global discussion. local perspectives.
In January 2009, King Report III will appear in South Africa, having been written by a committee of 90 members. One of them is Estelle de Beer from the University of Pretoria. If you are wondering what a PR academic is doing on this Committee, it might just be because Estelle is doing her doctoral thesis on Corporate Governance, Sustainability and Strategy.
I should warn readers in advance that this column is going to be a bit of a rant because I am very frustrated by many of my peers. If you ask people why they join a communications/PR association, many of the top answers include networking (usually number 1), career development and following best practice. Yet the majority of people do not attend events, never proactively contact another member and don’t even tap into the online...
On August 15th my quarterly copy of The Public Relations Strategist (published by the Public Relations Society of America) arrived. The Summer 2008 edition’s cover highlighted the feature article, “Where PR Belongs: A Move at Chrysler Spurs Debate.” The provocative title drew me in, so I literally dropped everything (but the magazine) to have a read. Although Chris Cobb’s article focuses on changes to the reporting structure at the US-based auto giant (a company that...
In a manual written for his students in 2005, Emanuele Invernizzi (Professor of Corporate Communication at IULM University in Milan and co-organiser of the 2008 Euprera Conference to take place in Milan) distinguished between the concepts of ‘core’ and ‘extended’ public relations competencies. He regards ‘core’ competencies as media relations, public affairs, organisation of corporate events and ceremonials while ‘extended’ competencies, in addition to the above, includes planned support to other functions (e.g. human resources, finance,...
In 2004, the Dutch scholar Prof Betteke Van Ruler referred to PR professionals as being ‘from Venus’ while PR scholars are ‘from Mars.’ UK academics Fawkes and Tench found traces of anti-intellectualism amongst PR practitioners/employers in their recent research study. An editorial by Wood in a leading academic publication in the UK, ‘Journal of Communication Management’, challenges academics to communicate their research more effectively rather than “languishing comfortably in an ivory tower.”
As suggested by Prof Emanuele Invernizzi, co-organizer of the Euprera Congress taking place in Milan 16-18 October, I listened to his interviews with a number of academics and practitioners on the Congress website on the topic of the ‘Institutionalisation of Public Relations’. Both Prof Betteke van Ruler from the Netherlands and Prof Anne Gregory from the UK emphasised the importance of the educational role of PR. This was one of the four PR roles/dimensions identified...
In not many weeks some of us (scholars and professionals) will be in Milano participating at the Euprera annual Congress, which this year (October 16/17) is dedicated to the institutionalization of public relations. Although there will be a relevant but small segment of participants from other areas of the world, it is reasonable to expect that most will be European, and therefore are likely to transfer European perspectives. This is one good reason to review...
In a comment to my last post, PRC reader and frequent commenter, Brandon Carlos, indicated his frustration at the apparent dearth of Canadian resources, "Another lagging area in Canadian PR, Judy, is in the educational text arena. As a recent grad, I can attest to the atrocious selection of Canadian-focused PR texts. In a country with a population base spread across such a vast land area, you would think that nowhere other than Canada would PR be such a necessity."
I am not an advertising agent, but a storyteller. This statement concludes a splendid article by Gugliemo Emanuel, correspondent from London of the Italian daily Corriere della Sera…dated December 1 1909 (yes! one hundred years ago..), significantly titled BUM!
I am not an advertising agent, but a storyteller. This statement concludes a splendid article by Gugliemo Emanuel, correspondent from London of the Italian daily Corriere della Sera…dated December 1 1909 (yes! one hundred years ago..), significantly titled BUM!