Public Relations?

PUBLIC RELATIONS – MEANING & DEFINITIONS

Public Relations practice has been defined as “the establishment of two-way communication to resolve conflicts of interest by seeking common ground on areas of mutual interest, and the establishment of understanding based on truth, knowledge and full information. – Practical Public Relations, Pitman.

Public Relations is the management function, which evaluated public attitudes, identifies the policies and procedures of an individual or an organization with the public interest, and executes a program of action to earn understanding and acceptance. – Denny Griswold.

Public Relations are the attempt by information, persuasion and adjustment to engineer public support for an activity, cause, movement or institution. – Edward L. Bernays

Public Relations practice is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organization and its publics. Public Relations are about reputation – the result of what you do, what you say and what others say about you. –The Institute of Public Relations, London.

The management function which gives the same organized and careful attention to the asset of goodwill as is given to any other major asset of the business - John W Hill

Public Relations is a combination of philosophy, sociology, economics, language, psychology, journalism, communication and other knowledges into a system of human understanding. – Herbert M. Baus

PR is merely human decency, which flows from a good heart. – Charles Plackard

PR – Good performance, publicly appreciated, because adequately communicated. – Fortune Magazine.

PR – everything involved in achieving a favorable public opinion. - George F Meredith, American Public Relations Association.

Public relations is a management function, of a continuing and planned character, through which public and private organizations and institutions seek to win and retain the understanding, sympathy and support of those with whom they are or may be concerned – by evaluating public opinion about themselves, in order to correlate, as far as possible, their own policies and procedures, to achieve by planned and widespread information more productive cooperation and more efficient fulfillment to their common interests. –The International Public Relations Association, The Hague, May 1960

Public relations is whatever the individual practitioner thinks it is. – Carl Byoir

The communication and interpretation and the communications and ideas from an institution to its publics and the communication of information, ideas and opinions from those public to the institution, in a sincere effort to establish a mutuality of interest and this achieves the harmonious adjustment of an institution to its community. – Scot M. Cut lip and Allen H. Center.

Public Relations – Its object is not to sell a product, but to produce a favorable image of a company and improve on it, if necessary. – Max K. Adler.

Public Relations means what it says – relations with the public. It is practically a self-defending term, it aims to create and maintain confidence. It is a system of communications to create goodwill. It produces that intangible quality or asset goodwill – and earns credit for achievements. – Frank Jefkins

The only remuneration for public relations or press relations work shall be the fees of the client or the salary of the employer on whose account this work is undertaken. - The Ministry of information, French Government Official text, October 23,1964, which appeared in the journal Official de La Republic Francaise, the Official gazette of the French Government.

Public relations is a mode of behavior and a manner of conveying information with the object of establishing and maintaining mutual confidence, based on mutual knowledge and understanding, between an organization, a corporate body carrying out various functions or activities – and the different sections of the publics, internal and external, that are affected by some or all these functions or activities. – Lucien Matrat.

Public Relations is Dale Carnegie’s – winning friends and influencing people – writ large. – Robert Heilbroner.

Public relations is a distinctive management function which helps establish and maintain mutual lines of communication, understanding, acceptance, and cooperation between an organization and its publics; involves the management of problems or issues; helps management to keep informed on and responsive to public opinion; defines and emphasizes and responsibility of management to serve the public interest; helps management keep abreast of and effectively utilize change, serving as an early warning system to help anticipate trends; and uses research and sound and ethical communication techniques as its principal tools. – Foundation for Public Relations Research and Education, U.S.

The promotion of rapport and goodwill between a person, firm, or institution and other persons, special publics or the community at large through the distribution of interpretative material, the development of neighborly interchange, and the assessment of public reaction. – Webster’s New International Dictionary.

The actions of a corporation, store, government, individual etc., in promoting goodwill between itself and the public; the community, employees, customers etc., is public relations. – The Random House Dictionary.

Relations with the general public, as through publicity; specifically, those functions of corporation, organization, etc., concern with attempting to create favorable public opinion for itself. – Denny Griswold, ‘Public Relations News’.

Public Relations is a social philosophy of management expressed in policies and practices, which, through sensitive interpretation of events based upon two-way communication with its publics, strives to secure mutual understanding and goodwill. – Sam Black.

Public Relations practice is the art of social science of analyzing trends, predicting their consequences, counseling organization, leaders, and implementing planned programs of action, which will serve both the organization and the public interest. –The Mexican statement made at an International conference of Public Relation Institutions held in Mexico City in1978.

The art of convincing people that they should adopt a certain attitude or pursue a certain course of action; usually associated with management’s Public Relations. – IGNOU, JMC-04, Public Relations.

PR practitioners, editors and authors have sought to capture the essence of public relations function in a phrase, slogan or book title that might catch on popularly and dispel misconceptions. Among these are : *Good performance, publicly Appreciated. *PR = Performance and Recognition. *PR = Performance and Reporting. *PR = Pathway to public favour. *PR = Crystallizing Public Opinion. *The Engineering of consent. *The conscience of an Organization. *Doing good and Getting credit for it. *Deed first, then words. – The way the deed is interpreted. *Public communication. *Public Information. *The aim of PR is ‘to promote positive and favorable images of people or firms in public life, without actually appearing to do so’. Most companies have PR departments dedicated to creating and sustaining a good image with the general public. – Dictionary of communication and Media studies.

Public Relations, management function that obtains, assess, and evaluated public attitudes toward an organization, advertiser or individual. Following this ongoing process, the policies and activities of the entity are identified with the public interest, and a program of action is executed to develop public understanding, goodwill, support and acceptance. – Dictionary of Mass Media and communication.

Public Relations is an effort to identify and interpret policies and programmes of an organization with the objective to establish a bridge of understanding and goodwill between the organization and its publics. – Dr.G.C.Banik, A Guide to Public Relations & Journalism

Public Relations is an umbrella term which covers a wide range of areas, including: Corporate communications; Issues management; Product publicity; Investor relations; Financial communications; Lobbying; Public affairs; Media relations; Community affairs; Crisis management; Events management; Sponsorship and a range of services which feed into all these. - Jon White and Laura Mazu, Strategic Communication Management – Making Public Relations Work

Public Relations is a method of creating a climate of good opinion in which business can be done. It uses many means to smooth the lines of communication, enabling the person concerned to improve his image by putting his best fact forward. –The Good Publicity Guide, Reginald Peplow.

The practice of promoting goodwill among the public for a company, government body, individual or the like; the practice of working to present a favorable image. –The Macquarie Dictionary.

Public Relations is the management function that identifies, establishes, and maintains mutually beneficial relationships between and organization and the various publics on whom its success or failure depends. –Scott M. Cut lip.

Public Relations is finding out what people like about you and doing more of it; finding our what they don’t like about you and doing less of it. – John E. Marston, Modern Public Relations

Public Relations is concerned with maintaining harmonious and understanding relationships between the various parts of an organization and all the groups, which have a relationship with it. This could mean management, workers, shareholders, trade unions, suppliers, customers and government as well the public. – Paul Winner.

Public relations means doing the right thing in the right way, at the right time, and then telling people about it. – International Harvester.

Public Relations is the gentle art of letting the other fellow have your way. - William A. Nielander.

Public Relations consists of all forms of planned communication, outwards and inwards, between an organization and its publics for the purpose of achieving specific objectives concerning mutual understanding. – Frank Jefkins.

Public Relations is the work of presenting a good image of an organization to the public by providing information. – Oxford Advanced Learners’ Dictionary.

Public Relations is a distinctive management function, which helps establish ad maintain mutual lines of communication, understanding, acceptance and cooperation between an organization and its publics; involves the management of problems or issues; helps management to keep informed one and responsible to public opinion, defines and emphasizes the responsibility of management to serve the public interest; helps management keep abreast of and effectively utilize change, serving as an e4arly warning system to help anticipate trends; and uses research and sound and ethical communication techniques as its principals tools. – Dr. Rex. F. Harlow, U.S

Stripped to its fundamentals, public relations means communication with others.

– Tymson & Sherman, PR Manual, Australia, 1996.

At the other extremes are those who hold that public relations professional must rise above the level of mere communicators, mere technicians. Public relations professionals must be social scientists, public policy experts, and managers of issues. Some add that they can always hire writers. – Joseph F. Award The power of Public Relations, US, 1985.

Public Relations practice is the management of communications between an organization and its publics. – James Grunig and Todd Hunt 1984.

Those functions and policies designed to bring about the communications and interpretation of ideas and information to all various publics of an enterprise; and the communication and interpretation of information and ideas from these publics to the enterprise in an effort to bring the two into harmonious and fruitful adjustment. – Schoenfeld, 1954.

PR is the planned effort to influence public opinion through acceptable performance and two-way communication. – Cutlip and Center, 1964.

The business of inducing the public to have understanding for and goodwill toward a person, firm or institution, also the degree of understanding and goodwill achieved. – Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 2001.

A suitable thing made up of many forces, both inside and outside the individual organization. – Gerber, 1960.

A part of the affairs aimed at keeping publics informed, keeping informed about public attitudes, and reacting to those attitudes. – Reynolds, 1966.

Public Relations practice is the discipline, which looks after reputation with the aim of earning understanding and support and influencing opinion and behaviors. --- Roger silver.

Public Relations strives by long range effort to build favorable public attitudes. – Douglas L. Gilbert, 1971.

Public Relations is mode of behavior and a manner of conveying information with the object of establishing and maintaining mutual confidence, based on mutual knowledge and understanding, between an organization; a corporate body carrying out various functions or activities and the different sections of the public, internal and external, that are affected by some or all these functions or activities. – Claude Chapeau, 1982.

Public Relations involves planned, indirect, persuasive communications to stimulate demand and favorably influence attitudes and opinions about a product, service or idea. The focus here should be on the phrase “influence attitudes and opinions”. In public relations, information is used to influence public opinion. Often this is done so subtly that the target audience is not even aware that a planned process is behind much of what is seen in the news or the mobilization of advocates to a particular cause.

– Practical PR, the Futures Group International, US, 1995.

Public Relations involves many other disciplines and it can have an impact on every aspect of an organization. It is about projecting the right message and as such, it can involve press relations, advertising, marketing, sponsorships, exhibitions, local community events, the environment and public affairs. – Successful PR, Claire Austin, London, 1992

Professional public relations is described as “the art of convincing people that they should adopt a certain attitude or pursue a certain course of action; usually associated with management – Howard Stephenson, Handbook of Public Relations, US, 1960

Public Relations means different things to different people, but professionally, it means “creating understanding and better still, mutual understanding. Very simple, really except that understanding is probably the most difficult thing in the world to achieve. It is a process of effecting change. – Frank Jefkins, Public Relations for Your Business, UK, 1987

Practical public relations is the professional attempt to achieve good public relations in order to promote the success or welfare of the company, organization or individual on whose behalf the public relations effort is made. – Sam Black, Practical Public Relations, UK 1984

The purpose of public relations practice is to establish a two way communication to resolve conflicts of interest by seeking common ground or areas of mutual interest and to establish understanding based on truth, knowledge and full information – Sam Black

Strategic Public Relations is the process of establishing the public relations function in its rightful place – as a management discipline to be found at the highest and in all types of organizations – Mike Beard, President, IPR, London, 1995

The duties of a Pubic relations practitioner whether he belongs to the staff of a firm or is an independent consultant, are to devise and submit to the firms or organizations employing his services the means of establishing and maintaining good relations, based on mutual confidence, with the public and keeping it informed of their achievements and, more generally, of all matters relating to their operations. These duties may also be extended to include the relations of firms with their own staff. The public relations practitioner is responsible for implementing the recommended policy and for measuring results.

The information he/she supplies about the organization must in all cases carry mention of its source, be strictly objective and be absolutely free of any propaganda, commercial publicity or advertising content. The Press Officer carries out the duties defined above as a specialist in relations with the following information media: press, films, radio and television. The duties of a public relations practitioner and of a press officer are incompatible with their practicing at the same time as a professional journalist or advertising agent.

Public Relations is the ‘science’ that deals with the opinions and the relationship of an institution with the people; it involves to secure the goodwill and support.

Public Relations is to plan and carry out short, medium and long term plans to create better knowledge and understanding, especially through dialogue of the groups and their activities and also of their problems as well.

Public relations is the science of attitude control and a practice of winning confidence.

Public Relations is the skilled communication of ideas to evaluate and interpret opinion, attitudes and aspirations of the various publics – internal and external – with the objective of producing a desired result.

Public Relations is planned, persuasive communication designed to influence significant publics.

Public Relations is the art of making your company liked and respected by its employees, its customers, the people who buy from it, and the people to whom it sells.

Public Relations is any situation act, or work that influences people.

Public Relations is the skilled communication of ideas to the various publics with the object of producing a desired result.

Public Relations is the art of science of developing reciprocal understanding and good will.

Public Relations is promotion of rapport and goodwill for a person, firm or institution, or other persons specially with the public or the community at large through the distribution of publicity material.

Establishing a bond of relationship and contacts between two groups of public.

Lobbying for interests.

To influence, solicit, or mobilize support for an idea, a cause, a problem, an institution, or an individual through communication and persuasion.

To develop and encourage attitudes and behavior to nurture the delicate plant of mutual understanding.

Building of sound and productive relations with the organization’s publics.

A sincere effort to bring about harmonious adjustment between an organization and the community through dissemination of information, ideas about the organization to its publics external and internal and also providing a feedback from the publics to the management.

Counseling management in dealing with public opinion and to plan and execute communication programs to gain public understanding and acceptance of the management’s point of view.

Management of information.

In simple terms, PR is an attempt through information, persuasion, adjustment and individual contacts, to seek support for some activity, cause, movement, institution, product or service.

Public Relations is specialized body of knowledge, skills and methods.

Public Relations is a management function which deals with the relations between two or more organizations or publics, both national and international, producing the kind of relations desired or used by those organizations or publics.

Public Relations activities are carried on by practitioners, who serve many types of organizations and publics, such as business, government, finance, labor, education, scientific, trade and professional organizations, special interest groups, racial and sex groups, customers, stockholders, employees, suppliers, opinion leaders, cultural groups and others.

The public relations practitioner, seeking to serve the public interest, is aware of the influence of public opinion on decision making and decisions and counsels and communicates in the following ways (a) Serves as a two-way conduit between an organization and the public (b) Makes an effort to project not only what the organization is, but also what it has been and is becoming, by interpreting it to the public in terms that people can understand and interpreting the public to members of the organization in terms they can understand. (c) Researches the organization’s relations needs, as well as the attitudes held by its publics, recommend a policy and a program to meet them, and measure the effectiveness of policy and program. (d) Seeks to build and maintain favorable recognition of the organization by establishing an interchange of information between the organization and its publics on the social, political, economic and other important forces in our society, depending on feedback from the public for guidance. (e) Suggests adjustment of the organizations behavior to meet the social, political and economic responsibility and the needs created by shifting human standards and attitudes, as research indicates. (f) Strives to anticipate and correct false impressions and respond appropriately to criticisms of the organization (g) Sees that meaningful relations are maintained with the government and that legislation and regulations affecting the organization are reported to management and suggestions are made for dealing with them (h) Conducts research on the publics attitudes, especially of audiences that are important to the organization, and informs management of the attitudes found. (i) Tries to help the organization demonstrate a keen sense of social responsibility along with profit responsibility. (j) Assists members of the organization to speak clearly and forthrightly in all public contacts when presenting facts and viewpoints. (k) Helps management read the signs of the times correctly, apply them constructively, and think in terms of change. (l) Uses as important tools of public opinion and other forms of research, the principles, methods and research findings of the social sciences, visual, written and spoken presentations in the press, on radio, TV and film tape (m) Serves as a part of management, either as an internal staff member or officer or as an external professional counselor or consultant.

Doing good things and telling people about it.

A two-way communication between an organization and its publics.

What we do, what we say, what we are.

A passage from the report of the International commission for communications say public Relations professionals are first and fore-most communicators. “Communications maintains and animates life and runs as a thread linking the earliest memory of man to his noblest aspiration through constant striving for a better life. As the world has advanced, the task of communications has become even more complex and subtle to contribute to the liberation of mankind from want, oppression and fear and to unite it in community and communion, solidarity and understanding.”

Public Relations is the communication and interpretation of ideas and information to the public of an institution; the communication and interpretation of information, ideas and opinions from those publics to the institution in the effort to bring the two into harmonious adjustment.

Public Relations is also graphically deciphered as ‘P’ for Performance and ‘R’ for Recognition. In other words “Doing the right thing and getting credit for it”. Without performance there is no public relations. Performance and public relations are the two eyes of modern organization, which always go hand in hand.