It was with disappointment, but no surprise, that I read a front-page story in PR Week about how "PR has failed to shed its 'ab-fab' image". Researchers found that the majority of coverage about PR in our national press was negative and only 35% positive. One newspaper article even described PR as 'the art of saying nothing'.
This one-sided view of PR comes from the press just following the antics of 3rd rate celebrities with their publicists who hawk their torrid little lives around. The other main culprits are the political 'spin doctors'. I live in hope that one day the media will stop calling upon the likes of Matthew Freud, Max Clifford and Alistair Campbell for interviews about reputation and PR. One day, maybe we will see the CIPR talk for the industry.
The fact of the matter is that PR is the best and most cost-effective way of building reputation, creating a dialogue and relationship with your stakeholders and building the bottom line. PR should be taken far more seriously at board level and PROs should ideally report directly into the CEO. Until we as an industry are taken more seriously this will never happen.
PR will always get bad press until we as an industry invest more in setting the record straight. We do such a great job for our clients why can't we do it for ourselves?
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