One dimension of this discussion is the opportunities blogs in particular are providing organisations – through PR-driven brand journalism – to make a proactive, high profile contribution to discussions on key issues, including industry news. Large organisations especially have the resources to gain high SEO rankings because of their relevance to issues and topics of conversation.

They can therefore rival even large news organisations as a provider of content – analysis and thought leadership in particular, leaving the daily grind of ‘news’ to the old school woolly mammoths.

It doesn’t have to be either/or, though. The two paradigms can operate in tandem, just as they are evolving to do.

And why wouldn’t organisations do this (i.e. create reputation-building safe haven sources of information that goes STRAIGHT to stakeholders (i.e. unmediated – getting the message across without media bias)? As long as this is done with credibility, authenticity and with stakeholders’ interests in mind, it will make an impact and is already doing so.

This is taking an issues management approach. Intelligently done, it is an approach that can not only build reputation proactively, it can also provide a bulwark against negative criticism that occurs in a crisis situation, including from the woolly mammoths.

But it’s not just organisational blogs that are at play there. There is the 3^rd party: the independent blogger. We’re coming to the new tiger in the jungle.

Public relations needs to be proactive in issues management

One strategic approach for brand journalism, especially when using a blog platform, is to frequently link to and address issues discussed by and/or relevant to influential, or potentially influential, bloggers (in the context of an organisation’s reputation and/or a specific issue). The organisation should be addressing these issues from its own perspective, providing insights and information that will be unique to it – thus helping with differentiation, SEO and thought leadership positioning.

Why should the woolly mammoths have all the exclusives, pray tell?

The recognition of the blogger’s perspective through taking this approach will make them make feel valued and respected, even if the organisation takes an oppositional perspective to them. This will definitely speed up the information flow in a crisis (i.e. potentially stamp out the brush fires of disinformation that can escalate an already explosive situation).

Would you say the same approach would work with traditional journalism (i.e. link to journalist’s stories on either their own blogs or media website)? In my view, it won’t work as well because the journalists are bred and paid to be difficult folk, taking the cynical, uber-sceptical position.

Journalists have egos. Who would have thought?

But there are exceptions to this rule, especially in vertical/B2B media outlets and, let’s not forget, journalists are people too and as such possess egos (often quite colossal ones) that will feel gratified and respected if an organisation links to their online endeavours and accords them recognition and respect when addressing their positions. So, in summary, it can’t hurt!

Non-journalist bloggers – tigers without manners?

Because non-media bloggers aren’t restrained by the same standards and regulation as journalists, they can put unfounded content and utter speculation on their sites, meaning the genie can escape from the bottle (even if the genie is a figment of the writer’s imagination or ego) very quickly. If the organisation has an established blog and possibly even relationship with the blogger, this fire can be doused extremely quickly.

PR content marketing is more than join-the-dots

As social media is such a well resourced and many-limbed conductor of contemporary crises and issues of a reputational nature, it is imperative that an organisation of any size cultivates more than just a ‘placeholder’ presence on a blog and other social media, as well as having a presence that talks not only about positive ‘pretty’ issues impacting on the organisation, but also about challenging and divisive ones.

For brand journalism to resonate with its stakeholders it needs to take this holistic approach, embracing a wide range of issues relevant to the organisation and its stakeholders’ interests, needs and wants.

Independent bloggers influence the media itself, thus giving their presence greater resonance. In an interesting summary articulated in a study in the Journal of Public Relations Research, which has influenced this post itself, it was stated that bloggers:

• Act as ‘watchdogs’ to media by identifying inaccuracies
• Remove barriers to information access that media might put in place
• Upset the once dominant agenda-setting primacy of the media woolly mammoths
• Democratise the sources of information and perspectives available to stakeholders to gather information.

All of this is true, of course. So now we have three sources of news and blogs:

• Media woolly mammoths
• Organisational elephants in the room
• Independent tigers of the jungle.

Care to venture outside?

Stop press: Very soon a new, free whitepaper will be launched on this blog called The Holy Trinity of public relations: thought leadership, 3rd party credibility and strategic alliances. Spread the word! #PRholytrinity

What role do you think organisations should play in the provision of thought leadership, industry information and news – either through social media such as blogs or other platforms? What are your observations on the rapidly evolving tripartite sources of news and insights we have – media, bloggers and organisations? Where are we headed?

If you found this post of value, please share it through Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. Thanks!

Whilst I am an advocate of organisational change – short-term pain for long-term gain – to help create better stakeholder relationships, without the initial important component of listening being applied in an exacting, scientific manner, change and impact in any context will not be fulfilled to its best possible level.

The value of listening pre-crisis for PR and reputation management

In an issues & crisis management dimension there are a range of excellent reasons to have a sophisticated set of organisational listening protocols in place. Listening enables you to:

• pick up on organisation mentions and the context (very important) in which this has occurred
• identify and understand issues
• identify stakeholders, as well as key influencers on your target audiences
• proactively build up database of those who are either fans of the organisation and its issues, have an interest in them or who can positively influence others, enabling you to build programs targeting those receptive to information and giving you a good opportunity to amplify your content across the internet
• identify and develop relationship management strategies for those who are critical of the organisation
• gain fresh perspectives on how organisational and stakeholder change could occur, facilitating continuous organisational improvement (communication-specific or broader business-relevant)
• identify topics and issues of interest to target audiences that an organisation can create communication programs from (including inbound marketing and content marketing approaches)
• put in place planning to address potential issues come crises, including reaching out to relevant stakeholders before issues escalate into crisis territory. These potential issues could have been identified through stakeholder monitoring.

Why listening helps PR during a crisis

If you have an effective stakeholder listening process set up you will hear, and you can react to, the issue and where it came from. You can do this accurately and with speed, thus saving time and helping minimise issue/crisis escalation and negative reputation impact.

PR-driven social media helping organisations post-crisis

Social media is a boon for issues management, crisis management and continuous organisational improvement. This is because once integrated into an organisation’s listening strategy, it can provide deep information to help an organisation:

• understand and assess stakeholder reactions to crises
• determine what elements of the crisis stakeholders responded to most significantly (e.g. nature of organisational crisis management and response; what elements of the crisis generated greatest concern/relief)
• who the most active commenters were (both positive and negative), thus helping determine influencers and programs that can be put in place to leverage supporters and educate/inform/build more positive relationships with negative commenters/influencers
• prioritise stakeholders that could potentially become champions or advocates of the brand
• reach out to stakeholders to further explore their positions
• emphasise post-crisis organisational change that is occurring and continue the conversation
• anthropomorphise (give it human qualities) the conversation and, hence, the organisation
• determine the ROI on crisis actions undertaken, ultimately helping identify opportunities for the organisation to change its operations/crisis communication to create more positive relationships with stakeholders.

All of this information provides a valuable resource for continual whole-of-organisation improvement and, by extension, organisational cultural and – of course – communication change.

Stop press: In a few weeks a new, free whitepaper will be launched on this blog called The Holy Trinity of public relations: thought leadership, 3rd party credibility and strategic alliances. Spread the word! #PRholytrinity

What other activity can take place – communication-specific and more broadly business-relevant – as a result of effective target audience and stakeholder listening? Do you have examples of how an organisation has changed its communication and business as a result of listening to its stakeholders that you can share?

If you found this post of value, please share it through Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn.

According to recent data that has come from Nielsen, social media use in Australia:

• is up 127% in 2011 compared to 2010
• increased its share of being a leisure pursuit by 36%
• sees, on average, Australians spend nearly ten hours per week on social networks.

Additionally, a new study from the USA amongst  300 C-suite and senior executives found that companies that fully embrace social engagement are experiencing four times greater business impact than less‐engaged companies.

This is on top of the cold, hard fact that social media provides invaluable help in the field of crisis communication management to:

• identify emerging issues and key stakeholders and influencers
• enable speedy communication during the crisis
• provide information to improve future crisis operational and communication processes (not to mention business operations in the broader sense).

Bearing all this evidence in mind – what’s the problem?!

*This supposition, and a number of others noted in this post, are based on findings and analysis in Trends and issues in Australian corporate affairs 2012, a survey of over 300 of Australia’s most senior corporate affairs professionals, undertaken by leading public relations, communications and corporate affairs recruiter, Salt & Shein.

PR watches the social media boat sail by

Following are some quotes from the report’s respondents that had me raising an eyebrow or two:

• “I think there are ways and techniques that people will eventually refine that will allow you to control the message in a social media context.”
• “I still think it’s all about controlling the message. Social media is just another channel, but with tighter timeframes.”
• “The market predominantly reads the serious press, watches ABC news and listens to AM and PM. It doesn’t necessarily look at someone’s tweet or Facebook post.”

When PR pros start talking about controlling the message, I wonder do they actually mean controlling reputation? Because I would have thought by now that it is generally recognised as being realistic that reputation and brand are created jointly between an organisation and its stakeholders, with social media being one of the main reasons why this is in fact the case.

Controlling the message is, in many instances, an extension of the reputation control presumption. Messages are translated, modified, re-articulated by stakeholders, with value-adding occurring all the time. Trying to control the message, then, is like saying here is a bottle with a genie in it, but don’t you dare open it!

The report says its respondents are, “over-whelmingly… taking a “toe in the water” approach to social media whilst actively monitoring the medium.” A little bit of bravery here guys! It’s not like we are short on data supporting the need to alter our approach to communication, reallocating resources as necessary.

The response from what I assume is an ASX-listed company’s PR employee in regard to the ‘market’ implies that the market is the only stakeholder they care about. This further implies that the company’s focus is a narrow one. I am sure it has more than one stakeholder to maintain and build a relationship with.

The report further notes that, “Several senior practitioners at top 50 companies were scathing in their assessment of the medium, variously describing it as “pure hype”, “completely oversold” and “a re-run of the internet frenzy in the 1990s”.

This seems to fly in the face of best practice PR that espouses thought leadership and its placement on social media, the critically important approach of inbound marketing and the content marketing that needs to underpin it.

On the other hand, as noted through the rationale of the following report respondent, there can be a sound reason for avoiding social media, at least until you figure out a way for ROI to be delivered:

“In one part of our business we are avoiding social media altogether because it’s a hornet’s nest populated by activists who are well mobilised and organised around a single issue. We have assessed the impact of their social media activities on our reputation as miniscule, as the number of people following and reading the blogs and posts is very small.”

Public relations using social media for crisis communication

“The biggest issue for corporate affairs to manage is social media. It has fundamentally changed the paradigm from managing information to managing information flow. Whatever vestige of control there was is fast being dissipated through the fragmentation of social media and the rise of customer democracy in parallel.”

From a crisis management perspective, it seems hard to justify standing by and just watching and monitoring social media.

This notion is amplified by the findings of survey last year that highlighted brand and image as top of the list of risk concerns for 300 Australia and New Zealand executives, with social media highlighted as a “particular risk to brand, image and reputation.”

Well, here’s a news flash guys, unless you are on the social web engaging and influencing, it is going to be too late come crisis time to play catch up. Do you want to build up the relationship bank account before withdrawals are made, or receive the sort of withdrawal shock to the system that Greece, metaphorically speaking, is going through?

The Salt & Shein report notes, “Social media’s role in escalating negative news whilst compressing deadlines and response times is a recurring theme in our quantitative survey, with nearly 18 per cent of respondents nominating its role in issues and crisis management.”

Is a significant, if only partial, solution to concerns like this not screaming us in the face?

What did you think about the findings flagged in this post based on the Salt & Shein report? Does the level of social media engagement from so many leading Australian companies surprise you? Most report respondents were from the Australian financial services sector, so do you think the report results aren’t a fair reflection of PR practice by large organisations?

If you found this post of value, please share it through Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn.

There are benefits to both approaches, but embedding communication/public relations with the logistical/operational side of the crisis wins out according to two leading Australian corporate communication and issues and crisis management professionals.

Integrating communication into holistic crisis management

“My preference is to have a ‘combined’ team dealing with both crisis response and crisis comms,” says Tony Jaques , owner and director of Issue Outcomes.  “The reason is that I feel the alternative sets up a differentiation which is unhelpful.

“I have given this issue quite a lot of thought over time and I feel that a combined team serves to very strongly emphasise that crisis management is a truly cross-functional activity, of which comms is an important part, but not really more important than others.

“I was running an issue management workshop for a client recently on a very strongly legal issue and the question was asked whether there should be a separate legal issues management plan developed. I think the answer to this question is the same.

“There is sometimes value in establishing a ‘sub-team’ for specific purposes, but the core crisis team must retain overall responsibility.

“Does having a separate comms team mean the spokesperson would necessarily be part of the comms team, or would that person be a member of the ‘core’ team? Thinking in terms of responsibility and accountability, I believe best practice becomes almost self-evident.  It is the crisis management team which must be seen to be in charge, including the most senior managers, with a comms sub-group acting only on delegated authority.”

Craig Badings, a director at Cannings, agrees with Tony.  “Definitely merge the two together,” says Craig.

“Why?  Because I have seen too many crises when it becomes clear that the planning was done separately and as a result the left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing. This puts the business under enormous pressure.

“The danger of planning them apart is that the operations’ crisis plan focuses on what it thinks is most important – business continuity, with little thought given to the external communication pressures and demands this will place on them and senior management.

“The two have to work seamlessly with very clear responsibilities (e.g. the CEO will likely spend a lot of his/her time dealing with various stakeholders almost in a full-time communications role with little time available for operational issues).  These are the sorts of things that need to be taken into account in the planning so when it does happen the business doesn’t crumble under the pressure.”

The importance of public relations for permission to operate

An operations/business continuity/logistical-focused management of a crisis needs communication for its objectives to be realised to the best possible effect. For instance, when it comes to business continuity it may be necessary to liaise with stakeholders such as industry associations, regulators and business partners (e.g. suppliers, customers etc).

Even if it is not these stakeholders’ communication professionals that business continuity needs to liaise with to ‘fix’ the issue and retain/gain permission to operate, the communication professionals in these organisations will frequently be called upon to handle activities in regard to their own reputation. In this case, clearly there needs to be multiple layers of communication that occur between different stakeholders and it will be a smoother process if public relations is at the heart of the crisis management process.

Permission to operate is important both as a logistical reality with many crises as well as a fairly vivid sub-text when it comes to reputation management.

There may be organisational stakeholders that don’t actually decide if an organisation should be allowed to continue to operate in a official capacity, but they sure as hell influence whether this will actually occur (not to mention influence share price impact, an ability to expand operations, make new acquisitions, attract new and quality employees etc).

You only have to look at the recent (and ongoing) example of chemical company Orica’s PR crisis and the issues it is having with local residents and councils – not to mention the NSW state government that has been giving them a pounding.

Crisis communication: an opportunity for public relations credibility

Enhancing the credibility of public relations may not be a sufficient reason for integrating communication/public relations into a sole crisis management team, but it is certainly a corollary of doing so.

In a crisis situation the importance of communication and reputation management becomes very apparent, even to those most averse to recognising the power of public relations. No CEO is fond of having the organisation he or she runs hammered by the media, politicians and 3^rd party analysts.

Because of this reliance that different vocational disciplines have on public relations, it should help the latter become a stronger part of organisational culture. And to fully leverage both the opportunity that a crisis presents and the power of public relations, a review of what occurred in the crisis is the perfect time for the public relations team to present rationales why it might just be that the organisation needs to evolve for two reasons:

• To better meet the needs of its stakeholders
• To enable the organisation to meet its long-term business objectives.

Do you think that communication/public relations should be incorporated into the core crisis team responsibilities, or be a separate entity? Has the credibility, stature and impact of public relations increased in organisations you have worked in after a crisis? In your experience, has applying a public relations two-way symmetrical communication mindset post-crisis helped your organisation meaningfully evolve?

All of these factors underline the importance that public relations can play in generating trust for the organisation it works for (not to mention the discipline itself).

Two of the saddest characteristics of contemporary society are that:

• frequently organisations cannot be trusted (especially those with the sort of marketing mindset that prioritises turning a buck over longer term relationship management)
• a large swathe of media cannot be trusted - especially the metro mainstream variety. They are victim to resource cutbacks, ownership intervention (i.e. the “‘corrosive influence’ of corporate power on journalism”) and other forms of internal politics, the phenomena of journalist as ‘star’ (e.g. Andrew Bolt) in preference to analyst and a negative attitude fixated on divisiveness, not building and healing.

Public relations, on the other hand:

• sees valued long-term relationships as a means to helping to make money, not being a barrier to it. Thus compromises and negotiation are inherent in effective PR practices
• can be trusted (if it is applied as it should be, with a concern for all stakeholders, not just its employer).

Unlike the media, public relations is an increasingly well-resourced discipline. Incumbent on a PR professional is a responsibility to influence an organisation to evolve in line with stakeholder needs and wants. It works inside an organisation to advocate change. All the media can do is drop bombs from a great height and hope they hit the target. Dropping bombs is code for destruction, too – not a positive force.

One of the main activities of public relations is, or should be, content marketing – the provision of reliable, trustworthy and useful information from an organisation to its stakeholders. Content marketing’s credibility is already significant and if PR pros and organisations use the tactic ethically (as well as shrewdly) then it may well be that public relations the discipline, and organisations that employ this approach, can be trusted more than the media.

Qantas public relations – success or failure?

In regard to the Federal Government of Australia, Qantas failed because it gave the government a few hours notice before it pulled all its planes from operation. It gave the government little time to make a meaningful intervention.

In regard to its customers, it failed them as it gave them little or no notice of their flights not existing anymore.

In regard to the CEO having his salary upgraded to something around the $5 million mark, whilst at the same time trying to stick it to the unions and employees by granting employees a far lower salary increase, both in dollar times and percentage of pre-existing salary terms, Qantas failed.

It is a bit hard to take any high moral ground when you are being paid a motza and you are quibbling over much smaller changes to your colleagues’ pay packet.

In regard to cutting costs through such means as servicing planes overseas where pay rates are cheaper than in Australia and being too sly for its own good in regard to pilots’ pay rates, Qantas failed.

In regard to it listening to and effectively engaging with its stakeholders, then acting with these stakeholders’ (customers, employees, the Australian Federal Government, potentially [?] its own shareholders) interests and welfare at heart, Qantas failed.

This is in addition, of course, to Qantas’s safety record nosediving in recent years, its reputation for being a quality airline dipping alarmingly and – now here’s a surprise – what was once a reliable airline now seemingly being the precise opposite.

Can PR work when in an arrogant business milieu?

Qantas no doubt has a strategy that it believes will pay dividends (in its different incarnations) in the future. Based on reports of its non-inclination to reach out to mitigate damage done to the brand through the crisis in a hurry, it sounds all very concerted and conscious. Watch out for the marketing blitz to come soon, following its decision not to worry too much about crisis communication.

Actually, in some ways I like their non-crisis comms decision. It knew it would get a hammering. Maybe the best thing to do is just take it on the chin then go for business as (ab)normal!

Destroying the workers’ representative bodies (the unions) has been mentioned. And whether you like them or loathe them, unions have served a valuable role in the development of worker safety and well-being, as well as helping us earn a fair wage.

It makes you wonder why organisations employ public relations professionals at all. Clearly, in a case such as the Qantas shutdown, the priority was not on stakeholder well-being, it was purely about putting the business in a position where it could get it’s own way. Will this mean long-term benefit for its stakeholders?

I doubt it. Qantas shareholders will probably be the big long-term winners. That, or the airline, which was already in possession of a diminishing reputation, will simply die.

 What do you think about the way Qantas handled its public relations? What would have occurred if PR advice had been listened to? Was Qantas forced into this position? Are the unions to blame? What was the unions’ approach to public relations? Can anyone or any entity be relied on for trustworthy information in a situation such as this?

Chief Executive Graeme Leibelt was quoted as saying he had, “not heard anybody in authority suggest that the expansion plans should not go ahead.” This was in reference to chemical leaks potentially delaying enhancements at one of its plants.

This leak involved the release of a potentially cancer-causing agent, which NSW Health found posed no risks to residents of a nearby suburb – though as is the case in these sorts of issues, the residents themselves are doubtless not so sure.

The bigger stakeholder picture

Using Leibelt’s alleged quote as a basis for discussion, the issue which struck me was that companies and humans can often be so focused on their commercial and shareholder relationships they forget about – or minimise the importance of – the communities in which they operate.

This is a mistake for a number of reasons:

• Local communities will supply some of their employees. This can lead to lower morale=commitment=productivity from them = bottom line impact
• Employees are an organisation’s most effective and important communicators. If they are advocates, their influence is positive. If they are frustrated, their communication and their impact is negative
• Communities are made up of humans. Humans vote, they lobby, they influence politicians and politicians hate negative pressure and a negative spotlight being put on them. And politicians influence regulation that will impact on the company’s operating conditions, potentially compromising a company’s ability to run its own race.

Perhaps most importantly, the notion that it is people in “authority” are the only ones that matter, as implied in this alleged statement, communicates arrogance and a concern only with those that will adjudicate on the company and the way it operates.

This, in turn, implies a belief that it is not the welfare of the community, or larger society, which matters – it is the welfare of the company which overrides all others. For companies in this day and age to take this approach means they view social and environmental ramifications of their operations as being of secondary (if that) importance.

This is not a tenable approach as it is big business which runs society these days, not governments. And so big business needs to take on a greater responsibility than looking after its shareholders who hold stock.

All of us are their shareholders:

• We share their world
• We share the positive and negative impact they have on society and the environment
• And believe it or not – we have authority!

Public relations’ influence on hubris

There are two areas where public relations can influence an organisation to prevent the hubris and negative stakeholder perceptions that are inherent in Leibelt’s alleged quote:

• The culture, values and operating systems of the organisation
• The manner in which the organisation communicates especially, in this case, to the media.

Public relations is a positive social force, one that can impact positively on organisations so that they take the long view. This may mean compromised profit in the short term to help achieve longer term business objectives: short-term pain for long-term gain.

It is a management discipline that provides organisations with a means of understanding the needs, wants and issues of their stakeholders. With this understanding, organisations can evolve themselves, thus creating entities with more functional and productive relationships – including those of a regulatory, political and, yes, media nature.

Public relations is far more than a marketing adjunct. We are talking serious strategic and cultural heft, here.

On a more prosaic and tactical level, I think any public relations consultant would have taken fright at Leibelt’s alleged quote. Even if he believes it, he still shouldn’t have said it!

To help make sure this negative reputational quote didn’t occur, some of the following needed – or need – to occur (which is not to say they weren’t occurring already –sometimes glitches just happen!):

• Key messages need to be workshopped and refined, whether for overarching organisational messages of those specific to this situation
• Media training for company spokespeople, especially those in potentially problematic industries such as Orica, is imperative

• Counselling from senior public relations employees before, and during, situations such as that which Orica was facing are also imperative
• The spokespeople, chief executives included, need to be willing to listen to advice. Make your own judgement, sure, but we have a very good idea how to help the media whilst at the same time getting organisational perspectives across and either enhancing reputation or, at least, minimising reputation damage.

As to the local community, there are a whole range of opportunities there for engagement, if the organisation cares…But that’s for another post.

What do you think about the alleged quote from Orica’s chief executive? Am I over-dramatising its impact? Can you think of parallel situations you have been involved in or observed? If so, what was the impact on the organisation or its stakeholders?

Certainly, the marketing communication dimension of business communication, in the context of issues management, may have been glossed over quite significantly.

Marketing communication is an unusual discipline, if indeed it is a discipline. I tend to think of it as a set of tactical mechanisms that fall under both marketing and public relations.

From a practical perspective, I suspect marketing communication tactics are traditionally and generally implemented by the marketing team, but based on the strategic remit of public relations, these tactics are equally useful for public relations. This has been proven time and again by organisations that have a corporate communication function, but not a discrete marketing one (not unusual for government organisations in Australia).

Some marketing communication tactics include:

• brochures and flyers
• direct mail and email
• social media marketing, including Facebook, Twitter and blogs
• events, launches and stunts
• branding.

Marketing should think like public relations

Marketing in all of its guises should be cognisant of the broader remit in which its activities occur. In essence, marketing needs to think like more public relations. Questions marketers need to ask include:

• what are the ways in which this product or service could enhance or damage the relationship my organisation has with its stakeholders?
• what are the different perceptions that varying stakeholders could have of this product or service and what are the ways in which we can optimise the experience of our stakeholders in regard to the product or service?
• will making money off this product or service compromise the capability of my organisation’s other products or services to make money?
• if this product or service doesn’t deliver according to its objectives, what do we do?
• what is the history of producing products or services such as these and have there been issues in regard to them that could compromise outcomes such as profit, organisational reputation and stakeholder relationships?

Characteristics of the product or service that need to be considered in this thinking include:

• What is it designed to achieve?
• What is it made of?
• How is it manufactured and delivered?
• How much are workers in the production and supply chain paid and what are the conditions under which they work?

Marketing as broadcast; PR as interactive

Despite its many claims to the counter, marketing is essentially about selling, so it would do well to consider the broader strategic remit of public relations, which is also about selling but, more importantly, the long term reputation of an organisation and the relationships it has with all its stakeholders, not just its customers.

Marketing communication elements offer an opportunity to listen, engage and evolve, but so does their generally non-confrontational nature provide an excellent means to build relationships and reputation.

As marcomms is generally driven by marketing strategy, this strategy should situate itself in a broader context than profit and loss, thus providing room for marketing communication tactics to apply approaches that can enhance the organisation’s positioning and reputation.

The challenge is doing this in a way that doesn’t cloud the positioning of the product, service or initiative the marcomms is promoting. But it is possible. And doing so effectively will build the stakeholder ‘relationship bank account’.

What are examples of where marcomms can be used to build an organisation’s reputation you can tell us about? Does marketing miss the bigger picture of organisational reputation, focusing too much on profit & loss, in your opinion? Does marketing have a conversation with stakeholders for any other reason than to make more money and, if so, is this fair enough?

PS. This blog has just been named as one of Australia’s 25 best business blogs. Some great company I’m keeping if you care to check the other 24.

Delany said this in a recent issue of one of the world’s very best literary journals, The Paris Review. He also implied science fiction warns of issues and opportunities and considers alternative ways of thinking.

Well! If he hasn’t captured some fundamental essences of public relations I’ll eat my Akubra!

Describing public relations

There are five factors relevant to public relations’ capability encapsulated in Delany’s comments:

• Using our creativity to imagine how organisations and stakeholders can change themselves to better meet their goals – collectively and individually
• Providing a voice for the oppressed, marginalised and disenfranchised
• The potential that PR has to make the world a better place
• Issues management, including this mindset being part of the approach organisations take to marketing communication
• Taking stakeholder feedback, as well as using imagination, to help conceptualise and consider alternative ways of thinking and operational paradigms.

Public relations is not about putting a foot on the throat of stakeholders, subjugating their views and behaviour. Doing this has the following impact:

• Ultimately, sooner or later, the foot on the throat will be named and shamed, forcing the organisation into crisis, damaging its reputation and brand(s), leading to a lowering of profits, a difficulty in creating stakeholder relationships (including ones of a financial nature) and reduced productivity due to employee disengagement
• The organisation will not be in a position to learn from its stakeholders to create more enduring relationships, sustainable profits and, culturally, a more effective organisation
• It contributes to a negative, solipsistic society, which leads to divisiveness and a compromising of life’s manifold pleasures, both for those within and external to organisations.

Public relations contributing to an evolved organisation

Typically, PR’s creativity is thought of in terms of creating a communication strategy or tactic to gain the attention of stakeholders and influencing them to behave in a desired manner. All a bit dictatorial, really. Not very dialogic or symmetrical.

A more profound level of creativity is required to get organisations and their stakeholders to change so that their needs and wants become more aligned and, eventually, lead to mutually beneficial outcomes.  Public relations can help this occur by advocating both for stakeholders as well as organisations – if it chooses to do so…

One reason why public relations is important in this context is that it is the expert in language, in providing meaning. For organisations and their stakeholders to create a mutually beneficial relationship they need to speak the same language, or at least be empathetic towards each other’s language.

Narratives, motifs, meaning-making are all part of this mutual process, through which the organisation typically has the greatest power to be able to effect – due to its influence, finances and communication reach.

There is creativity involved in understanding and imagining how stakeholders less powerful than organisations feel about the organisation and how their lives are impacted on by it. Whilst this is more empathy than imagination, the most critical aspect is considering all parties through communication and organisational operations. PR pros have an important role in helping these, potentially, marginalised stakeholders interact with the organisation.

Issues management creativity

Creativity is also important in the very strategic issues management dimension of public relations. In this context creativity is applied to the manner in which scenarios are envisaged that an organisation needs to prepare itself to deal with. The imagining that is required through this process is not pure blue sky. Clearly, it needs to be business-relevant. Influencing factors, starting points or boundaries of the creativity include:

• risk management analysis of an organisation
• market research
• the nature of an organisation’s products or services, the processes which help deliver them and stakeholders’ relationships with the products or services.

The value of digression for narrative and public relations

At the risk of concluding this post with a notion that deserves its own discussion, Delany makes the interesting point in his Paris Review interview that there is great value in discursive discourses and narratives. Inherent within this assertion is the depth that language can inject into a discussion. So two elements, really:

• Not being linear or restrictive in narratives (i.e. get more creative)
• Utilising language to prompt imagination and help stakeholders map out their personalised version of an organisation and hence determine their own unique relationship.

Some of these notions will be too much to bear for those heavily wedded to the tightly defined notion of professional communication. But I believe there is great value in public relations appealing to the emotions and creativity of organisational stakeholders, whether it is through the use of language or the nature of narratives inherent within organisational discourse.

What do you think? Is public relations, or maybe just the assertions made in this post, science fiction?

The result of this will be stronger organisation-stakeholder relationships and an enhanced reputation. It will be an enriched organisation better able to meet stakeholder expectations. And it will help the organisation achieve its mission and objectives.

One dimension of relationship bank account saving schemes relates to how important marketing communication can be in building reputations, but a recent study in the highly credible Journal of Public Relations Research (JPRR) has also ascertained the key finding that:

“maintaining positive relationships with stakeholders may be more important than individual crisis strategies.”*

A sub-text of this finding is that issues management is the best solution for crisis management. The only problem being that issues management, of course, needs to occur before a crisis occurs. The upside of having to make an issues management investment is that it generate benefits additional to that of helping out in a crisis:

• It helps sell products and services
• It makes it easier to enhance and forge new relationships with key stakeholders
• It will help retain and attract excellent talent (i.e. employees).

So we now have two dimensions to aid in crisis management before the crisis hits:

• Marketing communication
• Issues management.

Public relations, issues management and reputation

Believe it or not, Brown and White say that there have been few studies illustrating how the quality of the pre-crisis relationship between and organisation and its stakeholders can impact on reputation impacts of the crisis. An implication of this is that most research into crisis management has focused on what to do during a crisis and following a crisis.

It seems obvious to purport that a negative relationship history impacts on perceptions towards an organisation during a crisis (Coombs & Holliday, 2001). Elements like trust, openness, investment and commitment have been identified by scholars (Bruning & Ledringham, 1999; Bruning & Galloway, 2003) as being important to building organisation-stakeholder relationships, whilst the following dimensions exhibit positive aspects of an organisation in these relationships:

1. Demonstrating likable human qualities (anthropomorphism)
2. Professional benefit/expectations
3. Personal commitment
4. Community commitment
5. Comparison of alternatives.

A challenge to two-way symmetrical communication?

An interesting corollary of this research and its assertions is that organisational change is not necessarily included in excellent organisational behaviour. This contradicts some elements – the most important ones? – of two-way symmetrical communication, which describes best practice public relations involves changing the behaviour of both an organisation and its stakeholders.

Purely from as issues management and crisis communication perspective, I still would have thought that identifying issues and evolving the way an organisation operates is the best way to mitigate crisis risk and potential reputation and stakeholder relationship damage.

So is the research saying that organisations don’t need to change the way they do things to create stronger relationships? It would seem so, which is entirely feasible. My view, however, that the best way to make a positive impact on relationships is to change, so the organisation operates more in line with its stakeholders’ needs and wants.

Of course, in a commercial environment, certainly one of the most pressurised and conflicted operating environments (others include community, health, government, NGO and more), the depth of change that will occur to meet stakeholder needs and wants faces a significant degree of challenges. And due to this the role of public relations professionals is extremely difficult if organisational change is an objective.

Human feelings are intrinsic to public relations

Of the five points noted above, it is also interesting that four of the five dimensions have a strongly humanistic and/or personal element. Only the dimension of ‘comparison of alternatives’ is a mechanistic one. Each of the others involve creating or presenting a ‘human face’ to the organisation and it behaving as a human being, rather than an edifice or machine with no ‘soul’, feelings or personality.

The implication of this seems obvious: organisations, whether they like it or not, have an emotional role to play with their stakeholders. Marketers have long appealed to the emotions of their potential customers. Untold amounts of marketing is predicated on consumers creating an emotional attachment – a relationship – with brands.

This is something that PR professionals would do well to pay heed to and learn from our marketing brethren.

Relationships trump crisis management

An important finding of Brown and White’s study is that, “maintaining positive relationships with stakeholders is more important than any individual crisis response strategy.” (There are various approaches that can be taken during a crisis, such as apologising, denial, blaming a scapegoat, justifying, creating an excuse and more.)

“Positive relationships trump [crisis response] strategy,” say Brown & White.

One slight exception, or value-add, to this general finding was that taking a “bolstering posture that seeks to build a position connection” between an organisation and its stakeholders results in less negative impact on the organisation. Bolstering means to accept responsibility but connecting a positive aspect of the organisation.

The dubious amongst us might be tempted to define this as spin, but that isn’t necessarily the case. It could simply be an attempt to add balance. An example is that whilst responsibility for the crisis is accepted, pointing out the positive record of the organisation, especially but not necessarily in the context of the crisis topic, could be very relevant. It provides a reality check for those taking a negative approach to the organisation. “Bolstering postures…remind stakeholders why they became involved with the organisation from the beginning.”

People and organisations make mistakes. Nothing in life is more certain. An aspect that separates the also-rans from the leaders is accepting this and trying to improve and evolve…which in itself continues the essential narrative on which Brown & White’s study and this discussion is based:

• Listen to stakeholders,
• Learn from stakeholders
• Evolve to better meet stakeholder needs and wants.

This will improve stakeholder relationships, enhance organisational reputation and create a deposit in the reputational bank account which provides protection when a crisis eventuates.

[A future post will explore links between marcomms and issues management.]

What are your take away thoughts from the study discussed here? How much have organisations you have worked with invested into the relationship bank account? How profoundly are an issues management and two-way symmetrical approaches inherent in the way they operate?

*The Journal of Public Relations Research article on which this post is based, and from which quotes are pulled, is Organization-Public Relationships and Crisis Response Strategies: Impact on Attribution of Responsibility, Brown K.A. and White C.L., Volume 23 (1) 2011.

But in the field of issue management it is having a dramatic impact not just on the day-to-day practice of the discipline, but is changing forever an organisation’s stakeholder relationships and the expectations of its stakeholders.

[This is a guest post by issue & crisis management expert, Dr Tony Jaques.*]

The growing expectation gap

Since Issue Management first developed, there have been various different approaches to defining what an issue is. One of the earlier ideas was the so-called Expectation Gap Theme. This very simple approach basically says that an issue arises when there is a gap between the actions of an organisation and the expectations of its stakeholders.

The expectation gap concept lost some popularity because it is very passive and lacks the proactivity that issue management should display. Now the rise of the social media is reviving interest, not because this approach changes the way we think about issues themselves, but because social media have changed the community’s expectation of what is acceptable corporate behaviour, as well as increasing the community’s capacity to communicate those expectations.

The rise of social media is commonly described as creating a more level playing field between those with power and those affected by exercise of power. However a less recognised impact of social media is the way in which community expectation is changing, which has significant implications for the future of issue management.

My online newsletter, Managing Outcomes, and my issue management-themed blog often discuss how organisations have paid a high price for failing to acknowledge this new reality. Two recent cases demonstrate the obvious increasing speed and globalisation of issues and, in addition, highlight the evolving gap between organisation action and community expectation.

Hyatt Hotels fiasco

When three Hyatt Hotels in the Boston area decided to lay off almost 100 housekeeping staff and replace them with lower cost, out-sourced employees, the Boston Globe alleged that the housekeepers had been tricked into training their replacements by describing them as temporary vacation staff.

Hyatt promptly issued a firm statement denying any trickery, adding that it was helping the housekeepers find work in Hyatt and other local hotels and that they had been provided with transition assistance and full severance benefits.

However the damage was done and through late 2009 the story became an internet and media sensation, focusing mainly on community expectation of how a luxury hotel chain should treat its lowest paid workers. There were calls for a boycott of Hyatt, a public protest in the city of Boston and politicians urged Hyatt to reconsider.

More importantly for a global brand, the story spread around the world through mainstream international news sources and hundreds of blogs and social media sites. Even the normally staid Harvard Business Review blog offered the headline: “Lessons from Hyatt: Simple ways to damage your brand.”

As HBR concluded: “There’s at least a small lesson here: think about the way your actions will be perceived by all your stakeholders before you take them.”

Gap’s new logo

Another view of new stakeholder expectations arose in late 2010 when The Gap clothing chain announced a change to its long-time logo, triggering a firestorm of protest around the world. In the face of widespread opposition, the company promptly said it would ‘crowd source’ a new logo, then within days jettisoned that plan and reverted to the original logo.

Although history is littered with brand fiascos – think New Coke and Vegemite iSnack 2.0 – the Gap logo backflip helped popularise an emerging stakeholder concept: that brands ‘belong’ to consumers and not manufacturers. Promoting this trend, influential bloggers argued that Gap had no ‘right’ to change the logo without consumer consultation and support.

Where to for issue management?

Some commentators have argued that Gap management grossly over-reacted to online criticism from a small but very vocal minority, while others claim the entire episode was a marketing stunt.

While the truth about this case may continue to be debated, the detail here is less important than the fact that for Hyatt and Gap – and for many others – stakeholders now have different expectations about how organisations should behave and about their own role in how issues are managed.

Working from the platform provided by the social media, stakeholders are reconfiguring the traditional ‘expectation gap’ and issue managers cannot afford to ignore that change.

*Dr Tony Jaques consults to corporate and government clients on issue and crisis management and risk communication through his company, Issue Outcomes Pty Ltd. He has been widely published in academic and non-academic journals around the world and writes Managing Outcomes, Australia’s only specialist online issue and crisis management newsletter. He can be networked with at his issue management blog and Linkedin profile.

[This post is included, with many other posts, in a free strategic PR report that can be downloaded from this blog by email subscribing to it. The report - Public relations 2011: insights ideas issues - features professional practice-adding value from 10 global PR leaders (and me).]