June 26, 2007
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In another bold attempt to drive off readership while also enjoying the summer, I’ll be leaving the blog world for 10 days or so. We’ll spend a long weekend on our annual Clarion River expedition followed by a week of partying at home on Sandy Lake with friends and family.
If you don’t already know this, you can’t be a gracious host while blogging. It’s not possible. Ask my wife. Yeah, I’ll be monitoring this site and approving comments, but I won’t have anything intelligent to say for a while. You probably won’t notice.
Look for me down there somewhere — in the green Old Town Tripper wearing my trusty Tilley hat, eh? If you want to canoe the Clarion, contact Dave Love, the best friend this river and Western Pennsylvania’s environment ever had.
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No Comments » | Blogging, Clarion River, Dave Love, Public Relations | Permalink
Posted by Bill Sledzik
June 21, 2007
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It’s summertime, and I’ve hit some tough sledding. Don’t tell the dogs.
I’d blame writer’s block for my absence of posts these last 10 days. But that isn’t the problem. Fact is, I just can’t find a topic that lights my lamp, at least not anything you’d want to read about.
But here are a few things that might get you thinking about PR and life:
Summer doldrums led me to myragan.com, the new social networking for communication professionals. On arriving, I set up my profile page, then I ventured into some discussion forums where I extended my war of words with Strumpette. Read the rest of this entry »
5 Comments | Kent State, PR, PR Education, Public Relations, Strumpette, myragan | Permalink
Posted by Bill Sledzik
June 10, 2007
Left Manhattan around 5 p.m. Friday wondering when I’d find time to compile highlights of the Edelman New Media Academic Summit. Then my 8:30 p.m. flight to Akron was cancelled, s tranding me at LaGuardia long after every hotel and rental car had been snagged. So instead of heading home, I snagged a couple of lattes, a power source and — voila, this post emerged from my all-nighter.
http://toughsledding.files.wordpress.com/2007/06/logo.jpg Rather than publish a caffeine-charged message on Saturday morning, I waited for a clear head and time to edit. Just can’t help but think that my unkind words about Yankee fans and the Big Apple had something to do with the flight cancellation. But, nah. If there is a God in heaven, he can’t possibly be a Yankee fan.
So let me get back on message. Read the rest of this entry »
20 Comments | Edelman, PR, PR Education, Public Relations, Public Relations Ethics, Social Media, newmediasummit07 | Permalink
Posted by Bill Sledzik
June 8, 2007
http://toughsledding.files.wordpress.com/2007/06/richard-edelman2.jpg At the opening session of Edelman’s New Media Academic Summit Richard Edelman told PR professors and others that social media enable us to embrace the concept of “open advocacy.”
He added, “PR cannot progress progress if it’s categorized as ’spin.’ We need to disavow this kind of behavior. While PR people cannot and should not claim to be impartial,” he said, “we can be transparent, so contentions (about our clients) can be examined by the public at large.”
Fortune magazine’s David Kirkpatrick quizzed Richard about his firm’s missteps involving WalMart. Edelman called the WalMart RV tour a “learning experience for all of us that shows we still have a long way to go. We’re out in front (on uses of social media), and periodically, we’re gonna stumble.”
While Richard spoke specifically to public relations, the rest of the panel included MSM experts who told how they’re are using the Web. They covered a lot of ground in 90 minutes, but I came away one clear message: Today’s PR practitioners, just like today’s journalists, must be will more versatile, and adept at using and understanding the full range of media. And we’ll need to do this very quickly.
But you knew that. More to come.
Disclosure: Edelman is covering my expenses for attending this conference.
No Comments » | Blogs, Edelman, PR, PR Education, Public Relations, Walmart, newmediasummit07 | Permalink
Posted by Bill Sledzik
June 4, 2007
Some issues of interest to PR professionals — and one for the Kent State faithful. Here’s to a longwinded Monday!
On-the-job whining is out the open. Or so says Jonathan Cox in a story for McClatchy Newspapers. His story cites mostly anecdotal evidence that young employees in today’s workplace aren’t afraid to bitch about their jobs and their employers. In fact, Cox says some employers actually encourage whiners to speak up.
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Not that long ago “loyal” employees were expected to do their jobs and shut up. But it seems at least some employers see value in listening to employee complaints, then making adjustments to enhance productivity and retention. What a concept!
We’ve all read the statistics about the cost of replacing a productive employee. So if your company or clients don’t have listening posts in the workplace, you might want to ask “why not?”
Cartoon by Wayne Edwards, The Family Poet. Read the rest of this entry »
7 Comments | Internships, Kent State, Marketing, Public Relations, Ray's Place | Permalink
Posted by Bill Sledzik
