McClellan, PRSA, Cohen and CBS, You Tube, Harold Burson, Jack O’Dwyer, Myself and…boy what a blunder!

As professionals, we know only too well how often we are called on to discover or even create reasonable opportunities for published visibility, as well as to rouse and galvanize internal/external stakeholder groups when a client or employer’s reputation is in a critical condition (or, more recently, even in business as usual circumstances). So what else is new?…..

election polls are only the tip of an iceberg for an essential review of understanding reality as it unfolds ever so fuzzily…

Once again most polls conducted for the recent Italian elections were wrong. Giuseppe De Rita, a highly intelligent and reputed analyst, sentenced: Italians are born liars. So what else is new? Helas! This is but the tip of an iceberg which calls into question, and not only in Italy, a number of ‘truths’ in many traditional activities such as market, political and social research, analysis, public relations, procurement, journalism…..

finding a responsible path towards the institutionalization of the public relations function!

From an organizational perspective, the ongoing and accelerating process of institutionalization of the public relations function, besides its many positive aspects (for the organization, for public relators as well as for influential publics of both), also implies certain risks which whoever exercises any influence in determining or assisting that very process, should be well aware of..

Architects and Public Relators: we both create SPACES where publics interact….

A lively discussion came up last Thursday evening in Rome, at the second of the six sessions scheduled for the production of the video book on ‘What is Public Relations’, which my friend Joao so acutely and courteously described here, following up on the first session. The general topic has to do with many issues my co-bloggers have touched upon in this blog as well as with the content of a recent (the plum of...

The CIPR (UK) moves forward with the Government towards a new licensing approach

As honoray fellow of the CIPR (the UK professional association), I received this cipr news highly interesting piece of news the other day, which implies that -in agreement with the UK Government, and moving forward from the 2006 already very innovative official recognition of the Institute- procedures have been set for individual members of the CIPR to receive a chartered status…

Peer-to-peer roundtable discusses “How effective is corporate governance in Canada?”

On Tuesday, February 5th Direct Engagement Inc. is sponsoring a peer-to-peer roundtable discussion on corporate governance in Canada, “Capital markets in Canada compete globally for issuers and investors. Scandals in the US demonstrated their fragility. Statistics show Canadian regulators devote a smaller percentage of their total budget to enforcement than the US. Is the present corporate governance system working? Why are some organizations better than others in corporate governance?” Although this is a paid-attendance event,...

Reinventing diplomacy

I sometimes think that we get a little obsessed with what PR is and isn’t, and I am not always sure that these conversations do anything more than keep us busy navel gazing. What I’d like to think about is what PR is becoming…and that’s everything. My personal belief is that formalized communications evolved because it was the only way to manage as organizations grew in size. What is happening today, in my opinion, is...