THE OBJECTIVE IS CHANGE
 In practical terms, PR objectives are
to do with specifying what changes
need to be made in an
organization’s relationships with its
publics, to further the solution of
business problems and the
exploitation of business
opportunities.
The seven objectives
of change
1.
2.
3.
A main requirement: to cause changes in awareness. Because
without that there can be no other change, except by accident. In
some cases, increasing awareness may be sufficient.
In other cases, however, it is not lack of awareness that causes the
problem. Sometimes an organization is faced with a suspicious,
skeptical public: a public that is quite aware enough. In such a case
as this, what is needed is to improve public knowledge.
Increased knowledge can lead to better understanding and
this is important because PR is about explaining each side to the
other. Some organizations know the importance of this objective. One
of their guidelines develop with customers and suppliers a continuing
and satisfactory relationship leading mutual confidence. That
confidence flows from understanding.
The seven objectives
of change
4.
Better understanding will usually lead to a shift in
perception.
A customer survey by direct mail was exercised by the British Gas. Only
four questions were asked.
i.
The first asked how the customers felt about the company’s
activities, such as attending to leaks, gas bills, etc.
ii. The second:what most pleased the customers about the service.
iii. The third asked what was most irritating. All these were not really
about the services being provided but about how the customer
perceived them.
iv. The fourth question gave the game away. “if you had to pick one
which we could do which would most improve your view of our
service, which would it be?”
Not to improve the actual service, but to improve the customer’s view of
it. No doubt the British Gas learned enough from the survey to enable it
to change the customers’ perception, a perfectly reasonable objective,
as far as it goes.
5.
From that clearer perception belief should flow.
The seven objectives
of change
The marketing plan of an organization may call for public
relations support in developing customer preference and
brand loyalty. To do this is to bring about a change in
attitude. Many tracking studies are about changes in attitude –
6.
political polls, for example – which may or may not lead to action.
The most important (and the most difficult to achieve), is
the objective of changing behaviour.
7.
Whatever the changes to be accomplished, campaigns could be seen
as either mainly preventive or mainly remedial:


If preventive PR, the timescale is likely to be long;
If remedial, things may have to be made to happen nor
quickly.
STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

The long-range way of looking at objectives is for
their strategic value.

Any business organization needs to address itself
to a limited number of general areas of objectives.
(Peter Drucker.)

Four such areas, in no particular order of
importance, are:
1. Market standing.
2. Innovation.
3. Worker performance and attitude.
4. Public responsibility.
Innovation
 Faced with prevailing multi-complex employment
problems, a scheme was launched with the
following four clear objectives:
1. To create awareness of the scheme and establish a
broad level of understanding of its aims among key
sectors of the population.
2. To encourage support from sponsors and potential
sponsors (who were, of course, one of the key
sectors).
3. To give the long-term unemployed the opportunity to
be aware of the existence of the scheme.
4. To find a suitable name for the scheme.
Worker performance and
attitude
 Organizations do not have objectives.
 Only people have objectives and unless the
corporate objectives of a business are
compatible with the personal objectives of
the individuals working in it, they cannot be
sustained.
Worker performance and
attitude
 Organizations do not have objectives.
 Only people have objectives and unless the
corporate objectives of a business are
compatible with the personal objectives of
the individuals working in it, they cannot be
sustained.
SYSTEMATIC MANAGEMENT
APPROACH
 OBJECTIVES: What specific results do we aim to
achieve? What changes do we want to bring about?
 STRATEGY: What are the crucial decisions we have to
make to attain our objectives?
 PROGRAMS: Which methods and media will we use?
How? When?
 RESOURCES: How many people do we need? How
much money? What services and materials? What will
we actually get?
 RESPONSIBILITY: Who is going to do what? On whose
authority?
 ANALYSIS: What precisely are the problems to be
solved? And the opportunities to be seized?
 EVALUATION: How well did we do? How do we know?
 ACCOUNTABILITY: Who is answerable for what was
done?
PR AREAS:
Financial and Corporate
Government affairs
Marketing Communication
Internal Communication
Community Relations
ANALYSIS and AUDIT
 A communications audit is “A broad
scale, loosely structured research
exercise, which examines the
effectiveness of communications within
organizations and between organizations
and groups outside.”
ANALYSIS and AUDIT:
3 stages process
1. Information gathering: identifying and collecting data
and information on attitudes and trends, by means of
internal and external interviews against a common topic
menu.
2. Strategic analysis: weighing all options and choosing
the most appropriate alternative strategies to be
articulated in a “preferred strategy matrix”.
3. Communications program: putting the chosen
option (s) into effect after spelling out a communication
strategy, program, action plan and timetable.
1.
AUDIT: ADOPTS
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Advantages
Disadvantages
Opportunities
Problems
Time Factor
Stakeholders




1,2
3,4
5
6
: inward looking.
: outward looking.
: applies no matter which way you are looking.
: is the reason for the other five.
Review: STAKEHOLDERS
 Whatever other purposes an organization may have, it must also
have the purpose of serving the interest of all its stakeholders – that
is,
all the people affecting the organization
and affected by it.
 Not all of equal importance.  Before
an ADOPTS
analysis, it is first of all necessary to identify and
rank the stakeholders.
 Depend on who and where you are. There can be no standard list.
 Although some stakeholders – e.g. customers – are bound to occur
on pretty well in every list.
 Only you can decide who your stakeholders are, but: your
organization cannot choose its own competitors.
 ADOPTS analysis is not about program targeting or
getting coverage.
 It is about meeting the needs of
stakeholders.
SETTING
OBJECTIVES
 It should
clearly be understood that there
are no big differences between objectives,
aims and goals. These trigger the question
do they matter? Definitely.
 A goal is an actual destination, an aim is
somewhat less definite and more of a
hope that you are going in the right
direction. Objective is a slightly more
elaborate form of the word object which
expresses the idea of point to be aimed at.
 Therefore an objective embraces the ideas
of both aim and goal.
SETTING OBJECTIVES
 It should clearly be understood that there
are no big differences between objectives,
aims and goals. These trigger the question
do they matter? Definitely.
 A goal is an actual destination, an aim is
somewhat less definite and more of a hope
that you are going in the right direction.
Objective is a slightly more elaborate form of
the word object which expresses the idea of
point to be aimed at.
 Therefore an objective embraces the
ideas of both aim and goal.