Public Relations in the Organizations - Essay Example

Running Head: Public Relations Essay Public Relations Essay Customer’s Name: Customer’s Course: Tutor’s Name: May 31st, 2012 Introduction According to (Cutlip, Center & Broom 1985, pp. 5) Public relations guides complex and pluralistic society in decision making process hence becoming more effective by way of common understanding among groups and institutions. This way it harmonizes between public and private policies. In particular, it operates on a range of organizations in the community like trade unions, hospitals, religious structures, colleges, schools and others in the aim of achieving their objectives. In other words, these organizations must establish effective relationships with their stakeholders and society. In order to achieve the goals, the management of these organizations must know the attitude and values that governs the public. The roles of public relation are determined by the external environmental factors and the practitioners serve as mediators and advisors of actions and policies. This paper discusses the statement in relation to the practicality of the public relation. Before agreeing or disagreeing with the claim, it is important to analyze the statement in relation to today’s functions and roles of public relation. In public relations, public opinion refers to a collection of views from different people in a population. For example, currently people have different opinions on the possible effects of some of the policies legislated by the government to curb negative effects of globalization. Persuasion on the other hand refers to force that directs people to choose and has influences to the society at range. Currently, organizations through social media and online advertising persuade people to buy their products (Bivins 1980, pp. 68). Finally, the term crisis management as applied to public relations means to curb related risks such as deaths, plant closing, regulatory crackdowns and other environmental issues that can impact negatively on running an organization. The theory of crisis management in public relations dictates that when a crisis happens, the organizations are only left with two options i.e. coping with public and media criticism or manage the crisis. Discussion Looking at the organizations in the society today and when the statement was made, the statement is more of aspirational statement now and then. As much as the public relations practitioners would want to help in the decision making process, most of the PR practitioners do not help in the decision making by shared understanding. Instead, the main role of any public relations today is publicity marketing (Broom, Shawna & Ritchey 2007, pp. 80). In addition, in relation to public and private policies, there are no such policies since most of the PR job is to impress and make aware through both modern and traditional ways. Though there is service rendered in public relations, it is not based on mutual understanding among the involved parties. Again, there are those PR practitioners who work to minimize the gap between internal and external stakeholders but the number of such PR practitioners is not large as one would expect. However, through internet as a media of communication there are demands on the roles of PR i.e. what they ought to do to represent companies in the World Wide Web. In that respect, PR people should be operating on the internet today more than anywhere else. Again, though many of them look like they are already there, majority do not have the proper tools and skills. When the internet technology was being embraced by many departments within an organization, PR was left behind looking on. In the light of these, PR makes news in the net but more often than not, they do not add any information in the internet even with the knowledge that internet is the largest source of information that any institution can use all the time (Watson & Noble 2005, pp. 15). From the point of view of public relations roles, the PR should; foretell, interpret and analyze the impacts of public opinions (whether positive or negative) on the operations of the organization, guiding and offering advice to the management in terms of communication, course of action, policies and what it means to the public, on a continuous mode; conducting research and other programs of actions through hence communicating the result to the public for the organization success which comes in the form of employee, fundraising, financial, marketing, community and/or government relations, in addition, the PR should implement and plan any efforts by the organization to influence public policies, and finally PR should budget, plan, set objectives, recruit, train, develop facilities and manage all the resources required to do all of the mentioned tasks (Watson & Noble 2005, pp. 65). Most of the roles mentioned above contradict with the definitions statement of PR. With this it is important to understand the literature behind this definition statement. The statement put PR as the management that supports strategic trade planning by way of understanding public policy, using bi-communication to enhance understanding and reduce any conflict that may arise and meet the required standards of corporate responsibility as expected by the stakeholders. However, it seeks to use products, operations and services to change the existing policies to support the very elements of change. So, public relation in this case is not limited to government, customers, or media relations. In it, PR should engage strategic business planning decisions that will change operations for better. Moreover, it should engage for better services, products and communications so as to foster mutual interests and harmony among the stake holders. In essence, values and facts of any policy are very important in development of any company and its reputations. Say, an automobile manufacturing company with corporate mission has to be viewed as the technological leader and is expected to fight any existing claims that its technology is perfect as stated. Nevertheless, if the parties establish good relationship they are all subject to gain. From definition, the one of the role of PR is the social role that if properly utilized can make the organization meet its objectives in a manner that benefits the institution (Bivins 1980, pp. 67). But the society is viewed as comprising of many competing groups, targeting both market and customers to win the ‘game’. Reality dictates that two organizations in the same market cannot establish a mutual understanding with another organization of its caliber. In addition, PR should work in a range of institutions in the society like trade unions, government agencies, business, hospital and alike to meet its objectives. These organizations should develop effective relationships with other stakeholders like members, employees and the public at large. These objectives have not changed since the definition was stated (Broom, Shawna & Ritchey 2007, pp. 70). Nevertheless, it is difficult to establish effective relationships with more distinct stakeholders the main reason being that the same stakeholders can react back either positively or negatively. In this, both CEOs and directors have realized that their roles are limited due to pressures from the activist (stakeholders). In the current global environment, trade unionists are fighting for their place in the offshore trade (Bivins, 1980, pp. 66). Again, the agencies from the government are flattering more clear more so with the huge amount of information stored in the web sites. However, this transparency comes with critiques that in most cases do not concern the constituent problems. The PRs in the organizations are operating through the internet the main reason being that, most of their members and stakeholders are there. Consequently, faced by these critiques they are calling for security, privacy and protection from constituents. The idea behind PR and the management of organizations may be characterized by either head of border or an investor who may take a good position of the stock in the company. Therefore, for PRs to act as counselors of management and to be mediators aiming to translate policies is not as easy as it may seem. As a matter of fact, the public affairs personnel in some places in the world like Washington DC are doing much of the work as lawyers (Horton 2007, pp. 4). Again most of the corporations’ counselors are working with more credibility than their counterparts in PRs. The relations counselors in investors are also working for company’s reputation than PR practitioners. The market researchers in the current global market are not viewed with great importance in marketing management. Furthermore, the public opinion has continued to be an important task of public relations. However, the work has been made easy with the online services that give more ideas and new sources. This calls for more analysis since the stakeholders and other interested groups are scattered. The question relayed to public relations practitioners now is whether they will be able to develop the required habits and skills about the public opinions. Conclusion In conclusion, the PRs need for counseling management will continue with no other reason than the PR practitioners forgetting the fact that the principles are being challenged with the current technology advancement. Again, the facts derived by the definition paragraph have not improved the PRs approaches and the manner of their work. Going with the knowledge that the definition paragraph was written 30 years ago and that the world is changing, the PRs practitioners today require more of technical skills than the laid facts. The attitude with practitioners about the use of technology in their field has not yield much success more so due to the fear of involvement with the technology (Horton 2007, pp. 8). Even today, it is still unclear on whether the PRs will ever embrace new technology and oth7er media tools and surrender their traditional ways. In addition, with the more hopes characterizing this field, the reality surrounding PRs is not on their side. There is a need therefore for PRs practitioners to remediate, evaluate and monitor both private and public opinion. For them to be accredited practitioners in management they require a combination of business minded ideas and talent that are highly treasured. Finally, it is important to point out that the opinions outweigh the facts about the roles of PRs hence I disagree with the definition statement. References Bivins, T 1980. Ethical implications of the relationship of purpose to role and function in public relations: Journal of Business Ethics. Vol. 1, pp. 65-73. Broom, G., Shawna, C & Ritchey, J 2007 .Toward a Concept and Theory of Organization-Public Relationships: Journal of Public Relations Research. Vol. 9(2), pp. 83-98 Cutlip, S., Center, A & Broom, G 1985 Public Relations Theory II.UK: Routledge Horton, J 2007 .What is PR today? Official Statement on Public Relations available online at: http://www.online-pr.com/Holding/What_is_PR_Today.pdf Retrieved on 26th may 2012 Watson, T., & Noble, P. 2005 .Evaluating public relations: A Best Practice guide to planning, research and evaluation. London: Kogan Page. Read More