This week in PR (20 September)

News in brief

Congratulations to @MandyPearse & her campaign team on being elected @CIPR_UK President-Elect 2020. I wish you the best of luck in driving our profession forward. #CIPRElection

I’ve been humbled by the wonderful people who believed in me, thank you for getting involved! pic.twitter.com/gzZjbIe4ER

— Rachel Royall (@RachRoyall) September 18, 2019

• • Mandy Pearse has won a close-fought CIPR presidential election, by 667 votes to 552, on a ‘turnout’ of 15%.
  • CIPR deputy CEO Phil Morgan is leaving for the role of Chief Executive of the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine; Koray Camgoz has also left the CIPR for the PRCA (see below); John Gerlis has been named Public Relations and Policy Manager at the CIPR
  • Five more CIPR members have become Chartered Practitioners, taking the total to over 300. They are: Beth Durham, Manpreet Dhesi, Nic Fearon-Low, James Hayward, Paul Howlett-Davey
  • Here are the winners from The Drum’s inaugural PR Awards
  • PRCA has announced the shortlist for the annual Reginald Watts prize for insight. The winner will be announced on 16 October.
  • TripAdvisor has released its first transparency report amidst criticism of fake reviews
  • Arun Sudhaman’s scoop for The Holmes Report about the Hong Kong government’s failure to appoint a PR firm has been picked up internationally (see eg BBC, The Guardian).

PR is the art of perception management and persuasion – but it needs a strong, true proposition to work with. If Hong Kong makes substantive changes, then strategic public relations can reflect and amplify that to the world. PR isn’t a smokescreen of spin, nor should it be. https://t.co/ZUVfnruIZP

— Jason MacKenzie (@jasonmackenzie) September 18, 2019

Academic and education

As the industry continues to evolve, so has IPR. We’re excited to continue fostering research and research-based knowledge in PR and corporate comms practice by predicting, investigating, and amplifying and engaging with academic leaders and industry pros. https://t.co/mTkhn37fhc pic.twitter.com/WcIYdhVEJr

— Institute for PR (@InstituteForPR) September 18, 2019

• Robert Minton-Taylor: The Long and Winding Road (19 September)
  ‘Jade and I are both in the Hyper Acute Stroke Unit at Bradford Royal Infirmary. I feel like a robot that has been assembled with two unmatched halves and the software hasn’t been sorted yet. Finding my mouth is tortuous. Why doesn’t my left hand know where it is and why do I keep stabbing the fork instead into my chin?’

Consulting and careers

• Ella Minty: Is a PR Strategy a Tougher Sell to Clients than PR Tactics Are? (19 September)
  ‘You cannot, ever, sell/pitch a comms strategy unless you understand and know how your strategy will fit in/tie into the overall business strategy of that organisation – the question you have to ask yourself is “do you”?’
• Koray Camgoz: Switching lanes for a (almost) fresh start (19 September)
  ‘There’s no denying the PRCA and CIPR are competitors. But it’s equally true that both bodies drive the industry forward. I’m fortunate to be moving to an organisation where I can continue working on the issues I’m passionate about; principally making PR a more accessible, inclusive and ethical industry.’
• Hel Reynolds: Replace your inner critic with an inner fan club (18 September)
  ‘One thing I’ve noticed about the students I work with, is as their confidence grows, their work gets more creative and effective.’

Gender, diversity and wellbeing

Politics and public affairs

• Mike Love: Does it matter when politicians duck the TV interview? (19 September)
  ‘The spotlights and microphones vain politicians seek out in good times are still there when the bad times come. Politicians should perhaps be careful what they wish for when they ‘big up’ the role of broadcast media when it suits them to do so.’
• Lizzy Tomlin: Lib Dem Conference 2019 – Is Brexit the Party’s gift or curse? (18 September)
  ‘The Lib Dems have elected a dynamic female Leader, had electoral success in European and Local elections, gained seven new MPs (one through a by-election and six from defections), 700 new Councillors.’

• Stuart Thomson: What is certain in these uncertain times? How public affairs can help (16 September)
  ‘Trying to map out what will happen with Brexit is challenging to say the least.  But that does not mean that public affairs cannot help organisations make sense of what is happening and what is likely to happen. Without this advice, the risks simply increase.’
• Adam Mack: Data, Dominic Cummings and the Death of Polling (13 September)
  ‘The real, central, issue is that such [government] data are sourced, studied and acted on behind closed doors – they are the property of a political elite (yes, Dom, you’re the Elite now) but imagine the potential if they were open-sourced, replacing tired and irrelevant political polls in the public domain?’

Public and third sectors

Things I find deeply distressing today:
* Those on the right who are outraged that the RNLI spends 2% of its budget saving the lives of non-British children.
* Those on the left who think that David Cameron losing a child is “privileged pain”.

What happened to compassion?

— Rachel Cunliffe (@RMCunliffe) September 16, 2019

• Dan Slee: 30 days of human comms: #63 the RNLI bat back The Times and Daily Mail (16 September)
  ‘The cherry on top of the cake was the #rnli_disgrace hashtag that turned into an ironic British thing that echoed the exact opposite of what you may think the hashtag was saying.’
• Darren Caveney: The unawards19 are open (15 September)
  ‘The UnAwards are a huge passion of mine. They were established to recognise the hard work, creativity, successes of the communications and PR industry, largely but not exclusively by any means in the public sector.’

Issue, crisis and reputation management

• Ian Briggs: Crisis Football: the winners and losers in the battle to save clubs (16 September)
  ‘The Premier League currently seems a universe away from the lower reaches of the pyramid. And, the gap between the rich and the rest seems vaster than ever.’

Internal communication

This is terrifying – these are slides from another conference where someone presented about culture change – if this is being shared as a good example we are all in trouble #ioms19 #iomsummit #change #internalcomms #culture pic.twitter.com/Zp4RNvTtyy

— Jenni Field (@mrsjennifield) September 17, 2019

• Jaime Cox: Why is tone of voice so important in corporate communication? (19 September)
  ‘Make it captivating, not cringeworthy – here are my top 10 tips for establishing an effective tone of voice in corporate comms.’
• Robert Phillips: Trust and Leadership: Colleagues and Collaboration (18 September)
  ‘The dynamics of trust are different when considering colleagues, bosses and employees, as distinct from clients/ customers, regulators, stakeholders and civil society.’
• Oliver Frankham: IC health check – four tips from Dr Kevin Ruck (18 September)
  ‘There’s a myth that employees don’t really want to know about big corporate stuff, that they just want to do their job and go home. Well, the employees I’ve interviewed said they were very interested. So, this is a myth we need to bust.’

• Rachel Miller: How to start out in internal communication (13 September)
  ‘Today I’m here with news of a brand new career guide which aims to stop people falling into comms and encourage them to fall for comms.’

Brand and influence

• Mario Mejia: Oracle’s rebrand: hit or miss? (17 September)
  ‘Beginning with their new mission statement written by Oracle’s founder, Larry Ellison: “Our mission is to help people see data in new ways, discover insights, unlock endless possibilities.” Wow. Zero mention of the enterprise or application suites. Simple, human, inspired.’
• Hamish Thompson: The unplugged influencer (16 September)
  ‘The best influencers are the people most like us – and closest to us. The ones that really share our interests. The ones that are likely to be enthusiasts. Your friends, family and expert acquaintances are the ones that steer your behaviours.’

Content and creativity

• Emma Baker: Avoid these 5 mistakes to make better videos for your brand (16 September)
  ‘Creating strong and engaging video in-house can seem daunting. So learn how to avoid and fix these common mistakes to take your smartphone video production skills to the next level.’

Media and digital

Is it that important to dredge up a 31-year-old tale? The Sun has misjudged this one. A tragic historic event of this nature is not of interest to their readers. There is a profound mood change out there. Wake up. Causing painful distress is not worth the clickbait. https://t.co/J3WkJDbu6K

— Mark Borkowski (@MarkBorkowski) September 17, 2019

• Jessica Pardoe: Why You Need PR Knowledge To Be A Good Link Builder (no date)
  ‘A traditional PR professional will be pleased with a media placement and whether a backlink has been included in that piece or not tends to make no difference. Those hardwired with digital PR and link-building tendencies, however, break a sweat until we’ve secured that sweet backlink in a piece.’
• Thea Chippendale: ASOS Product PR – Real or Fake? (19 September)
  ‘For those that don’t know – the girl in the picture below, is me. I became a part of one ASOS’ most viral campaigns in recent months. So many people commented saying that this was a set up and that my social profile was fake. Well here’s the story behind what happened.’
• Jake O’Neill: Think’s Jackie Scully on Influence, her marathon wedding and five inspirational challenges (17 September)
  ‘Influence is unlike any other magazine I’ve ever worked on. This is a membership magazine that isn’t afraid to push the boundaries – to the point that even editorial planning meetings are challenging.’
• Simon Marshall: Digital 100: the one million club (17 September)
  ‘No UK law firm is ranked in the top 100,000. (Whereas three of the Big Four accountants are ranked in the top 10,000 – a considerable order of magnitude higher in terms of total web traffic.)’
• Stephen Waddington: Countering trolling as a communication activity (16 September)
  ‘Trolls exploit the natural human instinct of self-defence. The rational response to trolls is to engage and debate. That’s a mistake. Trolls play by different rules. Their goal is for their argument to be heard by as many people as possible.’
• Chris Lee: PR and SEO Centre Stage at BrightonSEO (no date)
  ‘PR played a key role in the latest BrightonSEO conference as the two symbiotic disciplines continue to integrate.’

#prstudent #bestPRblogs

We’re on the lookout for talented PR student bloggers and social media communicators, and aim to showcase a seletion here each week of the academic year. First, we need to discover who’s out there. By way of inspiration, here’s an honest and inspiring post from a recent English Literature graduate taking up her first job in digital communications.

• Emily McGowan-Phoenix: The warmest Welcome:  My First Weeks at Social Communications (19 September)
  ‘Whilst exciting projects certainly shaped my first few weeks, the thing that I appreciated the most was the fact that I felt valued. I might be new to the company, but I’ve been asked for my opinions and input since day one. I’ve been kept in the loop face-to-face, over the phone and via email regularly – a perk which is unsurprising to me as I work with a group of expert, experienced communicators.’