BURKE: And, J.R., you’re also the chair of the programming in the event here this year. Think it’s very safe to say you’ve done a fantastic job based on the response and feedback that I’ve heard at all of my sessions and end tables.
But, you know, what goes into planning a session, especially when you’re looking for your peers to be able to plan something that’s going to be meaningful and effective for them? How did you determine what the agenda would be and how you were going to drive that agenda?
HIPPLE: Well, there’s three things that we really try to focus on at the Counselors Academy conference, and that is profit, performance and people. And it’s basically around the management of the business of public relations, particularly public relations, independent public relations consulting firms. It’s the professional development and the skills that we need as practitioners, and then it’s the interaction that we have with our–with our members and the networking that’s really one of the things that distinguishes Counselors Academy from, I think, any public relations group in the country.
BURKE: I would absolutely agree with you, and you choose fantastic locations. J.R., where can people find you online and in social media?
HIPPLE: Social media is @jrhipple, and online is hippleco.com.
JOHNA BURKE: Hello, this is Johna Burke with BurrellesLuce, and I’m at the PRSA Counselors Academy with Ken.
Ken, will you please introduce yourself?
KEN JACOBS: Sure. I’m Ken Jacobs of Jacobs Communications Consulting, and I help public relations agencies in three ways: number one, to grow and manage their business; number two, improve client relationships and client service; and number three, to enhance staff performance and motivation, primarily through training.
BURKE: Great. Ken, you’re doing a session on working with millennials. Can you please share with the people that aren’t able to make it on some of the tips about effectively working with millennials in the workplace?
JACOBS: Sure. Well, the number one tip is to stop complaining about them, particularly if you’re a baby boomer like myself or if you’re in Gen X, but to appreciate the fact they are the largest and fastest growing part of our work force. They’re 37 percent of them today; by the year 2014 they’ll be 47 percent. SO we have no choice but to learn how to manage and motivate them. And I think the most important thing is to understand the different cultural issues that have affected this generation. Understand their values, understand what makes them tick, understand how they’re different from both the baby boomers and the gen Xers and learn to appreciate them. And once you gain some insight into how they think and how they work, they can be very, very productive and really contribute to your team.
BURKE: I think those are great points and reminders for all of us that work with them, to really find a way to bring out the value that they bring to the organization. Tell me again how people can find you on the web and in social media.
JACOBS: Sure. They can find me at www.jacobscomm.com, that’s J-A-C-O-B-S-C-O-double M-dot-com. They can also find me on Facebook and LinkedIn and Twitter.
August in Washington, D.C., where I work, exemplifies the “dog-days” of summer. Congress recesses and it seems everyone else does, too. The slightly slower pace allows us time to reflect on the first half of the year, and make plans for the last two quarters.
“Third and Fourth Quarters Will Define PR Recovery” headlined a recent PR Week article. To summarize: Just because there was an upswing in the first two quarters of the year, does not mean the industry has truly emerged from the downturn.
So how can you help your organization emerge successfully?
1. Efficiency is a term thrown-around a lot, but it is still an important concept to PR that few have mastered. One friend, who works at a Fortune 500 company, said she wrote down everything she did for a few days. She was shocked to see she was not as good at multi-tasking as she thought. Her advice was to try to focus on completing a project before you look at the next email or tweet. This mirrors a similar idea expressed in a recent BurrellesLuce Fresh Ideas post by my colleague Colleen Flood, who attended the PRSA Counselors Academy back in May and learned that people can only do one thing at a time, as our brains haven’t yet involved to truly multi-task.
2. Mary Fletcher-Jones, Fletcher Prince, said via LinkedIn, that she plans to review clients who came on, clients who left, and what they purchased. I plan to do some of this same reflection and I think it is good for public relations, sales, and client service professionals to incorporate this practice on a regular basis.
Here are some other ideas for your August refection time:
Review budgets for the rest of 2010 and start on the 2011 budget.
Look at your PR/marketing plan, and decide if you need to make some mid-year changes.
Take time to read industry blogs and articles. What new tactics can you learn and put to use?
If you find you don’t have time for good refection, you might need to review your staffing needs. Do you need to hire someone to help with new projects/campaigns?
Set some new personal goals for the rest of the year. A life coach once suggested posting your main personal goals where you see them often, like on a Post-it note on your desk.
Do you have other suggestions for a mid-year review? Please share some of your insights. How are you working to help your organization emerge from the recession?
JOHNA BURKE: Hello, everyone. This is Johna Burke with BurrellesLuce, and I’m here at the PRSA Counselor’s Academy with Tom.
Tom, will you introduce yourself?
TOM GABLE: Hi there. Tom Gable, I’m CEO of Gable PR from San Diego, California. And I’ve been in the public relations business more than 30 years.
BURKE: And, Tom, you just did a session on strategies for success. Can you tell the people that aren’t able to attend some of those key takeaways and areas where they need to focus in order to make their agencies successful?
GABLE: Yeah. The whole idea is that a system can help make C players into B players, B players into A players. When I first started in the agency business as a journalist, the PR profession was mostly unbalanced; people were ambiguous; they weren’t doing good management. It was all based on the success of the individual talent. So if a good person left, client service would suffer. The idea is that there’s a lot of great books on this, including “E Myth Revisited” by Michael Gerber, a whole lot of other research books on what you try and do is build the system so it’s very easy for people to follow through, to set goals for their clients, and then to move forward according to specific plans. And if you have systems for quality control, client planning, creativity and–built in, then you’re going to be more successful in the long run.
BURKE: Great, Tom. And I want to make sure everybody knows that you also are a PRSA fellow.
GABLE: Yes, ma’am.
BURKE: And if you can let them know where they can find you on the web and in social media.
GABLE: OK, the web is www.gablepr.com, G-A-B-L-E-P-R.com. And then I tweet @tomgable. And so just neat, clean and simple. Make it easy.
BURKE: Great. Thank you so much for your time, Tom.
JOHNA BURKE: Hello, everyone. This is Johna Burke with BurrellesLuce, and I’m here at the PRSA Counselors Academy with Indra.
Indra, will you please introduce yourself?
INDRA GARDINER: I’m Indra Gardiner from Bailey Gardiner in San Diego.
BURKE: Thanks so much for joining us. And you’re doing a session on incorporating digital into the agency and how you can turn that into revenue. Can you tell some of the people some of the success stories and some of the tips that you have to implement that?
GARDINER: We’ve spent the last couple of years growing our agency digitally and expanding our service offerings to our clients. And not only has it been helpful for them in terms of results, but it’s also allowed an opportunity for our employees to learn and grow and expand their skill set. So it’s been everything from learning SEO and then applying that to our social media as well as our web development side. So it’s been cross-purposed to things like email campaigns and how does email fit into social media and a public relations program? So it’s a–it’s a much broader way of thinking about public relations and the marketing skill set.
BURKE: Great. That’s super advice for anybody to be able to apply to their systems. And so where can people find you on the web and then in social media?
To summarize: Just because there was an upswing in the first two quarters of the year, does not mean the industry has truly emerged from the downturn.
