PR should be experienced, not just taught

Hi future PR practitioners,

This will be my last post and it will wrap up some of the things that weren't taught and experienced in previous PR units. I firmly believe that a PR degree is just a starting point and as Harrison (2011, 15) has said, “Graduation is not an end to study. It is the start of a lifelong process”. By now, I can tell that only a portion of what I have learnt at university will be useful in the workplace because not only I will always be learning new things as a PR practitioner but also some of these things have to be experienced. Likewise, PR is a fast-evolving profession, so every PR practitioner has to constantly adapt to the changes in this demanding profession.

Things I didn't learn and experience at university:

1. Drafting media releases and communication plans in French (Written communication is mostly done in French in Mauritius and most PR Practitioners need to have an excellent grasp of the French language)

2. Media monitoring – Writing and sending daily Media Alerts to clients on positive and negative articles about them.

3. Calculating Advertising Value Equivalency (AVE) for media coverage of PR generated news stories by measuring the dimensions of these articles and multiplying to the newspapers’ advertising rates.

4. Assisting in Press Conferences – Greeting journalists, marking their presence, noting down their contact details and distributing goodies/media kits to them.

5. Contacting and following up with journalists – confirming if they have received invitations for event/media function/press conference/round table and calling them again to mark their presence.

6. Working without a proper brief – Sometimes, we are not given a written brief for a particular task while at university we always had those for every PR assignment that we had to submit.

7. Implementing a PR Plan – We've been writing a few PR plans for real life clients at university although we've never executed any of these and this is the most complex part.

Although this internship is just a foretaste of the real thing since it was relatively short and we didn't experience everything, it actually prepares us to join the workplace confidently. Moreover, I do believe that I've done quite a lot in one month and learnt many new things. If it wasn't for the PR 393 Professional Practice unit, my knowledge and understanding of PR would be limited to only general PR concepts and guidelines. So, kudos to Curtin for having introduced that unit a few years back because it certainly allowed us to put some of the teachings of the other PR units into practice.

Okay fellow PR 393 students, now that most of us have already completed our internships and we are nearing the end of this semester, it's time to move on to other things. It felt great to share my internship experience with you and to read about yours during the last few months. I would like to seize this opportunity to wish you all best of luck with the report writing and for your future endeavors.

P.S: Do you guys have any anything else to add to the list above? You’re most welcome to do so in your comments :)

Much love,

Houmaira Ramjaun

15102108

CTI, Mauritius

References: 

Harrison, Kim. 2011. Strategic Public Relations - A practical guide to success. South Yarra: Palgrave Macmillan

Keep Calm and Stay Professional...

Hello everyone,

Hope that your internships are treating you well and you’re making the most of this learning experience. I'm sure that we’ve all had our fair share of difficulties during our internships and this is one of mine:

While interning at Blast Communications, I had to contact many parastatal bodies, embassies and consulates in Mauritius to obtain the contact details of senior officers for a list of database. It got tedious at times because I had to talk to 3 people in order to obtain that information and each time I had to repeat the same thing. I also had to phone journalists from different media outlets on a number of occasions to confirm whether they had received invitations for a round table and call them again 1 to 2 days later to mark their presence. Sometimes I had to phone the media outlets up to 3 times in order to obtain an answer and I had to do it because I had to provide my supervisor with an updated list of the attendance sheet.

Well, to be honest, I found that task quite nerve-wracking because I’m not much of a talker and I really didn’t know how to make intelligent and constructive conversations with those people. One of my colleagues has really encouraged me because she sensed at the beginning that I was feeling stressed and unsure. So, I drafted my phone call script in advance because I didn’t want to stumble when talking to them and I found this very helpful. Also, I did my own research and gathered some information in case they asked me a few questions. I’d sound really unprofessional and sloppy if I didn’t know what to reply to them. So it’s important to be well prepared before contacting people.

At times, I felt like the people on the other end of the line were being annoyed because I had to phone several times. There were also people who were really rude and cold to me on the phone, but I still had to keep my cool and stay courteous when speaking to them because that’s part of the job. It is also an important aspect of being professional which is paramount in the PR Realm. Likewise, certain people put me on hold for a long time but I had to remain patient. If I hung up on them which might be considered as impolite, I could face the possibility of not having them cooperate with me when phoning them again.


That's pretty much it for my third post. Keep me posted with your internships :)

Until next time,

Houmaira Ramjaun

15102108

CTI, Mauritius

Happy Birthday, Mauritius! – “Celebrating our diversity the Blast Way”

                                                                                                                                 

                                                                                                                                  Courtesy of Blast

Hello aspiring PR Professionals,


I know, it’s been a while since the last time I’ve posted something on the PR 393 Reflective Blog and I'm truly sorry about the delay but I was hoping I could make up for the it with this vibrant post. So today, I’m going to share an incredible experience with you: the celebrations of Independence Day at Blast Communications. For those who don’t know, we were celebrating the 45^th anniversary of Mauritius this year and because the 12^th March, which marks that occasion is a public holiday, the Blast team has chosen to observe this event on the 8^th March instead.

Luckily, I have been able to participate in this glorious event that created a very spirited and fun atmosphere at Blast Communications and I was truly mesmerized when I saw all of my colleagues play a part in this event. To put it in PR terms, it was basically an internal campaign which took place for a few days. It first started with the design team proposing a few visuals for an advert of Blast Communications to show its patriotic pride to the public. Brainstorming sessions were carried out so that everyone could agree on a visual and the tagline that would accompany it. After that, my colleague Emilie, PR Executive, negotiated with specific media outlets to have the advert placed in their newspapers at an affordable price. Of course, we had a very limited budget allocated for the placement of these adverts.  

Moreover, a list of activities on the 8^th March has been devised by the PR Think Tank to mark this event by involving everyone at Blast Communications. They are:

- Lunch served with typical dishes of the different communities in Mauritius (entrée: Chinese and main course: creole etc...)

- Handkerchiefs for lunch decorated with Mauritian flag ribbon and all desks adorned with a miniature Mauritian flag.

- All Blast employees wearing personalized t-shirts (black as the background color with the logo and the chosen tagline “Celebrating our diversity”) and a badge of the Mauritian flag.

- A photograph of the Blast team forming the number 45, taken from the roof – photograph which will be used on the website, Facebook page, E-newsletter and also on an e-card which will be sent to all Blast’s clients and partners.

- Launch quizzes/guessing games also known as “Sirandanes” (which forms part of our Mauritian culture and tradition) throughout the day and a winner will be announced in the afternoon.

- Have all Blast employees plaster their handprints on a canvas board to make a four-colour chef-d’oeuvre (using acrylic paint of the four different colours of the Mauritian flag: Red, Blue, Yellow and Green)

All of the above mentioned activities have been successfully put into place, with the help of every Blast employee. On that eventful day, everyone wore the same personalized t-shirt at work, thanks to the designers, Kim and Ritesh who came up with the t-shirt’s artwork and to the event coordinator, Diane who ordered the t-shirts and had them ready for that day. Lunch which was taken care of by the administration was really delicious and it was an opportunity for everyone to joke around and get to know each other more. 


Moreover, it was nice to see everyone get their hands dirty with paint and sing the national anthem, just like school children. Eventually, the winner of the “sirandanes” turned out to be Valérie who works in the media monitoring department; she practically guessed most of the answers before everyone else and earned a box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates as prize, which she generously shared with everyone. Lastly, the Managing director, Mrs Aisha Allee-Mosaheb was really pleased with the outcome of this internal campaign and she congratulated everyone for their part in it and for planning everything in so little time.

I hope that you’ve enjoyed reading this post because I’ve actually enjoyed recounting that experience with you. If you have any questions concerning my internship, please feel free to leave a comment on any of my posts and I shall get back to you shortly :)

Best Regards,

Houmaira Ramjaun

15102108

CTI, Mauritius

The Start of Something new...

Hello my PR 393 peers,

I’m Houmaira from the Charles Telfair Institute (CTI) in Mauritius and I’m currently studying for a BA in Mass Communication with double majors, Web Media and Public Relations from Curtin University. Like most of you, I’m in my third year and I will soon begin my final semester, hence the last stretch before obtaining my much-awaited degree.

It’s been a little bit more than one week since I’ve embarked on my Internship at Blast Communications, one of the leading PR firms in Mauritius. I chose Blast Communications because I really wanted to conduct my PR 393 Internship in a professional consultancy and I firmly believe that it will be extremely helpful in my PR learning journey and also a good start for my PR career. 

A few days prior to the beginning of my internship, I went through all of my PR 220 slides (media releases, newsletters, speeches, etc...) because I wanted to be well prepared before stepping into Blast's office for the first time. The people there are incredibly nice and they’ve greeted me with the warmest welcome. They have been helping me a lot with my tasks and I’m still learning the ropes. I’m trying to pay as much attention as I can and I’m writing down every little thing that I’m being taught. 

From the very first day, I’ve thrown myself into work and I actually thought that the first week would be “light”, but I was wrong. Work has been keeping me busy and my first week was rather hectic but that’s only because I’ve been assigned a lot of work from my colleagues. I’m trying to imagine working during the midst of my semester; it’d have been extremely difficult for me to juggle studies and work. Anyway, I’m glad I’ve started my internship during the holidays and I’m expected to finish it during my 2^nd week of classes at CTI.

 

I’ve been firstly introduced to the media monitoring which is at the core of Blast Communications. I’ve had to familiarize myself with all of Blast’s clients as well as their competitors before getting my scissor ready to cut out newspaper articles on these companies and make a compilation of media clippings. I’ve been told to write summaries of the newspaper articles, sometimes translating the articles from English to French or vice versa, so as to send media alerts to Blast’s clients and this had to be done in a specific way.

I’ve also conducted extensive research to draft some interview questions, to make a list of database for contact persons of various companies and for a campaign that Blast is working on. I’ve even had the chance to share and propose some of my own ideas for the campaign during brainstorming sessions and my colleagues told me that my ideas were very pertinent and useful. Furthermore, as per an urgent request, I’ve had to prepare a fact sheet of questions asked in the media surrounding a controversy linked to one of Blast’s clients, by monitoring all media portals in the past few months.

For a first week, I believe that I’ve done quite a lot of hefty tasks and I’ve been able to prove myself to my colleagues. So far, I love this internship, thanks to the positive work environment that I’m surrounded with, and I really want to make the most of it. Every day is different; I’m learning new things each and every day and the only thing that becomes monotonous is the daily media clippings.

I have to admit that the PR profession is not that easy and it is indeed really challenging because it requires a lot of time, devotion and patience and you have to be really alert and circumspect but at the end of the day, you know that you’re doing a great job as you can help make a positive change.

Well, that’s it for my first blog post. I’m glad I shared my first week’s experience with you and I can’t wait to read yours too. I wish you all good luck with your internship and hope that you will find it to be an enriching experience. Stay tuned for my upcoming posts!

Houmaira Ramjaun

15102108

CTI, Mauritius