100 rpm

My fantasy PR reading list

What books do PR lecturers use and recommend?  If I had to name the most-thumbed PR books on my shelves I'd probably list Tench and Yeomans' Exploring Public Relations, Freitag and Quesinberry Stokes' Global Public Relations, Coombs and Holladay's PR Strategy and Application, Cornelissen's Corporate Communications and Kelleher's Public Relations Online.

The global library of books about PR is growing, but there are some that I wish existed  - either because they would would help me in my work, would complement those listed above, or simply because I'd like to read them. And as I'm not going to have the time in the next five years or so to remedy this by writing a book, here's a list of some that I would love to see appearing in library catalogues:

• A critical case study book.  This should have an international focus and be written by someone not involved in any of the campaigns.  As the saying goes, 'history is written by the winning side,' and this is the situation with case studies; only those deemed a success ever seem to be considered worthy of publication.  I'd like to see a book which also exposes campaign failures and analyses where campaigns went wrong.  Even when detailing successful campaigns, I'd like to see a book where the authors talk to everyone involved in the campaign - including the hapless account assistant who spends a week selling in a story to get one or two pieces of coverage.  This would help us understand what we really mean by 'success.'
• A collection of academic essays which looks at issues facing practitioners as individuals.  There is so much potential for further research on areas such as gender, communication, diversity, class, ethical practice, exploitation, education and the like. There has been some fantastic work in these spheres and I'd love to see some of these topics given more space.
• A really thorough book on strategic PR planning which addresses the subject from an organisational perspective and contains lots of examples of 'real' plans as well as a critique of their content.  Some students really struggle with writing a plan, and find past plans an invaluable resource.
• A PR lecturer's handbook featuring ideas for seminars, workshop topics and discussions.  In common with other lecturers, I've got a store of workshop and seminar material, but it would be fantastic to pool the knowledge and ideas of other PR lecturers together.
• A book on law for PR practitioners.   McNae's Essential Law for Journalists is brilliant, but a PR practitioner also needs to know about aspects of consumer and corporate law - for instance, how many PR practitioners setting up their own consultancies or working freelance really understand contract law?   Kolah's Essential Law for Marketers fills most of the gaps, but to have everything in one title would be preferable.

Some of these books might exist already - if they do, let me know.  If they don't ... I'm not precious, please borrow these ideas, I'd love to see these books in print, rather than in my head.

EUPRERA Euroblog Social Media Awards - call for entries

Last year, one of my MA in Public Relations students, Annika Wahl, was shortlisted for a EUPRERA (European Public Relations Education and Research Association) Euroblog Social Media Award for her blog Hanna La Kiw.  Although she didn't win (in her category that honour went to Laura Fischer for New Media in Practice) I was delighted that she'd made the final cut

The call for entries has just been made for the 2011 awards and the judges are looking for PR bloggers across these three categories:

• Most effective social media presence established by a communications/public relations student studying on undergraduate or post-graduate programme at a European university.
• Most innovative use of social media techniques in a communications research project or investigation
• Most valuable contribution to the academic understanding of the impact
  of social media on PR practice.

Details can be found on the Awards website.

Competitions like this are a fantastic way of discovering exciting new blogs from across Europe, so I'm looking forward to clicking on some links as the participant list is published.

 

What happened to Dave? Five videos to liven up a PR class

I'm jealous of mathematics lecturers.  I'm even jealous of people who lecture in engineering and physics.  As we grind towards the end of term, a maths lecturer can liven up a lecture with some great jokes (especially about engineers).    But PR?   Maybe it's because the subject is too new, or uncomfortable with its status, but PR jokes are few and far between.  I have to rely instead on my catalogue of anecdotes and stories about the world of PR  to raise the tempo in an end-of-term lecture.

Or, I can show a video.   And not just any old video.  These are my top five videos for livening up a PR lecture.  They are all relevant to teaching PR (not just  social media) and all manage to be engaging, humorous (although I appreciate that this is relative), relevant and informative(ish) all at once.

 1.  Research methods.
What better way to explain to students how not to compose a questionnaire.

 

2. Lobbying
Some students find the political process daunting.  This series of videos simplify the lobbying process.  Unfortunately, the series ends rather suddenly , leaving my students desperate to know what happened to Dave.

 

 Free Dave! The series

3. Flashmobs
I haven't shown this is class yet, but I will.   A neat way to illustrate aggregation ... and the "wisdom of crowds?"

 

 4. Reputation
This will usually be the first - and last - time a UK student will hear a country and western song played in class. 

 

5. Viral marketing
I'm feeling all nostaligic now.  When I first started teaching PR I had to explain what a 'viral' was.  And I used this video to illustrate it.  It also  could be used to spark a discussion about alignment of  communication channels/messages/audiences. 

 

Potential blog topics revisited

Last year I wrote a post to help my MA in PR students write their first few blog posts:  Potential blog topics – the list that PR students won’t need after a month

A year on and the post is still getting three or four hits most days (sometimes over a dozen, and from across the world - there are a lot of student bloggers out there!).  However, since a new cohort of De Montfort University MA in PR students will be setting up blogs in the next few weeks, I thought I'd revisit the list and add a few more ideas to help both them and anyone else who needs inspiration.

Ideas for PR student blog posts

• Is there a social media or PR campaign that you admire?  Critique it, and see if you can interview the person behind it.   What was their objective?  How did they manage the campaign?  Did it meet their expectations?
• Interview with one of last year’s PR graduates from your university.  How did studying PR help them find work or develop their knowledge?  What are they doing now?
• The advice you'd give to any student planning to study PR.  What do you wish you'd read or done more of before starting the programme?
• Comment on a PR issue that interests you - for instance diversity, surveys, ethics, work experience ...
• Get involved in the Twitter #Comms Chat and write about your experiences
• Attend a guest lecture held by your university (it doesn't have to be about PR) - review it and/or interview the speaker afterwards – they will (probably) be delighted to help

Whatever you write about, make your posts concise and  make sure that you focus on one main topic.  It's better to write 200 words than 2,000, and if you find yourself straying off the point ...well, that's probably another blog post.

I'd love to hear more ideas for student blog posts - please do add them!

 

Sharing your research - IPR Best Masters Thesis Award

Our MA in PR students are working  on their dissertations at the moment.  They're not alone - PR Masters students across the country (and beyond) are busy reading, writing, interviewing and number crunching as the submission deadline draws closer.

However, unless you're aiming for an academic career where you'll develop your dissertation themes further, it's a shame that after all the hard (and occasionally innovative and academically inspiring) work, most dissertations end up on a shelf gathering dust, destined not to be read by anyone other than those who mark it.

Which is why the Institute for Public Relations'  Northwestern Mutual Best Masters Thesis Award is such a great idea.  Entering involves very little extra work, and the chance to share your research (oh, and win a trip to NYC!)  has got to be worth the time putting the entry together.

Deadline for entries is 15 September 2010.  If you're proud of your work, why not share it?

Exposing those cv porky pies

CIPR Midlands is running an event You're Hired! aimed at helping interviewers get the most out of prospective candidates - a great idea for a session, since small companies and agencies sometimes lack the ability to coach or train new managers in this area.

Unless there were blatant lies on a cv, it could take until interview stage to expose some of the best works of fiction on a cv:

Interviewer:  "You say you enjoy going to the theatre?  What's the last play you went to see?"

Interviewee:  "Um, I saw some Shakespeare at school ... I like the idea of going though."

Interviewer:  "It's great that you're interested in current affairs - did you hear our client interviewed by John Humphrys on the Today programme this morning?"

Interviewee:  "No ... I don't watch Channel 4 news" (pause as interviewer scrapes herself off the floor)

However, thanks to Twitter, we don't have to waste our time at interview stage finding out that the candidate we're talking bears no resemblence to the person on the cv. 

You say you're interested in current affairs?  I'll expect you to follow at least a couple of national daily newspapers or online news sites (and not just those recommended to you when you sign up to Twitter).   And since you're working in PR, you must be fascinated by the media in all its forms, so I'll expect to see you following @mediaguardian at the very least.   And while the sort of PR people you want to follow might depend on the nature of PR you're interested in, I'd expect you to follow at least a couple of these PR/social media people or the people they're connected to:  @stedavies, @jangles, @markpinsent, @wadds @emilycagle @mediaczar @armano, @trevoryoung, @shelholtz, @harrietcrosse @behindthespin (these names have been picked at random from people I follow who posted today, in case you were wondering why you were included or missed out).   

If you don't follow any PR people (or journalists) I'll smell a rat straight away - are you really interested in a career in PR, or did it just seem like a nice idea?  And if you say you love politics, I'll expect you to follow at least a handful of politicians.   

And  of course it's not just about following ... it's about how you use Twitter as well. 

Work placements: A lecturer's view

A 1980s TV campaign for the Guardian encouraged us to look at the wider picture before forming an opinion.   Although this is generally a good idea, sometimes this leads you to think too much about an issue, ending up without a clear perspective.

This was how I felt about the ongoing debate about work experience in the media industries (some recent articles are here and here).  My  confusion  was fuelled by having vested interests that pulled me in three different directions. 

My academic research concerns the exploitation of workers in the cultural industries (which doesn't just cover work experience but also homeworking, online work, personal branding, etc. etc.).  However, as a direct contradiction,  I also lead the work experience module on De Montfort University's MA in Public Relations, thus actively promoting placements.  You can see my dilemma. On top of this, I also used to work as a PR practitioner and consequently have met scores of work experience students, who have varied in their quality from the terrifyingly awesome to being a terrifying liability.

All this led to a lot of hand-wringing and soul-searching about where I stood in the debate.   But after listening to the experiences of my work experience students this year, and reading stories from all corners of the industry, I've decided that some of my confusion about the work experience/exploitation debate derived from the fact that I was trying to make PR 'work experience' mean one thing (we'll put to one side 'placements' and 'internships' here, which can have slightly different meanings).  For in PR, the term 'work experience' can span two types of employment - one exploitative, one not.  I will explain:

• One kind of placement is essentially symbiotic.  The organisation feels that it wants to give something back to the industry, but at the same time it needs to remain profitable, and has some minor but interesting jobs that need carrying out.  The placement student spends a lot of time shadowing and attending meetings but also contributing to team activities, sharing their new university knowledge and 'doing' PR - something that my placement students find invaluable.  

• But there's another type of placement.  I'm increasingly being phoned by organisations who have a 'project' and want a 'placement student for three months.'  No, they don't want a placement student.  They want an unpaid resource with few employment rights.  Similarly, I'm hearing stories from placement students (rarely mine, fortunately) who are working at agencies where the placement students outnumber the paid staff.  While some of these students are getting amazing experience by being allowed an awesome level of responsibility at a very early stage in their career, the agencies are simply exploiting goodwill and pocketing the cash from clients.  In one case the placement students had to vacuum the office at the end of the day!  This isn't work experience, and although 'economic downturn' might be an excuse, it doesn't make it right.  There's no mentoring, no support, and no coaching that goes beyond tearing a press release apart.  These jobs should be done by paid staff (and that includes the cleaning).

As a result of this, I've made a decision.  I'm happy to promote and encourage students to apply for the first type of internship.  After all, they enjoy the placements, apply their prior learning, find out more about PR, and acquire valuable experience and contacts - and the host organisation gets something out of it as well.  As for the second type ... I'm not going to promote their 'opportunities' to my students or retweet their vacancies via Twitter.   And if I have the chance, I'll privately explain why.  Simple as that.  It's not a particularly active stance, but it's a start.

Not "Where did you do it?" but "What did you do?"

The Times reported recently that parents were paying for students to have high profile work placements.   And to an employer, a week somewhere like Condé Nast must look pretty impressive on a cv.

But when the placement is discussed in a future job interview, and savvy employers ask what a student actually did during their placement, a breathless reply of "I attended board meetings, shadowed the MD and went to photo shoots" doesn't hide the fact that the student did very little apart from watching a glamorous corporate life unfold in front of them.

While some of our MA in PR students secure great work placements at high profile organisations (without paying, I hasten to add), many spend their four-week placements in small-ish regional agencies.    And I'm often asked: "Do you think I should be doing something in London?   Won't an employer want to see that I've worked somewhere well-known?"

My answer is ... no. Good small agencies are great places to carry out work experience simply because the organisational structure means there's no room for someone to do nothing - so students have to get stuck in to a full range of PR tasks from their first day.

This year, students carrying out placements at regional agencies helped to organise events, write blog posts for the agency blog, drafted press releases which they then saw appear in print, advised on social media strategy and tactics, talked to journalists, attending networking events and helped with client research -the sort of jobs which a large organisation might have difficulty letting a student do due to internal bureaucracies, departmentalisation or not wanting to lose control.

So while placements at large organisations can give students a brilliant hands-on experience of PR, it's important to remember that small regional agencies do the job just as well.    The question that employers should be asking a student about their placement is not:  "Where did you do it?" but "What did you do?"

I'd be interested to hear what PR employers and students think.

Some coffee time reading for PR students ...

The US-based Institute for Public Relations (IPR) is "an independent nonprofit that bridges the academy and the profession, supporting PR research and mainstreaming this knowledge into practice through PR education." It's a fantastic resource for students and lecturers alike who are researching topics relating to PR practice - and this isn't just because of the breadth and depth of research papers in the archives, but also because there's no paywall.

On Monday, while talking to my second year PR students about PR evaluation and why they had to understand and know how to measure AVEs in order to critique them, an email from the IPR arrived in my inbox.  By coincidence, it was alerting me to a just-published research paper on media measurement. 

"A New Paradigm for Media Analysis: Weighted Media Cost looks at a new way to analyse media coverage.  'Weighted Media Cost' looks at the correlation between media space achieved by PR activities, time, and business outcomes.    While I've got some issues with this methodology as a way of proving the value of public relations activities (most of these issues, in fairness, the authors raise, although don't dwell on too much) it's an interesting read.

My decade in review

Inspired by Simon Wakeman, I thought I'd run through a few of my personal goals, trials and achievements of the decade.  Of course, what I think is worth writing about today I might decide is meaningless and superficial tomorrow, so before I change my mind ...

2000

On 23 December 1999 I got together with Adam, who I'd dated a couple of years  previously.  There's a picture of us climbing on Christmas Eve (if you're interested in these things he's slapping for the top of Meringue (HVS) at Lawrencefield, me belaying).   At the time, I was working for a PR agency in Birmingham as an account director, living in Nottingham and enduring a 100 mile round trip every day.  I hated the job, I hated the drive, and I'd been in one car crash too many in the past year.  I spent all my spare time climbing, running and travelling, taking 'burning the candle at both ends' to extremes. 

2001

I changed jobs, took a salary cut, and became an account director at Paskett PR, a specialist PR agency (gardening and food) in Derby.  I nearly didn't start the job as I suffered a head injury in February whilst winter mountaineering, and spent most of the spring seeing everything tinged in green.

Just as I thought life was pretty settled and good (working at Pasketts was huge fun, if not particularly challenging), Adam was offered a job in Iceland, which he took.  We got engaged in August 2001 just before he was due to leave. In September I  won my first ever running-related prize - a set of candles for coming third in a fell race. The date was 11/9/01 Guess a lot of people hadn't turned up due to the events of the day.

I then suffered a serious knee injury and couldn't run for six months.

2002

Adam and I got married in January.  I decided that I'd rent out my house and move to Iceland.  I loved my job, but couldn't see myself working in PR forever, and wanted a chance to try other things.  I moved in May and by July was working ...ironically for a PR agency, Kom ehf, where I ran training courses and liaised with their international clients.

I ran my first Icelandic mountain rance - the Þorvaldsdalsskokk - a grueling 20k across path-free tundra and snow slopes.  I got a medal (I think for coming third) and a strained ankle.  It was one of those races where everyone finishes covered in blood and bruises.

I was only working part-time, so had plenty of time to run, walk, cycle, read and decide what to do next. 

2003

We lived in Akureyri, below the ski resort of Hlidarfjall .  I spent the winter snowboarding, and would for the next three winters, getting quite good (I don't do tricks, I just like going very, very fast).  We really made the most of our time in Iceland, and despite the hardships - not the weather but the bureaucracy, the sheer remoteness (we were a six hour drive from the bright lights of Reykjavik and an international airport) and some aspects of the culture - had an amazing three years.

I started an MA in Mass Communications via distance learning at the University of Leicester.   I ran a lot, and picked up a second place in the Lake Myvatn Midnight Sun marathon (3:43 - which I thought was a personal best (pb) but on consulting my running diaries years later found out it wasn't). 

Was really starting to enjoy my cycling and taught myself to swim 'properly.'  Took part in my first sprint distance triathlon at Husavik and won.

2004

More snowboarding, more running, more travelling, more studying.  Flew back to the UK to run the London Marathon in a personal worst time, but was greatly cheered afterwards to meet up with some of my virtual friends who I'd met on-line through a running discussion forum.  I'd hardly heard the term 'social media' but there I was, drinking in a bar in London with a group of people I'd only ever chatted with via my laptop.

As we had the previous summer, we spent a month with our tent and climbing gear in France and Spain, climbing hard and living a simple life in the sun.

Ran my first Olympic distance triathlon (at Husavik again) and won (again) in 2:28. I immediately retired from triathlons, quitting while I was ahead.

2005

Won the Akureyri Vetrahlaup (winter run) series.  Did some guest lecturing at the University of Akureyri. I knew by this stage that I wanted to make the switch from PR practitioner to academic, and was slowly putting everything in place to make it happen. Living in Iceland, it was easy to see the economic crash coming (it was obvious, even then) and decided to come 'home' while our salaries were still worth something, moving back to the UK in May.  Started working at Eden PR in Nottingham.  Finished my MA, but missed  getting a distinction by a couple of marks (darn!).  

2006

Was offered a position as senior lecturer in PR and media at De Montfort University in Leicester in January 2006, with a specific brief to set up an MA in PR and run an undergraduate module.  

Did a lot of fellrunning and won my running club's fellrunner's championship - the first woman to do so.  Also made a foray into the world of women's road racing (road bikes that is) which was exciting and terrifying in unequal parts.

Did the Fred Whitton Challenge - a nice 108 mile day out over the Lake District's hardest passes.  Finished in 8:28, so one of the fastest women, but knew I could have gone faster ...

2007

A tough year.   We were trying and failing to recruit a new PR lecturer at work, so I was doing two jobs while trying to keep up with the running and cycling, but neither were going too well.  I had papers accepted at a couple of conferences, so was making a start to my academic career.  I then had a cancer scare (thankfully a false alarm) but it took me a while to get over the illness that led to the scary symptons.  Picked up a few minor race placings, and won my first UK race but wasn't getting any faster.  Decided on a new approach, set myself some goals but frustratingly just got slower in November and December.  It wasn't until Christmas Eve that I discovered why ...

2008

IsabelleHafdís was born in August 2008.  Despite pregnancy, I still managed a couple of fell races, and a snowboarding holiday, while getting increasingly huge. Had papers accepted at conferences in Cardiff, Miami and Brussels, so made the most of my last few months of 'freedom.'  Despite a c-section was out on my bike after five weeks and running after six.

2009

Isabelle is growing up into a lovely toddler but it's true that having kids changes everything.  We still managed to go camping in the south of France in the summer, but life moves at a different pace now.  I started racing again, but lacked the time/opportunity to train well, so achieved no great results and subsequently just treasured the times I could get out for a decent ride or run.  I went back to work in June, thankfully only doing one job this time (at work, at least). Having participated in, researched and taught social media for half a decade I decided that it was time that I started blogging at 100rpm.  Which is where you are now.