Accountability, Innovation and the PR Way

I just read Richard Edelman's most recent post about PR's role in forming a new business environment through straight talk and direct counsel. He references Paul Seaman's Wall Street Journal column about our industry's complacency with the current major issues facing businesses today. He says:

"I predict that the public will be interested to hear from genuinely knowledgeable and thoughtful businesspeople of every stamp, from the bold to the cautious. There will be a premium on professionalism, competence, coherence. To those buzzwords, I'd add these: authenticity, frankness, seriousness. Business and PR are about to get real."

About to get real? Shouldn't we have been "real" this entire time? I agree with Seaman's conclusion that we need to offer blunt, authentic advice (and encourage our clients to speak that way), but that should be the standard operating procedure of a profession that wants to be trusted and heard in the board room and escape our ugly stereotypes.

Looking at the current communications landscape, Seaman says we've basically lost our edge in an effort to make nice with all of our clients' stakeholders. Seaman is right when he says, "Being loved by everyone isn't a successful business strategy." It is, however, successful business strategy to work with those stakeholders we can to move the needle forward as a conscience organization (even "greedy" capitalists). There is room for strategic Corporate Responsibility programs in the next chapter of business.

We get paid to advocate on behalf of our clients, big or small, and to inject their thoughtful, well-formed opinions into the public space. We are paid to "be real" and to bring fresh ideas to the table. It is also our job to bring those generally thoughtful businesspeople to the media and encourage our clients to exude professionalism and competence. If we are not doing these things, if we haven't been doing these things, we are not doing our jobs well. It shouldn't take the failure of our clients for us to realize our fundamentals may be off. And if they are, we certainly can't wait to fix them.