Achieving

In our careers, we don’t always achieve everything that we would like to achieve. We may not secure a promotion, win an award, gain a payrise or attain our outcome objectives. But life isn’t a game of hopscotch where you have to follow the rules to get from 1 to 10. Does it matter if…

Power

Giving a voice to the voiceless is a powerful thing to do. Without advocates, those unable to speak up or speak out, for themselves, all too easily become victims of others with more power, The voiceless can be misunderstood, evoke negative feelings and be subject to negative behaviours. New York based Sophie Gamand uses her…

Platinum

What is platinum? Platinum has been called “white gold”; its name derives from the Spanish platino, meaning “little silver”. Platinum is special – in chemical properties, colour and symbolism. Platinum is the name of a new book – more on that below. The alchemical symbol for Platinum connects those of silver (moon) and gold (sun)….

Dedication

At this time of year, it is common to look back over recent achievements and plan ahead to how we may dedicate our time and efforts in future. This approach is a key step in sustainable professional development and involves two of three stages of reflective thinking: Reflection on action – what have we done?…

Researchers

Mind the PR Gap is a new initiative that aims to bring together research and practice in the field of public relations. It is open to PR practitioners, academics, researchers and students. As I’m involved with the event taking place on Wednesday 12 July 2017 at Birmingham City University, this post is partly promotional. With…

Grief

Nine years ago I experienced the depths of grief when my dad died. The words of the blogpost “A private tragedy” that I wrote then remind me of the immediate pain. I generally don’t acknowledge this “stop all the clocks” moment, when a solid knot was tied in the thread of my life. But I…

Submission

When we talk about submitting an assignment or other piece of work, this verb is often viewed as a process, the action of uploading or physically presenting something for assessment. That’s what I’ve done this week with my PhD thesis. But in doing so, I started thinking about the concept of submission. We’ve come to…

Understanding

This is the first in a series of posts with one word titles. According to the Oxford English Dictionary there are over 600,000 English words, with new ones added each year. Word: A single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing Any professional communicator needs to be aware of the meaning of the words they…

Is it time to step away from the Grunig & Hunt four models of public relations?

If you’ve ever read a public relations textbook, you’ll be familiar with the Grunig & Hunt four models of public relations. Those who’ve studied a PR qualification will have written essays on the construct, even squidging it into papers where it wasn’t necessary because it has to be included, right? No – there’s more to…

Public Relations is a tradition of practice

I’m very interested in how we think about and study public relations – and how this conceptual understanding connects to what we do in practice. I believe in questioning the accepted wisdom, arguments, actions and assumptions that are inherent in public relations practice (and theory) using reflective and critical thinking. Only by being mindful of…