Ah, here we are at the crossroads once again...no wait, it's the end of the line rather than a crossroad..haha
Anyway, this chapter connects to me very personally as it talks about the perspective of Public Relations of the Asian nations and culture in comparison to the state of affairs we see in the Western countries. Talking about locality always gets me jumping around - call it patriotism or the want of showing off Singapore to friends everywhere, issues pertaining to Singapore always had a soft spot in me heart.
Hence, the disagreement, from the readings, that PR in Singapore IS still for the sole purpose of government propaganda.
Well, let's talk about the state of PR in the Asian context first, shall we? I agree with the readings that there is still work to be done if Asia was to match up to the standards that is in place within the Western nations now. However, a different strategy has to be employed within Asia if we were to rise up and fulfill our potential as Asians are naturally conservative and respect authority.
Not saying that the Western culture don't do both of those, but a comparison of public reaction to PR campaigns of a similar context is probably enough to gauge the differences in tolerance level between the two culture.
As mentioned earlier in my blog post about PR ethics, the mailbox-vandalism PR stunt that Singapore Post undertook earlier this year, in promotion of an arts event related to the Youth Olympics Games 2010, received island-wise criticism and distaste. So much so that the CEO of SingPost had to offer an apology at a media conference to appease the Singapore citizens.
Compare that with the Marc Ecko stunt where they appeared to "vandalise" Air Force One - it turned out to be a staged PR stunt as the plane was a private jet which was designed to look like AF1 - and the difference in opinions was drastic. Americans wow-ed at the stunt, offering praise and amazement at the ability to pull off such an act and even having it on tape. After the viral marketing hype wore down and the true nature of the campaign was revealed, there was backlash nor stone-casting. They still revered it as a creative concept of PR, unlike their Singaporean counterparts.
All in all, improving the state of PR affairs in Singapore is not just a matter of casting away our culture and traditions. These 2 aspects makes us unique compared to others and we shouldn't case it away. Rather, we should tweak strategies that are successful in the States and finetune them to work in the Asian culture.
With that said, I think it's about time Asia slowly open up to being more receptive in new ideas too ;) - we could use abit of humour and creativity in our lives, otherwise life will just be plain boring...
Terence, for the final time....OUT!
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Week 10 - The one where Terence analysed the pros and cons of New Media
Society, as we know it, is totally a different place from the generations of yesterday. Heck, I don't have to go back so far...the generation of today is ALREADY the equivalent of Back To The Future when compared to my childhood.
Back then, I was an avid fan of Transformers and G.I Joe while also eating, sleeping and breathing football. Nowadays, kids will be lucky to even get out of the house to go have a ball of a time at the playground within their vicinity as all they can think of is the INTERNET, COMPUTER games and FACEBOOK.
Gone are the days where friends will call each other up, setting a date out for coffee to catch up or kids to meet neighbours at the playground and potentially being best friends for live. Now, it's all about chatting on Windows LIVE Messenger or Skyping across the world to online friends they've made throguh multiplayer games.
Such is the prominence of the Digital Age that the term New Media got coined. New Media consists of media technology that is linked to the one biggest development since the early 1990s - The Internet.
People are staying connected to each other, no matter the geographical locations, through social-networking websites like Friendster or Facebook while others are sharing daily happenings lin their lives with the world unknown through blogs and Twitter.
It isn't just normal people who are getting involved with the Internet. Organizations, it seems, are slowly getting into the act in line of upgrading their PR policies.
With changing times, newer tactics are required to engage with the publics and stakeholders of organizations and what better way than the global platform that everyone is on? Public Relations is heavily based on an open-ended communication/feedback system and a system such as the Internet will allow organizations to create greater opportunitiues for participation and consultation between key stakeholders and the organization.
Locally, Starhub is one of the leading lights of organizations taking the initiative to engage its customers through forms of New Media. One of the major telco companies in Singapore, Starhub registered itself on Twitter, a micro-blogging website, to allow itself to directly address rants and complaints from Singaporeans who have a tendency to log on to Twitter to let fly their frustrations at Starhub's Internet service, or rather the lack of it.
An important aspect of Public Relations management and execution is that responses to crisis be as immediate as possible so as to reassure the stakeholders that the organization is on top of it. New Media is certainly helping organizations bridge gaps like this with countries such as Singapore and the United States enjoying proliferation of Broadband-on-Mobile like services through smartphones such as the iPhone and Blackberry phone models.
If technological advances have the potential to transform the ball park of communication between organizations and its publics and key stakeholders, shouldn't we be embracing this as a new age of PR management?
Back then, I was an avid fan of Transformers and G.I Joe while also eating, sleeping and breathing football. Nowadays, kids will be lucky to even get out of the house to go have a ball of a time at the playground within their vicinity as all they can think of is the INTERNET, COMPUTER games and FACEBOOK.
Gone are the days where friends will call each other up, setting a date out for coffee to catch up or kids to meet neighbours at the playground and potentially being best friends for live. Now, it's all about chatting on Windows LIVE Messenger or Skyping across the world to online friends they've made throguh multiplayer games.
Such is the prominence of the Digital Age that the term New Media got coined. New Media consists of media technology that is linked to the one biggest development since the early 1990s - The Internet.
People are staying connected to each other, no matter the geographical locations, through social-networking websites like Friendster or Facebook while others are sharing daily happenings lin their lives with the world unknown through blogs and Twitter.
It isn't just normal people who are getting involved with the Internet. Organizations, it seems, are slowly getting into the act in line of upgrading their PR policies.
With changing times, newer tactics are required to engage with the publics and stakeholders of organizations and what better way than the global platform that everyone is on? Public Relations is heavily based on an open-ended communication/feedback system and a system such as the Internet will allow organizations to create greater opportunitiues for participation and consultation between key stakeholders and the organization.
Locally, Starhub is one of the leading lights of organizations taking the initiative to engage its customers through forms of New Media. One of the major telco companies in Singapore, Starhub registered itself on Twitter, a micro-blogging website, to allow itself to directly address rants and complaints from Singaporeans who have a tendency to log on to Twitter to let fly their frustrations at Starhub's Internet service, or rather the lack of it.
An important aspect of Public Relations management and execution is that responses to crisis be as immediate as possible so as to reassure the stakeholders that the organization is on top of it. New Media is certainly helping organizations bridge gaps like this with countries such as Singapore and the United States enjoying proliferation of Broadband-on-Mobile like services through smartphones such as the iPhone and Blackberry phone models.
If technological advances have the potential to transform the ball park of communication between organizations and its publics and key stakeholders, shouldn't we be embracing this as a new age of PR management?
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Week 9 - The one where Terence navigated through a crisis with his reputation intact
The PR practitioner in this day and age probably has the most unenviable job scope in the world - upkeep the reputation of their clients/organization in the eyes of their publics AND help fix a broken reputation when a crisis or scandal erupts through the company and tears the initial public impression of the organization/client up into pieces.
In the readings, the quality of relationships between an organization and its key stakeholders was defined as the determinant of an organization's reputation and I couldn't agree more. A good reputation is crucial for a company if it wants to do well. This is where the PR practitioner comes in - he/she has to:
Once a good relationship is established between the publics and the company and belief in the organization sky-high, profits will eventually soar through the rising engagement of services and usage/purchases of products from the organization etc.
However, there is a saying that goes along the lines of "A crushed piece of paper can never go back to its original, un-crumpled state" and this is certainly the same for reputation / image.
The 2nd part of this weeks' readings focused on Crisis Management and this is the chapter that probably interested me the most, beating the Media Relations chapter hands down.
Crisis is defined in the dictionary as an unstable or crucial time or state of affairs in which a decisive change is impending; usually one with the distinct possibility of a highly undesirable outcome. Usually an unpredictable event that could potentially trigger the start of the end of an organization, it has to be dealt with as soon as possible with as much finesse and grace as possible in order to ensure minimal damage to the organization's public image.
The readings revealed, through a study back in 2005 by Farmer and Tvedt, that 27% of organizations WILL NOT make it through a crisis when it hits them YET many of them remain unperplexed by the possibility.
Toyota Motors was chided in some quarters for not acting fast enough in light of the recent safety scandal which saw the recall of millions of Toyota cars due to malfunctioning accelerator pedals and brake systems. Akio Toyoda, the president of the company, maintained radio silence for a few days despite calls from the public everywhere, from Washington to Ontario to Timbaktu even, for a response from the company.
Thankfully, Toyoda acted relatively quickly after his radio silence, coming out to apologize for the company's oversight on a QC problem like this. While it was not an instant reply from Toyoda, which was even preceded by a reply from the deputy vice president, analysts reckon it was still enough to salvage some pride and keep Toyota's reputation intact amongst the global motoring population.
I personally felt that Toyoda, along with recent shamed celebrities such as Tiger Woods and Jack Neo, should have come up with a response, at the very least if an apology is unavailable yet, as immediately as the analysis backstage can possible allow.
Why a response at the very least? That's because it shows that the organization's willing to take responsibility (NOT akin to taking the blame for the mistake/scandal....yet!) and make amends to it. Stakeholders and publics love to see the organization assume responsibility as it will go to show that they understand the severity of the situation and will start making repairs to the relationship between the 2 parties that had been spoilt by the scandal.
To conclude, the Toyota recall scandal has proven that a crisis happens to any organization, regardless of size and stature, and that there is an urgent need to have a rescue plan for anticipated crisises. This is essential as executive bigwigs will no longer have the luxury of time once a scandal hit and the faster a response, the more minimal damage can be..
Onwards to the age of New Media!
Terence....OUT!
In the readings, the quality of relationships between an organization and its key stakeholders was defined as the determinant of an organization's reputation and I couldn't agree more. A good reputation is crucial for a company if it wants to do well. This is where the PR practitioner comes in - he/she has to:
- help to ensure that the needs of stakeholders are understood and met
- encourage consistency in delivering positive results on promises
- help to articulate and frame messages that organizations want to deliver
Once a good relationship is established between the publics and the company and belief in the organization sky-high, profits will eventually soar through the rising engagement of services and usage/purchases of products from the organization etc.
However, there is a saying that goes along the lines of "A crushed piece of paper can never go back to its original, un-crumpled state" and this is certainly the same for reputation / image.
The 2nd part of this weeks' readings focused on Crisis Management and this is the chapter that probably interested me the most, beating the Media Relations chapter hands down.
Crisis is defined in the dictionary as an unstable or crucial time or state of affairs in which a decisive change is impending; usually one with the distinct possibility of a highly undesirable outcome. Usually an unpredictable event that could potentially trigger the start of the end of an organization, it has to be dealt with as soon as possible with as much finesse and grace as possible in order to ensure minimal damage to the organization's public image.
The readings revealed, through a study back in 2005 by Farmer and Tvedt, that 27% of organizations WILL NOT make it through a crisis when it hits them YET many of them remain unperplexed by the possibility.
Toyota Motors was chided in some quarters for not acting fast enough in light of the recent safety scandal which saw the recall of millions of Toyota cars due to malfunctioning accelerator pedals and brake systems. Akio Toyoda, the president of the company, maintained radio silence for a few days despite calls from the public everywhere, from Washington to Ontario to Timbaktu even, for a response from the company.
Thankfully, Toyoda acted relatively quickly after his radio silence, coming out to apologize for the company's oversight on a QC problem like this. While it was not an instant reply from Toyoda, which was even preceded by a reply from the deputy vice president, analysts reckon it was still enough to salvage some pride and keep Toyota's reputation intact amongst the global motoring population.
I personally felt that Toyoda, along with recent shamed celebrities such as Tiger Woods and Jack Neo, should have come up with a response, at the very least if an apology is unavailable yet, as immediately as the analysis backstage can possible allow.
Why a response at the very least? That's because it shows that the organization's willing to take responsibility (NOT akin to taking the blame for the mistake/scandal....yet!) and make amends to it. Stakeholders and publics love to see the organization assume responsibility as it will go to show that they understand the severity of the situation and will start making repairs to the relationship between the 2 parties that had been spoilt by the scandal.
To conclude, the Toyota recall scandal has proven that a crisis happens to any organization, regardless of size and stature, and that there is an urgent need to have a rescue plan for anticipated crisises. This is essential as executive bigwigs will no longer have the luxury of time once a scandal hit and the faster a response, the more minimal damage can be..
Onwards to the age of New Media!
Terence....OUT!
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