This week in PR (27 November)

News in brief

https://twitter.com/woolfallalex/status/1331933108048891907

• Lobbying scandals? PRCA has rejected the Sunday Times report about Luther Pendragon following an investigation; but the PRCA referred a complaint about Tulchan (not a PRCA member consultancy) to the House of Lords Commissioner for Standards which has rejected this complaint.
• Vuelio’s Online Influence Award for PR/comms went to Ronke Lawal. Comms2point0 was highly commended.

Covid-19 and comms

Our Director General @Ingers1975 – The comms legacy of Covid ' #CommsAcad

"Covid will clearly leave plenty of legacies… There’s a clear positive legacy for the comms industry. Because this period has shown what I would describe as the power & the purpose of communication."

— PRCA (@PRCA_UK) November 24, 2020

• Tony Langham: Love is the thing. Hate isn’t. (no date)
  ‘I hope this makes a contribution to our industry by giving a structure to think about the future.’
• Rachel Royall: The power of broadcast to tell the vaccine story (20 November)
  ‘Broadcast media will be critical to the Government and the healthcare system in conveying operational messaging to the public and patients about how to access the vaccine and how it will be distributed.’

Purpose and professionalism

• Maja Pawinska Sims: Podcast: W Communications CEO Rachel Friend  (24 November)~
  ‘On taking on the PRCA chairman role: ‘Our industry is important. We can make a huge difference to society. It’s important that we come together and are represented well. I believe that we can affect change by coming together more than by working individually.’
• Jan Gooding: The perfect marketer in 2025 will be a responsible one (24 November)
  ‘The imperative of addressing the grotesque over consumption in the world now particularly sits with those of us in marketing. We are part of a system that is destroying our world.’

Consulting, teams and careers

• Charlie Spargo: A Week in My Life: Jasmine Headley-Craik, Co-owner, Content Soup (23 November)
  ‘Finish the day prepping for our first virtual pitch tomorrow before heading home, having dinner and then logging back online to do my weekly virtual knitting class. Everybody will be getting hand knitted jumpers from me this Christmas.’

Wellbeing, gender and diversity

https://twitter.com/bmeprpros/status/1331628743065022471

• Nik Govier: I’m not stupid, or lazy; I’m dyslexic, and we need more neurodiversity in PR (26 November)
  ‘Greta Thunberg has shown us what someone with autism is capable of, and I believe that my dyslexia is a gift.’
• Andrew Kirby: Why am I doing Movember this year (no date)
  ‘I work in comms. I’m a storyteller by trade: I’ve authored eight novels, countless short stories and four non-fiction books (about the good old days for my football team). And yet I’ve never been able to set down the right words about how I’m feeling, neither on a page or in the spoken word.’

Public and third sectors

I'm managing the PR and comms for a large number of charities and not for profits right now, who are seeking business collaborations or the chance to be a #charityoftheyear beneficiary. Please get in touch if you know of companies keen to engage. deborah@lexiaagency.co.uk

— Deborah Watson (@DeborahWatsonPR) November 24, 2020

• Ross Wigham: A postcard on covid comms vol2 (25 November)
  ‘As we look to a reintroduction of the tier system I asked people across the network to offer up their tips and biggest lessons from last time when it comes to good public sector communications.’
• Amy Johnson: TikTok for charities (24 November)
  ‘A common misconception about TikTok is that it’s just full of teenagers dancing. While there’s certainly a popular – and now wealthy – hoard of young dancing influencers, that’s just one of the app’s many ‘sides’…’
• Darren Caveney: They’re a celebrity – get me out of here! your favourite brushes with celebs… (23 November)
  ‘Most of us have an anecdote about a time we’ve worked with a celeb. They’re often quite an ‘experience’ Here’s a crowd-sourced fun blog post sharing the experiences of over 30 comms pros.’
• Amanda Coleman: The brain drain (21 November)
  ‘When I heard the news about a potential freeze on public sector pay it made me think of only one thing – the loss of more talented communication professionals from key teams.’

Politics, public affairs and public sphere

Thanks to @SparklyPinchy for highlighting the new @FHFLondon @Fleishman #COP26 Unit in London – ready to help tackle communications and public affairs in an important year ahead on climate change. https://t.co/JzbPBStylc

— Michael Hartt (@Michael_Hartt) November 24, 2020

• Stuart Thomson: Be ready for the radical: What the government relaunch really means (24 November)
  ‘If the Government is committed to a national [road] charging scheme then it will need to sell its benefits and be prepared for a long and hard political fight. If there is to be a fight then it has to know that [it] has friends who are prepared to stand up for it.’
• Danny Rogers: The Portland Communications story shows that public affairs firms can’t afford more scandals (22 November)
  ‘Last week the Sunday Times broke a story that created concern, however. It alleged that the chairman of Portland Communications, one of the UK’s biggest public affairs firms, had secretly served as an adviser to a health minister for six months, before sending sensitive information on lockdown policy to paying clients.’

Risk, crisis and reputation

I’m excited to have been appointed Vice President, Crisis Communications at Kenyon International Emergency Services, the world’s foremost disaster response company. I’ll be doing the role alongside my current practice still available for crisis response or crisis & media training https://t.co/dE0QxWapGQ

— Donald Steel (@LondonDonald) November 26, 2020

• Thomas Malnight and Ivy Buche: ‘Never let a crisis go to waste’: how three CEOs helped their companies thrive in a pandemic (24 November)
  ‘We spoke to the chief executives of three major companies in three very different industries. In their responses to the crisis we found that Winston Churchill’s adage of “never let a crisis go to waste” was as relevant as ever, with businesses finding positives during the pandemic.’

Brands, storytelling, and influence 

• Belle Lawrence: Brand Personality Power [podcast] (no date)
  ‘Voice is essentially the way you describe the brand personality in adjective form – for example, it could be lively, professional, bold or factual. By setting these out, you’re describing the mission for what you want the brand to be seen as…. Now tone is a subset of your brand’s voice.’
• Jen Derrick: How to stop writing in technical jargon (25 November)
  ‘Storytelling is at the heart of good communications and is what prompts customers to engage and take action. When we overuse jargon, we stop ourselves from being able to tell a story in a compelling way, as the complex terminology clouds all the good stuff. Jargon essentially makes it hard for your audience to grasp the essence of what you’re trying to say.’
• Mary Keane-Dawson: Why Wickes launched the home improvement industry’s first campaign on TikTok (25 November)
  ‘The #MyWickesMyWay campaign involved seven content creators each producing a video on the social media platform.’

Measurement and evaluation

https://twitter.com/PRCA_UK/status/1331213636992454657

• Paul Stollery: From coverage to capital – demonstrating a link between media coverage and successful fund raising (no date)
  ‘We found that the impact of media coverage on fund raising was most pronounced in the B2C sector.’

Internal communication

• Advita Patel, Trudy Lewis and Jenni Field: The Importance of Understanding Business Acumen [podcast]
  ‘If you’re not measuring your outputs and outcomes effectively, I don’t know how you can demonstrate your value. Measurement is step one to understanding the business.’
• Belinda Gannaway: Employee experience: why it matters now more than ever (24 November)
  ‘In our new book we take a look at 20-year-old empirical research that was among the first to make the link between employee attitudes and organizational performance.’

• Alyson Davis: Internal Comms and the challenges of COVID-19 (24 November)
  ‘At the end of October my role as Internal Communications Manager at Boots UK was made redundant due to COVID-19. I’ve spoken to many IC practitioners over the last four weeks who are in the same position as me.’

• Laura House: Leading through a screen (part two) (24 November)
  ‘As remote and hybrid-working becomes the norm, senior execs are increasingly forced towards digital channels to engage their workforce, or risk loss of focus and performance drift from their teams – and it’s our job to help them to do that.’
• Martin Flegg: Wild West (22 November)
  ‘There are no clear universal benchmarks for what an internal communicator is, or does. No agreed levels of competence or typical tasks and responsibilities for junior, mid-senior, senior and director level roles. No clear guidance for job titles, meaning it’s difficult to judge where a job role sits on the seniority scale. No clear benchmarks for reward and recognition, or cross cutting standards for qualifications or accreditations.’

• Lia Crooks: Black History Month: a comms and inclusion case study (22 November)
  ‘Black History Month (BHM) needs to feel meaningful and one of the biggest challenges at the outset was how to celebrate BHM remotely when most of us are suffering from the dreaded Zoom fatigue.’
• Simon Monger: What baking cakes and IKEA tell us about change management (20 November)
  ‘And it’s not just cake mix and IKEA furniture. This applies to many aspects of daily life. Think about Build-A-Bear Workshop, cocktail masterclasses, cookery classes and so on. We place a much higher value on things in which we have invested time and effort.’

Technology, media and digital

• Stephen Waddington: How to build your PR tool stack (26 November)
  ‘Most of the innovation is driven outside the PR industry typically from sales or SEO, but there are examples from within the PR industry.’
• Jen Atkinson: Babel Insights: Analyst Q&A with Teresa Cottam, Chief Analyst, Omnisperience (26 November)
  ‘Although my job is ostensibly about technology, it is really about people and ideas. People are the source of innovation and the barrier to adoption. I love helping them understand what is important and why, inspiring them, challenging their thinking, refreshing their ideas.’
• Claire Walker: The game escape: But it’s not a game, it’s a multibillion industry with reputations at stake (25 November)
  ‘Twitch is the biggest streaming site worldwide and beyond acting as a tool to keep people connected, it helps get powerful messages across too.’ 
• Paul Sutton and guests: The big question: What can we expect from 2021? [podcast] (25 November)
  ‘Katy Howell: As far as the professional skills go, I think it’s about time anyone who works in social understands that their role sits between maths, stats, behavioural science, creativity and copy. You cannot employ one person to ‘do social’, you need a team.’
• Rich Leigh: Brand report: 74% of marketers think budgets will stay the same or grow in the next 3 months (24 November)
  ‘Media relations and content marketing look to be on the chopping block for more than two-thirds of the brands looking to reduce marketing spend, with digital PR/linkbuilding spend a concern for almost half.’
• Alice Buttery: Writing BANGING Digital PR content to fuel campaigns (24 November)
  ‘Tone of voice is what makes brands stand out. It’s how you can tell Nike from Tesco own brand, or Monzo from Barclays. Two brands can offer virtually the same service, but the way they do it makes them different and appeals more to their target audience.’
• Hel Reynolds: The ‘commsplanation’: duff advice from the non comms colleague (23 November)
  ‘Have you ever been commsplained? It’s where someone who is less qualified than you, or less experienced, explains something to you.’

Academic, education and training

Find out more about our qualifications and our specialist diplomas which we run with the @pracademy by checking out our brand new prospectus! https://t.co/aitLyOxYs1

— Souha Khairallah (@SouhaKhairallah) November 25, 2020

#prstudent #bestPRblogs

Enjoyed talking with @leemoya’s students @lse on routes to careers in communication and sharing my own journey – if 2020 has taught us anything is that comms is a critical skill in every size and shape of organisation. Wishing them all the best for their future careers

— Kinda Jackson (@KindaJackson) November 24, 2020

• Megan Laura Harris (Liverpool John Moores): Sainsbury’s Christmas Advert – The Criticism and Support (26 November)
  ‘Even though there was criticism, I was really pleased to see all the support that the advert generated. Even companies such as Marks and Spencer reached out to show their support (shown below).’
• Eloise Newman (Solent): Black Friday: A Chance to Find a Good Deal or An Opportunity to Tackle Sustainability Issues? (26 November)
  ‘Black Friday could be seen as an event which encourages a lot of panic-buying and impulse-buying due to large crowds and glaring, red reduced stickers. However, this blog aims to examine the ways in which Black Friday is perhaps being reclaimed by sustainable brands.’
• Holly McAllister (Ulster): Brands Building a Sustainable Future (26 November)
  ‘As a society we need to make changes to how we purchase, what we purchase and where we purchase from. These decisions may not seem like they are making big changes now, however over time they will have drastic effects.’
• Rachael Thompson (Sunderland): A conversation with… Ali King (25 November)
  ‘Being an introvert, I love working from home on my own all day, but there are times I miss the office gossip! Once the Covid situation has (hopefully) passed, I’m looking forward to trying out some coworking spaces so I can get the best of both worlds, or at least organising some coffee dates with friends, old colleagues and work contacts.’
• Babett Kürschner (LCC/UAL): Technology Design: How to prevent biases from determining your business decisions (24 November)
  ‘Our brain stores acquired knowledge as mental shortcuts, so called “building blocks”. This enables us to make decisions relatively quickly instead of having to rely on our brain’s processing power to ponder on every single action too long. This can be useful in everyday situations, like shopping for groceries for example.’

• Ciara Hughes (Ulster): The Perfect Mistake? (24 November)
  ‘From the outside looking in, this looked like the perfect recipe for disaster. However, KFC saw an opportunity in this crisis. The spotlight was on them, so they decided to take control.’
• Aoife Teague (Ulster): Should we be following example or using our own initiative throughout this pandemic? (24 November)‘For many, the easiest way to keep track of what they can or cannot do is to follow the examples of those setting these guidelines, or so you would have thought.’
• Eimear Delargy (Ulster): Oh Polly? More like ‘Oh No Polly!’ How a customer service nightmare shamed the fashion giants… (23 November)
  ‘Users of all ages and genders rushed to the student nurse’s defence and called Oh Polly out for their contradictive behaviour – wanting to show appreciation for NHS workers but then not allowing them to claim the prize when they’re too busy working on the front line and saving lives???’

https://twitter.com/KatieHullPR/status/1331540634004545537