Creative Public Relations for a Digital World

It’s hard out there for a CEO.

Recently, we witnessed a week’s worth of drip-drip-drip coverage about Yahoo chief Scott Thompson’s resume. The gaffe culminated in Thompson’s resignation after only four months on the job. But the controversy, on the surface, wasn’t about whether he’d faked an advanced degree, or falsely claimed Ivy League credentials. No, this was about his undergraduate major.

The headline-making departure last month was that of Best Buy chief Brian Dunn. Maybe it wasn’t surprising, but it was breathtakingly abrupt, amid unsavory and unsettling rumors of “improper conduct.”

Granted, each of these, and other “CEOs behaving badly” situations was really about company performance. And in Thompson’s case, the growing crisis wasn’t handled well. But it’s obvious that the stakes are higher than ever for the head guy. Controversy over executive pay, diminishing public confidence, and the news cycle have conspired to make even seemingly trivial missteps a big story.

The implications of the new, more perilous chief executive role aren’t lost on those who recruit and install the top guns, or on professional communicators. Corporate boards will redouble efforts to troubleshoot potential problems in advance. And it’s only right that chief executive prospects should be vetted with the zeal and rigor of (most) presidential candidates. Every weakness, peccadillo, or hint of scandal can, and will, come out.

At a time when a strong, communications-savvy CEO is more needed than ever, corporate strategists and PR specialists will become even more cautious about putting the head guy out there. A deep and visible executive bench is a strong communications strategy, and, these days, good risk management. But it’s more likely that access to the executive team will simply become scarcer for journalists.

The bottom line, of course, is that most of the responsibility lies with the chief executive. The occupant of the corner office needs to acknowledge his/her shortcomings, seek the best advice from those outside the inner circle, and be aware of when a problem or crisis has grown beyond their capability to address it. A terrific example of the “new” CEO who actively seeks counsel around his own leadership development is that of Mark Zuckerberg, as detailed in a recent New York Times piece. Yet, Zuckerberg, who will be 28 next week, is an anomaly even for a technology company.

The imperial CEO is long dead, and well he should be. And maybe we shouldn’t feel too sorry for the guys who can generally pull a ripcord on a golden parachute and go home to a fat bank account. But it’s possible that the pendulum has swung too far from the command-and-control days. The margin for error is so thin that you have to ask yourself, at some point, who’s going to want this job? When accountability becoming scapegoating, it’s a losing proposition for everyone.

It’s that time again, when an army of newly minted graduates hits the streets (or, more literally, their laptops) to land that first job. It may be the tightest employment market in years, but the challenge of finding work is probably good preparation for what’s to come! If you’re determined to break into PR, here’s my best advice.

Use every connection you have. Neighbor’s son-in-law’s girlfriend work at a PR agency? Ask for an introduction. Share a hometown, hobby, or favorite sports team with an employer? Let her know. Be polite, but be persistent, and don’t be shy. This is not a career for the faint of heart.

Ask for advice, not a job. Of course your goal is to be hired, but you may get further if you ask a senior executive for ten minutes of her time to get her best advice about breaking in. It’s a bit harder to turn that down, and your strategy should be to get on the radar.

Perfect your writing. In a competitive job market, a grammar error, tortured phrase, or typo will eliminate you, plain and simple. (Marijane’s post about resume gaffes is just the tip of the iceberg!) Learn to write for brevity, rather than for term-paper-like word counts. Be punchy. Be bold. But be brief.

Don’t spam. It’s amazing how many emails I get with another agency’s name in the body, or with telltale font changes or other signs of an e-blast. A mass email tells an employer that you’re not serious. And never, ever, start a note with “To Whom It May Concern.” Prospecting for a job is a lot like pitching media; the personal approach is time-consuming, but it’s the only way to do it.

Be social. As in following prospects on Twitter, engaging them on Facebook, and participating in industry or company LinkedIn groups. Consider Facebook ads, an introductory video of yourself, a career-themed Pinterest board. Show that you understand the medium and how to use it.

Get real. Experience, that is. Most agencies require at least one internship. Interviewing PR pros about their daily routines, studying the media and developing knowledge in a niche area or vertical category is also helpful. When I co-taught a graduate-level PR course, I was impressed by what the students knew that I didn’t. Cool stuff, like persuasion theory. But, very few had enough practical knowledge to write a solid client recommendation memo. The more practical experience you have, the better.

Have opinions. The best way to persuade an employer that you can help a client stand out is to do it for yourself. In an interview or short cover letter, offer some independent thinking. It’s more impressive if, instead of saying how much you’d die to work on their newest client, you have thoughts or ideas about the client’s business, the category, or a competitor. If an employer asks what you think of her agency’s website, be prepared with a thoughtful answer, not empty flattery. If she doesn’t ask, volunteer it. PR people are recommenders. Be one.

Package yourself. Make your strengths relevant. Be a storyteller, but prepare your narrative in advance. One of my worst interviews occurred when a recruiter asked me to tell her about myself. I babbled a life chronology rather than controlling the interview and focusing on relevant strengths. The open-ended questions can be the hardest, so have your “key messages” ready.

Show, don’t tell. In telling your story, illustrate your strengths with anecdotes and examples. Don’t just brag about your best qualities.

Be a media junkie. Nothing warms a PR executive’s heart like a true student of the media. Drop names, visualize stories, show that you’ve not only done your homework, but that you consume a broad diet of traditional and social media on your personal time and take an interest in PR industry and business topics and developments. You are what you read.

Be curious. Always ask questions. Even if you’re speaking with six executives in a row and have heard the corporate spiel from each of them, ask them something. Even if you know the answer. Your job is to show engagement.

Have other suggestions that have worked? Please share!

The past two weeks have seen a cascade of misdeeds to fascinate apology-watchers like me.

Where to begin? There’s the mushrooming scandal over the GSA’s $820,000 taxpayer-funded junket to Las Vegas in 2010. And the even seamier “hookergate” involving members of the Secret Service (though at least they were cost-conscious in their indiscretion!)

There was also plenty of outrage over ill-chosen public comments. In an unexpected gift to the Romney campaign, progressive pundit Hilary Rosen managed to anger stay-at-home moms, conservatives, and even the White House with her comment about Ann Romney.  Then there were the rogue remarks of rocker and gun enthusiast Ted Nugent, whose wacky anti-Obama rant earned him a visit from the Secret Service itself, in a nice bit of symmetry.

Most of the above have resulted in a public mea culpa. Some are baffling and nearly all are terrible. Inspired by the past week of apologies, I’ve drafted a guide for how not to deliver a face-saving public apology:

Wait it out. This is what Hilary Rosen tried to do in the wake of a strong reaction to her statement that “Ann Romney hasn’t worked a day in her life.” Though Rosen explained she was objecting to candidate Romney’s attempt to liken his wife to struggling working moms rather than criticizing her choice, the controversy didn’t abate until she formally apologized. Politics? Of course, but if you live by the sword, sometimes you have to fall on it.

Blame the victim. “I’m sorry if anyone was offended….” is how the classic non-apology starts. This is a flawed communications strategy because it evades responsibility and seems to put the blame on the injured parties. There’s a bit of this in Romney adviser Richard Grenell’s public apology for his Twitter updates criticizing Hillary Clinton’s appearance, Rachel Maddow’s style, and Callista Gingrich’s hair, among others. “I apologize for the hurt (the tweets) caused,” reads Grenell’s statement. A more sincere message would have gone something like this: “I attacked people in petty and personal ways because I don’t like their politics, and that is immature and wrong.”

Blame the system. Similarly, pointing fingers at forces beyond your control to deflect responsibility is unlikely to be effective. Disgraced former GSA head Johnson tries to have it both ways in her apology. She accepts responsibility but spends more time explaining that the infamous Vegas junket was well underway when she was appointed and that she was “unaware of the scope.” Weak.

Make it about you. Johnson goes further by expressing sincere regret for the GSA fiasco. Her words are affecting…until the end. “I will mourn for the rest of my life my failed appointment…” should be more about the taxpayers, not her career. Similarly, in Rush Limbaugh’s apology to Sandra Fluke for calling her a “slut” last month, he spends the bulk of his statement justifying his own outrage over the contraception issue, then ends with the single line, “I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.” Not enough, Rush.

Make light. Actually, humor (of the self-deprecating variety) can occasionally work, but it’s highly risky and must be deployed with extreme caution. An exception to the “no humor” rule and my favorite use of self-deprecation may be Robert Scoble’s blunt and refreshing self-indictment for an opinionated rant against an online commenter last year. Scoble was man enough to drink his own (apology-flavored) Kool-Aid in a blog post titled, “How I Made Myself Into An A-Hole.” Well said.

Agency of record. It’s a phrase to warm the heart of any PR professional. It tends to evoke a long-term, retainer relationship with a largeish account. But there’s evidence that the agency of record (AOR) may be heading the way of the traditional media tour. Gone.

According to the latest study conducted by the USC Annenberg Strategic Communication and Public Relations Center, clients are spending more on PR. Good news! But only 15 percent of the 600+ senior communicators surveyed say they have an agency of record; a decade ago, by contrast, more than half reported an AOR relationship.

Bad news? Perhaps. But why the shift? The report attributes it to the need for more specialized and more regional expertise. That’s undoubtedly true, but I’d also factor in the economy. Even if you’re spending more on PR projects, cost allocation and management is simpler when you have the flexibility of shorter contracts. Most importantly, it’s easier to calculate the ROI based on a discrete assignment.

And ROI, or more precisely, impact, is where PR is going. Thanks to the rise of social media, the industry’s maturation, and the sophistication of measurement tools, we can quantify the results from a given campaign with increasing precision. In fact, the Annenberg study showed that PR spending is up largely due to greater investment in evaluation.

The death of the AOR sounds scary, but here’s what it really means for PR firms.

More opportunity. This is particularly true for smaller or specialty firms. Presumably this heralds more respect for what we do, and the increased specialization of PR and communications overall.

Regard for PR as a strategic business tool. The study backs this up as well, showing that a corporate PR officer is increasingly likely to report to the “C-suite.”

Greater quality consciousness and focus on PR impact. Though agencies may deride project assignments as forcing us to “always run for reelection,” that tend to be more goal-oriented and more closely tied to business objectives. That’s a good thing.

Besides, that cozy, long-term AOR relationship was never really so secure. Let it go. We’re well positioned to prove the value that PR brings to the table. And that’s the good news.

Can the pitch be fixed? I don’t mean the new reality TV show, although the debut episode was a losing proposition — contrived, tedious, and unrealistic. But there was one aspect of the show that hit home, and that was the pitch itself.

A team from McKinney, the first of two ad agencies competing to win a client, files into a stark conference room, engages in awkward chitchat, and begins an upbeat walk-through of its lead creative campaign idea. The energy feels forced as the camera zooms in on the client executives, blank-faced, bored, distracted.

The vacant client reactions were probably a function of editing, to heighten what little tension the episode contained, and (spoiler alert) McKinney comes out on top, so there’s no abuse here. But the uncomfortable presentation scene made me reflect again on the typical search process where the agencies turn themselves inside out and throw lots of time and talent at a creative assignment in hopes of winning the prize.

I wonder if the clients who sponsor these beauty contests fully realize how hard a competitive pitch is on the participating companies. Maybe they do, since for the client who looks at ten firms, the search is likely to be protracted, confusing, and absurdly time-consuming. (On the show, the client very humanely looks at only two agencies. But the typical bake-off can include far more.)

It’s ironic that most agencies will deliver their best work on spec. At least in advertising, the creative that takes first place will presumably be the basis for the actual campaign. But ask PR professionals how many times they’ve actually executed the winning idea. For us, the pitch is usually an expensive and time-consuming chemistry test.

The whole process could use a fix. Here are my thoughts on how we might simplify the typical agency search:

Limit the field. Three or, at most, four agencies should be enough. It helps if the key attributes of the most compatible agency partner – size, culture, geography, etc. – are determined ahead of time.

Limit the deciders. Of course, corporate politics may dictate otherwise, but a smaller decision committee will save time, money, and anguish on both sides. A cross-functional team is an invitation to disaster.

Skip the RFP. We recently participated in a project pitch where the prospect vetted us by phone, then followed with a brief questionnaire with five open-ended questions, asking for our response in three days. They made a decision two days later. Almost painless. (p.s., we won.)

State your budget. Many clients fear being open about the budget because they want to take advantage of a competitive situation to get the best price. Why not determine your actual budget and get the highest quality work for it?

Spend the time. Offering real access to the decision-maker(s) and delivering quality information to agency candidates, rather than delegating the discovery process to an intern, will elevate the caliber of agencies who participate and the recommendations you receive.

Consider paying for spec work. You’ll get more in-depth, higher quality responses. And every agency will love you for it.