Final lessons from a PR pro

On my last day of my supervisor called me in to her office for a ‘chat’ about my internship. I won’t lie, I was nervous.  In my mind this was the part where she goes through all my intern work and scrutinizes it, evaluating my progress in a confronting finale to my placement. Of course that wasn’t the case. Instead, she sat me down and said she was going to give me the most important advice she could give about a career in public relations.

The first thing she spoke about was organisation. Specifically, emails. She told me that as ridiculous as it may sound, sorting your emails in to separate folders is the best thing you can do to stay on top of your workload. In a corporate PR situation, as it would be with any communications role, there is quite a bit of versatility in the work that you do. You may be dealing with writing an internal article one day and organising a sponsorship event the next, so it’s integral to be able to have each different sector of your work carefully separated. It’s no fun having to search through your inbox to look for an email or to forget to respond to something important. Organisation is key.

 

The second thing she told me was that no matter how much writing you do at university, nothing will prepare you for the amount of writing you do in a real communications role. She told me that you may write 20 PR plans during your degree, but you probably won’t even need that skill until you’re in a high level position. ‘Ninety per cent of my role is writing,’ she said, and now I’m grateful that I studied a few journalism units while I’ve been at university. 

My supervisor finished off our meeting by thanking me for all the work I had done and saying she’d happily write me a reference– this was nothing like the scary final meeting I had envisioned. I left feeling grateful that I had been able to have for such a rewarding and useful experience. 

When I got home that day I opened my email inbox. I had 3,109 emails. Would you believe it, I managed to purge every unwanted subscription and piece of junk until I had a neat inbox with a number of carefully organised folders. 

So here I am. Internship completed. I am now ready for a career in public relations and so is my email inbox.

Responsible Stakeholder Management

The social responsibilities of a large corporation, such as the organisation I’ve interned with are an extensively discussed issue by governments, media, not-for-profit organisations and greater society. A general expectation of ‘giving back’ is felt by the majority of West Australian society, without laws or institutions to enforce this idea. Throughout my time studying Public Relations the concept of corporate social responsibility has been extensively discussed and evaluated. Working within a community relations team, who’s primary mission is to deliver services to the community within the footprint of the company gave me unexpected insights into the practical world of CSR.

Having worked within non-profits, education institutions, and government departments seeing CSR from a corporate perspective provided refreshing insight.

The amount of time, planning and researching causes and effective solutions to communities within the organisations footprint is enormous. Partnerships are sponsorships exist to fulfil strategic objectives within communities. Responsibility and monitoring of expenditure, particularly on such a large scale was a priority of the team. The relationships between the organisations are managed through regular meetings and reports, both are critical to monitor funding and also reduce any negative impact on reputation or loss of social license.

Partnerships and sponsorships were generally viewed as favourable, but were also accompanied with high expectations. Partnering institutions are provided with guidelines, resources and support, with an expectation of delivering services, communication and reporting at a big business level. This could often be a reality check for smaller organisations that previously worked at a different level. Organisations who performed maintained a committed and long-term partnership. The team is fair but also cuttingly honest. The weight of responsibility for spending was enormous, and unproductive partnerships are politely let go.

Being a part of the corporate team distributing funds has changed the way I approach working for a non-profit and the relationship with our funders. Utilising initiative with funding partners is greatly appreciated and might just be the difference between cancelling and continuing a contract.

Mining Communications: Aboriginal Australians

From the beginning of my internship, the vitality of the relationship between the Aboriginal Australian’s and the company was made an apparent priority. Ingrained in my everyday work and interactions were teams of staff genuinely dedicated to the preservation of Traditional Land Owner countries, artefacts, sacred sites, lawyers supporting the equality and rights of Traditional Land Owners legal representation for agreements and the consequent implementation and those that focused on Aboriginal business development, employment and training. It did not take more than an hour to realise I was immersed in an office filled with genuine beings who cared about Aboriginal Australians and wanted a sustainable future for all affected by the mining footprint.

 Perhaps I seem a little naïve. I have worked previously for not-for-profit, education and government institutions, all of which had missions and visions to delivery services for a group in need, yet none of these compared to the corporate culture I stumbled across interning.  My first day began with NAIDOC week celebrations. Whilst numerous incredible and inspiring West Australians, some of Aboriginal decent spoke with incredible apt of inspiring tales that truly made me think, none made quite the same impression as the company Head of Department. The opening speech was real, the senior management member not only talked of the strengths and inspiring stories, but also openly acknowledged the companies negative past history with Aboriginal Australian’s as having ‘not always been good’. It was refreshingly real and honest and made feel that there was opportunity for working towards a future that has changed this, as although the past was not right, it was also not hidden.

The organisation is now a leader in private industry for Indigenous employment. As a team member I encountered the social license that has been created through Aboriginal Australians support of the business. Working alongside other teams I encountered Insights into the scholarship, employment, business development and support programmes as well as land rights and cultural heritage departments, all backing up the words with actions of a genuine intention at improving the relationships with Aboriginal Australians. 

There were still very real challenges. Tailoring communication and training processes and services is critical, there were many cross-cultural challenges and lessons to be learnt and faced on a daily basis by our teams. On a personal level I felt these challenges sometimes there were cross-cultural challenges. I had to ensure I worked through issues slowly – enabling patience, respect and being mindful of challenges from others cultural perspective. I faced cultural differences with workload expectations and different senses of time. However these challenges were minor when compared to the value of the input of cross-cultural perspectives and skills, such as local understanding and a commitment to the area that most FIFO workers lacked. More importantly, as an individual I had pride in participating in a diverse workplace.

For more information on this issue and other insights, utilise the following resources:

-        http://epress.anu.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/whole10.pdf

-        http://www.miningaustralia.com.au/features/mining-the-middle-class

-        http://www.sbs.com.au/dirtybusiness/

-        http://www.csu.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/409459/Guide-for-Working-with-Indigenous-Australian-Staff_-WEB.pdf

-        http://www.firstaustraliansmedia.org.au/vision/

First bump on the road...and not the last

ACCEPTING AND UNDERSTANDING FAILURE 

Good day everyone and welcome to my third post about my Perth Fashion Festival (PFF) journey. I think it's safe to say that we all dread the day we make a detrimental blunder at our work place. Rehashing the required tasks as an intern, my job was primarily to assist with sponsorship proposals prepared on Microsoft Power Point slides. As a non-profit organisation, PFF heavily relies on corporate sponsors to come on board to support the Festival. In order to get a strong foothold on this task, it is vital to understand the organisation's business drive as well as their goals and objectives. 

Each proposal needs to be tailored according to its respective corporate sponsor - both current and prospective. This task involves a mixture of public relations, marketing and even some journalism. "A sponsorship proposal needs to be tailored to each prospective company by using available information to define the synergies between the respective marketing synergy and the sponsorship offer" (Ferrand, Torrigiani, and Povill 2007, 98). In a hypothetical situation, if an organisation offers brand building and profile, we must understand the prospective client's target audience. As a Fashion based organisation, PFF has taught me that you have to learn the "corporate language". My supervisor made an interesting point where she mentioned that as a fashion community we have to play with the people in suits. This applies to every industry co-existing within the corporate community. 

Gauging my experience as a journalism student I have heard on multiple occasions on how the grass is always greener and more truthful on this side as opposed to the public relations side. As different as these disciplines may be, some fail to see how dependent they are on one another and a mixture of these skills help you handle tasks better. As a PR and Journalism student, being placed in the sponsorship and business development department was challenging and became more daunting as the internship progressed. At the same time, I liked the idea of being thrown into the deep end where it is really a sink or swim sort of situation. I realized there was a lot more that this job needed and I started teaching myself about marketing to keep up. 

Handling these proposals and working on the day after day proved an amazing learning opportunity. It was my first attempt at putting together corporate proposals and my supervisor was supportive and willing to teach me tricks of the trade. Another point I would like to stress on is the importance of listening. This extends beyond instructions where it also applies to listening to your surroundings. Working in a new environment like Perth helped me learn different ways of communicating and also be more outspoken about my opinions. 

Reverting back to the title of my post - the first bump on the road. The day came sooner than no later. As an intern, you are determined to do your best and impress your supervisor. We may face various kinds of pressure to do our best and at times, we get caught up in the ride. In a fast-paced environment like PFF, time is always of the essence and we have to keep up. Once, in my attempt to do so, I had more than three (3) Power Point slides open and I was cross-checking one with the other. My untimely rookie mistake was trying to do more than I could handle all at once, only to have it backfire. This mistake was brought up after the document was sent for approval and it failed to pass. It was a horrifying experience and unfortunately, this bump was not the first of its kind. 

Being unable to cope with the internship's requirements was pressurizing and also made me realize how unprepared I was to embark the real working environment. As an intern, you are essentially on a probation period with less pressure from the organisation and not having to worry about matters like key performance indicators (KPI's). Simultaneously, being a student about to graduate, ideally you would want to learn how to swim before the ship sinks. This journey has been a 'Titanic' in its own right and has taught me an invaluable lesson - Embrace failures in a graceful stride and move forward. Amy Anderson, an entrepreneur and contributor on Forbes Magazine quoted this, "If we aren’t making mistakes, then we likely aren’t trying enough new things outside our comfort zone, and that itself is a mistake" (Forbes, 2013).

Here are some useful websites for you fellow comrades out there:-
a) http://www.thegrindstone.com/2012/02/15/career-management/8-things-not-to-do-when-you-make-a-mistake-at-work-734/
b) http://www.forbes.com/sites/amyanderson/2013/04/17/good-employees-make-mistakes-great-leaders-allow-them-to/


Until the next post, this is Dhiva.

Keep your chins up and skin tough.

Dhivashini. T (Dhiva)
16106648 
Curtin, Bentley 


Reference
1. Alain, Ferrand,, Luiggino Torrigiani and Andreu Camps i Povill. 2007.Routledge Handbook of Sports Sponsorship: Successful Strategies. Oxon: UK. Routledge.
2. Anderson, Amy Rees. Forbes. 2013. "Good Employees Make Mistakes. Great Leaders Allow Them To". Accessed May 15, http://www.forbes.com/sites/amyanderson/2013/04/17/good-employees-make-mistakes-great-leaders-allow-them-to/

My first PR event: Overtime and Adrenaline rush

Hello everyone!

I’m Justine Lai, currently interning at Porter Novelli (PN) Singapore.

This is the second post about my internship, and I’m going to blog on a brief overview about the day of my very first PR event – SKF Business Press Day.

Let me start with a little introduction about SKF – SKF is a global engineering company with over 46,000 employees in 130 countries. Their core products are bearings, mechatronics, lubrication systems and services to construction and manufacturing corporations which include technical support, maintenance, consulting and training (Yes very engineering, I know). Its past projects include the Singapore Flyer and the Marina Bay Sands.

The SKF Business Press Day was held on the 4^th of July 2012 at the company building located in Changi, which was during my 4^th week of internship. On the day before the actual event, my colleague Shirley gave the team a ‘Minute-by-minute’ schedule on what would be happening and a brief on our individual roles. She also gave a heads-up on the contingency plan and the list of things to prepare. Through my colleagues’ comprehensive preparation and emphasis on minor details, I’ve come to realize that PR practitioners feel the most pressure during media events, and they would do tons of precautions to prevent any mishaps from happening.

I stayed in the office till 11pm that day (my personal latest record) to prepare the press kits and event materials needed for the event, and I got reimbursed for MacDonald’s’ dinner and cab fare (which totally made my day)!

 

Reception Area & Press Materials

I arrived at the event site 15mins before the meeting time and my first task was to prepare the reception area and arrange the press kits accordingly. After about an hour, journalists began to arrive at the venue and that’s when the adrenaline came - media backing out and some of them had lost their way. It was quite a nerve-wrecking moment, as my colleagues start to get daunted by thoughts of having no media present at the event. Fortunately each of us saved the media contacts onto our phones and as I received a few calls, I could recognize who they were, which publication they were from and I gave them instructions as directed.

The press event then commenced, with each of the main executives giving their presentations – Tom Johnstone, President and CEO of SKF, Rakesh Makhija, President Asia and Member of SKF Group Management and David Bishop, Asia Pacific Director. There was a short interval in between the presentations and A Roundtable Q&A session for the media was then carried out.

The session took about two hours and it wasn’t very relaxing for me. I was tasked to record the presentations and jot down notes of the whole event.

A picture of me writing frantically and recording the whole session with my phone and colleagues’ tablet.

After the note-taking (and quite frankly painful) session, a media tour was conducted on SKF’s applications and solutions around an exhibition area where the team and I followed the media around, listened to the tour and jotted down notes along the way.

The event concluded with a delicious lunch session where we were served with finger food around the exhibition area and I finally got to satisfy my cravings – sushi, fried prawns, mini sandwiches, and other delightful pastries! Of course, the end of the day doesn’t mean the end of it all. The team and I had to compile post-event tasks, such as media follow-ups calls, media monitoring, and the compilations of reports to wrap up the whole project. Here's one of the coverage that we had from the event - SKF launches green strategy.

It was a really eventful and interesting day as I got to interact with some of the journalists present at the event. I learnt a lot about press events and onsite PR skills that day, and how it felt to have nerve-wrecking moments when we encounter problems during a media event. A contingency plan is always needed, and with the right planning and management, the possibility of success of an event would be much greater.

Best Regards,

Justine Lai

15215640

Curtin Singapore