The good: Melanie Formentin, a gifted former student and friend, received a fully-funded TA spot in the strategic communications management doctoral program at Penn State.

The bad: She also received the dreaded thin-envelope rejection letter from Ohio State.

I advised her to jump for joy over the former and forget the latter, but in the back of my mind, I cannot get the “rejection” out of my thoughts. Clearly, there is something amiss. I could spend this whole post chatting about Melanie’s strong points, ranging from her excellent work as a student and teacher to her clipbook (as thick as the NYC phone book) and the published article that we co-authored for Public Relations Review. She is simply a star performer and has the CV to prove it.

The broader issue that needs addressed, however, is the treatment people receive when they make these kinds of major life decisions, such as choosing a college or graduate school or applying for internships and jobs. Despite all the whiz-bang technology and talk about social media improving audience-organization relations, when it comes down to it, there is a communications breakdown between applicants and institutions. The situation is — in a word — reprehensible.

For many people, life can seem like a long series of formulaic rejection letters. Why, Melanie might ask herself, did she not get into a school that she invested a great deal of time and money applying to? The application process is literally and emotionally expensive. Yet, in so many cases, the thin letter is a mass-produced template. Even the signature is usually stamped. One pours heart and soul into the effort and in return gets a flaccid, shabby, and inhumane reply, utterly devoid of empathy. Writers and other creative individuals are also familiar with the form letter rejection.

The situation is even worse when one considers the employment game. We all have personal tales (maybe even dozens or hundreds) of applying for a position that seems as if it were written directly from our resumes, to then hear nothing from the organization regarding the application or its fate. Often, we do not even know if the position got filled, let alone the qualifications of the person who won it.

The easy answer is that organizations are inundated with resumes and that a personal reply is simply not feasible. Doesn’t this excuse ring a little hollow? I know that it does for the many people waiting to hear something (anything!) from the organization. Disappointingly, many of us have even heard stories of people who made it to the interview stage who never received a follow-up call, letter, or e-mail.

The sad aspect of this situation is that it constitutes a communications breakdown. Organizations fail themselves by taking the path of least resistance, which is basically opting to not be truthful with applicants, whether it is college admission officers or human resources directors. Furthermore, we fail ourselves by accepting this treatment. There are a myriad of convenient rationales for not informing people of why they did not get a particular job, scholarship, internship, or whatever the case may be. I assume that the underlying reason is the threat of potential lawsuits. Most organizations are much better at “CYA” management than treating people like human beings.

An article in The New York Times last summer confirms that the lack of response is on the rise. The piece correctly pins some of the blame for the gaping electronic hole on candidates who scattershot their resumes all over the Web, as if they are qualified for every job that appears. Still, is it too much to ask for some clarification? It would be difficult to quantify the cost of an angry applicant, but there certainly is a financial impact, particularly in an age in which companies seem willing to fight for the business of every individual they can get.

Returning to Melanie’s case for a moment, how difficult could it have been for someone on the search committee or an administrator to provide her with some feedback? College search committees are notorious for this kind of behavior, but Fortune 500 companies cannot claim the higher ground either. Laura Marcus suggests that job applicants request feedback, which can certainly do damage to one’s mental state, but at least (if truthful) would help the candidate prepare for the future.

Perhaps the larger issue at hand is that there is no clear distinction in today’s society between reality and unreality. The two are so intertwined that there is no hope for “the truth” to be revealed. Rather than provide honest evaluations, we hide behind form letters. Instead of thoughtful critique, one gets legalese — or worse — hears nothing at all.

What I have a difficult time delineating is whether most people would even want the truth. Americans are really good at evading the truth by wrapping themselves up in whatever popular culture impulse occurs at any given moment, so perhaps the truth would be considered in some way un-American. For example, as if telling a person why he didn’t get into the college of his choice would be keeping him from achieving his dreams.

I like to think that we are a bit tougher than that. And, we would be, if we lived in a culture that valued the kind of dispassionate evaluation that would be necessitated by such an environment.

Image courtesy of dbking at Flickr.com

Rather than cover the intense fighting in southern Afghanistan, which took the lives of four NATO servicemen yesterday, or focus on President Obama’s speech later today in Las Vegas, where he will launch a $1.5 billion plan to help the states most hit by the housing crunch, the media storm hovers over Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, waiting with bated breath for Tiger Woods to break his self-imposed vow of silence.

Yawn!

I cannot decide if the saddest aspect of this whole pseudo-press conference is that it makes (yet again) a mockery of the press or that people seem to care at all. Let’s just all take a collective deep breath and admit that there are about a million more important, pressing events and issues that need attention.

Yawn!

Given the rules that Tiger and his camp have imposed on today’s “event,” let’s drop the “press” from “press conference” and just refer to it as a conference. Outraged, the national golf press corps responded by voting to boycot the event — as if they were invited anyway. But, all this boo-hooing from golf experts and other media talking heads is just too much to take.

Yawn!

All of the sudden, golf writers (don’t forget…covering golf) are indignant because they cannot ask Tiger Woods questions about his private life? Where were these junior league Woodward and Bernsteins the last decade? Please let me know if you can remember a golf journalist ever asking Tiger a difficult question. Can’t do that…might get one exiled to the outer reaches, covering the lesser lights outside Tiger’s universe.

Yawn!

Remember, though, this public falling on the sword is media-driven. Countless men and women around the world have affairs and get divorced. I usually fall into the “you wanted to be a celebrity, so deal with the consequences” camp, yet this circus (after a lifetime of watching “public apologies,” from Magic Johnson to Bill Clinton) is just too much.

Yawn!

Without Woods’ star power, many golf writers might be out of work, which adds another dimension to the story. Hardcore journalist types often lament (or even hate) public relations, marketing, advertising, and other organizational communications as evil or somehow impure compared to their chosen trade. Perhaps a little self-reflection is in order today…as all those boycotting golf writers try to figure out a way to continue talking about Tiger Woods, long after he finishes, or until his next appearance.

Image by striatic/hobvias sudoneighm

Occasionally, though, an essay so daft slips into the mix, that I feel compelled to critique it. Elif Batuman wrote such a piece this week, “Confessions of an Accidental Literary Scholar.” What is even more agonizing is that the essay is drawn from a book to be published in a week or so by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This piece is bad on so many levels, I can’t even begin to place them all under a microscope, from the ridiculous title to the blazing sense of entitlement Batuman reeks.

I feel so strongly that I have to repost what I said on the comment section:

“The primary challenge in today’s confessional, peek-into-the-medicine-cabinet society is that this kind of drivel is viewed as an affirmation. Are Chronicle readers supposed to emulate Batuman here or gain inspiration from her story? Or, is Batuman’s story one of poor work ethic and entitlement?

Let’s take a closer look at what she outlines. First, imagine the angst of the teen Batuman so “oppressed” by “the tyranny of leisure” that she can’t do anything more than spend weeks “flopped on my grandmother’s super-bourgeois rose-colored velvet sofa, consuming massive quantities of grapes, reading obsessively.” This incident, though, stands counter to her teenage determination that she should not “read too many novels.” She also admits that she not intellectually curious, and “uninterested by what I knew of literary theory and history… I didn’t care about truth; I cared about beauty.” Here “beauty” is jargon used to elevate privilege over critical thinking or the hard work required to gain knowledge.

Next, Batuman is uninterested (perhaps the theme of her young life), in linguistics because her professor required her to think. Her sense of entitlement leads her to believe that she knows more than the professor with the typical millennial excuse: “I could not imagine a more objectless, melancholy project.” Instead, she focuses on the professor’s looks, another indicator in our celebrity-obsessed world. She takes the easy route, rather than working to understand the subject, “I couldn’t face linguistics again—it had let me down, failed to reveal anything about language and what it meant.” College instructors will certainly recognize this trait – it’s the teacher’s fault, not the student that did not actively work to learn. In response, Batuman takes the easiest path, a degree in literature, “the major with the fewest requirements” and only reading 7-8 novels.

Then, Batuman decides to write a novel (again, from a person who has not read widely or shown the ability to work hard), but does not want to go to an M.F.A. program that would actually require her to read deeply or demean herself by paying tuition, attending classes, or (gasp) “analyzing the writings of a bunch of kids like me.” Being too privileged for this, she decides an artists’ colony is the answer, but later backs out of that too when the amenities are not up to her standards.

Batuman hits the lottery when Stanford accepts her and gives her financial support, though in the essay she writes this in passive voice, probably an attempt at modesty: “I had been offered five years of financial support.” Realizing that being a grad student at Stanford requires all the messy things grad school entails (“classes, conferences, teaching, and endless lunches…[and] term papers”), she drops out to write a novel, which she also cannot accomplish.

Somehow a magazine editor gave her an assignment to write about short stories. Rather than learn from the experience, she blasts the writers in the Best American Short Stories anthologies (edited by writers you might have hear of: Lorrie Moore and Michael Chabon) because they think of writing as a “craft,” as if the choice between it and thinking of writing as art is an all-or-nothing decision. In response, she labels the work in the anthology, “a nearly unreadable core of brisk verbs and vivid nouns.” Let’s review some of the writers Batuman places in this category: John Updike, Alice Munro, Edward P. Jones, T.C. Boyle, and Joyce Carol Oates.

Then, in the tradition of Lifetime movies and confessional bloggers, Chronicle readers are given the payoff, the big “a-ha” moment, after Batuman falls while jogging and breaks her elbow: She loves literary theory after all! Ohh, the humanity! Seeing the reality in a $1,700 hospital bill, she takes “a cold, hard look at the direction my life was headed.” Luckily, Stanford threw her a lifeline.

So, I return to my original question: are we supposed to admire Batuman or gain some kind of special insight from her story? I shudder to think about what her tale says about Stanford, entitlement, or millennial navel-gazing fueled by self-absorbed blogging and Facebook. The outcome of celebrity-obsession as manifested in today’s society is that everyone now believes that their story is meaningful. The entitlement of thinking one deserves Warhol’s 15 minutes of fame is rampant. Batuman is a case book example.”

Please, tell me I am crazy for being so harsh or pointing out these egregious statements. Or, am I on the mark?

Bill Sledzik is a thoughtful guy. Like many other communications professionals around the world, I find myself thinking about a topic or big picture issue in the field, and sure enough, Bill has blogged about it at ToughSledding. His most recent post centers on critical thinking, which over the years has developed into one of the central issues in my life. But, that obsession is part of the “challenge,” because I am always aware of critical thinking in a world that rarely values or supports the idea.

The devaluing of critical thinking starts early in the United States. For example, our K-12 teachers are hamstrung by focusing on standardized tests, rather than providing students with a broad, liberal education that forces them to reexamine their developing world views. Critics lament the notion that educators have to “teach to the test,” but do not attempt to change the system. As a matter of fact, I would estimate that most intelligent people realize that standardized testing has hurt the American education system, yet it remains the central focus of the public education system.

In the work world, one is constantly confronting the lack of critical thinking. In communications, that often means relying on what worked in the past, rather than do the necessary hard work required to analyze, assess, evaluate, and create. Often, the conservative notion of doing what worked last month, year, or decade is built on a tower of ignorance — the executive does not really understand the communications function or the sales force does not really appreciate the IT staff, and the list goes on and on. The results of “silo-ed” thinking is dysfunctional organizations that have too many leaders protecting their turf, rather than doing what is best for the entity as a whole.

Teaching college students about critical thinking — whether new freshmen or graduate students — is arguably the most important task of faculty members. Particularly when dealing with undergrads one must realize that long after they have left the classroom and forgotten much of the material we yearn to get in their heads, they will retain the basic tenets of critical thinking if the concepts have been presented, discussed, and modeled.

Last evening, Kent State University hosted Ken Bain, the renowned teacher and author of What the Best College Teachers Do. He outlined the categories college students often lump into as learners. Surface learners are motivated by fear and resort to memorization and other basic tactics to get through material. Strategic learners are motivated by recognition (most often grades) and learn to provide the “correct” answers. Deep learners are motivated by meaning and a need to know the answers to questions that intrigue them.

As educators, we want classrooms filled with deep learners, unfortunately, many of the best students are strategic learners — over their time in the school system they learned to map out a strategy for getting good grades, but often at the expense of conceptual learning. One does not need to look back very far into their pasts to see how the emphasis on standardized testing and grade fear played a role in this development.

The post-college outcome, however, is shocking. Everyone has met a strategic learner-turned-organization-leader who assumes that they know everything based on their successes in college and the outside world that equates good grades with wisdom. So, the high-flying attorney thinks they know how to write because they got an “A” in English Comp and know how to write contracts, or the business executive who thinks they have insight into employees because they minored in Psychology.

The challenge is in the assumption that people make about what they think they know. Success has caused people to cement their world views into place because achievement fueled the idea. The basic deficiency, however, is that people are not willing to question their own thinking. Society rewards and celebrates people who make decisions, right or wrong, when the reward should go to people who make thoughtful decisions after consideration of evidence, etc.

Their is a glaring disparity between critical thinkers and non-critical thinkers, yet we are surrounded by a system that rewards the “gut” reaction and decision, good grades over deep learning, and speed over meaning. This leaves college professors in a difficult situation: Does one help students become the kind of future leader who reacts or thinks? Clearly, the former is valued more in the work world than the latter.

The easy answer is to say “both,” yet in practicality there must be a core belief that guides one’s teaching and there may simply not be enough room for pursuing both paths. My decision to this point in my teaching career is to create a learning environment that fosters critical thinking using the concepts of the class as tools in building those skills. As a result, sometimes my students react negatively to my charge of “be creative,” when they would prefer to have the instructions laid out piece-by-piece, as if learning were simply gluing together a model airplane.

But, I’m still learning…

The disparity between what communications students and business students learn in the classroom is immense, though there are some critical overlaps, at least from the communications side of the fence. Basically, mass communications students are required to take some introductory-level business classes, while business students are often shut out of our classes due to the entrance requirements in many journalism and mass comm departments.

Despite that business students often take no formal communications classes, they still somewhere in their curriculum pick up enough to assume that they understand public relations, advertising, etc. While it may seem insignificant for 22-year olds marching across a stage to pick up their diplomas, the lack of actual training versus the opposite notion leads to ramifications that are negative for budding executives and communicators.

Assessing the “challenges” in overcoming this issue, the best option seems to be beefing up the business-side of the communications curriculum, primarily due to the silo nature of higher education. My experience is that business school faculty and their colleagues from mass communications and communications rarely work together for the good of the whole. [Though I am hoping I find a different situation here at Kent State] Creating future public relations professionals who have a greater understanding of business management (beyond the basic introductory classes, which are often large lectures) will enable those new communicators to prove that they can “talk the talk” with their business colleagues.

My own experiment with infusing my courses with more business management perspective has been ongoing for the five years I taught at the University of South Florida and continues now as I transition to teaching graduate classes in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Kent State. My self-assessment is that the effort at USF lead to some better basic understanding of business, particularly when it came to introducing my students to integrated marketing communications.

At Kent State, I am upping the ante significantly in a graduate-level class this semester: “Public Relations Management.” Traditionally, the class is taught as a glorified case study-centered course, focusing on having the students create a strategic plan for a local nonprofit organization. While I do not denigrate those that follow this format — there is certainly value in it for PR grad students who have little practical knowledge — where is the “management” aspect in that scenario?

Instead, I ask the students to actually engage with strategic management thinkers and to look at the business environment from an executive position. As I set up the course, I found it shockingly easy to find material that provided accessible executive viewpoints. Using the Harvard Business Review, I have them read Peter F. Drucker, arguably the greatest management mind in recent history, and other pieces that address how c-level businesspeople think, feel, and make decisions.

In both my professional and academic careers, one recurring criticism of public relations and communicators I hear (particularly from executives) is that the agency, company communicators, etc., “don’t understand my business.” Though I personally see this as a challenge on the part of the executive as much as the communicators, it is my hope that introducing my students to some innovative business thinking and theory will help them look at business challenges as business challenges and not just communications challenges.

In discussions with educators, I often use the analogy that we are all some version of Johnny Appleseed, spreading seeds of knowledge that our students will go out and grow. My march continues…in a future post I’ll share the sproutlings.

As a result, the rhetorical question contained in the title of this post becomes hazy. Communicators think quite a bit about ROI, but coming up with meaningful methods of determining return are less bountiful. My thinking is that 2010 should be the year of ROI in the communications industry — as should every year — until we have an accepted method of measuring return that is accepted among professionals and our executive brethren.

Below is an excerpt of a comment I posted at PR Nonsense, March Communications’ blog written by Meredith Eaton, which examines some trends for PR in the new year, rightly identifying an increased interest in ROI in the CEO’s office:

“ROI will remain increasingly important, but [I] wonder how the industry will address this challenge. As a former professional and current PR academic, my thinking is that coming up with a reasonable method for measuring ROI is going to take a partnership between practitioners and scholars that is currently only taking place in pockets.

I find it ironic that the industry has about a million social media “gurus,” but only a handful (if that) of widely-acknowledged ROI/measurement experts (such as Katie Paine). The development of ROI is essential for respect in the executive suite, yet the industry lacks the ability to prove its worth.

Overall, from my perspective, it seems as if too many communications professionals think like consultants, rather than CEOs.”

A quick search around the blog world shows that many others are discussing return from a variety of viewpoints. Rachel Rose Belew, for example, examines the difference between the hard and soft sciences of communications writing at her blog The Copywriter’s Crucible. She sees a marriage between the “art” of creativity and “science” of measurement.

Beth Harte, at Marketing Profs Daily Fix, provides a detailed overview of building a strategic communications plan and how one would calculate ROI based on its implementation. Beth also provides a list of links to other pieces she’s written on ROI, which are valuable for anyone hoping to gain insight on the topic.

Of course, no discussion of measurement is complete without acknowledging the leadership of Katie Paine. Her latest post is a clinic in thoughtful thinking about calculating ROI in social media.

My Kent State colleague Sean Williams is also a frequent commentator on ROI at his blog Communication AMMO! His recent post on the theoretical underpinnings of social media provides a basis for thinking about ROI in that area. Sean’s future research will be a real eye-opener as organizations continue to search for measurable methods for developing social media campaigns.

I keep returning to the last point I made in the comment at PR Nonsense regarding the mindset of communicators. The notion that we should emulate consultants (”counselors”), rather than executives seems to be a hindrance to thinking through ROI. If professionals started looking at the business from the viewpoint of the C-level executives they work for, they may find that this perspective naturally leads to greater emphasis on calculating return.

However, students and young professionals are taught to link of themselves as counselors — sitting at the CEO’s table and whispering communications nothings in his ear — rather than as members of the CEO’s operating team, focused on the same things that keep the CEO up at night. In reality, we need to think more like business leaders and less like communicators.

This idea is also central to my conception of integrated communications, which at its heart, means that communications leaders link their strategic plans directly to the plans of the CEO and/or Board of Directors. Conducting this kind of planning forces the communications team to directly focus on the organization’s plan and its outcomes or aspirations.

Making ROI the centerpiece of the industry necessitates cooperation between the professional and academic worlds. I look forward to the day when we have thousands of Katie Paine-like ROI “gurus” tackling measurement. The industry needs it, as do our organizational partners.

Emily Milo

Research Account Manager

(954) 336-4499

PRSSAResearchGroup@gmail.com

INTERNSHIPS OUTWEIGH CURRICULUM

Florida college students value internships and networking over professors and course work

Tampa, December 7, 2009 – Despite an era defined by recession, downsizing, and staggering unemployment rates, some 68 percent of college students feel prepared for life after graduation. However, survey respondents contend that professors and school curriculum are not what is preparing them.

A research team from the Walter E. Griscti chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) at the University of South Florida conducted an opinion poll of college students using Facebook and Twitter. The team surveyed more than 300 Florida college students.

Asked to rank the most important preparation tool for life after graduation, 48 percent claimed internships, while 30 percent indicated networking. However, only 6 percent of students found professors and curriculum most important.

“Excelling in the classroom isn’t enough anymore,” said Michael Brito, a senior at the University of South Florida. “The focus is no longer on papers and textbooks, it is on finding a good internship and networking with the right people.”

Some 81.5 percent of respondents claim that a quality education is important when it comes to getting a job or going to graduate school. Survey results reveal that students recognize the importance of obtaining a college degree, but are no longer depending on professors and curriculum alone.

“What defines college for today’s students is much different than what we traditionally view a college education,” said Bob Batchelor, an instructor in the School of Mass Communications at the University of South Florida. “As these survey results show, the partnership between academic institutions and local businesses and organizations may make or break a student’s shot at future success.”

About the Walter E. Griscti Chapter of PRSSA at the University of South Florida 

Since its founding, the Walter E. Griscti Chapter of PRSSA at the University of South Florida has developed into a top-tier chapter filled with talented students eager to enhance their knowledge about public relations. Involvement in the chapter enables members to network with professionals and peers, learn about internships, hear guest speakers, attend national conferences, publish articles in its newsletter, participate in the national Bateman competition, volunteer in the community, and attend socials each month. The chapter works closely with the Tampa Bay chapter of PRSA and the Tampa Bay chapter of the Florida Public Relations Association (FPRA) to provide numerous networking opportunities for its members. These strong relationships allow members to work face-to-face with those already in the industry. For more information please visit, http://prssausf.webs.com

Truckloads of books have been written about social media as a business tool and its consequences for the business world. Those of us interested in popular culture, however, have waited for someone to tackle social media from a broader perspective. With Celeb 2.0 by Kelli S. Burns, my friend and colleague at the University of South Florida, that long-needed gap has been filled.

Published by Praeger (an imprint of ABC-CLIO), Celeb 2.0 examines both sides of the celebrity coin — celebrities using social media to connect to fans and fans using similar channels to feel closer to their favorite icons, but also mimic the celebrity lifestyle. These tools, such as blogs; video-sharing sites; user-news sites; social networks; and message boards, fuel the nation’s fascination and consumption of popular culture — certainly the primary use of social media in today’s world, despite the desire to use social media as a business tool.

Burns’ research includes interviews with social media users and creators, focusing on how celebrities use blogs, Twitter, and other tools, how YouTube and other sites create celebrity, how Web 2.0 shortens the distance between fans and stars, and how the new social media influences news reporting and series television.

Personally, for all the hype social media receives as a business and/or communications tool, I have always felt that it had far greater consequences as a shaper of the broader culture. Scholars, general readers, and those interested professionally in social media will find Celeb 2.0 full of insight about prevalent celebrity is within social media and what it means for the future. Certainly, social media “gurus” will find much in the book that helps them understand the consumer mindset.

Burns outlines this notion, explaining, “The most significant consequence of social media, however, may be the influence on popular culture, as social media affect our consumption patterns and our creation of popular culture products, possibly changing the very meaning of popular culture.” As she correctly relates, the blurring of the lines between consumption and creation enabled through the use of social media has profound implications.

Interestingly, Celeb 2.0 also provides insight into the limitations of social networks as business tools. If users are primarily focused on celebrity and becoming some form of mini-celebrity, then the efforts by marketers to build “conversations” around traditional products is not really going to interest most people.

At the end of the day, Celeb 2.0 offers readers engaging analysis on a number of thoughtful topics, from how bloggers and YouTube video creators develop into celebrities to social media portrayals on film and television. Burns has also provided future generations of readers and scholars a powerful early history of social media. Certainly, popular culture enthusiasts will find much value in Celeb 2.0, as will those interested in understanding social media’s ubiquity in modern America.

Given that it is virtually impossible to escape popular culture’s reach in today’s world, it’s hard to imagine that Ray had to fight to get the topic accepted in academic circles. Out of this effort, Ray and a close band of like-minded colleagues founded the Popular Culture Association (PCA) and the American Culture Association (ACA), which serve as the intellectual home for untold scholars devoted to exploring popular culture in all its guises. One of the thoughts members of the PCA/ACA most often express is the friendliness and welcoming nature of these organizations. When one joins the PCA/ACA, there is a sense of entering a family. This culture is a direct reflection of Ray’s leadership, and may ultimately serve as his most lasting legacy.

On a personal note, Ray served as a mentor for me and countless others. I still remember my anxiety in meeting him for the first time, since this was “THE Ray Browne.” Yet he could not have been more kind. Unlike many senior scholars in other fields, Ray reached out to younger scholars, offering publishing opportunities and priceless counsel. I owe much of my philosophical thinking and writing to his influence.

One of the last projects I worked on with Ray was when he graciously agreed to write the foreword for the four-volume collection I edited: American Pop: Popular Culture Decade by Decade (2009). In it, Ray presented a lyrical definition of popular culture that I treasure: “Similar to a growing garden, culture is the gatherings of community beliefs and behaviors, which depends on its roots for sustenance. As the plants grow both individually and collectively, they develop and influence the surrounding societies.” It will be difficult for a scholar to more beautifully or succinctly analyze American popular culture in the 21st century.

[This post originally appeared on Greenwood Press’s Pop Culture Universe blog]

– Most business executives never take public relations courses in their schooling

– As such, they equate public relations with publicity or crisis management (or some other limited view)

– Public relations professionals and educators do not a good enough job helping people understand their worth

– Communicators, as a result, are not widely admitted into management’s inner-circle of strategic decision-makers

This vicious circle, along with its more unethical offshoots, such as public relations being perceived as a female profession thus less “strategic,” is the primary reason that Grunig’s so-called “Excellence Theory” has not worked as a foundation for the public relations profession. The theory necessitates that public relations practitioners are accepted into the “dominant coalition,” or in plain English, the group of executive’s that direct an organization’s strategic initiatives.

Here’s an excerpt of my response to a post at PR Conversations:

The whole equation seems pretty simple: if Grunig’s so-called “Excellence Theory” were beneficial to practitioners, then they would have adopted it wholeheartedly over the last two-plus decades.

The communications profession would welcome a magic bullet if one existed…the “Excellence Theory” isn’t it. If it provided the benefits Grunig assumes, then it would be at the front of every communicator’s mind.

Professionals yearn for innovation, just like their colleagues in other professions. For example, look at the business world’s acceptance of innovative management theories (say, for example, Six Sigma) over the last several decades. If it works, adoption is not difficult.

No matter how much individual teaching a professional does within her organization, she is fighting a losing battle, particularly if her colleagues (with business degrees and MBAs) don’t buy into the theory.

So, for 20-plus years, educators have spun their wheels teaching Grunig’s models, while students confront an entirely different world after graduation.

I’ve said it before and I will say it again. The so-called “Excellence Theory” is a foundation of sand for public relations. Attempting to build on it is not going to work. Sometimes a poorly designed house simply needs bulldozed.

If professionals and educators really wanted to do something beneficial, they would reject Grunig and begin building a model that enables professionals to do their jobs better and organizations to communicate more effectively.

The most worthy challenge facing the profession, for instance, is determining return on investment (ROI). If the professional and educator communities could come together to find better methods of calculating ROI, then show its value to business leaders, the benefits for the profession would be priceless.

Some of Grunig’s ideas might even play a role in the new model, certainly there will be times when symmetrical communications works best (but could never be the sole means of interacting with audiences). Time, however, has proven that “Excellence” isn’t excellent. After decades, the field needs to move on. The commitment to it is hindering advancement.

[The slide presented above is from a Grunig presentation in Hong Kong, published electronically in the PR Conversations post linked above.]