To continue from my previous column again I reiterate that a good Public Relations professional must have empathy and should have an ability to work together.
- A good Public Relations professional must identify his own strengths. The next step is to contemplate how to use these strengths to his advantage, intentionally organizing and structuring his life around them.
- A good Public Relations professional should collaborate. Occasional human contact makes a difference, even if it’s just via telephone. There is no substitute for a handshake, eye contact, recognizing the change in tone when people talk, and the ability to read the body language of others in developing a collaborative relationship.
- A good Public Relations professional should take and give constructive support. Sometimes this feels like, and is indeed, criticism. Remembering that feedback makes you and your work stronger can soften the sting, whether you are on the giving or receiving end.
- A good Public Relations professional should understand Data and Data Analytics because he will always need to be able to read, understand and interpret data and use advanced analytics in their core capabilities.
I strongly feel that, in addition to possessing strong and varied communication skills, Public Relations practitioners in the future will need to be able to process data and use advanced analytics in their core capabilities, along with a strong sense of how to apply behavioural science into their engagement practices. We now have access to incredible amounts of data. It’s a game changer. Data gives the information we need to predict our target audiences preferences and behaviour reliably.
We used to rely on public opinion polls, their attributes, but that does not necessarily mean they would do as we predicted. These days there is a plethora of tools available to capture data sets that are directly actionable for Public Relations. Using data, Public Relations professional can test their ideas and the selected channels they use. Similarly, data provides the answer to the question about whether an activity should be scaled up or down.
To achieve this –
- FIRST AND MOST IMPORTANT: Communicate, Communicate, and Communicate – up, down, sideways. But be frank. Be fearless yet polite. Keep a positive smile.
- Develop trust with the management – try to be a guide, friend and counselor. You must endeavour constant intellectual updates and you should be a culture vulture.
- Make creativity your forte. Conceptualize ideas and articulate the same into words and visuals.
- Be genuinely interested in people, and their problems. You must listen as many people as you can and empathize.
- You must build a sound media network and always be responsive to media men. However, you should never try to glorify lies or half-truths to mislead them.
- You must organize your work. Time management is must.
- And lastly, what gave me the biggest mileage and I would advise all to follow – We must try to generate organizational excitement to build a win-win environment. To achieve this, be polished, be positive, and always keep a smiling face.
Yes, a smiling face
Without a smile how can there be any public relations. The trouble with most of our people is, they are in tension, psychological pressures, and the problems of meeting targets. So a kind of tension builds up in them. They cannot smile.
I have a story to tell here. Sometime back, a very senior friend narrated this to me and I noted down in my diary. I’ll share the narration in his own words: “A businessman of America visited Delhi when India was facing food shortage and it was in the process of procurement of wheat. Here he met many senior officials, and visited some of government as well as private sector offices. My job was to be with him and facilitate all this. After a few months he sent me a clipping from US. It was an article that he had written in a major publication about his experiences in India. He wrote: “these Indian officers and heads of departments are very serious minded people. They don’t smile. If you look at their faces, you think they have swallowed a spoonful of castor oil. The only person who can make them smile is the photographer. That poor fellow will say, Please smile, please smile and in response they would very reluctantly try to produce a smile, only to go back in their original mood immediately after that.”
That businessman didn’t sign any contract here because he could not find any connection with people he met here. All he wanted was a tight handshake and a smile. Contrary to that we proclaim ourselves to be the best host in the world.
