media update’s Adam Wakefield was at the Indaba Hotel in Fourways, Johannesburg to find out what is top of mind for thought leaders and practitioners within the industry.
The final day of the conference was opened by newly elected PRISA president,
Kavi Kalicharan. Looking back on day one of the conference, what stood out for Kalicharan was the power of social media and collaboration and the focus on skills enhancement within in the industry. The final session of day one bore immediate fruit for this critical industry pillar.
“In the space of half an hour, we had three interns placed. If we can do that in half an hour, imagine what we can do in one week, in one month, and one year,” Kalicharan said.
Public relations and managing expectations in uncertain times
Kalicharan was followed by former ICCO past president and president of growth and development international at Omnicom Public Relations Group, David Gallagher. His keynote address was titled “Managing expectations in uncertain times”.
“I think, fundamentally, we are in the business of managing expectations … The things that we do, the channels that we use to engage, continue to change and evolve, sometimes in very dramatic ways. The way we do it hasn’t changed: to help manage expectations,” Gallagher said.
Based on his personal experience on a plane that was forced to make an emergency landing, Gallagher had five steps to managing expectations:
- Establish stakeholder expectations;
- If those expectations are breached, acknowledge it in real time;
- Abandon the status quo when it is no longer viable;
- Communicate a new plan; and
- Return to the status quo with explanation.
His advice for PR professionals is to listen fearlessly so that expectations are established in clear terms, find empathy so confirmation biases are abandoned, anticipate multiple events through scenario planning, create future stories of shared meaning, and beat expectations via generosity.
The ethics of public relations and business
Following Gallagher’s speech, Nedbank group ethics officer Driekie Havenga took to the stage to talk about the importance of ethics in business and public relations.
She started off with a quote, “Power does not change who you are, it just reveals who you are”, using it as a pretext for why ethical leadership is the root of ethical business practices and running an ethical enterprise.
“Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It is the foundation principle that holds all relationships and this resonated with me on such a basic and primal level,” Havanga said.
“The first thing that we usually tell our people when they come to our [office] is, ‘Please remember, we are not in the business of making money. We are in the business of creating trust’.”
If you do not have trust in your investor, your clients, or your shareholders, then you won’t have people giving you money to make money. Good business ethics is good business practice.
Public relations, digital transformation, and the media
Following Havenga’s speech and a break, the conference split up into three tracks as it had on the first day.
Among those tracks, the topics of managing news in digital media, strategies to deal with parody social media accounts, business innovation through brand communication, digital transformation in public relations, educating PR professionals for the future, and energy efficiency and behavior change were discussed.
Jaco du Plessis, director at BCORE, in his presentation on digital transformation in PR, noted how digital has led to half the Fortune 500 companies in the year 2000 disappearing off the list.
Digital transformation, when a business adapts to disruptive technologies and how they affect customer and employee behaviour, is a business imperative if those aiming to do so want to stay relevant.
“The goal of digital transformation is to make business relevant in a digital era while growing opportunities and profits, as well as scaling efficiently in the process,” Du Plessis said.
Marion Scher, a journalist, trainer, and media consultant, told those listening to her track that changes in the news today happens in minutes, not hours, and given the size of South Africa’s media industry, all it takes is one mistake to become ‘persona non-grata’.
Anyone creating press releases longer than a page, and even then some circumspection is necessary, is wasting their time. Scher urged PR professionals to personally contact and meet journalists, forging relationships in the process.
PRISA Conference closes with strong words and call to action
After lunch, Lynn Hill spoke about personal brand leadership and living in power with passion on purpose, and she was followed by Yomi Badejo-Okusanya, president of African Public Relations Association.
Chris Verrijdt, chairman of PRISA’s consultancy chapter, then gave an introduction on how PR can future proof itself before opening that same question to the floor. Conference attendees weighed in with their own thoughts of how the PR industry can claim its rightful place in the business sun as a critical component.
Daniel Munslow, chairman of the
PRISA Conference, then closed the thought-provoking two days with a word of thanks to all who attended.
It was an engrossing two days where public relations looked inward, with a foundation laid for the coming year. Next year’s conference will be held on Thursday, 24 May and Thursday, 25 May at Misty Hills Country Hotel, Conference Centre & Spa in Muldersdrift.
For more information, visit
prisa.co.za.
Want to know what happened on the first day of the 2017
PRISA Conference? Read more in our article,
PRISA Conference: A time of great opportunity, but challenges remain.