Good Business the rise of CSR

Why corporate social responsibility ?
Organisations in developed economies are today influenced by public opinion , shareholders, members of campaigning groups.Tench and Yeomans : 2006 pg 100). Also according Adam Garfunkel companies are also implementing CSR because of globalisation, the state of the planet , the information age and also risk and reputation management .
The PR practitioner can utilize CSR to build a company's corporate image and reputation.Most companies that are more interested about the bottom line can rest assure that practising social responsibility can be used to differentiate their organisation and so provide them with competitive advantage.
In a review of the role of PR firms in corporate social responsibility programs, Lisa Roner wrote in Ethical Corporation that "many early efforts to communicate on corporate responsibility have been high on production value and low on substance."As was discussed in the lecture some CSR programmes are not well thought through and can end up having a negative impact . The main issue that was also raised was that some companies end up targeting programmes that are not even remotely to their businesses.
The lecture and exercises helped me to clarify some impressions of CSR , I automatically thought that CSR was the PRO's responsiblity . I didn't fully grasped the role of PR in a CSR programme. Another point that i also recognized was that the practitioner has to work closely with other departments to formulate an effective programme.

References:
Tench and Yeomans(2006) . Exploring Public Relations. Prentice Hall
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Corporate_social_responsibility

Diversity in PR

Multicultural public relations can be defined as management of formal communication between an organization and their relevant publics to create and maintain communities of interest and action that favour organization. Diversity speaks to the inclusion of ethnic minorities, gays and lesbians, elderly, customers etc. Zena Martin in her lecture outlined that companies in the United States have embraced diversity more than their counterparts in the UK. The argument then is why is diversity so important especially for the public relations practitioner? Firstly our society is rapidly changing and so includes people of various backgrounds, race, creed, sexuality etc. Also according to Banks (1995) by not including diversity into practice it is potentially filled with missed opportunities and inadequate performances that can result in misunderstanding cultural differences.
Colin Bryne (2008) outlines that many companies have embraced diversity but their PROs need to reflect this. In his article he focuses on diversity within the workplace. However as Zena Martin outlined in her lecture it extends to include customers. As with all aspects of PR, integrating diversity involves researching and understanding audiences.
Although more needs to be done to integrate diverity into public relations there has been strides by the CIPR via their website " Diversity Matters" which is designed to help their members tackle this issue.

Class Exercise

The class exercise for attracting men to the public relations profession for our group was somehow challenging. We sought to concentrate on messages that would attract more men. We identified that messages would speak to their ego and include words such as macho, strong and prestigious. We were influenced from the previous lecture on feminization of PR and thought that only specific areas of PR would appeal to men. The outcome from the class is that implementing diversity can be complex from the employees to the customers/ clients. The important point is to know the audience and this has to be based on research.


References

Banks, S. (1995) Multicultural Public Relations: A Social – Interpretive Approach.
Sage Publications
Byrne, C. (2008) PR WEEK Opinion: Industry needs to reflect social diversity. [Online] Available at: http://www.prweek.com/uk/home/article/789078/ [Accessed March 2008]
CIPR available at: http://www.cipr.co.uk/diversity/ [Accessed March 2008]

Feminization of public relations

To demonstrate that feminization of PR is all around us we can just look at the ratio of men to women in our MA class. It’s a striking contrast to the early days when the field was dominated by men. The class debate brought up an interesting point that although there are many women in the profession to the extent that it is regarded as a ‘pink collar’ profession men still hold the management positions.
HON et al (1992) asserts that feminization has been at the fore of the discussions about the future of the field with regard to professionalism, prestige and salaries. Although more women are involved in education and subsequently the PR field they experience inequalities in regards to salary and status.

An argument exist that men biological and socialization attributes cause them to be disposed to self-select the inherently risky manager role . While on the overhand women choose the technician role because its safe and there are low levels of involvement . This point supports the idea that its not out of discrimination that they are paid low but instead because of their assigned roles.
The way forward to address the feminization of PR is to see women as equal and to acknowledge their contribution. Notwithstanding this mobility up the work ladder should not be based on gender but on merit.

Grunig , J.( 1992) Excellence in Public Relations and Communication Management . Lawrence Erlbaum Associates

Audiences and Stakeholders.

In the lecture one crucial point to knowing an audience is to consider groups that affect the organisation and are affected by the organisation. According to Wilcox and Cameron (2006 pg 271) in defining audience they state that it is a complex intermingling of groups with diverse cultural, ethnic, religious, and economic attributes whose interest coincide at times. Out of all the models to segment stakeholders I preferred the 9 ways by Broom and Dozier. It was extremely helpful with our group exercise and we would not have identified all the publics. Also I found that the social marketing approach would be more applicable for use by NGOs and government organizations.
Public relations practitioners have to realize that audiences are dynamic and the strategies to reach them are not static. An example of this challenge is the Internet and the fact that it’s hard to control the message and hence the communication.

Reference: Wilcox and Cameron( 2006) Public Relations Strategies and Tactics . Pearsons International

Case Study:
How Oakland Children's Fairyland reached new audiences?
The Challenge: Oakland Children's Fairyland, opened in 1950, was Walt Disney's model for the legendary theme park he built a few years later in Orange County. But Fairyland's visitor base had narrowed to local neighbourhoods. This limited repeat attendance and net income, which depends on souvenir and refreshment sales. Public agencies had cut funding on which the park historically counted. With a limited budget, Fairyland needed to expand promotional coverage outside the inner city to reach new parent/child visitors elsewhere in the Bay Area.
The Solution: They worked quickly with staff to promote a new upcoming evening show. The park's news media mailing list was updated and expanded, and photography showing children enjoying themselves in park surroundings was accumulated. A photo call was issued for the lively preparations made for Fairyland's 47th birthday by young, costumed volunteers.
Results: A front page, above-the-fold colour photo in the city's largest suburban paper the day before the new show's debut, plus generous calendar listings in all major regional dailies. Dozens of queries from other periodicals and freelance writers stemmed from this initiative. The new show debuted to a sell-out audience. Both weekday attendance and concession revenue are up.
Source: http://pr.e-agency.com/case_children.shtml