Tag: journalists

If We Had a ‘Meet the PR Pro’ Panel for Journalists

~ penningink ~ Leave a comment

Local chapters of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) frequently have “meet the media” panels as a feature of monthly programming. In these informative sessions, local journalists representing print, TV, radio and online media outlets share the type of news they cover, how they cover it, the best way to reach and pitch them, and more.

These are helpful sessions, especially for younger public relations professionals.

But I have often wondered why we can’t reciprocate—why can’t we invite an audience of journalists to hear a panel of PR professionals? Because there are a lot of misperceptions among journalists about what PR is and how PR professionals do their jobs. 

 Here are some points that could be made to an assembly of reporters:

  • Media relations and pitching stories to journalists is a small part of what PR people do. While some PR people may  focus on that role, such as media relations managers or public information officers (PIOs), some PR people do very little or no media relations. 
  • News releases and pitches are just one tactic PR people use. PR is about building mutual relationships with multiple publics, and all forms of communication are used by professionals. These can include paid advertising, organizational media such as newsletters, annual reports, brochures and more, or the vast array of digital media including email campaigns and social media and wed sites. Most PR people have a number of ways to directly and effectively reach internal and external publics. Journalists come into play occasionally.
  • Where journalists sometimes feel outnumbered by PR professionals pitching them far more stories than they could ever do, PR people feel outnumbered by journalists asking for comments, interviews and information for stories the PR person may not have initiated. A news conference can help add efficiency in such cases, but with breaking news a PR pro may have to make multiple callbacks to journalists even as they are dealing with questions from a client or CEO, planning an investor conference call, working a community relations meeting, attempting to meet a deadline for internal communication and more.
  • While journalists sometimes complain of PR people pitching things that are not even newsworthy, PR people complain of some journalists doing stories that are more market-driven (ie good for ratings) than newsworthy, or they cover stories in a way that is sensationalistic as opposed to objective reporting. 
  • Journalists may feel annoyed by PR people interrupting them with pitches, but should keep in mind that it is often only through a PR person that a journalist is aware of some news or gets access to an interview with a well-informed source. Often such high-profile individuals have to be convinced to even do an interview since they feel too busy for journalists. PR people also offer media training so that executives give clear, concise, factual and compelling interviews that provide key information as well as those all important quotes, SOTs and actualities. 
  • Journalists should be careful who they call PR people. Just as not every rogue blogger is an actual journalist, there are numerous people out there who pitch stories who have no degree in PR, much less accreditation (APR) or even a job title that is public relations. Don’t judge a whole profession by a few imposters or bad actors. In fact, in the history of White House press secretaries, only one or two was actually a PR person. Most come from politics. The same lack of PR pedigrees is common in corporate and nonprofit settings as well.
  • Legitimate PR people are inherently ethical. They bristle at the notion of “spin” and deception. College PR programs stress the big picture and ethical practice of PR. Advocacy for an organization and persuasion if done honestly is not “spin” or “putting an organization in a positive light.” It is professional representation of a voice and perspective that has a legitimate right to be heard in the “marketplace of ideas.”
  • Finally, the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of the “press” is not actually about journalism. It is about all citizens being able to print (ie on a printing press) and distribute information, and today that applies to other communication technologies. PR and advertising professionals are afforded the same rights as journalists in this regard.

These are just a few comments that could come up at a panel for journalists to understand public relations and those who practice it, as well as how it should be practiced professionally. There are many productive journalist-PR pro relationships, and they usually involve a healthy mutual understanding of each other’s job.

Defining PR a Challenge Amid Dishonest Media Cultivation

~ penningink ~ Leave a comment

It happened again. A major PR association set out to define “public relations”, and the media responded by calling the profession “spin.”

This is getting old.

But to get up to date on the current matter, here’s a rundown. The Council of PR Firms has rebranded itself and in so doing taken it upon itself to re-brand the entire public relations industry. You can see more about this effort in their “manifesto.” (I immediately cringe when they position public relations within marketing, but that’s the subject of another post).

 This follows on the tails of PRSA’s work to come up with a new common definition of public relations in 2012. The resulting definition pleased some but critics remain.

But, as always, the news media covering the PR industry couldn’t resist resorting to diminishing the effort with smug references to PR as “spin.” Witness the effort of New York Times scribe Stuart Elliott, whose column is touted as about advertising, but he lumps public relations within it, thus broadcasting some professional ignorance or at least courtesy as to what public relations people actually do.

Industry trade PR Week took on Elliott and the Times directly with a commentary by editor Steve Barrett. I appreciate the effort and agree with the perspective. But this won’t be the end of it.

In a paper I wrote in 2008 for the Journal of Communication Management (“First Impressions: Media Portrayals of Public Relations in the 1920s”), I point out how the media persistently refused to give a complete view of the profession in the decade it was first commonly called “public relations.” Pioneers from Edward Bernays, Ivy Lee, Arthur Page and others argued and demonstrated that public relations work was already evolving to be more than publicity and was about honest relationships with multiple publics on behalf of organizations. Time Magazine and Editor & Publisher were wickedly scathing in their assessment of the “new” profession of PR, hypocritically resorting to subjective commentary over objective reporting.

So this latest kerfluffle with the Council of PR Firms and the New York Times take on their efforts is more of the same.

I know Stuart Elliott. He graciously came to speak at Grand Valley State University at my invitation in 2003 when our School of Communications celebrated its 20th anniversary. He was a delight to spend a few days with, and he enjoyed seeing neighborhoods of Grand Rapids as I drove him to and from a TV interview about the history and future of advertising, the subject of his speech to us. It may have gone so well because, ahem, the New York Times PR office assisted in the trip.

But I wonder if his resorting to casting PR as “spin” in his recent article is the tired habit of trying to find an engaging lead over an honest and balanced report. Or kit could be laziness in falling on a cliche or stereotype rather than really listen to the subjects of the story and report it, even if it means interviewing several sources in the field to show a balanced perspective. I worry that Elliott lets his opinion out, and his opinion is not well formed, as evidence by some passages in his article that assert attempts to influence are at odds with transparency and honesty. I would love to ask his opinion of newspaper editorials.

None of this is to say that PR should be without criticism. There are, as in any profession, bad apples who should be called out for bad practice. But journalists should not over-generalize or stereotype entire professions. A little reporting might actually reveal, as I’ve noted previously, that some of the worst offenders with regard to unethical PR practice come from journalism, or are non-PR people doing PR, or have no education in PR.

But no, this media cultivation and framing of PR by journalists will likely continue. The hope comes in that many journalists, especially when you get out of the biased bi-coastal media centers, have more full and productive relationships with PR professionals. Witness a recent event sponsored by the West Michigan Chapter of PRSA in which morning news producers or anchors from all four area network affiliates stressed their need for help discovering content for their programs.

In the end, I think it best that PR people don’t get too morose about select examples of journalists putting forth opinions of our field as if factual. They over-generalize PR people, let’s not as PR people over-generalize journalists.

I am launching a study about this next semester. I’ll be working with an undergraduate honors student looking at journalists’ opinions about news releases and pitches they receive and associating their assessment of them as helpful or annoying and looking for variance based on the sender’s PR credentials, actual job function and other factors.

I can’t wait to report the honest results.

Assets Laid-Off Journalists Can Leverage for PR Jobs

~ penningink ~ 2 Comments

It’s a common expression in business to talk about “leveraging assets.” That’s just the way people in pinstripes talk about taking advantage of skills and resources to achieve your objective.
I’ve been talking to a number of laid-off, outsourced, terminated, bought-out journalists over the past few months who are looking to transition to a new job. Many of them are understandably upset, because they have spent 20-30 years acquiring skills that don’t seem valued in an industry that is collapsing under their feet.
But those skills aren’t entirely irrelevant. There’s no doubt that journalism is adapting radically to respond to the confluence of changes in technology, culture, and economics (see Steve Rubel’s “Clip Report”for a nice overview of the emerging news media landscape. But that doesn’t mean “old-school” journalism skills are irrelevant. It just means they’ll be applied in different ways, across different platforms, and for different organizations, even those outside of journalism.
Public relations has been a refuge for former journalists for centuries. In fact, in 1926 Editor & Publisher decried the number of journalism school graduates going directly into “this new field called public relations.” Many have debated whether journalists can make the transition to PR. Some joke that they have to “sell their soul” to go to “the dark side.” But this merely shows a misunderstanding of what PR really is, and that there are different types of PR jobs out there, based on different models of PR practice.
Journalists can make the easiest transition to the type of PR known as “public information”. Public Information Officers (PIOs) often work for a government agency or state university, and the job involves disseminating objective information, primarily one-way. That’s not too dissimilar from what a journalist does. A recent example would be Ed Golder, former editorial page editor of the Grand Rapids Press, who is now the PIO at the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. 
Journalists may struggle a bit more to work in PR roles known as “two-way symmetrical” or “two-way asymmetrical.” The former involves listening and engaging with publics in dialogue and advising management to adapt to public concerns. The latter is still two-way but more driven to be persuasive in ensuring the organizational goals are met. This can be more of a challenging transition for journalists used to writing objective information and distributing it one-way (although editorial writers have an edge here). An advanced degree in PR or organizational communication, or at least attending local chapter meetings of the Public Relations Society of America, could be helpful to make the transition.
But there are base skills that good journalists have that they can leverage for PR jobs, especially since the landscape for PR in corporate, nonprofit and government institutions is changing for the same reasons, social media and otherwise, that journalism is changing. Those skills include:
  •    Writing. This sounds fundamental, and it is. But a common complaint I hear from employers is the lack of writing skills among the work force. Even the most brilliant strategy or communication plan can fail if it’s not well articulated.
  • Storytelling versus catalog copy. Consumers and other publics these days need to be “engaged,” not just informed. Journalists who are experienced in writing more than meeting reports but getting to the essence of a story and stressing its relevance can be an asset in PR. Those reporters who have been active on Twitter and Facebook and other social platforms, building their own brand as well as their media outlet’s, are a step ahead here as well.
  • Reporting. Reporting is more than asking questions. It’s knowing what to ask, who to ask, processing the information quickly and re-presenting it in a way that is accurate, clear, understandable and compelling. A reporter transitioning into PR can be a “quick study” in learning the organization quickly and well enough to represent it to the public. They just have to remember they are no longer a reporter but actually have to keep organizational objectives in mind.
  • Multi-media. Print reporters who also did page layout, photography, or video for a newspapers web site—not to mention former broadcast reporters—bring an increasingly valuable tactical skill to organizations. “Every organization must be a media organization” is a common mantra as corporations, nonprofits and government offices have their own blogs, YouTube channels and other online and social platforms requiring more than simple text.

Former journalists have other options besides working in public relations for an organization. One is to continue to be a journalist. The radical changes in news media are demonstrating that it is not necessary to work only for a traditional newspaper or TV station. Citizen media like the Rapidian and online media like RapidGrowth continue to grow. As mainstream media are diminished, the opportunities for these alternative, online-only media outlets may grow.
Another likely option is to be a journalistic entrepreneur. This is more than the old notion of being a freelancer. Journalists could be self-employed and provide content for a variety of news media and other organizations. While newspapers are diminishing, the online media environment has a burgeoning number of outlets. Add to that the nonprofits and companies and gov
ernment departments that need to feed the content beast, and a good journalist could stay comfortably busy. This will be even more true as the demand for quality versus quantity of information naturally rises as the public is overwhelmed and seeks credible, timely and relevant information.
Who knows—a group of former journalists could even start their own agency, not unlike Editors at Large, formed by former Grand Rapids Magazine editor John Brosky years ago, or the Wordsmiths whose staff has changed over the years but the agency continues today. They could even start a new news media outlet–either broad based or niche focused by audience or subject–to compete with the one that laid them off.