Public Relations In A Nutshell.

According to The British Institute of Public relations (1948) Public Relations is the deliberate planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics. The 1978 Mexican statement issued at the end og a convention attended by more than 30 associations defined PR as The art and science of analysing trends, predicting their consequences, counselling organisational leadership and implementing planned programmes of action which will serve both the organisation and the public interest. Rex Harlow found 472 definitions of PR after examining books,journals and magazines on PR coupled with personality interview of 83 PR practitioners and then synthesized these various definitions into this one: PR is the distinctive management function which helps to establish and maintain mutual lines of communication, acceptance and cooperation between an organisation and its publics; involves the management of problems or issues, helps management to keep informed on and responsive to public opinion; defines and emphasizes the responsibility of management to serve public interest, help management to keep abreast of and actively utilize change serving as an early warning system to help anticipate trends and uses research and sound ethical communication techniques as its principal tools What Public relations Accomplishes. According to Leslie (1969) professional PR directs every campaign towards achieving the following objectives. 1. Prestige or favourable image and its benefits 2. Promotion of products and services 3. Goodwill of employee or members 4. Prevention and solution of Labour problems 5. Fostering the goodwill of communities in which the organisation has units. 6. Goodwill of stockholders or constituents 7. Overcoming misconception or prejudice 8. Forestalling attacks. 9. Goodwill of suppliers 10. Goodwill of the rest of the industry. 11. Goodwill of Government. 12. Goodwill of dealers and attraction of other dealers. 13. Ability to attract best personnel. 14. Education of the public to the use of a product. 15. Education of the Public to a point of View. 16. goodwill of customers or supporters. 17. Investigation of the attitude of the various groups towards the company. 18. Formulating and guidance of policy. 19. Fostering the viability of the society in which the organisation functions. 20. Directing the course of change. PR also involves a) Crisis management b) Reputation management c) Issues management D) Investor relations and Labour relations e) Grassroots PR also called astroturf PR. Methods, tools and Tactics of PR. 1. Audience targetting 2.Press Conferences 3. Press releases 4. News Releases 5. Lobby groups ( For Govt) 6. PR events or PR stunts 7. Talk show circuit. 8. Books and other writings