global discussion. local perspectives.
By Sean Williams Who owns corporate messaging? This is navel gazing of the first order, and the fact that I’m writing this post is testament to how we can start arguments with all the seriousness of Lindsay Lohan’s newest brace of public shenanigans. Judy Gombita’s recent Social sniff test post skewers the idea that “everyone is an employee brand” advocate; its associated comments by some smart thinkers covers some, but not all, of this ground....
Some weighty conversations with subject experts: Debating employee engagement in a healthy corporate culture versus an amplified trend to “suggest” a program of socializing, whereby “employee brands” or “advocates” post marketing messages on their personal accounts (similar to native advertising). The communicative, socialized organization In December 2012, in my Access Byte column, I detailed what constituted a “communicative organization” (i.e., ones with a robust yet fluid structure), both externally and internally. I quoted Dave Gray,...
Recently I visited Black Creek Pioneer Village, a rather unique “recreated” village (it is described as an “outdoor living history museum”) harkening back to the 1860s, which has grown both in density and its rich “relating” of history in the approximately 50 years since its inception. As someone who holds a double-specialist undergraduate degree in English and History—and, more recently, as a proponent of the “organizational narrative“—it should be obvious why I have an affinity...
It’s a brand new world. Brand being the key word. Coke, Starbucks, Nike—they all want to sell you something. They always have. But today, brands are not just products and branding is not limited to marketing. In this feature [CBC Radio] documentary, Ira Basen takes us inside a burgeoning brand culture where people obsess about their personal brands, form “relationships” with brands on social media, look to them as legitimate vehicles of social and political...
By Jean Valin, APR, FCPRS and Daniel Tisch, APR, FCPRS The last few years have witnessed a variety of successful global efforts to build consensus amongst public relations professionals and academics on the profession’s role and value to organizations, as well as to society. The most recent process, the Melbourne Mandate, was co-created by some 1,000 people from 30 countries over the course of a year, and then unanimously adopted in November 2012 by more...
Evolving to corporate media It was almost a year ago that I interviewed Ira Basen on The intersection of public relations and journalism in the digital age on PR Conversations, a post that was quite popular and seemingly influential. For example, it was due to this late July 2012 interview that Ira Basen was invited a year later to be a keynote speaker at the CPRS Conversations2013 conference. In my most-recent Conversations Byte on Maximize...
In the last PR Conversations post, Toni Muzi Falconi presented a revised conceptual framework that proposed an organization should apply six generic principles of public relations within the operative context of six infrastructural characteristics to determine specific applications. The paradigm was subsequently developed with input from Rob Wakefield from Brigham Young University (the first scholar to theorize the paradigm a couple of decades ago), and Jim Grunig, who originated the Public Relations Excellence study in...
The PRoust Questionnaire provides a quick insight into a public relations practitioner’s interests and point of view, as well as his or her professional beliefs and values. If you are not familiar with the original 19th-century Proust Questionnaire, please see details at the end of this post. PRoust Questionnaire answers from Sean Williams: 1. What is your most striking characteristic as a PR practitioner? My analytical, academic and rather intellectual approach to internal communication...
This post offers a video recording of a recent lecture given by Larissa and James Grunig at New York University – courtesy of Toni Muzi Falconi, who kindly introduces the video below. In addition, Heather Yaxley provides a brief overview of the highlights of the lecture. We extend our thanks to James, Larissa and Toni for offering the video to PR Conversations. Introduction by Toni Muzi Falconi A few years ago, PR Conversations published...
I’ve yet to come across Constance Hope in any public relations textbook – perhaps not surprising as women are largely missing from the history. Indeed, apart from Doris Fleischman, I am unaware of any female voices writing about early experiences of the practice in the US; and Fleischman’s contribution inevitably is linked to her husband Edward Bernays. So exactly who was Constance Hope and why should we care about her story? Well she authored a...