This week in PR (6 January)

It happened this week

This has been a short working week, so this round-up also includes a selection of content pieces published in the three weeks since our last weekly summary on 16 December 2022.

• The CIPR has announced its board and council members for 2023 – the professional institute’s 75th anniversary year.

Profession

• Steve Shepperson-Smith: CIPR is 75: here’s why you should care (5 January)
  ‘The CIPR was founded in 1948 and is thought to be the oldest membership body for the industry in Europe, remains one of the largest, and is almost certainly also the biggest provider of training, accreditation and qualifications for practitioners on the continent.’
• Anne-Gret Iturriaga Abarzua: Message from the IPRA President:  Hopes for a new year January 2023 (4 January)
  ‘Communication leaders should be humble, and proud. As senior communication professionals, we have a duty to share our experience and knowledge with anyone interested. We have a voice. We know how to bring people, ideas and initiatives to the foreground. We know what to say, when and to whom. We know the value of dialogue and respect.’

Purpose, climate and ESG

• Ben Smith with Zoe Ward-Waring and John Higginson: How and why PR firms can become a BCorp [podcast] (3 January)
  ‘21 UK PR agencies, by my reckoning, are BCorps. Being a BCorp is all about transparency, and if you’re interested you can review any company’s results on the BCorp website.’

Consulting, skills and careers

https://twitter.com/drewb/status/1602992980171919360

• Jonah Miti: Why I Chose To Do An Apprenticeship (no date)
  ‘I wanted to do an apprenticeship rather than attend university as I was keen to gain first-hand experience working in PR and develop my knowledge of the media industry.’

Public and third sectors

• Sarah Combes: My first two months in local government (4 January)
  ‘The communications team acts as the Council’s storytellers and information providers, and we are sometimes the first point of contact for residents, especially on social media.’

Politics, public affairs and public sphere

https://twitter.com/rebeccaoco/status/1610223353641537536

• Imogen Shaw: A tale of two speeches (5 January)
  ‘While Telegraph sketch writer Madeline Grant was particularly cutting in her assessment of Sunak’s delivery, likening him to the AI chatbot ChatGPT, Starmer’s speech was plagued by technical issues, leading The Independent to comment that he sounded ‘like a Dalek’.’
• Imogen O’Rorke: As 2023 dawns, where is Britain on Net Zero? (5 January)
  ‘There was one glaring omission from the PM’s opening speech of 2023: the UK’s net zero plans.’
• Emma Dean: 2023 Trends in Women’s Health (4 January)
  ‘If 2022 was the year everyone was talking about the menopause, 2023 will be the year of the period.’
• Milos Labovic with Stuart Thomson: Reputation and Public Affairs [podcast] (2 January)
  ‘One of the things that’s changed over the years is we [in public affairs] have become much more aware of various aspects of communications we can use. Those with a strong reputation are much more likely to be listened to. Political audiences have an ability to impact on reputation – they have their hands on the levers of power.’
• Thomas Sharpe: UK and China – Happily Never After? (16 December)
  ‘The politics, in short, bode badly for the future. The economics, however, tell a different tale.’

Brands, content, community and creativity

• Adam Driver: Carving the content turkey – repurposing your content marketing (4 January)
  ‘Over the festive period, you can feed off that main meal for weeks… Similarly, when you create a substantial piece of content – that important interview, the (gulp) annual report, a major event or a new podcast series – you can and should repurpose elements and sections.’
• Paul MacKenzie-Cummins: 1 million fake ‘thought leaders’ accidentally shine light on real experts (16 December)
  ‘There are 1.11 million people on LinkedIn with the job title ‘Thought Leader.’’

Research, data, measurement and evaluation

Crisis, risk and reputation

• Amanda Coleman: Crisis communication without the communicator (4 January)
  ‘I have often said that artificial intelligence can’t yet get the emotional detail that is needed from developing crisis communication. But it is clear that ChatGPT can provide an initial starting point for any issue and crisis communication.’
• Steve Double: Something to Mone about? The importance of staying authentic in a crisis (22 December)
  ‘Something like “Michelle has done nothing wrong and would love to tell her side of the story when the time is right – for legal reasons she cannot at the moment” would surely have served her better? It is still effectively a “no comment” but sounds much less defensive, and certainly more like someone who knows only too well the power of positive PR.’

Behaviour and influence

• Scott Guthrie: Scarcity principle: Prime Hydration sells out in UK (5 December)
  ‘Prime understood well FOMO – the idea that potential loss plays a large role in human decision making. Limiting supply made the drinks desirable.’

Internal communication

https://twitter.com/dosomethingkim/status/1610948296629182465

Media, digital and technology

How PR pros will use AI:

✅ researching generic topics
✅ generating rough translations
✅ writing rough first drafts
✅ some analytics

How PR pros won’t use AI:

❌ researching complex topics
❌ editing and proofreading
❌ wordsmithing quotes
❌ fact-checking

(for now)

— Alexandre Rizos (@alexandrerizos) January 4, 2023

• Alan Miller: Should B2B copywriters worry about ChatGPT? (no date)
  ‘If you want copy that’s pretty much the same as everything else, ChatGPT will provide it. That’s not to say ChatGPT isn’t an impressive achievement.’
• Louise Nicolson: Chatter bot (no date)
  ‘Will you change your mind about AI?  AI and machine learning will undoubtedly shape the next decade.  Whilst copywriters can rest easy, for now, AI has already changed the world.’
• Alex Malouf: Bye Bye Twitter? (16 December)
  ‘I don’t like where the company is headed under its new owner, Elon Musk. From how he’s treated Twitter’s staff, to an out-in-the-open bias for views and social media accounts that I find abhorrent (from antisemitism to transphobia, fascism and xenophobia), my head tells me to get the heck off of Twitter.’

Academic, education and training

• Stephen Waddington: End of term report (16 December)
  ‘I have recognised my own position on the continuum of public relations researchers from idealistic to critical. I’m developing my research around a pragmatic perspective that is critical of practice but supportive of it realising its potential within management.’

#prstudent #CreatorAwards23

We’re keeping this space open to showcase talented PR student content creators (or indeed for any current university students seeking work in public relations). Simply tag your shareable social media content with #prstudent and we’ll find it and consider it for inclusion. 

• Amie Cairns (Leeds Beckett):

@amiercairns props if you watched to the end #prstudent #publicrelations #leeds #leedsstudent #marketing #pr #publicrelationsagency #fyp #xyzbca original sound – aims:0