A good manager works him or herself out of a job. That’s a notion you may have heard over the years – and it makes a least some sense. I’ve always admired managers who can distance themselves from the technical, day-to-day duties of an assignment or campaign and, instead, work on creating value through new ideas, programs or systems. They create something from almost nothing. That would certainly sound refreshing to any business owner or client.
I’ve recently embraced the notion that I, too, am trying to work myself out of a job, at least theoretically.
Who needs PR?
It all started with this simple question: if a company is wholly good and engaged in sincere, ongoing and proactive dialogue with its stakeholders, then to what extent would they require the counsel and services of a public relations firm? The company could still require writing, photography, publicity, event planning, media or presentations training and other technical services, as well as some form of administration and coordination, but what else in the way of strategic public relations?
And so, in theory, I’ve grown accustomed to the idea that we can strive to work ourselves out of assignments if and when clients institutionalize PR at the C-suite, ownership or leadership levels. And that remains a deep-rooted hope of mine. We are, after all, fighting for the elevation of our profession in the DNA of leading organizations.
It’s different in practice
In practice, organizations by and large are not wholly good or engaged in sincere, ongoing and proactive dialogue with stakeholder groups. (I don’t want to be overly harsh on corporations – persons, including myself — do not necessarily fare much better). We could speculate on the reasons why this is so. The decline of virtue? Growth of individualism? Rampant consumerism? Broken or stressed-out families? We can all meditate on these important topics.
What’s certain is that an increasing number of large institutions – be they private or public – have effectively neutralized their ability to practice and optimize public relations efforts thanks to the development of extremely siloed departments that are under pressure to deliver a very narrow set of department-specific outcomes.
For example, a marketing department may be judged on a strict payout ratio (spend vs. sales), an HR department may be judged on head count and an operations department on cost containment. That’s likely why so many organizations seem to fumble on the messages they are communicating or the behaviour of its leadership or company as a whole. It has become hard for many of them to “walk the talk” – both from the deeds (walk) and messaging perspective (talk).
PR is a growth industry
Some people in PR may be worried about the confluence of social media and content, or the decline in the consumption of traditional media. Be at ease. There’s a greater opportunity out there to consider. Let’s work hand-in-hand to help companies reinvest in a good dose of common sense, frank story telling based on frequent disclosure (even the lackluster news), Good Samaritan or neighbourly conduct and social concern for employees, customers, neighbours and other stakeholders. When we achieve that, we’ll all be better off and likely in even better careers.
Daniel Torchia is managing director and partner at Torchia Communications in Toronto.
