Environment matters!

Chapter 7- Public Relations Management in Organizations

In today's reading there were plenty of things relating to the environment and this was something i found interesting. I am a person that believes that the earth's survival is the responsibility of humans and that is why i thought this chapter was one that i could relate to and understand about. Moreover, the chapter explains about using systems as a way to help resolve public relations problems and of course the environment is one of them. So here goes :D

As more and more people are becoming concerned with the environment, people expect businesses to stand up and commit themselves to tackle the issues that pose a threat to the environment. Communities and stakeholders have high expectations and therefore, businesses need to consider the impact an operation may have on the environment.

A PR professional knows that issues concerning the environment can potentially affect the health of the organization. Experts believe that the time is up for businesses to sit around and do nothing and that action has to be taken now. Therefore, a PR professional has the responsibility to identify and understand the needs and expectations of the organization's environment such as those relating to climate change and by understanding such causes, they need to be able to create appropriate responses or action.

After reading, the introduction of the chapter, i realized that a lot of things mentioned were true. People are becoming more concerned but there was still the lack of action to tackle the effects of global warming. I also think that organizations play an important part because they are one of the factors that greatly impact the environment.

So moving on, how do corporations adjust to problems, such as being environmentally friendly? Apparently, the answer to this is understanding systems. Once we understand systems, we will be able to identify, analyze, and resolve public relations problems. However, after reading what may be a whole bunch of things relating to what is a system and the types of systems, i still found it very hard to grasp the true understanding of it.

The things i did manage to understand was open and closed systems. Closed systems were those that isolated themselves from the environment and other systems. This form of organization may follow the regulations and procedures but they are unlikely to interact with the public. They tend to have a one-way communication perspective as they do not consider the public. When issues or crisis occur, the PR in this firm are more likely to deny anything to happen and cover-up the incident.

The other form is open systems. From what i have read, open systems are view their environment as an important factor to survival. Open systems will continually seek information from their environment and will respond to any pressure or issue that may affect the survival of the organization. The organizations using this system knows that two-way communication is important. Therefore, organizations not only need to listen to public opinion, but also to build relationships with stakeholders and key organizations within their environment.

The chapter also mentions how PR is important to fields of an organization. PRs must have links and communication between other departments of the organization and these include, marketing, legal and human resources. At times, these three main departments compete with the PR department for resources from the organization.

The Practice

Chapter 6- Public Relations Practice

Today, i found out that contemporary PR practitioners require more than just one skill. In fact they need to be multi-skilled. Organizations rely heavily on PRs because these people help achieve organization goals. As we all know it is difficult for an organization today because they are faced with pressure all the time. That is why PR is crucial for an organization. PR practitioners are the ones to find solutions to problems, to changes, to build relationship with the public, create dialogue, improve organization image, manage issue and improve awareness and understanding of the organization. With all this to do, they also have to understand what is ethical or unethical and find appropriate ways to help the organization in a way that does not negatively affect the public. With all the responsibility that is required in a PR job, being a PR practitioner is definitely no easy job.

So what really is ethical or unethical you might wonder. The readings provided an interesting title, "Our actions are guided by our values". People all around the world have different interpretations to things, observe things in ways that aren't the same and predict upcoming events in different perspectives. The fact is, everyone grew up in different communities, experiences, schooling, family and religion and these factors affect the way values are established in an individual.

There are many types of organization a Public Relations practitioner can work in. The first is the non-profit-sector and these include organizations such as Red Cross and World Vision. PR's working under Non-profit forms need to be skilled in various fields. However, there is a limitation in working in a non-profit company as there is usually a lack of governance and accountability. People give money to help and assist victims, but at many of the times there have been cases where the money that they give do not reach the victims at all.

Another type of organization to work in is the corporate sector. The corporate sector is mainly existing to provide returns for its stakeholders and their main priority is to ensure the future viability and ongoing profitability of the business. The PR's working in this field has the role of facilitating the business through relationship management, support the achievements and corporate goals and to be able to contribute in enhancing the corporate reputation.

The third form is the public sector. The PR's working under this sector has the role to deliver government messages about programs, services and initiatives to the general public. They give the community information that people need to know about. These things include, drink driving and quit smoking campaigns. Public relations in this field also have the role to portray the government in a positive light as they are working for the government.

The final form of organization is the consultancy. Consultancies generally work as individual businesses. They make income by providing PR services to clients and by satisfying their client's needs. Consultancies are competing against other consultancies to gain business and therefore, the more knowledge and skills, the better chance for the consultancy to be more successful against its rivals.

Organizations need to be aware of their community connections and basically, why they want to deliver to the public. Organizations need to build strong relationships and connections that outline their values and principles. Every corporation has its own approach on community connections. For instance, BHP Billiton's approach is: "Critical to our long-term success is our ability to build relationships and work in a collaborative and transparent way with business partners, governments, non-government organizations and host communities. Wherever we operate, we commit to engaging regularly, openly, honestly with people interested in and affected by our operations."

Research. Research and more Research.

Chapter 5- Public Relations Research

Finally, i have started to do my blogs again! Busy with tonnes of weekly assignment and now i have to catch up..lets see..5 weeks worth of readings XD

Already after reading the introduction i am faced with many reasons why research in an important factor in PR. No doubt though, research is important in basically anything we wish to do....well nearly everything. I mean when we get assignments, we research. Before we buy things, we basically ask around and look online to check whether the product is good or not. Thats researching too. As for PR research is vital because every step we take in PR requires us to research. That is fact finding, opinion assessment, message testing, planning, execution, and evaluation. Research helps people to back up findings, to find out new things, and to get a better understanding of things.

According to the book, An Introduction to Public Relations: From Theory to Practice, there are in fact three steps towards thinking like a public relations professional and this includes research BIG TIME!

Step 1-

This requires the person to be able to understand the problem, issue or opportunity. Here we need to ask whether what the overall context is and what type of extra information is required to help develop a good program.

Step 2-

Here research questions need to be framed. In this step we need to know what to find out, what the objective research is, the questions required to help get the information and thinking how to frame the question in a way to get useful material and data.

Step 3-

The final stage is designing the research activity and this involves asking where, or from whom the information and answers can be found. It also involves knowing what must be done to get the information and what can be done after receiving the information.

There are many ways a research can be carried out by a PR executive and these research methods can be particularly helpful and useful to understand things. Two main form of research methods are quantitative and qualitative methods. Each has its own strengths and weaknesses as each is focused to do different things.

Qualitative is in depth research that answers the question "why" and gives the researcher an understanding of how things take place in such a way. It also can be used to go through a wide range of topics and to test people's reactions and responses. Qualitative methods can be conducted by one-to-one interviews or even focus groups, which includes a small group of people to participate in an interview together.

Quantitative on the other hand, is answering "what". Quantitative usually gives numbers and statistics. Quantitative allows the overall feedback of the population, as it gets a big number of people to do the research. Quantitative methods are usually closed ended which gives no room for additional answers to why the result takes place in such a way. One way to do this is quantitative research which is by conducting surveys.

However, there is one other form of method which includes the usage of both quantitative and qualitative methods. This is known as "triangulation". For instance, in a research to understand "smoking habits", quantitative method such as surveys can be created to get a number on how many people smoke in a suburb, while qualitative method such as focus groups can help understand why these people take on smoking. Not only does triangulation help receive proper statistics, it gives a further understanding to what the researcher wants to find out.

After reading on, the chapter helped me to recognize the importance of making sure the information is reliable and relevant. Research should be only carried out if there is a good possibility that the results are to be accurate. There are also things to consider when gathering information such as if the information is primary or secondary sources. Primary sources are research data that are generated by the researchers themselves. On the other hand, secondary sources include sources that have been gathered by other people.

Another thing to take note is that research methods have ow become more advanced as there are new research tools that are being developed all the time. Technology has given the opportunity for researchers to do their research at a a faster rate and low cost. Examples are online surveys, hotline on specific issues, blogs as a qualitative research tool and online databases.

Compared with traditional research methods, people are more keen to undergo new research methods as they can do it anytime and at a time that is convenient for them. People tend to reject surveys that are asked on the street because they don't have the time or patience to spend time answering questions on the street.

After further reading, i also found factors that restrict Public Relations research. One of the main issues is budgets. Often research can be costly, in both measures of money and time. The response on limited budgeting at times is by doing the research only once. The problem is that things usually evolve and change and therefore, something can be missed. If a researcher really wants accurate results, there needs to be ongoing research so that up-to-date information is at hand.

At times, companies may put research as a low priority, because they may feel that the research is not necessary. A company may feel, "Yes it is good to have research" but "No, it may not be necessary". The fact that the company feels this way may also mean that the person who wants to conduct the research did not make a convincing argument for the research to go on.

In other occasions, research is not conducted because there is just not enough time to do so. For a research to happen, there needs to be enough time and money. Allocating the right time and budget is crucial because a research cannot not be done rushed.

When your'e a PR

Chapter 1-Understanding the Twenty-First Century

This is actually chapter 1 and which i was suppose to blog about 39725 million years ago, but couldn't because i had no book then XD Well im going to catch up now and i think most of what i blog about will be relatively the basic about public relations and its connection to the 21st century.

So in order to understand the true essence of what public relations is we need to understand its origins and in particularly these two subjects: publics and stakeholders. According to the book," public is a group of people who share a common interests or values in particular situation- especially interests and values that might be willing to act upon". When a public has relationship with the organization, the public is called stakeholder, meaning that it has a stake in your organization or an issue potentially involving your organization."

There various roles a public relations person plays in an organization. Some of these roles include, internal communication management. This means public relations people are in charge of managing organizational blogs, websites and bulletins as well as, working with HR and management and being informed in all aspects of an organization. They are also the key people to develop media relations and are the ones to provide company media to the public.

Another component of their job is external networking and multifaceted communication, relationship building. PRs are generally in charge of website and blogs and in this charge they must provide communication and information. PRs also are the ones who will go out and meet community leaders and stakeholders when celebrating organization success or community functions. They also have to promote corporate social responsibility with partnerships and other organizations and also promote and find publicity for the organization.

An important component is also issues/crisis management, reputation and brand management. This is a very important job for PRs because they have to constantly monitor the public and observe the issues and see whether any of it can impact the organization. Moreover, PRs are the leading people when a crisis hits an organization. They will have to quickly think of a way that will do less damage to the company reputation.

Research is also another component for public relations. As one of the blogs i wrote on research, it it an important aspect for PRs. PRs need to conduct research before initiating campaigns and events. It is utterly important because the amount of precise research done will determine whether the campaign or event is successful.

I have an issue.

Chapter 10- An Issues-Crisis Perspective

All over the world there are issues that affect not only an individual or an organization, but the whole world. Such issues include global warming, terrorism, species extinction, diseases and viruses such as HIV, natural disasters, racial discrimination and so forth. The public will have strong opinions on these issues and when there is a large number of people working towards an issue, they can often bring about change.

It is important for an organization to recognize the issues that the public is concerned with because how they handle their practices may reflect their reputation and credibility. Public Relations play an important role when managing crisis and events because they are interlinking with the media, which will present and portray the news to the public in a particular way.

Crisis as explained in the text is a highly uncertain event with causes and effects that are unknown. If a crisis is major and it occurs with potentially negative outcomes, it will affect the organization as well as the publics, products and services and its reputation. A crisis needs to be managed carefully.

The main difference between issue and crisis is that issues arise when there is a gap between what a company does and the key expectations the public has for the company. Crisis however, are unpredictable.

A PR person needs to be able to manage issues. They need to identify and understand trends and concerns that is likely to affect the organization and its key publics. What the PR needs to do is able to meet public expectations or even better, to exceed it.

Ethics revolving around us

Chapter 4- Public Relations Ethics

Today's lecture was all about OCD and no, it is not Obsessive Compulsive Disorder but stands for Organizing Chaos Daily, a service that provides its clients a way to handle clutter with an organized system. I found the name of the service very tactful as it is a name no one is likely to forget and organizing is already a part of being OCD in medical terms! So the lecture this morning was basically a guide to the major assignment we were given. OCD was our client and we are to be the potential PR to help the service provider build its

Besides the lecture, i did some reading on Chapter 4- Public Relations Ethics.
In this chapter, there were various key factors that are important to understand. Firstly, we must ask ourselves, what is ethics and what it means to be ethical.

So to answer the first question, we must understand that ethics is everywhere. There are both personal ethics and even more so professional ethics, such as for doctors, teachers, journalists, PR practitioners and so on. In basic terms, ethics is a standard of behaviour, on how our behaviours, as individuals and organizations, can affect the wellbeing of the society. These ethics involve morals and values, which have be instilled ever since a person was young. For example, a basic ethic for an individual that was instilled at a young age is "Don't lie and always tell the truth". These morals and values were instilled by our family, education, culture, religion, reference groups, experience and many more. Therefore, it is also likely that not everyone's ethics, morals and values will be the same.

Thus, after understanding what ethics are we need to consider how a person can be ethical and how at times being ethical is difficult. Howard and Matthews explain that ethical is obvious and natural and therefore choosing ethical behaviours should be "as normal and as unconscious as shaking hands". However, in my opinion, it is not easy to be ethical nowadays, especially in a world full of hurdles. There are now more ethical issues that many people are choosing to ignore and it is simply not "as normal and as unconscious as shaking hands".

We have encountered many unethical behaviours from professionals in like forever. Teachers having relationships with their students, doctors having relationships with their patients, journalists ignoring a person's privacy and so on. A PR practitioner also has its own history of crossing the lines of being ethical. The case study we did on plastic surgery advertising and how it is against the law to do so. However, even if it is against the law and unethical to do so, the PR agent managed to use the media to get media coverage. No, they did not go against the law because they 'used' the media and the media made it easy to be made use of, but, yes it was unethical.

Another particular aspect i learned was the convention of dividing ethics theory, which was put into three groups- virtue, deontology and consequentialism.

Larry Temkin gives an insightful summary on what each of the three are.

The first is the virtue ethics, which asks the question, "what kind of person ought i be". This is as i mentioned above, leans more on personal ethics. It is how a person builds their own values and morals. Even more so, to attain virtue ethics, a person must think for themselves and consider what type of person they want to be and behave.

The second is deontology and this asks the question, "what are my duties?". This form of ethics revolved mainly around the writings of German philosopher Immanuel Kant who believed that ethics were formed under rules for good behaviour. This would include rules from the bible "The 10 commandment" or codes of conduct from every professional and the most important one, the law itself.

The third and final form of ethic is consequentialism, which asks the question, "how ought the world be?". This for me was the hardest of the three type of ethics to understand. The method for this is to understand two terms: reversibility and universibility. Reversibility is by pretending and placing ourselves in the shoes of the public that will be affected by the actions we are about to execute. Then you think if these actions are acceptable or will they hurt the public in anyway. Universibility on the other hand, is asking whether the action you are about to undertake will make the people working for the firm and the people that you are working for happy.

The importance of a BLOG and the power of people.

Chapter 3- Theoretical Concept

This weeks lecture i learnt quite a number of interesting information such as the power of blogs and people and why a PR person needs to understand these factors.

As we all know the modern world we live in now revolves itself along side high-tech technology and more importantly the internet. The internet is a powerful form of media that has both its pros and cons. It has a wide range and diverse audience that use it various ways for their own personal interests. Facebooking, chatting, gaming, researching, youtubing, you name it and its there. However, one of the most strongest forms of such alternative media formed is blogging.

Nowadays, its hip to have a personal blog and to be able to tell the audience what one has done in the day, week, month. The thing is it doesn't seem to sound interesting- reading other people's thoughts, feelings, opinions and so on, but it is. People read blogs not only to find out and be entertained by what a person has done in their day but also because they want to find out information on new products and critics on food, movies etc.

Thus, blogs influence a way a person may form ideas about a product. Its like word of mouth online. Moreover, because of the power of the internet and because the power it has given to blogs, the power has now gone to the hands of the people. Remember one opinion can be carried and viewed by a large audience and that is why PRs need to be aware of this power.

Another interesting knowledge i gained from this weeks lecture is that the new generation of audience need to be reached in a more comprehensive way. Reaching them only through the mass media is now impossible. Thus, PR people need to be able to also understand the importance of experimental marketing and the impact it has on people.

Experimental marketing was derived from Confucius a Chinese philosopher who said, "Tell me and i'll forget, Show me and i may remember, Involve me and i'll understand." This form of marketing creates a connection between the consumer and the product in a memorable way. Example is when promoting Wii and allowing people to play the game and test it out.

Apart from the lecture, i read Chapter 3- Theoretical Concept (Silson, D.M). There were actually plenty of note worthy information, but there were unfortunately some parts i could not particularly understand. However, i did learn various things and will write about those that interested me the most.

Firstly, there were many theories involved in PR. There is the Systems theory, Cybernetics, Boundary spanning and a concept called the Requisite variety. Out of the three, systems theory was the most dominantly referred to in PR. However, i found Requisite variety to be the one that interested me the most. This concept was developed by W Roland Ashby and was further applied to organizational studies by Karl Weick. Basically, the theory suggests that with more diversity opinions from employees, an organization will be more prepared to withstand the effects of change that it may be confronted with.

This is because, with more voices, opinions and values, the company will be able to acquire more ideas and information than that with a company consisting of the same people with the same attitudes. The advantage of this concept is that it avoids groupthink which is exactly what i just mentioned- same people = same attitude and opinions which may not help a company to perform better and improve or see its faults.

Additionally, there are various communication theories and the ones i were most able to understand and find appealing was agenda setting and framing.

Agenda setting was developed by Donald Shaw and Maxwell McCombs who asserted that the media shaped our realities. In addition to this, they state that the mass media 'may not be successful in telling us what to think, but they are stunningly successful in telling us what to think about'.

Framing on the other hand refers to how individuals organize and place information in the mass media and how in return it affects the way we construct our realities. In public relations, it is important to place information consciously for the organization. PRs need to think about what information should be placed, what not to be placed and what is important to be placed. Not only that in the previous lecture, we learnt that PR's need to be able to think of different angles and choose ones that fit the context to which the story is for and one that is interesting and that may be appealing to the target audience. For instance, in a men's magazine, you are not going to place information about flowers in general. Instead you have to find a way to intrigue men readers towards the topic flowers, like what giving flowers to woman can do.