Readings: Week 10

Speaking as part of a group is something PR practitioners have to deal with all the time, as the readings this week illustrate. The problem for me and I'm sure for many others is how to make an effective group presentation? I feel this was the major key point of the week’s readings. Good group presentations need attention to self, presentation and certainly content!

In presentations, there is so much you have to think about. Content, audience, where to stand, how to stand, how to talk, varying tone, keeping nerves under control and somehow keeping the audience engaged and actually getting your point across. The readings this week detailed a number of ways to deal with all these confronting aspects of presenting which will certainly be useful not just in this course or while we’re at uni, but in the rest of our lives as well.

I found the reading on the three commandments interesting in that it spelt out three fundamentals of which I can sometimes fall trap to – thou shalt not be arrogant, thou shalt not be boring and thou shalt not be confusing. Reading through the ‘symptoms’ if you will about bad presentations, I saw that I could at times be all three, arrogant, boring and confusing. It certainly made me think about my approach to presentations and how we are going to deliver the presentation on our issues management strategy.

Further field, it made me think about how presentations are vital parts of the communications field and how failure at this can result in failure of business, products, contracts, partnerships etc. When you think about how one of the most effective forms of communication can be face to face, you realise the true power of presentations and how essential they are. The checklists provided in these readings are ones which I will certainly use for all following presentations.

Allyson.

Readings: Week 9

I have always thought of newsletters to be type of communication whose effectiveness levels are at polar extremes: if it is done good it will be effective and if done bad, so will be the effect. I’ve always been rather skeptical of newsletters as a form of communication, but I now realise this is only because the newsletters I have received are not effective and do not improve my relations with the company.

Key messages from the readings this week showed the potential of newsletters as an excellent method of communication between a company and its publics and explored how to make an effective newsletter.

Looking at Smartypantz Kidz, this is one area where they could establish their company and name in the wider public. As Inga and Simon currently use little communication techniques to keep in touch with key publics and stakeholders, a simple, quarterly newsletter could easily fill this void. But as far as issues management goes, I feel the newsletter is just no use. Trying to manage a crisis means taking immediate action – definitely not enough time to produce and distribute a newsletter. This is why we have had to look at various other communication tools to be able to reach stakeholders for our plan.

Looking more broadly, the readings have reestablished by confidence in newsletters and seeing how effective they can be if managed, produced and distributed correctly. One of the key points about content would also connect with the chapter in the textbook on media releases –as far as what information needed to go into communication. It’s essential that the right information reaches the intended audience in the right way, otherwise time and money have been wasted on something that had potential to be very effective.

Readings: Week 8

Trying to communicate with the media is such an essential part of public relations, yet the readings have shown me that sometimes practitioners go into it completely unprepared and as a result, are unsuccessful in their mission.

The readings this week covered the ways to most successfully communicate with the media, from content to medium - both of which are essential when trying to get the media's attention. I guess the readings this week were just a confirmation of messages I had already established through studying journalism and PR and working as a journalists. Journalists do get upwards of a hundred media releases everyday and as they don't have the time to go through them, they usually just look at the headline and first par - and that usually decides whether it goes to the bin or stays on the desk.

As far as our group task goes, I think the readings were important in not only recognising the power of the media, but also the power of on-line communication. In our issues management plan, we have focused on communication to be put in place in the event of a crisis. The question that we have had to anticipate in our plan was also "to contact or not to contact" and I think this reading cleared up our approach to contacting the media only when it is appropriate and using specific framing techniques to grab their attention. The reading about on-line media relations was also closely related to our project, as we have included this as a huge part in our plan. Apart from its immediacy and accessibility for all stakeholders, the internet is also a huge tool that would allow Inga and Simon of Smartypantz to share knowledge, ideas and corporate information to all publics.

Connecting and getting through to the media can be one of the most challenging aspects of public relations and it's nice to know we're not supposed to be experts straight away, but there are things we can do to improve our chances.

Readings: week 7

Every time I read a new case study of a program plan, it is always different to the previous. I guess this is one of the key aspects I learned this week. Although the differences between program plans was not identified in the reading this week, I think it has been implicit throughout all of the research I have done for the group plan. Further, I think this demonstrates how each program plan needs to be formulated to the particular task – while they all do have similar aspects, they need to be tailored to fit.

The reading identified several key areas of a program plan, namely: objectives, target audiences, background/current situation, research, campaign and implementation, budget, timeline and evaluation. I would have liked to see more of a focus on campaigns and implementation, as I feel this is where the main body of the program plan should be (perhaps I am wrong about this?). It was difficult to look at it as a whole though, as I kept relating each sector back to our individual plan. As such, I really liked seeing how audiences can be split up in to smaller groups, as this is a problem I have experienced with Smartypantz Kidz. Because they have so many stakeholders, it is essential that they be split or even prioritised into which groups need the communication process to happen first.

However, it was interesting to see how a program plan can be approached from different focus points. All the time I have been researching how to present an issues management plan – and realistically PR practitioners need to have a bigger grip on program plans as a whole, instead of being so focused on one aspect. I learned more about program plans as a whole through this reading.

This reading has furthered the research I have all ready done on how to construct a program plan, with a focus on issues and crisis management.

Allyson.

Readings: Week 6

How important this weeks' readings are to me!!!!

They all deal with crisis and issues management - the very things our group plan is based on.

Key messages from the readings centered around the preparation for a crisis: knowing and anticipating what will happen before something happens and having a communications plan in place to deal with it when it happens.

I think the main emphasis in all of the readings was preparation - establishing a crisis team made up of key organisational figures and PR experts, and having a plan in place to better ensure the organisation can deal with media attention, stakeholder questions and public scrutiny in a crisis situation.

The major aspects I found informative were to do with a crisis communication plan as a whole. Splitting it into three section - before, during, after - allowed me to see the many different aspects and tactics that should be considered in an issues management plan. I found the reading on using the www quite interesting, as it was something I had previously not even thought about, but now I see just how effectively it could be used. As far as using the www for Smartypantz Kidz goes, I think elements could be utilised, but as it is not a terribly large organisation, things like a live web cast would be a potential waste of time and money.

The Johnston and Zawawi reading also emphasised how important different communication is - particularly internal and external relations is. This links back to week 5's reading, where we looked at the importance of community and internal relations. As we found out last week, internal relations is imperative to the success of an organisation. Relating that to this week, I see the focus on this becomes larger, as it would be a foolish decision to keep employees in the dark about a crisis situation. I found out how essential it is that internal communication be fully fledged and always happening, so everyone knows what is happening and it eliminates a panic inside the business - one less fire that needs to be put out.

It comes as natural that every organisation will at some point face a crisis - be it major or minor. The thing that I have learned, and will be implementing through our group plan, is that there are many individual aspects which need to considered to make an issues/crisis management plan. I will be using checklists provided in these readings to make sure we have covered all bases, and best formulate a plan for Smartypantz Kidz.

There's a lot to consider, especially when thinking about things in a hypothetical sense, but I guess this is what real PR practiti0oners have to face everyday. So I'm enjoying the challenge.

Allyson.

Readings: Week 5

Internal and community relations are perhaps one of the most important roles of PR - after all, PR is all about improving the relationship between and an organisation and its publics. What better way to achieve this than developing and maintaining a healthy relationship with the organisation’s community - their stakeholders.

The reading by Marianne Sison dealt with issues of trust, honesty and community, integrated into the sphere of internal and community relations. Although I already felt community relations was imperative to the success of an organisation, I have now discovered methods to achieve this. Based on the two-way symmetrical model of communication, these methods include collaboration, negotiation, and consultation. A major focus on this is feedback - so the community recognises the organisation has taken on board their concerns, and further, are acting on them.

Internal relations on the other hand can be done through methods such as newsletters, company newspapers, notice boards, memos, awards, events, intranets and interpersonal communication. The emphasis on all of this is communication - making sure the staff and employees are informed and can provide feedback. This will help to ensure the staff is happy - therefore, they will more likely be good ambassadors for the organisation. This is a practice that we need to put into place for our group plan. Already it has become evident that communication is the key to success. As our group is not a large umber of employees, methods such as an intranet or newsletter would be wasted. Our main method of internal relations needs to be through interpersonal communication. We need to talk to each other, face too face, and ensure we all know what each other is doing.

On the other end of the readings, I found looking at the case study's a huge help. While ti is great to know the theory, the way I work is to see how it is put into practice. While the two case studies on blackboard did not relate to the issues management plan we are undertaking, it was good to see how they formulated the plan, and more specifically, how it was presented. The APHS plan was interesting, in that is demonstrated how a simple plan can be executed successfully. This is what we need to aim for.

These readings tied in closely to the work I have done last year for the Surfest Program Plan. In the Johnston and Zawawi textbook, there is a chapter on Tactics, which has a case study at the end which is similar to the readings - it was good to compare the two and see the different approaches they took and how they actually put the theory of PR into practice.


Allyson.

Readings: Week Four

The readings this week were helpful in developing my knowledge of practical skills in PR. Knowing the theory is great, but knowing how to effectively put it into practice is even better.

The key messages from the readings dealt with how PR practitioners can build relationships with the media, and as such, establish credibility and successfully execute PR methods.
The Johnston and Zawawi reading was one I had read last year, but going into the group assignment, I felt it has refreshed my knowledge of the way the media tick. This will be extremely useful, because when we look at how we can best promote Smartypantz Kids and how to get their best image into the public sphere, it will be great to know how what the media are looking for and how we can tap into those values the media want.

This was followed up in the reading by Richard Stanton, where the main issue of framing was discussed. Apart from actually discovering what framing was, I realised how imperative it is for PR practitioner - it parallels the way journalists look at stories. If something is not relevant, journalists won't even look at it. Knowing how you can tap into what a journalist wants is such an important aspect in successful PR.

The readings reminded me of things I had learnt in journalism, but from the opposite perspective. You get to see how being a successful PR practitioner can make the media's life a lot easier, and when the media is the main way of getting your message heard, this relationship and understanding is vital. I feel like I am so much more prepared for actually putting PR methods into practice and starting to network and develop my own skills.

Allyson.