This week in PR (20 March)

News in brief

Clearer messaging, empathy reassurance and leadership from the UK’s supermarkets than its government this morning. #pr #comms #crisiscomms pic.twitter.com/SUtzhCKO9L

— Maja Pawinska Sims (@SparklyPinchy) March 15, 2020

• Coronavirus (COVID-19): The CIPR has an information, support and advice page; the PRCA plans to launch a Global Covid-19 Public Communications Taskforce; IC Kollectif has collated A helpful list of resources for communication professionals.
• In other news, the government has delayed the introduction of IR35 employment rules affecting many freelance contractors in the private sector, putting it back to April 2021.
• Conferences: The International History of Public Relations Conference has been cancelled. The plan is to hold it next year in Boston, MA.
• OK Mentor: Georgia Rudkin of MHP is involved in this new mentoring scheme open to young women looking to enter the creative industries. Georgia writes: ‘The idea of the programme is to teach ‘board level’ skills from a much earlier age.  The line-up of mentors is amazing and we’re keen to expand the list to include senior PR professionals too.’

"Keep Calm and Wash Your Hands" – Vintage handwashing propaganda posters between the 1920s and 1940s. https://t.co/0lN7gKgPdU #COVID19 #Coronavirus #Propaganda pic.twitter.com/6qFEuMNYr5

— Michael Greer (@MGreer_PR) March 16, 2020

Coronavirus comms

We have created a little site to help people ask for and offer help to their neighbours during the #COVID19 outbreak. https://t.co/JK0xwwEvj3 – please take a goosey, share or even register if you’re looking to help (or be helped) locally. It’s a WIP, so don’t judge.

— Alex Myers (@AlexMyers) March 19, 2020

• Alex Malouf: Public Relations and the Coronavirus – How will we be impacted? (20 March)
  ‘If you’re working as a crisis communications consultant, you should have already had dozens of requests coming in for support (my general view of crisis comms is if you’re asking for help during a crisis, then it’s usually too late).’
• Rebecca Roberts: Uncertain times and the impact on young people – free resources to help us all (18 March)
  ‘The biggest inequality when it comes to wellbeing in the UK however is socioeconomic – i.e. those children and young people from lower socioeconomic groups are experiencing greater levels of unhappiness and poorer emotional wellbeing.’

• Darren Caveney: Coronavirus resilience: crowd-sourced tips for pressured comms teams (15 March)
  ‘Whatever comes next it’s going to place huge pressure on comms professionals and teams. How can we create resilient teams and look after our wellbeing during the crisis?’

Purpose and professionalism

• Robert Phillips: Fairytale Leaders & The Holy Trinity (March 2020)
  ‘Good leaders must be honest about the inevitable difficulties on the journey ahead, especially when they know it’s going to be tough. (Presidents and Prime Ministers, please take note).’
• Karan Chadda: Purpose-fully Panglossian (15 March)
  ‘Some companies are getting a little ahead of themselves. They keep talking about the destination but the journey isn’t really clear.’
• Mark Borkowski: Let’s measure in units of trust (13 March)
  ‘As it seems more and more likely today, that those who can work from home will be encouraged to, we need leaders who can measure in units of trust to ensure that things are achieved, a sense of community is ensured and some sort of normal is retained.’

Consulting, teams and careers

Playing Through the Keyhole on Zoom calls, have identified three tribes so far:
-The smart ones with bookshelves and art on walls
-The relaxed ones with pet snoozing on sofa and cut flowers on table
-The chaotic ones with plates by the sink, kids toys everywhere, unshaven
Others?

— John Lehal (@JohnLehal) March 19, 2020

• Ann Pilkington: Making virtual working, work (18 March)
  ‘At PR Academy we ditched the office about a year ago. And we’ve been virtual ever since. Here’s how we make it work.’
• Carrington Comms: How to shine in your first PR agency job (16 March)
  ‘Put simply, mistakes make you better at your job in the long run because you know what not to do next time!’

Politics, public affairs and public sphere

MHP were delighted to be joined by @katyballs, @jameskirkup, @matthew_elliott, and @PeelHunt's Steven Fine at yesterday's post-Budget breakfast – hearing from leading voices in politics and business to analyse Rishi Sunak’s Budget https://t.co/habH0qxDID pic.twitter.com/4tH3DWD1q6

— ENGINE MHP (@MHPC) March 13, 2020

• Tom Hashemi: New research: Politics in the time of Coronavirus (17 March)
  ‘Our forthcoming 2020 research looks in detail at public perceptions of experts, and what kind of expertise is valued.’

• Stuart Thomson: Coronavirus and public affairs (16 March)
  ‘It is worth thinking about other forms of engagement, such as using webinars or livestreaming smaller scale discussions (and recording them for later use). Trying to look for the positives, it may be a way of testing out some new engagement techniques for use in the future. But the reality is that most issues simply do not rate very highly at the moment. In which case for most organisations, think about pausing for a while and plan to start again after the Easter recess.’

Risk, crisis and reputation

LinkedIn is overflowing with people with no experience giving business continuity and crisis comms advice 🙁

— Ellen Carroll (@Ellen_Carroll) March 16, 2020

• Tony Langham with Ralph Jackson and Rachel Atkins: Protecting reputation from crises [podcast] (no date)
  ‘It was once the case that the lawyer didn’t like the PR people to craft messages that could lead to a liability. Now we’re both working together to make sure the company does and says the right thing. By working together, the client gets better advice. There are ways of saying sorry without admitting liability.’

Wellbeing, gender and diversity

• Gary Taylor: Splendid isolation (18 March)
  ‘This is not going to be a mere 14-day lockdown. It might not even be a two-month affair. Think you could do it for six months? Or longer? I know I can’t, and I’m doing it now!’
• Rachel Miller: How to do whatever it takes (18 March)
  ‘Over the past couple of weeks I’ve published thousands of words here on my blog to help you and made my crisis communication guide available as a free download and video.’

Campaigns and creativity

• James Herring: #viralkindess campaign launched offering help to those self-isolating (15 March)
  ‘The cards, which are available to download online , include boxes for neighbours to offer help with picking up shopping, urgent supplies, posting mail or even just “a friendly phone call”.’

• Jessica Pardoe: Coronavirus: Lessons From A Football Club (13 March)
  ‘Following the news that their game has been cancelled, [Aston Villa] had a bunch of food that would have been absolutely devastating to see go to waste. Luckily, they’ve got their heads screwed on at HQ and saw an opportunity to benefit the local rough sleepers and those who arguably are perhaps amongst the most vulnerable right now.’
• Andy Green: How viral can combat virus: What we need is a coronavirus meme strategy (13 March)
  ‘First coined by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins in his seminal book ‘The Selfish Gene’ (1976), Dawkins advocated how humanity had two forms of communication: genes enabling our DNA to be transmitted from one generation to another and memes. Memes he suggested, serve as parallel means of transmission for any cultural artefact. By cultural artefact this can mean anything from a message to a behaviour.’

Brands, storytelling, content and influence

• Orlagh Shanks: Can Influencing Be Taught? (18 March)
  ‘It’s a tough gig being an influencer (from what I can see). The ones that I follow and watch every day often wake up to 1,000 messages every morning – imagine your inbox being that full every single day. And after answering all of those questions, you have to produce content for your followers who will ask questions if you don’t.’

Measurement and evaluation

• Marianne Morgan: Could listening be the key to better measurement (16 March)
  ‘The clients and colleagues who deliver the best measurement are the ones who have taken time to think about what they want their PR to achieve – whether that is awareness, a perception change or an influx of sales leads – and how to measure that single, most-important thing effectively.’

Internal communication

https://twitter.com/Lynscomms/status/1239861498073305089

• Helen Deverell: Getting the balance right (19 March)
  ‘I like many others have seen nearly all my work cancelled from April onward. I’m due to go on maternity leave in July and the thought of not earning any money in the lead up is terrifying.’
• Sue Dewhurst: Five ways to make a bigger difference through communication (no date)
  ‘I want my work to make a positive difference to people and organisations. To me, that’s essentially what using communication in a ‘strategic’ way is all about.’
• Suzie Robinson: Remote, dispersed, field, frontline workers…? What do we call ’em? (16 March)
  ‘Every organisation has a digital workplace, even if it’s undefined. Those who work at desks in the office may be the most obvious users, but our communication and collaboration tools should be able to support people no matter where – or how – they work.’
• Heida Ingimsarsdottir: Can the aftermath of Coronavirus contribute to the triple bottom line of employee engagement (13 March)
  ‘The equipment will be there anyway so why not use it? Companies are being forced to learn to trust their employees.’

Technology, media and digital

• Jade Beddington: Journalists looking for non-coronavirus content (18 March)
  ‘Not every journalist or media outlet wants constant Covid-19 related pitches – so we’ve put a compilation of journalists (by industry) looking for stories that are virus free. Hurrah!’
• Paul Sutton with Ashley Friedlein: The future of messaging in business [podcast] (18 March)
  ‘One of the biggest trends in recent years has been the growth in messaging apps. Whatsapp recently reported 2 billion users, while – other than Instagram and TikTok – growth of mainstream social media has stalled.’
• Dan Slee: TRUSTED SOURCE: Looking to Michael Caine in Zulu to better communicate the coronavirus pandemic (15 March)
  ‘I would rather listen to the Chief Medical Officer explain to me the toughest step imaginable and why science says this is the best step rather than feel played by a politician using old school media management techniques.’
• Holly Hodges: PR blogger spotlight: Rachel Miller, All Things IC (13 March)
  ‘The speed at which we communicate and publish today means the relationship between the media and public relations is constantly evolving.’

#prstudent #bestPRblogs

• Hannah Chambers (Ulster): How Is Social Media Facilitating Social Distancing? (19 March)
  ‘How is social distancing being made social? By Netflix Party of course. If you can’t have a movie night with your friends do the next best thing and download Netflix Party Chrome Browser Extension which allows you to watch the same programmes as your friends and chat about it within the same browser.’
• Shea Hamill (Ulster): When One Door Closes, Another Door…Closes?? (19 March)
  ‘Who knew a run in with my old teacher would give me the push I needed to make another attempt at Uni. Here I am, in my final year studies writing my first blog. Who would have guessed with my track record?’

• Siobhan McKerr (Ulster): When I grow up I wanna be….a PR professional (19 March)
  ‘The first time I had heard of the term Public Relations was when I was finishing my A-levels and discovered a local girl from my area who was studying a business and PR course at university and had created a blog where she discussed all things PR related. Through reading her blogs I realised that, while I had no clue what she was talking about, the topics she was discussing really intrigued me. That girl was Orlagh Shanks, now the UK’s top PR blogger for 2018 and 2019.’

• Niamh Murray (Ulster): The green day that felt blue (18 March)
  ‘A lot of people said that St Patrick’s Day was “cancelled”. But, it wasn’t.  You can’t “cancel” a day. You can cancel events, concerts and plans; not a nationality.’
• Fionnuala Hegarty (Ulster): Eat, Pray, Love PR (18 March)
  ‘A lot of PR involves creating engaging content: writing blog posts, creating social media posts and developing written pieces. I got to do this more actively on my placement year and it was one aspect of the job I thoroughly enjoyed doing.’
• Steven Batey (Sunderland): What Can I Do During The COVID-19 Outbreak to Keep Me Entertained? (17 March)
  ‘As I sit here in my flat instead of going to University due to the outbreak, here’s a list of five things I’m planning to do over the next few weeks and hopefully this can give you some inspiration if you’re bored and sick of watching Netflix!’
• Myhoa Hoang (Leeds Beckett): In times of crisis and global union (17 March)
  ‘Listening doesn’t harm or hurt that much if you do it proactively and intuitively. Be selective. Be picky. But don’t ever stop listening.’
• Connor Lamb (Sunderland): Elderly shopping hour – a PR stunt or not? (17 March)
  ‘In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, Iceland have introduced an elderly shopping hour to some of its stores.’
• Teela Clayton (Leeds Beckett): Let’s iron out this virus (17 March)
  ‘I’ve tried to keep myself largely out of the flow of disinformation, the constant figures, the projections, the photos of health workers in hazmat suits like harbingers of doom. I’ve been plagued with selfish thoughts: if I get it, will I get an extension on my dissertation? Will I still find a job come May? Will we all be able to go on holiday at Easter? Do I have enough toilet roll to see out the week?’
• Rory Drake (Sunderland): Coronavirus Suspension: How club Twitter accounts filled the gap (16 March)
  ‘Being short of content ideas can be a problem in PR, especially when it comes to social media, and for many football clubs up and down the country this could now be a very real problem.’