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Managers, Why Stress Over Your PR?

by Robert A Kelly

The article assumes that you are a manager who needs and wants the kind of public relations effort that leads directly to achieving your managerial objectives.

Please feel free to publish this article and resource box
in your ezine, newsletter, offline publication or website.
A copy would be appreciated at bobkelly@TNI.net.
Word count is 1200 including guidelines and resource box.
Robert A. Kelly © 2006.

Managers, Why Stress Over Your PR?

Decide once and for all that instead of your business,
non-profit, government agency or association public
relations staff spending most of their time moving
messages from one point to another using simple
communications tactics, you really want the best PR
has to offer.

And that almost always means doing something both
positive and meaningful about the behaviors of those
important outside audiences of yours whose behaviors
MOST affect the departmental, divisional or subsidiary
unit you manage.

This assumes, by the way, that you are a manager who
needs and wants the kind of public relations effort that
leads directly to achieving your managerial objectives.

You can do this by persuading key outside folks of
yours to your way of thinking by helping move them
to take actions that help your department, group, division
or subsidiary succeed. But it can only happen when you
as a manager require more than tactics like special events,
news releases and broadcast plugs. That's when you'll
receive the quality public relations results you deserve.

The good news is that there's a solid foundation under-
pinning this approach to managerial public relations:
people act on their own perception of the facts before
them, which leads to predictable behaviors about
which something can be done. When we create, change
or reinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and
moving-to-desired-action the very people whose
behaviors affect the organization the most, the public
relations mission is usually accomplished.

More good news for managers lies in the kind of PR
end-products that can come your way. For example, new
proposals for strategic alliances and joint ventures start
showing up; community leaders begin to seek you out;
capital givers or specifying sources start to look your
way; welcome bounces in show room visits occur;
politicians and legislators begin looking at you as a key
member of the business, non-profit or association
communities; customers begin to make repeat
purchases; and membership applications start to rise.

Your public relations professionals are your shock
troops in making this work. They are already in the
perception and behavior business, and can handle your
data gathering activity, an essential component of your
new opinion monitoring project. However, you should
satisfy yourself that your PR staff really accepts why
it's SO important to know how your most important
outside audiences perceive your operations, products
or services. Essentially, be sure they truly believe that
perceptions almost always result in behaviors that can
help or hurt your operation.

Invest some time in going over your plans for
monitoring and gathering perceptions by questioning
members of your most important outside audiences.
Propose that the staff consider questions like these:
how much do you know about our organization?
Have you had prior contact with us and were you
pleased with the exchange? Are you familiar with our
services or products and employees? Have you
experienced problems with our people or procedures?

By the way, hiring survey pros to handle the opinion
gathering work, can result in costs exceeding the cost
of using your own staff people. But whether it's your
people or a survey firm asking the questions, the
objective remains the same: identify untruths, false
assumptions, unfounded rumors, inaccuracies,
misconceptions and any other negative perception
that might translate into hurtful behaviors.

As is always the case in administering programs, you
need to establish a clearcut and realistic PR goal
calling for action on the most serious problem areas
you uncovered during your key audience perception
monitoring. You may decide to straighten out that
dangerous misconception, bring to an end that
potentially painful rumor, or correct that gross
inaccuracy.

As you might suspect, it will be necessary to connect
your new goal to an action-oriented strategy that
shows how to get to where you're going. Actually,
you have just three strategic options available to you
when it comes to doing something about perception
and opinion. Change existing perception, create
perception where there may be none, or reinforce it.
Needless to say, the wrong strategy pick will taste like
red-eye gravy on your clams casino. So be sure your
new strategy fits well with your new public relations
goal. You certainly don't want to select "change"
when the facts dictate a strategy of reinforcement.

Moving a key audience to your way of thinking is never
a cakewalk. The first step is certainly asking your
team's best writer to prepare a persuasive message
that will help move that key audience to your view of
things. It has to be a carefully-written message targeted
directly at your key external audience. S/he must
produce some really corrective language that is not
merely compelling, persuasive and believable, but
clear and factual if they are to shift perception/opinion
towards your point of view and lead to the behaviors
you have in mind.

Your message will be carried to the attention of your
target audience by the right communications tactics.
There are many tactics available from speeches,
facility tours, emails and brochures to consumer
briefings, media interviews, newsletters, personal
meetings and many others. But be certain that the
tactics you pick are known to reach folks just like
your audience members.

As always, how you communicate your message
remains a concern because its credibility is fragile
and always suspect. Which is why you may wish
initially to unveil your corrective message before
smaller meetings through presentations rather than
using higher-profile news releases.

In due course, you'll want to compare where you are
now against the starting point to highlight progress
made since the program's inception. First, you'll
be demonstrating, in the form of periodic progress
reports, how the monies spent on public relations
can pay off. However, it's also an alert to start a
second perception monitoring session with
members of your external audience. Here, you'll use
many of the same questions used in the benchmark
interviews. But now, you will be on strict alert for
signs that the bad news perception is being altered
in your direction.

On occasion, the program will show signs of slowing
down. Fortunately, adding more communications tactics,
and/or increasing their frequencies, usually solves that
problem.

I asked up front: Managers, Why Stress Over your PR?

Certainly, as outlined above, there will be little
justification for angst or stress among business, non-
profit, government agency or association managers
who pursue public relations solutions that lead directly
to achieving their managerial objectives.

end

Bob Kelly counsels and writes for business, non-profit and
association managers about using the fundamental premise of public
relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has published over
230 articles on the subject which are listed at EzineArticles.com, click
Expert Author, click Robert A. Kelly. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola
Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport
News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communications, U.S.
Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The
White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia
University, major in public relations.
mailto:bobkelly@TNI.net Visit:www.PRCommentary.com

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