PR Voice

Vote now to have your say...

As I hope all members are aware, it is election time at the CIPR.  We have two elections ongoing currently, one for President Elect, and one for Treasurer.

Two of my Board colleagues are standing in each of the elections: Paul Mylrea and Jenifer Stirton for President Elect; Lisa Shaddick and Sally Sykes for Treasurer.

Having worked with all four of the candidates during the past three or so years I can assure all members that the choice facing them is between four honest, hard-working, committed and talented individuals, all of whom are prepared to give up their time and effort to help make the CIPR better and even more relevant for its members than it is today.

You cannot get this wrong members - the only thing you can get wrong is not voting at all.

With that in mind, I urge you to read the candidate statements which can be found here and then make sure you cast your vote. Ballot papers were in the last issue of Profile - and if you need a replacement set of papers, then you must act quickly as voting closes at Noon on November 20.

We face a tough time in the next two years as the Board, the CIPR council and staff, work together to rebuild our finances and design a CIPR fit for the online era.  I believe that in next year's President Jay O'Connor, and in whoever is to follow, we will have strong leadership and the right processes in place to support that team.

On the subject of the election and the finances; I have been disappointed that PRWeek has not given our elections more attention.  But - and as the question has been asked - let me assure all of you that the Institute did not suggest either of the President Elect candidates as spokespeople to PRWeek for its follow-up article on our finances.  We also expressed directly our disappointment that the article quoted only one candidate - and that based on a different interview - without even mentioning the name of the second candidate.

In fairness, PRWeek is now doing what it can to address this imbalance both in the online article and in its own email newsletter.  We have four candidates all keen to win and all canvassing hard for your votes. It's my view that PRWeek made a mistake in quoting only one candidate in this article and I am pleased that they have recognised that and taken some actions.

So - once again: please read the statements and cast your vote.  It is your chance to influence the direction we take going forward.

In the firing line

Since we took the decision to brief our members on our 2009 finances, and to speak to PRWeek, the questions have come thick and fast – some of them understandably pointed.

Of course, for a not-for-profit, member organisation of our size, a projected loss of £700k is of huge concern. It is certainly not the legacy I had in mind at the start of my year in office.  David Brain’s Sixty Second View blog is among many asking important and valid questions.

The background is complex, as you can imagine.  A loss of this size does not simply appear one day, nor does an Executive Board of a member organisation take any decisions knowing it will lead to such a loss.

But first up, let’s nail one thing about our ‘love’ of expensive London squares. 

We moved out of our cramped offices on two floors of a Farringdon side street into St James Square (SJS) in order to be able to run more training events onsite and to offer improved member facilities in a Central location (as our members, and those who attend our training events, travel from all over).  This worked – training increased, we had less need to hire space for our events, and income grew.  I know because I was Treasurer during that successful year.

But then the SJS building was sold and the new landlord applied for planning permission to re-develop the property and served us notice to quit. We had no alternative but to move.

The success of SJS meant that we looked for a property and a location that could offer the same opportunities to support and grow our in-house training.  Russell Square was perfect – and arguably more business-like than the “clubby” St James’s area.  It also had a stable landlord in Bedford Estates and a rent and rate proposition that was comparable to what it would have been at 32 St James’s Square, but with more usable space. 

Written financial proposals jointly agreed with the landlord regarding statutory compensation and other recompenses when the Institute was forced to leave SJS have not materialized. As you may know, this is because the property was re-possessed by the Bank and sold to a new landlord who was not obliged to honour the previous terms offered regarding our departure. Various matters surrounding the building and its former owners remain the subject of a Serious Fraud Office investigation. (See CorpComms magazine article for further information.) To add these woes, we are also still owed our original deposit of £125,000.

We do have some legal redress of course, for some of the monies we are owed, but it is a complex web and the decision I must take – with the help and support of my colleagues - is whether to press ahead with potentially costly legal action. The decision here is to ensure we build our case against the right party.

As every part of this sorry property issue unfolded, we took the best decision we could based on the information we had at our disposal at that time. 

Now, onto the remainder of the loss. Trading income was down across the board in the last quarter. Why didn’t we ‘predict’ this?  Well, because recent trends, upon which forecasts are based, gave no indication of a shortfall. Trading was healthy last year and in quarters one and two of 2009. 

Many PR businesses and client organisations have sustained losses in this recession.  We are no different.   It is what you do next that is a measure of your business performance.

So, a working party developed a cost management proposal based on a line-by-line review of our activities.  These cost cutting measures are across the board and are being implemented now together with other means of generating new or additional income from our activities and operations.

Most importantly, we have developed a three-year plan, which includes a root and branch review of the Institute’s role and structure. This is currently in consultation and is a vital part of our recovery.  One thing we are clear about is that, moving forward, we need to put in place a revitalised and firm strategic plan and that it should be the subject of regular and rigorous review.

I have confidence in the ability of the Institute, its Executive Board, members, staff and army of volunteers to place the Institute in a stronger position in 2010.

I understand the concerns and questions.  I’ve asked them myself, as have my fellow Board members.  But when I look back at the decisions taken, step-by-step throughout the process, I feel that they were honest and – on balance – correct at that time.  Would I change any of them with the benefit of hindsight, possibly.  But I can’t do that – all I can do is ensure we learn from the process, focus on the future and move forward with purpose. And that is exactly what we are doing.

The NLA won’t be getting any medals from me…

Sorry to have been absent from these pages for a while, but I seem to have been living in a parallel universe.  It’s a universe where a PR practitioner has to pay a fee in order to direct someone to a website where the content is made available free of charge.

But of course, it is not a parallel universe, it is the NLA reinventing the rules again.  I guest blogged about them this week on the PRWeek site – you can read that here. You will recognise the opening sentiment from the words above.

When I addressed the Fellows’ Forum at the annual House of Lords lunch I got possibly the biggest cheer of my Presidency so far for vowing to battle against these latest NLA charges.  I should also say that the lunch followed a splendid peer group debate led by George Pitcher of the Daily Telegraph on ethics and expenses. I hope that we are able to publish some of George’s remarks in Profile magazine either in print or online.

But back to the NLA – the latest charges are nonsense. Leaving aside the fact that I find it hard to understand why I should have to pay a fee, indirectly, to the owner of a newspaper website simply because I have sent someone to read the material on the site – especially when the owner of the site makes no charge themselves – there is also a tremendous amount of inconsistency in the fees and the way they seek to apply or not apply them.

Copyright law is, of course, complex and potentially confusing. But I would say it either applies universally, or it doesn’t. If the links I or my cuttings agency identify and forward to my clients are covered by copyright law and the NLA can therefore raise a charge legally against my business – then surely those same laws apply to Google. Except the NLA has no intention of taking Google on and therefore Google searches and links are exempt from its currently proposed charges.

So – my fellow PR practitioners, I could suggest that you carry out all your searches for client news online with Google news search and forward the link with results of the search and thereby avoid any potential NLA charge. But that is not particularly practical.

Instead, I will point you to the fact that the CIPR has produced some member guidelines on the new NLA charges (available via the Member Area of the CIPR site in the Public Affairs section under Policy Briefings). We did this because, actually, we want you to understand the NLA’s latest proposals and be well informed about the potential impact on your business. It doesn’t mean we approve of the charges or that we will not fight and campaign against their introduction. 

Already, in the meetings we have held with the NLA we have won some concessions. Not enough so far, but some. We are also looking to co-operate with the PRCA and other bodies on this matter.

This year’s medals…

Ironic really that this NLA debate should be taking place now.  Because last Tuesday at the CIPR Excellence Awards I announced the recipient of this year’s CIPR President’s Medal. I choose to award the medal to Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web. Sir Tim’s contribution to communications, and indeed to the way we can do our job is absolutely immeasurable.

The irony of course is that the man who invented the web and therefore led to the creation of the newspaper websites at the heart of the NLA action – gave his invention to the world copyright free. He believed in open communication and did not want to put any financial barriers in the way of his invention – so he gave it away. Now that’s class, and in stark contrast to the NLA.

As President, it is a great privilege to lead the choices of the Institute’s two premier individual medals each year. But if Sir Tim Berners-Lee was a popular choice when I announced him for the President’s Medal, my recipient of the Sir Stephen Tallents Medal for services to the Institute and the profession really did raise the roof – especially at the Fellows’ lunch when I surprised her and the Fellows by making an unscheduled early release of the news.

As many of you will know, this year will see the creation of our first individual Chartered Practitioners in Public Relations. But you can’t award an individual a charter, unless that profession holds the Royal Charter as well. That’s why I chose to award the Sir Stephen Tallents Medal to Professor Anne Gregory, whose drive, leadership and commitment during her year as President ensured that the Institute achieved Chartered status. That is a service to the Institute and profession that truly deserved recognition.

If anybody ever doubted the importance of reputation

The crisis caused by the exposure of the expenses of many MPs threatens more than just the political future of some of those individuals whose claims were highlighted and criticised.

Because if anybody ever doubted the importance of reputation, the current crisis is evidence of just what can happen when reputations are destroyed.

It is worth stating again that whether you are talking about an organisation or an individual, reputation is largely determined by three factors: what you say, what you do, and what others say about you.  I’m afraid that – at different times in this crisis – various MPs and their representatives have failed on all three counts.

And where we stand now, is that the reputational damage is so great – it threatens Parliament itself.  The collapse in voter confidence could very well see even lower voter turn outs in the next round of elections, which in turn could favour minority and extremist parties.

And it is hard to see where all this is currently heading.  Until you go back to those factors that affect reputation and look closely at the first two – what you say and what you do.  Parliament – not one party or another but the institution itself – needs now to be seen to be putting its House in order, it needs, more than ever before, to communicate clearly what it is doing, and some individuals need to either explain, apologise, or stand down – in some cases all three.

The media has played a crucial role in exposing some of the worst excesses; and – when the right actions are being taken – can also play a role in helping to rebuild confidence.  I do worry, however, that the media opinion will likely divide into party political lines and that’s one reason why I feel that the organisation leading change needs to be seen to be Parliament and not necessarily Government.

There is an opportunity for party heads to show leadership, but Parliament needs to unite around a series of changes and measures that have all-party support.  The issues at stake here are, I feel, too big for party point scoring.

Journalists and PRs: can it ever be a marriage?

Last week I debated the various strengths and weaknesses of PR and the media at a splendid event arranged by the CIPR’s Greater London Group in conjunction with the Media Society.  Alongside Jo Tanner, and CIPR Hon Fellow, Peter Luff MP – I did my bit speaking up for our industry against a heavyweight media line-up which included Guardian columnist and former editor of the Daily Mirror, Roy Greenslade, the Independent’s first media editor, Maggie Brown, and the former BBC arts editor, Rosie Millard now of the Sunday Times.

Moderated by former BBC Radio 4 Today programme presenter Sue Macgregor, the event was great knockabout fun in front of an audience of around 100 people.

Cherry Chappell of the Greater London Group was one of the event organisers and she told me that the 50 places for the event allocated to the CIPR were snapped up within 24 hours of the announcement.  Indeed, 70 people applied, so there was even a waiting list.

We were debating the topic: Journalists and PRs: can it ever be a marriage?  It would have been interesting to take a vote on that question at the end of the debate, but instead the vote looked to cover issues of trust surrounding news coverage and that was won fairly clearly by the Media.

My own view on the question of “can it ever be a marriage” is quite simple – it is a marriage and the question is actually what sort of marriage is it?

Having read Flat Earth News by Nick Davies, I am more convinced than ever that the pressure on the media of the 24 hour news cycle, the rise of the constantly updated news web site, and the ever growing influence of social media news sites, is actually affecting news quality adversely.

Meanwhile, our own industry gets larger and its influence on the news cycle also grows.  And while some of you will see this as a good thing, generally speaking I believe the public is better served by a strong, accurate, and independent media.

What’s more, I feel that PR does its best work in that environment and that both organisations and individuals are best served by a strong media and strong tactical PR advice and programmes.  A weak media, that swallows weak PR stories and doesn’t do enough verification and analysis, is not in the best interests of the good PR professional, the media, companies and organisations, or indeed the readers. 

Cherry Chappell summed up the situation well: the debate should actually have been about standards and the need for both parties to keep improving.  But that connects to a bigger issue in media land.

Because as the methods available to consume news continue to evolve, the media world needs to react and change in order to maintain and shore up its business model in the face of falling numbers – both in terms of circulation and advertising. 

Charging for online content is, for example, currently a very hot topic.  But in the UK,  where a news web site as comprehensive as the BBC is available free and funded by the public purse, it is hard to see how any other outlet – beyond specialist sites such as FT.com - could begin to charge a subscription for access to news.

I’m sure therefore that it comes back to content.  Content is king: it is what attracts and keeps the readers and that’s why both we, and the media, need to continue to work on improving the quality of our output.

I’m actually less interested in whether the relationship between the two sides is a marriage – and more interested in seeing that it stays healthy and survives.