Strategy, Planning and Scheduling
This chapter served an effective, practical addition to my growing knowledge of public relations. In order to execute an objective well, a PR practitioner needs to identify a clear understanding of the situation at hand through operational strategies, planning, budgeting and scheduling. These elements of a campaign are of upmost importance- without them a campaign is doomed to fail. Mintzberg and Quinn ( 1991) define strategy as "a pattern or plan that integrates an organisation's major goals, policies and action sequences into a cohesive whole."
The readings stressed the overall value of strategy in a campaign. I agree with this and found the steps to write an effective strategic communication plan interesting. The 10 important factors to consider are:
*An executive summary
*The Communication Process
*Background
*Situation analysis
*Main messsage statement
*Stakeholders
*Messages for key stakeholders
*Implementation
*Budget
*Monitoring and evaluation
Out of all of these points I feel that the monitoring and evaluation of a strategy is by far the most important element to executing effective strategy. Without the re-evaluation of original ideas, a campaign will not move forward or achieve the objectives set out.
Tactics
Tactics are an exciting element of public relations in that the use of a tactic is only limited to the practitioner's imagination and invention. I learnt it is important not to use the terms tactics and strategy interchangeably as they pose different implications. Tactics are methods used in order to achieve the strategic outcome of reaching a target audience.
The readings went into detail about traditional tactics in the industry such as media relations, printed materials, reports, newsletters, mail, branding, DVD's etc and their status as either controlled or uncontrolled tactics. I found the example of printed materials interesting as I had not previously thought about them in such detail. The need for careful consideration when producing printed tactics such as brochures, leaflets and flyers confirms its status as a controlled tactic, meaning the practitioner has the sole control of the production of the tactic and the way it is received (message creation and crafting of final distribution.) Factors that before seemed trivial to me such as paper size, colour use, semiotics, binding were revealed as important considerations when developing printed material. This is because visual elements may be the difference between a public successfully receiving a message or simply missing it all together. I also learnt that mistakes are costly to a practitioner's time/deadline and budget.
This week I commented on David Elliot's blog.
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1 comment:
Eryn
I agree with your comment that strategies, planning, budgeting and scheduling are important for an effective and successful campaign. And all of those elements point to PR Practitioner's being organised.
You also raised a valid point in that re-evaluating and monitoring a campaign is necessary to execute an effective strategy.
I think it is also important for practitioners to realise different campaigns require different tactics, ie not all tactics are relevant to each campaign.
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