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Public
Relations
If you are smart and
outgoing, enjoy meeting people and have a flair for media
relations, you can look for a career in public relations.
This feature describes the job requirements, personality
traits, growth avenues and lists institutes offering
professional courses.
Public Relations (PR) is often confused with advertising. It
is, however, a distinct branch of communication and involves
informing and educating the public about the activities or
philosophy of an organisation. Some companies have their own
PR departments, while others appoint consultants or agencies
specialising in the job. The keyword is communicating the
company's point of view to various target groups, in an
effective manner so that a favourable impression is formed.
PR is, thus, a powerful management function and a serious
business activity. It does not mean merely building relations
with different groups.
The importance of PR is growing by the day. Both government
departments and the private sector have realised that
advertising must be supplemented with an effective PR. This
helps in two aspects: first in keeping close to the customer
to satisfy needs and anticipate changes in customer demand,
and second, to create a favourable impression among the
people which advertising may sometimes not do. Multinational
companies have recently launched customer clubs through which
they keep in contact with their customers, take their advice
and inform them of new products or services. A happy customer
will most likely make repeat purchases, so an effective PR
makes a good business sense too. It is a means to win
customer loyalty.
State governments also undertake PR activities to create a
favourable impression in the minds of the people. They have
their PR departments which are supposed to communicate the
achievements of the government, but much of it is a waste of
money and amounts to nothing more than giving gifts to
people. Very few governments realise the importance of good
PR : one such example is that of the Chandrababu Naidu
government in Andhra Pradesh, which has backed its activities
with a good communication campaign. From a career point of
view, a government job would be secure but real PR challenges
exist in private sector.
Functions
The functions of PR can be described as follows:
a) Press Relations: One objective of the PR manager is to
ensure that the company gets written about favourably in the
press. For this, relations with media correspondents have to
be maintained. They have to be provided with information and
handouts.
b) Communications: Customers, suppliers, employees, dealers
and others in contact with the company must know what it is
doing or plans to do in the future. Misunderstandings may
otherwise arise which may affect the business in the long
run.
c) Lobbying: Effective PR can influence public policy. An
important function of the PR professional will be to maintain
close relations and convince influential people in various
walks of life.
d) Counselling: Doubts have to be removed from the minds of
people through meetings and counselling, which will help keep
a direct contact and not let doubts remain which may have an
adverse impact on the company.
The PR professional has to keep in mind internal and external
publics. Internal publics consist of those people connected
with the organisation. Employees, shareholders, suppliers,
distributors, bankers, advisors and so on are part of
internal public. Customers, media persons and the society at
large, can be considered external publics. Both groups of
people are important for an organisation and it must keep
their interests in mind. The PR professional has to ensure
that the public shares the perception of the company.
One can see from this that all organisations need public
relations activities. Apart from companies and the
government, political parties also have to ensure that the
public shares their viewpoint as they have to seek votes from
the people. For practically any business, some amount of PR
is essential.
Avenues
A PR professional has several options for jobs. The first is
to join companies or organisations in their PR departments
and hope to rise to the level of Public Relations Officer
(PRO) after one has gained experience. The second option
would be to join professional PR firms who work as PROs for
their client companies. Such agencies work on contractual
basis. Many advertising agencies have started sister PR
firms. Certain individuals having contacts with press
correspondents have started small set ups of their own, using
their contacts to get press releases published. Journalists
are known to switch to this field after they have built up
contacts which they can use for their clients. Among these
are some well known people like former Doordarshan
newsreaders, who own successful PR agencies or are working in
PR departments of organisations. A third alternative would be
to set up one's own consultancy, provided that one is pushing
enough and has some contacts with media persons.
It may be remembered that a PR job is not merely meeting
people and keeping relations with them. Often, it could be
tedious work as one sends out endless press releases or
invitations for press conferences. Each one must be followed
up since media persons have their own priorities and often may
not turn up for the briefing. Moreover, newspapers have their
own system of news selection and may well ignore the press
release that a PR professional may have prepared
painstakingly. Since the effectiveness of PR is judged on the
basis of reports that are actually published, it is a tough
job indeed as one's performance is based on what others do.
When things go wrong, client companies will want that news be
blacked out or that their own viewpoint be published as well.
This is often difficult because newspapers cannot select news
on consideration of others.
It is not necessary to have formal qualifications in PR to
get a job in this area, provided one has the contacts in the
press. For others, a degree will help at the entry stage.
People who have diplomas in advertising or journalism can get
PR jobs, but some institutes offer diplomas in PR as well.
One can start with a salary of Rs 3,000 to
Rs 6,000 a month,
depending on the kind of organisation that one joins.
Thereafter, it is up to one's performance. A senior PR
professional may get Rs 10,000 to Rs 25,000. If one is
effective and delivers results, the sky would be the limit.
The plus points of the job is that one meets high profile
people from various fields. There is a certain amount of
glamour, especially if events like beauty contests are being
organised. PR professionals are much in demand in the film
and beauty business too, since models and film stars want
their pictures published in magazines and need agents who can
do the work for them.
The importance of PR is expected to grow in times to come.
One reason is that globalisation has made a lot of difference
to the business environment. Global companies are very
effective in PR activities. As advertising is becoming
prohibitively expensive, companies understand that their
campaign must have an element of direct contact also since
that is the only way to know how the customers perceive the
company or particular products. That is why we have so many
door to door campaigns, surveys and public events. The future
of public relations is thus very bright and will often be
done in conjunction with other media.
Where to study
PR courses are offered by polytechnics and colleges all over
India. Universities offer courses in mass communications and
public relations. The basic requirement is graduation and
there is usually an entrance test for university courses and
reputed institutes. One need not look for a specific PR
course since a degree in journalism and mass communications
is also considered sufficient for such jobs.
The following are some institutes where one can study. Some
offer PR courses while others offer communication and
journalism courses which are very helpful for PR:
Mudra Institute of Communications and Advertising (MICA),
Ahmedabad.
Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Jawaharlal Nehru
University (JNU), New Delhi.
Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia, New
Delhi.
Narsee Monjee Institute of Management, Mumbai.
Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan in various cities.
State universities in different cities.
Annamalai University, Annamalainagar (Correspondence).
Personality Traits
As is evident from the above, a PR practitioner must have an
extrovert, outgoing personality. He must have contacts with
the media and be willing to use them. Such contacts are
developed through parties, sending gifts both in cash and
kind. One must be a go-getter. It is said that excessive PR
has eroded the independence of newspapers and TV channels,
which often use news items which have no relevance. This has
been the negative aspect of the PR job.
One must have excellent communication skills, both spoken and
written. Press notes and handouts have to be prepared; and
information given out that is both understandable and
interesting. An organising ability is required too, as one
may have to organise press conferences, lectures, exhibitions
and events.
Some other personality traits that a person must have are
resilience and the ability to work under pressure. Sometimes
it may be frustrating too if people do not turn up for the
event or exhibition that you may have organised. A major
source of worry will be if newspapers do not carry your press
releases or if a journalist does not cover the events. An
aspirant for a PR job must keep all this in mind and be aware
of the shortcomings of the job too. However, one quickly
learns the rules of the profession and will get to know what
will work and what will not.
Above all, a PR practitioner must be able to handle the
client. Often, clients want good things written about them
without actually doing anything. It must be remembered that
PR cannot create a good impression on its basis alone: an
organisation should actually be doing good 90% of the time
and talk about it for only 10% of the time. Sometimes, people
will want to be featured on the media with very little work
and this creates a problem for the PR professional. The
solution to this is to keep the PR department as part of the
business activity of the organisation so that there is a
holistic approach to the process.
Finally, it may be said that a career in PR is a promising
one, given the fact that more and more organisations are
realising its importance. But the best approach is to assess
one's personality too and see whether one can fit in or not.
Effective PR is a lot of hard work; after all, changing
mindsets is not an easy task. When things go wrong, it is the
PR department which must handle the negative publicity and
try to create a favourable impression. This is not only
difficult but very challenging too.
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