The defining theme that, arguably, characterises the world’s leading authority on public relations, Professor James Grunig, extensive, career-long discussion of public relations is this: organisations that proactively create mutually meaningful and mutually beneficial relationships with their stakeholders, including anticipating issues and actively communicating with them during crises:

“…should be more likely to develop relationships with their publics that make it possible to achieve organisational objectives, develop a positive reputation, and reduce the consequences of poor relationships on the implementation of management decisions.”*

“In some ways,” Grunig says, “Public relations has not been changed by the revolution in digital media.” The illusion of stakeholders being controlled existed before and it still exists now. Stakeholders create their own reality. The only way to impact on this reality is to engage and share information, to evolve based on this sharing and to enhance the meaning that relationships bring.

He made this comment in his recently published article, Paradigms of global public relations in an age of digitalisation (Praxis, a digital PR resource centre.) The article had as its central point the potential that social media has to, “truly revolutionalise public relations – but only if a paradigm shift in the thinking of many practitioners and scholars takes place.”

Global public relations in an age of digitalisation: the story so far

This post is the final of a three-part series that discusses certain elements of the article. In the first post (featured on Trevor Young’s PR Warrior blog, as was the second), the following elements were explored:

• how social media has complicated stakeholder targeting and communication
• the notion of ‘giving’ that characterises both public relations and social media
• the lack of control that organisations have over their stakeholders.

In the second post, key elements included:

• the participation required to utilise social media to its full effect
• the dialectic between reputation and engagement for organisational stakeholders
• social media as an issues management activity.

What social media can do for public relations

Social media, Grunig says, has “the potential to make the profession more global, strategic, two-way and interactive, symmetrical or dialogical, and socially responsible.” This will not occur, he warns, if PR pros use it as a means of “dumping messages”, however. Rather, he counsels professionals to interact with stakeholders and bring information, “from the environment into organisational decision-making.”

Social media, if not the ideal way to create this meaning (surely it is direct, interpersonal, face-to-face interaction which still rules here), is clearly becoming more and more influential in this regard.

Human beings are increasingly relying on these forms of communication. For some, social media/digital communication dominates their reality. And, certainly, the information they receive through these mediums, has a considerable degree of credibility. It has been argued that this is due to much of this information coming from individuals, rather than organisations.

Information that enters the social media realm and receives either a deliberate and strategised – or a non-designed organic – impetus from the solar systems of Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and their ilk can also have a cumulative, snowball-building ‘word-of-mouth’ effect that the planet has not experienced to this degree before.

Organisations can contribute to this multi-connected and multi-source generated and accelerated dimension. But they sure as hell can’t control it.

Social media is providing public relations with an opportunity to reinforce its importance to business and society. The profession is, in many cases, trying to take advantage of this opportunity. The question is, will it succeed?

The answer, according to Grunig, is only if we institutionalise public relations as a strategic management discipline, one that provides a vitally important element to business strategy and organisational culture.

“I have long provided evidence that public relations has greater value both for organisations and society when it is strategic, managerial, symmetrical, integrated [but not sublimated], diverse, and ethical,” summarised Professor Grunig. “Public relations, when practiced according to this global theory, helps organisations to achieve their goals, cultivate relationships in societies and globally, and reduce conflict.”

In the first post of this three-part series, issues discussed included how social media has complicated stakeholder targeting and communication, the notion of ‘giving’ that characterises both public relations and social media and the lack of control that organisations have over their stakeholders. In the second post, issues discussed included the participation required to utilise social media to its full effect, the dialectic between reputation and engagement for organisational stakeholders and social media as an issues management activity

What are your thoughts on Grunig’s thoughts and on this series of posts? Did you find them of value? Were there any aspects, arguments or thoughts you disagreed with? How can public relations enhance its professional standing and achieve its potential? What role or opportunity does social media have to play in this?

PS. I’d welcome you joining networks with me through my LinkedIn profile. Send me an invite!

*[Note that I am not differentiating, as Grunig does, between ‘stakeholders’ and ‘publics’. I am using the terms as synonyms.]

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