Duncan,
You're absolutely correct. I suspect she sat in on the interview specifically to
divert attention from the very issue that I tried to pursue with her later. The
last I heard of the situation (I left that publication more than two years ago),
there were still problems at animal control. I suspect, were the communications
officer working in the private sector, either she never would have gotten away
with such behavior, at least not for long, or she would have known better. I
believe that she exhibited a degree of arrogance and I suspect it had something
to do with a syndrome that is more common among people occupied in government
bureaucracies. Still, I've also experienced officials in the private sector who
had a circle-the-wagons mentality when they anticipated negative publicity. My
sense is such a reaction, in the long run, only makes matters worse.
Rich Rostron

Positive Action Development
(815) 690-8433
positiveaction.vpweb.com




________________________________
From: Duncan Matheson <duncan@...>
To: prbytes@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, January 8, 2009 6:28:46 PM
Subject: RE: [prbytes] Re: PR Tools for 2009 (please add on)


It's communications people who act like that that give us a bad name. First
question is why was she sitting in on the interview in the first place? I
agree she dodged a bullet because of the response of the newspaper
management. Her reaction suggests there was much fear over the guy's BG and
that it was not something they were comfortable with. I expect it would lead
to more anxiety by the staff, which means there's another chapter to be
written. Be interested to know how it plays out. Interesting case study.

Duncan Matheson

Bissett Matheson Communications Ltd.

Fredericton office (506) 457-1627

www.bissettmatheson .com

_____

From: prbytes@yahoogroups .com [mailto:prbytes@yahoogroups .com] On Behalf Of
Rich
Sent: January-08-09 3:43 PM
To: prbytes@yahoogroups .com
Subject: Re: [prbytes] Re: PR Tools for 2009 (please add on)

First, please allow me to clarify. I am not a pr pro. I'm a writer and a
reporter. Reading the postings below, I regret that these interactions did
not fare well. However, as with any situation, there is always something to
be learned. The most recent posting, from pr.pros (and please forgive my
ignorance as I have not looked back at all the postings that prompted this
exchange), suggests a degree of animosity. I am not here to judge whether
that animosity is justified or not. Rather, it simply made me think of a
situation I dealt with while writing for a newspaper. I'll write up a short
description of that situation below. For the briefer version of that story,
suffice it to say that the person in the pr position became angry with me
because she didn't like a question that I asked. As a reporter, it wasn't my
job to ask questions she liked. She should have anticipated the possibility
that I would ask difficult questions. More importantly, when, as I saw
it, she lost her temper, she shut the door on open communication. In my
mind, it's the equivalent of a public relations agent waving the white flag.
There may be times when it is appropriate for a pr agent to be gruff or
impatient with a reporter, though I'm not sure when that would be the case.
However, if the woman's behavior was appropriate, then most businesses could
save themselves the cost of public relations and, instead of hiring anyone
to perform these duties, merely inform their receptionists to hang up
immediately anytime someone from the media calls.

I recently sent a posting to this site informing our membership about the
new company I have started -- Positive Action Development
(positiveaction. vpweb.com) . Included in the posting was a link to my new Web
site. If anyone wants to take a look at it, I would appreciate your input,
even if your response is to tell me that my Web site "sucks." If you think
that it does, I would be thrilled if you provide a slightly deeper
explanation of why it sucks. I promise you, I won't be angry and I won't ask
to be removed from the group because of any such comments.

A fuller account of the story from above (everthing stated above and below
related to this issue constitutes my personal opinion):
While serving as a sports editor with a weekly newspaper (it was a small
paper and my responsibilities went beyond sports), I was covering a story
about a 70-percent increase in the number of animals euthanized by the
county's animal control department. Animal Control, a division of the
county's health department, was in a virtual war with the volunteers at the
animal control center as the volunteers were deeply upset by the increased
number of animals that were put down. The head of the animal control center
was eventually removed from her position and given a new job within the
health department. The communications officer for the health department (the
governmental equivalent of a public relations agent) took over as the
interim director of animal control. Of course, she also served as a primary
source and contact as I worked on the series of stories that came out of the
controversy.
Eventualy, the health department hired a new director for animal control. I
was given an opportunity to come in for an interview of the new director.
The communications officer was also there. In fact, I felt that she took
control of the inteview, held it to a limited perioed of time based on what
she described as prior commitments (which hadn't come to the surface when we
setup the appointment) and then interceded to answer the majority of the
questions I posed to the new director. My sense, afterwards, was that the
inteview was too short and only scratched the surface in terms of the
information I hoped to gleen from it. As the interview was ending, however,
one piece of rather startling information did come to light. The prior
position held by the new director of animal control was managing and caring
for animals for a pharmaceutical company in the region. In other words, he
took care of the animals used for experiments.
Such a revelation was not likely to calm the waters as far as the volunteers
were concerned. In fact, I felt that it seemed like a rather odd hire
considering the situation that, as I understood, had brought on the need to
bring in a new director in the first place. Such a background did not mean
that he was the wrong person for the position. However, it would have been
extremely unprofessional of me not to pursue the question further. As I was
not given a chance to do so at the time of our scheduled interview, I
attempted to contact the new director hoping for a chance to ask him about
the issue and, at the same time, hoping to fill out the interview without,
what I saw as, the communications officer's interference. My calls were not
returned. I even went back to the center but was unable to meet with the new
director. I had the distinct impression I was being avoided (incidently, and
just something to consider for future reference, when a reporter
feels he or she is being avoided, it automatically sets off alarms in the
reporter's head).
I then called the communications officer and asked her if I could speak with
the new director again. She suggested that he was too busy and I, therefore,
posed my questions directly to her.
I felt she was not entirely receptive to the question about his prior
experience. Finally, I pointed out to her that, when I told the readers,
inlcluding the volunteers, that he was hired from work with an animal
laboratory, the readers and volunteers would probably think the health
department had essentially "let the fox loose in the hen house." Her
reaction, in my opinion, was to go balistic. She yelled at me and hung up.
I did not agree with the way the publisher and editor at the newspaper I
worked for handled the situation when I brought it to their attention. The
publisher spoke of the need to give the new director a chance. My sense was
that we best gave him a chance by allowing him to respond to the concerns
his past experience raised. If he and the communications officer refused to
answer my calls or respond, such should be duly noted in the story. While
the issue of his background was included in the story it was not as high in
the story as I would have seen fit were it my call. As a result, in my
opinion, the communications officer was fortunate. If it was my call, the
new director's background would have been the focus of the headline and the
primary focus of the story.
While the communications offficer may have been fortunate in this instance,
what she had developed with me, a reporter she might have to deal with in
the future, was an adversarial relationship and, for me, a question of
trust. In other words, anytime I had to speak with her again, whatever she
told me would run through a finer filter than what might otherwise have been
the case.

Richard Rostron, President
Positive Action Development
1112 N. Madison St.
Woodstock, IL 60098
(815) 690-8433
pad_services@ <mailto:pad_ services% 40live.com> live.com
positiveaction. vpweb.com

____________ _________ _________ __
From: pr.pros <pr.pros@yahoo. <mailto:pr.pros% 40yahoo.com> com>
To: prbytes@yahoogroups <mailto:prbytes% 40yahoogroups. com> .com
Sent: Thursday, January 8, 2009 12:41:52 PM
Subject: [prbytes] Re: PR Tools for 2009 (please add on)

Please contact their owner. You are paranoid.

Corrective criticism Ned, your website sucks.

I didn't spam this group. I wanted to start a list of tools for PR
professionals. It appears to me that I walked into a room filled
with uptight, self-righteous, judgemental, paranoid..and let me not
forget RUDE individuals.

Sorry to crash this party.

Moderator, please kindly remove me from this group. And, do you
honesttttlllly think that I'd put MY link to a EMAIL GROUP without
engaging you -- FIRST about my product. That's true EMAIL MARKETING.

You are ALL rude!

I hope that I am allowed to have a rebuttal since my posts are
moderated. These jerks are trulllllllly closed minded.

-- In prbytes@yahoogroups .com, "Eduardo Giansante" <edubatera@. ..>
wrote:
>
> agree 100% Ned.
>
> That's not PR, that's spam.
>
> On Wed, Jan 7, 2009 at 9:38 PM, Ned Barnett <ned@...> wrote:
>
> > Dear pr.pros
> >
> > First, I suggest that if you want the help of your colleagues,
you let us
> > know who you are. It's just professionally courteous to sign your
emails,
> > especially if you're not well-known on the list - plus, you're
more likely
> > to get helpful answers.
> >
> > Second, if you're going to be a pr.pro, I suggest you work on
improving
> > your
> > grammar and syntax; frankly, your message came across like a
student's
> > query
> > for a paper, and this list doesn't particularly welcome students
asking us
> > to do their class work for them (that happens more than you might
think).
> > Of course, it could just be a typo - God knows how many of those
I've
> > "committed" - but when asking for help, I suggest you put your
best foot
> > forward.
> >
> > Third, and this is the biggie, if you're asking for help, you
might want to
> > set the stage by telling us why you want that help. Give us
something that
> > would put your question in context.
> >
> > For instance, while I'm not the world's Guru on online resources,
I do know
> > that I'm now in my 37th year in PR, and that since 1994, many of
my clients
> > and most of my communications (with clients and the media) have
taken place
> > online. Yet I don't have a clue what you're really asking, nor
what you
> > really want that information for.
> >
> > I can tell you that lots of people speak highly of Peter
Shankman's Help a
> > Reporter site - I've not yet found it helpful, but then I haven't
invested
> > the time needed to work that list. I generally stick to ProfNet,
but then
> > again, that's personal choice (and an expensive one) which has
born fruit
> > for me since the late 90s. I can't be totally objective about
Peter's site
> > - he and I had a falling out a few years ago, and my recent lack
of
> > postings
> > from that list suggest that Peter's not yet ready to let bygones
be bygones
> > - but that's got nothing to do with his service. I know my
webmaster thinks
> > highly of it.
> >
> > I've never heard of Pitch Engine - it may be one of those multi-
million
> > spring-up-from- nothing PR sites that seem to have proliferated. I
get
> > postings almost daily from half a dozen social networking sites
that send
> > me
> > (to me, useless) information about PR . perhaps this is one of
them. Or
> > perhaps it's the best thing since sliced bread. Since I've got no
clue what
> > you want it for, I can't even check the site out and give you an
opinion.
> >
> > I've at least heard of Media Bistro, but since I'm not looking to
have
> > lunch
> > with a reporter (they always stick me with the check) and because
I've
> > found
> > Internet meals to be way-low in calories (I prefer analog meals to
> > digital),
> > I can't give you an opinion there, either.
> >
> > So . let us know who you are, why you're asking and what you're
hoping to
> > do
> > with the information, and some of us may be able to help.
> >
> > As for kicking this off for 2009, kicking what off? Another
online list of
> > PR resources nobody's got time to work with? Or collecting
unclear and
> > unfocused emails? Give us a clue, here, pr.pros, what do you have
in mind?
> > How will kicking "this" off for 2009 help us? Maybe this is the
best idea
> > of the 21st Century, but based on what you've told us (and, more
important,
> > what you haven't told us), I don't have a clue. I suspect none of
the
> > others
> > here on this list do, either. However, they're more polite than I
am, and
> > are waiting for some curmudgeon like me to ask. So here you go -
the ball's
> > back in your court.
> >
> > Give us a clue? Thanks
> >
> > Ned
> >
> > Ned Barnett, APR
> >
> > Marketing/PR Fellow, American Hospital Association
> >
> > Barnett Marketing Communications
> >
> > 420 N. Nellis Blvd. A3-276
> >
> > Las Vegas NV 89110
> >
> > 702-696-1200 - ned@... <ned%40barnettmarco m.com>
> >
> > http://www.barnettm arcom.com
> >
> > From: prbytes@yahoogroups .com <prbytes%40yahoogro ups.com> [mailto:
> > prbytes@yahoogroups .com <prbytes%40yahoogro ups.com>] On Behalf Of
> > pr.pros
> > Sent: Tuesday, January 06, 2009 7:08 AM
> > To: prbytes@yahoogroups .com <prbytes%40yahoogro ups.com>
> > Subject: [prbytes] PR Tools for 2009 (please add on)
> >
> >
> > I am listing the only tools that I know of that really has helped
me
> > out-does anyone have listservs or any links that help PRs get to
the
> > right person?
> >
> > 1. http://www.helparep orter.com/
> > 2. http://www.pitcheng ine.com/ (HAVENT TRIED but saw on twitter)
> > 3. http://www.mediabis tro.com
> > 4. this egroups (please list any that you think we should add)
> >
> > I am not sure if this was done before but perhaps we can kick
this off
> > for 2009?
> >
> > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
> --
> -Edu Giansante
> http://edugiansante .com
> http://www.e- dublin.com. br
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>

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