Important questions for the PR industry have been raised today (at least in my feedreader!) by a whole host of ‘new PR’ luminaries.
Richard Bailey, Philip Young, David Philips, Stephen Davies, Drew B and Tom Murphy have all been commenting on: a) a new book Exploring PR which seeks to address where the future of PR teaching lies – in the social sciences/media faculty or the business school? and b) where new media/PR actually lies in the current PR mix (the latter issue – I believe – came from Steve Rubel).
I think it is fair to say that these issues are intrinsically related…
My personal view is that at present, PR is best taught as a media discipline at undergraduate level while agreeing with Elizabeth Albrycht’s comments that at a higher/post-grad level business/management skills should be included on the course.
But where, then, does all this new media activity fit in? The tools involved wouldn’t necessarily be included in a standard journalism/PR course (with the exception of Philip Young’s Sunderland course)and likewise new media business principals (Cluetrain?) probably wouldn’t be covered at a mainstream UK business school.
So there’s a three-way split to be reconciled: does PR in the 21st Century fall into business; media or web 2.0?
David Philips will probably say all three and more besides… and in theory he’s not wrong. But in reality PR has a long way to go, hence the new book on PR focussing on media vs business only (that’s a simplified reading, I know, and without seeing a copy I can’t be sure it doesn’t address new media issues!) .
It is – and will be – down to a joint effort between all the different groups working on the new media landscape (a la Giovanni Rodriguez/Eastwikkers), including the practitioners and academics/theorists, to crystallize the major shift in media/PR into a tangible industry role (ie a ‘post-blogging economy’ to lift one of Giovanni’s phrases once again!).
In the UK the Chartered Institute of PR is one year into its chartered status and many (PLUG: including the CIPR Northern Conference committee) are trying to focus on making PR a credible and respectable industry in which to work.
Perhaps, instead of trying to turn around the current perception we should instead be looking to make a fresh start? Moving towards David Philips assertion that PR should be taught in ‘PR schools’ rather than as an add-on to media or business courses.
The new media/PR landscape may just be the perfect opportunity to make this break; or am I getting ahead of myself?
Either way… there are many unanswered questions and gaps in the industry that will be filled at some point in the future. These conversations are just the starting point.
only today I was talking to my boss about a pitch which had pretty much been written
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