After working with Alzheimer's Australia WA (AAWA) a couple of days, I realise that public relations is not only important to profit-making companies but also plays an essential role for all not-for-profit organisations. The roles and functions of public relations in not-for-profit organisation and public relations in profit-making company are sometimes different. Charitable organisations use public relations to help people while on the other hand, profit-making use it to foster their own benefits - at least most of the time.
A not-for-profit organisation like AAWA often operates to serve the public interest and support an issue of public concern for non-commercial purposes. AAWA does not make money from their activities and at this point they need to generate funding through sponsorship and donations. Hence, one of the major roles of public relations in AAWA is to increase the reputation and profile of the organisation in order to encourage more donations. The money donated is often used to organise free activities, free forums, advertise events, print brochures for the community as well as to help individuals with dementia (AAWA's clients). AAWA uses public relations to attract members, clients and donors.
Another difference is the resources available to do the job. I realise that most of the not-for-profit organisations have smaller numbers of public relations staff and lesser resources. For example, AAWA has only one public relations professional doing everything from writing media releases to taking photographs during events and activities.
The main reason, I guess, is the lack of money and the lack of concern by other staff. Most of the executives or employees in AAWA or in most of the not-for-profit organisations are social workers, psychologists, researchers or doctors. Owing to their specialised field, they might be unfamiliar with the functions of public relations and this results in them not being able to corporate with the public relations officer effectively. Although the number of public relations professionals in not-for-profit organisations may not be large, their do play a significant role in their organisations.
By Winnie, Tuesday, May 20, 2008
2 comments:
Hi Wee Yi,
Like you, I also did my placement at a not-for-profit organisation and truth be told, I totally understand where you're coming from.
Unlike their corporate 'other', NFPs lack many things. Main reason being financial constraints are determining of what and how they carry out their work.
And, it's also fair to say that due to the specialised areas of the other employees or members who contribute their time to the cause, PR is often overlooked or rather undermined.
I have volunteers who are good at accounting, volunteer management, administrative work and, vet nurses and surgeons from Murdoch who come down everyday to render their help to the shelter.
Unfortunately, there's only one person who handles the PR side of things. It has been a great trial to start PR from scratch for someone who's just out in the industry for 'work experience'. But I've learnt alot indeed.
It's very basic to maintain good rapport with the committee members and the main PR person as any ideas you have in that wake will have to go through them before it gets actioned.
All that said, I'm hoping you enjoy your stint at AAWA. Glad to know you're having a fruitful experience!
Cheers
Siti
Hi Wee Yi,
I'm glad to hear you enjoyed your time at a not-for-profit organisation.
I have been working in a corporate environment for the past six weeks where they have the media resources to utilise, so I can't imagine what it would have been like not to have the media tools in front of you.
Siti, I have found that even the corporate have financial constraints. For instance each department are given a budget to work with. Partnerships can only sponsor a certain amount of community activities until the budget allocated to them is used up and they have to start declining sponsorship proposals; Corporate Affairs can only spend a certain amount on media tools, hired in consultancy etc. I imagine allocated budgets would apply to other departments such as Environmental Research, Accounting, Sales, Marketing etc.
I think PR is definitely not overlooked in a corporate sense, but I still think PR in general, whether it be NFP or Corporate is undermined by other professions like the departments mentioned above. At least we know how important we are.
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