I couldn’t resist grabbing the last line from Tom Murphy’s highly-readable post yesterday to be the headline for my post today. With an added exclamation mark.
This is the best response I’ve read to a laughable post by Russell Beattie last week in which he said that PR people are morons and where he whinges away about being pitched by PRs. I did split my sides when I read it. The generalities of it all! To me, there’s nothing in it that’s worth commenting on.
(And a great question Tom asks of Beattie: “Have you told your colleagues in the PR department that they are morons? Are you a popular co-worker?”)
What is worth commenting on, though, is one of the points Tom makes in his post:
[…] Good PR people are getting involved in conversations. They are helping companies to communicate effectively with their audience(s) using a wide array of channels from internal communications, to face-to-face meetings, to analysts, the media and sometimes even blogs.
Any profession has some members who are plain idiots. Some people who make mistakes. Unfortunately, posts such as Beattie’s add fuel to the fire of subjective negative criticism by those who are aways willing to knock communicators and the PR profession. Not helpful, really.
I think it’s good to remind ourselves that amongst all the negativity and silly stuff that’s out there, many communicators are just getting on with doing their jobs, practicing what they’ve learned and applying their skills and knowledge to the benefit of their employers or clients, and for their own professional development. Just as Tom said. They’re also helping colleagues increase their knowledge and understanding about new things like blogs, RSS, podcasting, etc.
Let’s focus on good practices for a change, not on the idiots and the mistakes.
Neville Hobson is the author of the popular NevilleHobson.com blog which focuses on business communication and technology.
Neville is currentlly the VP of New Marketing at Crayon. Visit Neville Hobson’s blog: NevilleHobson.com.
