. For the university part of my week I'll be teaching and supporting undergradaute students; for the other part of my week I'll be educating professionals towards the CIPR Diploma qualification. There should be time for other unpredictable educational, consultancy or writing projects too.

Happy Independents Day!

Speed versus substance

Here's a confession: I've done no more than dip my toe into Twitter. I know it's where the conversation is, I know it's the latest toy loved by celebrities and social media mavens. I know it's where news breaks and gets discussed. I know it's a great example of the mobile internet.

I also recognise (and this is best of all) that it's easier to get into than blogging, so a new generation has skipped blogging and become enthused by real-time conversations on Twitter. (Consider the irony: blogging, like email, is considered 'too slow' by Generation Y whose members grew up on instant messaging and mobile phone text messages.)

But even so. I'm not fashion-conscious and I'm keen to keep the noise down and cut through the clutter. Besides, I don't currently have any clients so the need to be actively engaged is lessened. If anything, I've moved more of my reading in the direction of good old-fashioned books in the past year. There's a tension here and I'm pulling against the trend.

But there's something else, a concern about the trade off between speed and substance. Stuart Bruce points to a post by Robert Scoble (in turn quoting Forrest Research analyst Jeremiah Owyang):

"The other night Jeremiah Owyang told me that thought leaders should avoid spending a lot of time in Twitter or FriendFeed because that time will be mostly wasted. If you want to reach normal people, he argued, they know how to use Google. And if you want to get into Google the best device — by far — is a blog."

So it's OK for me to come out as a Twitter refusenik. See how I'm ahead of the curve?

Expenses scandal source named

The PR hand behind the parliamentary expenses story has been named. He's Henry Gewanter and his Positive Profile website proclaims his involvement in 'the story of the century'. So far, so transparent.

But there are still more questions than answers arising from this:

• On whose behalf was he acting? Public relations can be a neutral force; it can even act in the public interest. But it usually acts on behalf of a paying sponsor. Profesional ethics and transparency require that we don't conceal or deny the sponsor's identity. 
• Why has his identity emerged now, and why was a PR intermediary necessary in this case? 
• How much did the Telegraph pay? It remains a big political story, but payment by the newspaper shapes our understanding of the newspaper's motives in the same way that it shapes our understanding of the PR agenda.

Now for The Fall of PR

Humans need narratives to simplify the muddy complexity of life. These narratives (stories) sometimes become so compelling that they appear to be the truth. But a narrative isn't the truth, it's a convenient and sometimes prevalent world view.

Here's a compelling narrative. Ten years ago The Cluetrain Manifesto proclaimed that 'markets are conversations' and that marketers should stop shouting and start listening. The text wasn't comfortable reading for public relations practitioners, but it suggested they were closer to mastery of the conversational style needed in the online age. (The book was written in the early years of Google and before the rise of blogging, social networks and twitter.)

Then, in 2002, brand evangelists Al Ries and Laura Ries narrated 'The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR'. Their thesis turned the normal thinking upside down: 'You can't launch a new brand with advertising because advertising has no credibility. It's the self-serving voice of a company anxious to make a sale. You can launch new brands only with publicity or public relations (PR).'

In The Long Tail (2006), Chris Anderson turned to markets. The whole process of launches and hits was becoming less important than the aggregate sales available in niche markets over time. Publicity was becoming less important than discovery in our Google-mediated world.

Continue reading "Now for The Fall of PR"

Private citizen, public blog

A high court judge has ruled that "blogging is essentially a public rather than a private activity", so unmasking an anonymous police officer who had previously won a literary award for the Nightjack blog (no longer available.) The news is reported widely; I've chosen to link to the FT's dispassionate account.

Libertarians are incensed. Here's their case: whistleblowers have an important role to play in a free society, exposing hypocrisy and wrong-doing. Without the cloak of anonymity, most would remain silent and our society could suffer as a result. Their case is even stronger in a totalitarian state: if speaking out would expose you to repression at the hands of those in power, then anonymous protest is the only viable route for most people. Essentially, this is an appealing argument in favour of free speech.

Ironically, this blogger was exposed following investigative work by The Times newspaper. Free speech for the newspaper has resulted in no expression for the blogger (and a warning from his employer).

Let's call the counter-argument the corporate perspective. This argues that employees have a contractual and professional responsibility to act in the best interests of the employer by, for example, not revealing confidential information. People dealing with matters considered to be of national security are governed by the Official Secrets Act; and most professionals and politicians struggle when personal conscience clashes with collective responsibility.

These questions have always existed. What's new is the ease in which personal publishing (blogging) can move from the private into the public sphere. What starts as a personal diary can end up being viewed as mass media. What lessons do we learn from this?

• Transparency requires that, in all but exceptional circumstances, blogs are stronger for coming from a named, identifiable source. The first place I turn to when visiting a new blog is the About page.
• The act of publishing means making something public. The rules have changed, though: 'publish then filter' means that most of what bloggers write remains effectively anonymous. But the advice has to be: 'Write with consideration. Your words may be read, even years from now.'
• Organisations need guidelines for employees on using social media. It's not a straightforward question of banning - or controlling - all engagement. Most organisations want to believe they operate as open, not closed, systems and many employees (certainly most knowledge workers) resent attempts at 'command and control'. It's not a narrow legal question; it's a broad matter of the mission and culture of the organisation and should be the domain of corporate public relations practitioners and advisers.

New theme: music and public relations

I've had some enquiries about running a music theme in Behind the Spin - so here's your chance to write about your favourite topic. We're a public relations magazine, remember, so here are some possible angles:

• Use of social media to promote music
• Festival promotion 
• PR careers in music 
• The decline of the hit and rise of the long tail (and what this means for the industry)
• Downloads, copyright and legal issues 
• Who's who in the music press
• The use of sound in public relations 
• The revival of radio 

Your ideas and articles are very welcome over the coming weeks. editor@behindthespin.com 
  

You only spin when you're winning

It's a potent criticism of public relations. That we shout loud when there's good news to tell, but go very quiet when there's nothing new to say. Kevin Moloney calls it 'hemispheric communications' because the PR sun only shines on one side of the globe.

There are new updates to Behind the Spin, focused around the themes of consultancy and technology (as well as the usual advice for students and graduates).

Our cover picture illustrates a PR consultancy in Second Life.

That was something worth shouting about in 2006; but what's happening now?

I can't blame the consultants for treating Second Life (and other social spaces) as a playground - nor even for shouting about this - since how else can they attract and advise clients?

But I'm left wondering what happened next.

News release revisited

I've been asked for some advice from a student on how she can improve her news release writing skills. (Obviously my twelve-week module on PR Writing at the start of the previous academic year had faded from memory).

I know that the traditional press release is discredited and that we should be willing to experiment with new forms. I prefer the term news release because this describes its essential ingredient. I also feel that the discipline of writing a 'story in a sentence' is useful even if the document gets discarded, and that a grounding in news values is important for PR students.

Here are my tips on news release writing:

• Ask yourself 'what's the story?'. Make sure that the story is focused on a matter of public interest or customer benefit - not just on the client's desire for publicity. No story, no news release. Does it meet the following test: 'is it new, or is it surprising?'

• To help you think about news, it describes an event so you should be able to answer the question 'what happened?' News is conventionally written in the past tense (eg 'launched', 'announced').

• Now write the story in a sentence using short words and dropping the adjectives (the descriptive words that can easily lead to hype such as 'revolutionary'). For style tips read the first sentence of any story in a newspaper - especially the tabloids.

• The rest of the document should elaborate on this sentence using the inverted pyramid principle (most important facts first, followed by next most important and so on).

• Always include a quotation: this is the next most important component as it should express a real opinion from a real person. Check and discuss this quotation with them and never resort to a statement starting with 'we're delighted...' That's not new, not surprising and won't be used, though it's opposite might gain you some attention. 'We're ashamed of our new product and apologise for introducing it...'

• Put the company puff in the notes or use a hyperlink. Don't clutter the news paragraph with a lengthy description of the client.

• The client will want to change much of the above, assuming the news release to be a form of placed adverisement. You have to earn your salary by advising them that without news there's no chance of publicity and that the news release is the start, not the end, of a process.

• Images are usually helpful, but don't automatically send large file attachments. Plain text is best (and a phone call first is usually better).

Challenging 'greed is good'

I often feel the debate on the professional status of PR misses the point when law or medicine are chosen for comparison. Public relations is a management discipline - and there's no formal profession guiding and governing general business managers either. (The argument has never been better crystallised than in a chapter heading in Morris and Goldsworthy's latest book on PR: 'Professional, but never a profession'.)

But what's this? Harvard MBA graduating students introducing a 'values agenda' and proposing they should work not only to maximise profit but 'serve the greater good'.

Youthful idealism or a timely new look at the purpose of business in the post-boom years? Or simply a tribute to the growing PR skills of tomorrow's managers?

Link via PROPenMic.

Wake up call to students and graduates

Perhaps you need grey hairs to know just how bad it is out there (I have lots of grey hairs). What's a graduate to do in these circumstances?

One ploy is to take what's offered and stick it out for at least a year (on the 'bird in the hand' principle). Another ploy would be to spend the next year gaining a postgraduate qualification, or travelling, or working voluntarily. Anything to differentiate your CV from the many others graduating in a recession.

What should a second year student do, faced with the option of a placement year or returning earlier to complete their studies? Take the placement year option. Here's the amazing thing: I hear there are more vacancies than there are students chasing these CV-building opportunties. I don't believe it!

I also hear there are opportunties at Publicasity in London (for a summer intern and for a graduate or year placement student); just as Wolfstar in Leeds is on the lookout for new talent. These two have something in common: they're looking for students with social media expertise.

All those wasted hours on Facebook and YouTube could prove to be your big career break. Only someone with grey hairs could think 'I don't believe it!'

How we learn: paddling pool or immersion?

Like many people involved in teaching, I like nothing more than learning something new myself. It's a pleasant bonus when the lesson comes from a student.

There's a lesson for me in the apparent contradiction in what one of our placement year students writes about how to learn about two areas of public relations practice.

On crisis communications, she writes: 'crisis is an area that you can only gain experience from when you are thrown in at the deep end'. Yet, on social media just a page later: 'I spoke to a lecturer regarding the lack of social media tuition at university and the opinion was that since we are of a younger generation ... we are assumed to already have this knowledge. This is not true and there is an academic gap that needs to be addressed.'

So, for one area of public relations it's 'learning by doing'; in another, it's 'back to the classroom'. This contradiction is the subject of a paper on 'teaching social media' I'm jointly presenting at the Stirling 21 conference in September, so this is a timely contribution.

What works when you want work?

Universities are producing record numbers of graduates just when the economy can no longer absorb them, it appears. The credit crunch will turn into a career crunch for some.

I don't have any easy answers to offer: I suspect that we're experiencing a shift from working for large organisations towards smaller players, from secure employment to more flexible arrangements. This can be painful for some, but open doors to others. Graduates, I feel, should be better equipped to respond to change and uncertainty than non-graduates. We'll see.

But help and advice has never been so available to those seeking work. Much of this advice can be summarised in two points:

• Network. This involves connecting with and meeting people, and not just on Facebook. Explore PROpenMic, the professional social network LinkedIn and join professional bodies like the UK's CIPR. Allie Osmar tells how her Mentorship Connection initiative led directly to a job offer for one person. Sadly, her career's taking off so the Mentorship Connection is no longer being supported.
• Stand out. This has always been a competitive industry and it's not getting any easier, so you need to be an outstanding candidate. Sometimes this involves paying attention to detail and doing the basics well. In a thoughtful essay, Harold Burson argues that 'writing quality has been diminishing for half a century at least' and that 'the young job seeker who demonstrates writing skills is immediately differentiated from others'. 

  UPDATE: Richard Edelman offers seven tips for graduate job seekers.

Desperately seeking symmetry

Every student of public relations learns about the 'two-way symmetrical model', considered to be the only excellent approach to public discourse by organisations. Though published 25 years ago (by US academics James Grunig and Todd Hunt) this model stands up remarkably well in an internet and social media age that prizes conversations and transparency.

I've just read a batch of essays stating that blogging exemplifies the two-way symmetrical model. Let's agree that blogging is (or should be) a two-way process. Readers can comment, they can continue the discussions on their own blogs through trackbacks and hyperlinks. But how is this symmetrical? A blog post always has more prominence than the comments; comments (particularly on corporate blogs) can be moderated and deleted. This is no more symmetrical than a newspaper that has a page for readers' letters and which prints occasional corrections (though rarely with the prominence of the original story).

If not blogging, then are there better examples of two-way symmetrical forms of social media? Conceptually, wikis are the most democratic form - since anyone (or any member of the community) can have equal rights to create and correct content. In reality, though, this is idealistic. Wikipedia (the most celebrated wiki of them all) has increasingly strong editorial controls and an army of volunteers policing changes and new content. So there's asymmetry here too. Besides, participation inequality (the 90-9-1 rule in Groundswell) suggests that very few members of any community are willing to do more than passively lurk - so we're back to one-way communications. Forget the conversations.

As for podcasts and videos, it's hard to argue that they're even two-way channels since they are products of editorial control (though the ease of creation and the way they are shared makes them a form of social media).

What about twitter? This is close to the ideal of unmediated voices in the public sphere (within the contstraints of 140 characters). Conversations can be joined and followed and there's apparent equality of voices because of the lack of editorial control. Clutter means we need filters, though, so Shirky's power laws still apply. Those with more followers have unequal conversational power.

Where are the social media examples of two-way symmetrical communications?

The bad-on-paper problem

You know about good-on-paper people? They tick all the boxes - on paper. In person, they can be disappointing to meet: there's just no chemistry.

Many public relations consultants are good-on-paper, I feel - perhaps because dating is such a good metaphor for the competitive pursuit of client relationships.

Most undergraduate students are the reverse of this. They're confident presenters and persuasive and personable individuals. It's just that they're bad-on-paper. When you come to read their essays you realise that inside that confident exterior lurk the thought processes and writing skills of a child.

Of course, it's easier to fix the bad-on-paper problem than the good-on-paper problem. Students have time on their side and need to be told when and why their written words let them down. The obvious fix for a good-on-paper consultant who's not winning new business is to be more modest - advice they're unlikely to heed in a recession.

The economics of news

I'm sure David Phillips will enjoy this (he's been defending the internet from the attacks of media pundits only today).

John Naughton's usual column is missing from today's print edition of The Observer. There's a small note to say it's available online instead (a suitable place, you might think, for a column about technology). I'm sure it was moved for reasons of space... until I read it. The column's about the problems facing the newspaper industry, including the issue of charging for content online and the difficulties even Rupert Murdoch will experience in moving to a paid-for model for online news.

Surely this can't have displeased the section editor? Will Naughton mind he's been exiled to cyberia?