Category Archives: reputation

PR lessons from Euro 2020

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NOW that Euro 2020 has come to a disappointing end for all but the Italians, what are the public relations lessons we can learn from the four-week festival of football?

If it came down to contexts, then clear and balanced communication lifts the trophy after a tense penalty shoot-out with dignified leadership. Misplaced brand synergies and political band-wagoning were knocked out in the group stages.

Public relations is all about reputation – what you say, what you do and what others say about you. It’s a mantra that spans a multitude of disciplines and contexts from fashion brands to football, personal life to political life.

So, who were the winners and who were the losers at Euro 2020?

Winner – a leadership culture

England manager Gareth Southgate has deservedly been recognised as a great communicator and a role model for how exemplary culture at the top will filter throughout an organisation or team. As social responsibility guru Peter Drucker says: ‘culture eats strategy for breakfast’.

Southgate’s England are unlike any international squad in my long footballing memory which were largely made up of talented, but often overrated individuals.

Southgate is not just a team selector. For years within his FA roles, he has been nurturing a culture and crop of likeable, positive role models whose values of self-respect, dignity often outshine their footballing talent. These players may be millionaires, but their genuine altruism is far more affecting and effective than that from the leaders we are traditionally expected to aspire to.

Southgate’s leadership can be likened to van Riel’s Elements of Corporate Identity with a clear purposeful culture developed from the top, complimented by what it says and does on and off the pitch. Ultimately, these shared values filter beyond to fans, the media and other stakeholders to create a positive image for the England camp.

Winner – England football team. Not only has the reputation of the team been enhanced on the pitch, the dignified way in which the young lions conducted themselves throughout the tournament was exemplary.

As footballers, the players are part of the production sub-system – providing the services to help achieve organisational goals. But the manner in which they responded to the despicable racist abuse following the final defeat, demonstrated that they were part of an adaptive system, too, responding and adjusting to external threats with dignity and clarity. Let’s not forget, several of these players are still very young.

There were examples of symmetrical communication within the team’s social media responses too with Tyrone Mings’ powerful tweet calling out the UK government’s hypocrisy triggering a heated Parliamentary exchange and stimulating debate over the ethics and declining values of political leadership.

Winner – a crisis managed with Danish dignity

It seems an age ago now, but the first Saturday of the tournament brought one of the most upsetting moments ever seen in sport when the Danish captain and talisman Christian Eriksen collapsed on the pitch after suffering cardiac arrest. For around 30 minutes, medics attempted to revive Eriksen while team-mates formed a dignified barrier around the player and comforted his wife who was watching at the pitch-side.

For several days, the tournament appeared in doubt as players, fans and commentators correctly opined that football is and never has been more important than life or death. Eriksen’s recovery inspired and unified the Danish team and nation to the semi-final of the tournament.

But the real winner from this traumatic event was increased public awareness and attitudes towards life-saving CPR training and skills. Eriksen’s collapse triggered international media interest in cardiac conditions, particularly when impacting seemingly young and fit people. This has spurred investment in life-saving defibrillators and new processes to ensure communities know where their nearest defibrillator is.

Loser – brand synergies shown the red card

Very early in Euro 2020, superstar Cristiano Ronaldo made his disdain for corporate sponsors Coca-Cola clear by moving aside two strategically placed Coke bottles during a press conference. A few days later, France’s Paul Pogba did likewise with bottles of Heineken during a media briefing.

Sponsorship is an essential part of corporate sport and international tournaments would disappear without it. But global audiences are not the passive consumers they once were; social media means publics have a strong voice and will actively call out mis-matching between brand and tournament leading to huge reputational risk for the mega brands. Ronaldo didn’t get to be the world’s greatest footballer by guzzling Cokes and Pogba doesn’t kick back with a beer after the match. So, don’t make that insinuation that they do – it’s disingenuous, misleading and damaging to the brand as was shown when an estimated $4billion was wiped off Coca Cola’s share value after Ronaldo’s actions.

Far better to take a subtler approach, identifying synergies between tournament and brand or to develop audiences and awareness in emerging regions. Chinese brands Hisense and AliPay were all over Euro 2020’s pitch-side advertising hoardings supporting their global strategy for recognition within sports markets – a clever move which will have brought these names to prominence in Europe and enhanced their reputation in Asia.

Wooden spoon – Own goal calamities and political gesturing

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has a long history of saying or doing the wrong thing at the wrong time – after all, it’s how he got to be the leader of the country. But his insincere band-wagoning during the Euro semi-final at Wembley demonstrated once again how out of touch political leaders can be.

The hastily arranged ‘Boris 10’ England shirt pulled snugly over an already dishevelled figure was a desperate publicity stunt which reeked of opportunism of the lowest kind. Let’s not forget this is the same Boris Johnson who has previously declared little interest in football and refused to condemn those who booed England players taking the knee.

Yet just yards away, young Prince George demonstrated his enthusiasm by belting out the national anthem and cheering on the team to victory – and he didn’t have to pull on a mini England shirt to show his genuine passion.

Elsewhere amongst the political elite were examples of ministers and MPs trashing the knee-taking as political gesturing then weeks later lining up to condemn the racists. Both literally and metaphorically, PM Johnson clearly believes he can have his cake AND eat it and needs to be relegated to the subs bench soon.

All in all, Euro 2020 was a successful tournament for football, particularly for beleaguered fans starved of the thrill of an international spectacle. But again, the tournament served as a valuable reminder that reputation is earned and public scrutiny means that what is said, what is done and what others say needs to more in balance than ever before.

Images courtesy of You Tube, UEFA, independent.co,uk, talksport.com, indy100.com

Are we engaged yet? A view of Grunig and Hunt’s 4 models of PR

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IN LAST WEEK’S LECTURE AND THIS WEEK’S SEMINARS, WE HAVE BEEN LOOKING AT PERHAPS THE BEST KNOWN THEORY IN PR – GRUNIG AND HUNT’S 4 MODELS.

Since 1984, PR scholars and academics have been citing and debating the merits of publicity, public information, persuasion – and whether we have reached the best practice of mutual understanding and engagement.

But while a trawl through any newspaper, magazine or online news outlet will reveal plenty of examples of the first three models, finding the pinnacle of model 4 – two way symmetrical engagement – is trickier.

That’s why, the last model is often seen as an ideal rather than a reality and why Grunig’s concept is often referred to as as the excellence model. It’s about excellent communications practice and on that basis we can understand why the model can have its detractors.

This article from the CIPR produced Influence website called time on the 4 models while our guest lecturer Stephen Waddington has explored the relevance of the excellence idea in the digital age.

While some organisations claim to have balanced, mutual understanding and engagement with their publics, surely in a commercial context at least, they exist to make a profit and therefore communication will always be geared towards achieving that goal. Yes, they’re listening, they’re even responding, but would they really risk profit at the expense of appeasing the conflicting demands of many different publics? We can’t really knock organisations for taking that stance and certainly there has been research which suggests that publics want to take the lead from brands, particularly those they trust and are loyal to.

Social responsibility, or the idea of being good corporate citizen, is where organisations can perhaps take the biggest strides towards excellent balanced communications. A business that makes a profit while genuinely seeking to adapt and meet the needs of its publics, is surely acting in a more balanced manner, with focus on mutual understanding – it’s a win win situation. But as we will find out in a few weeks, much CSR activity is little more than empty statements dressed up as goodwill with the primary goal of securing market advantage.

The truth is, there has not really been a better model developed in the last 35 years to plot the development of communications behaviour of organisations. Perhaps the best way to think about Grunig and Hunt’s 4 models is to consider what they are trying to achieve with stakeholders – for publicity, think the public be fooled or damned; then the ticky box of keeping them informed; using unbalanced persuasion to contact and convince or even control; through to conversations and engagement.

And as we have witnessed in the last few years, the fake news propaganda of our political leaders and campaigners, has actually taken us further and further away from genuine engagement. But for every Trump, there’s a Thunberg, and for every Cummings, a community champion champing at the bit to influence and engage – sometimes the biggest and most impactful social change comes bottom up activism, for example, the ban on fox hunting, same sex marriage and now climate change. Excellent communication and engagement is alive and thriving, but it’s not necessarily coming from the traditional sources we have trusted to lead and guide us – big business, government, politicians and celebrities. It’s now at a much more local, micro level – influencers, opinion leaders and activists – and that should give us all some hope that 2-way comms is not an unachievable ideal, but a real opportunity for authentic engagement driving societal change for all.

Newcastle named friendliest city in the UK

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OF COURSE, we already knew it but Newcastle was named the friendliest city in the UK in a survey last week.

The survey could not have had come at a better time for PR students, particularly when it comes to understanding reputation, earned and shared media.

The survey, which was put together a Travel website, claims to have been compiled by asking its 1.5million social audience.

Lively locals, great nightlife and culture and ease of access were all listed as factors which makes the Toon the land of smiles. Our city was also described as having ‘a homey feel where locals who go the extra mile to welcome tourists’.

It’s great to be in top spot beating much more cosmopolitan cities such as London, Edinburgh and Manchester – although this Mackem writer feels Sunderland deserves to be much higher than a measly 41st!

The survey can’t have come at a better time with thousands of students arriving in Newcastle to start their studies. The article has been shared and commented upon thousands of times by all kinds of Tyneside organisations, from the university, to big businesses, celebrities and of course the genial Geordies.

When we think about reputation, word of mouth is hard to be beat – it’s often based on personal experience and we tend to trust what others say over highly controlled messages coming through advertising or an organisation’s own website and social media channels.

Shared media is great for reaching large audiences efficiently, but it’s also about who is sharing and their credibility. The fact that it’s been shared by the likes of Geordie royalty Ant and Dec will have done no harm at all.

And what’s more, it was picked up by traditional media, meaning it made a big splash of earned media in the city’s much respected newspapers the Chronicle and Journal. Make no mistake, this survey was all about that highly credible contributor to reputation – what others say.

Newcastle should wear the moniker of friendliest city in the UK with pride. But as residents, workers and students here we should all have a responsibility to protect that reputation, through our own communication, whether that be feeding back to friends and family, or through our own blogs and social media profiles.

  • Have your say? Is Newcastle the friendliest city in the UK? What makes the city’s reputation so great and what are you basing that upon? Please feel free to comment