We need a new definition of corporate social responsibility (CSR) to apply not only to corporations, but also to governments, NGOs – any organization that competes for societal resources – thereby helping societies set a sustainable path. The economic crisis is a good opportunity for social scientists to talk to each other, who for decades have been telling us that organizations are not perfect: Herbert Simon and many others have proved Max Weber wrong.  For what concerns the environment ...

Careers in reputation management, public relations and corporate communications can be made or broken during times of crises. Communications practitioners who want more than a seat at the press-release end of the table should consider expanding their knowledge beyond communications to incorporate an understanding of the theory and research around risk communications. A compelling case for risk literacy among the profession is made in a soon-to-be-published paper by Dr. Chris Galloway, Swinbur ...

I write this post from Dubai, where the International Public Relations Association (IPRA) has invited me to speak at a conference called ‘Public Relations in the Age of Dialogue.’ There’s much symbolism here: a great global city, in a region at an extraordinary crossroads between tradition and modernity, hosting a dialogue about a profession undergoing a similarly profound transition. This chang ...

Twenty countries represented by 36 papers on the history of public relations shows that this “niche” area of study is becoming an important field of research. That’s the basic math of the abstracts for this year’s International History of Public Relations Conference to be held at Bournemouth University in England on July 11-12. ...

I’m very pleased to welcome the latest addition to the IPR Trustee Class of 2014.  Adele Ambrose, Senior Vice President and Chief Communications Officer, Merck, becomes our 44th Trustee. At Mer ...

I’ve been on the front lines of PR measurement for over 10 years in my role at General Motors.  In that time, I’ve sat through more vendor pitches than I care to remember and watched many squirm uncomfortably as I poked at the black box that is their particular proprietary methodology. ...

As the public relations industry grows in size and stature, it is coming under increasing scrutiny by the public, media and government. But not all scrutiny is bad, especially if it helps broaden the understanding of a profession and advances its role and value. ...

IPR Trustee Rob Flaherty turned my attention to Jonah Lehrer about a year ago.  Lehrer, the author of “How We Decide” and “Imagine: How Creativity Works” (due out next week), writes about neuroscience.  Last weekend, his essay in The Wall Street Journal hinted at what’s to come in the new book. ...

If you follow the work of crisis communications scholars such as Tim Coombs, perhaps you too have wondered about assumptions versus proof.  How much of what we take for granted about effective crisis response is supported by empirical evidence?  Is there more to go on than the war stories of crisis veterans, as important as stories can be to professional learning in public relations?  Thus, I was drawn to a ti ...

As members of the global public relations community, we sometimes ruminate amongst ourselves.  But out of shyness, arrogance or distraction, we fail to circulate thoughts outside our own, more comfortable, friendly and ‘politically correct’ intellectual environment. We also tend to resist the explicit inclusion in our work of arguments, concepts or methods that come from other intellectual environments.  This overall approach is clearly at odds with the core sense of our field of study or prac ...