Can PR people become agents of change?

I recently submitted this article to Behind the Spin, the public relations magazine for and by public relations students. As its online pages are dormant, I'm going to re-publish it here (with the kind encouragement of Editor John Hitchins). The only bits I've edited out are references to other items in the May 2007 issue, which won't make sense here.

CAN PR PEOPLE BECOME AGENTS OF CHANGE?

Such has been the expansion of media coverage about climate change in the last six months that most of us have probably stopped to think at some point about our own carbon footprint.

Whether to use a car? To fly? To stop buying so many consumer goods that travel half way round the world only to quickly become landfill?

Many of us may be tinkering with these thoughts as we struggle to come to terms with the difficulty of living green in a world that’s been designed round easy travel and consumption.

But how much tinkering have you done with the idea of your job in PR as being important to the environment?

Obviously there are PR professionals whose job is to promote green issues, and you may, or may not, end up as one of those.

But what about the thought that everyone who works in PR should be having an influence on the sustainability agenda?

It’s a provocative idea because PR starts when a client wants to pay for it. And as many of the readers of these pages are looking forward to lengthy and successful careers ahead that’s a vital thought to keep in mind.

But I’m suggesting that the PR professional should be pro-active about encouraging sustainable behaviour even if they’re not working for an organization obviously associated with sustainability.

I also believe that being on top of the sustainability story is going to make potential PRs more employable in the near future.

GREEN BY DEFINITION

A Yougov survey last year reported that 87 percent of people in Great Britain believe global warming is a big issue.

A COI (Central Office of Information) six monthly survey points to continued confusion about climate change. People don’t know how it relates to them and don’t understand how their actions can make a difference.

However 75% of those polled do have a view that industry and business could have ‘some’ or ‘a large’ influence on limiting climate change.

So people think it’s important, and think someone should be doing something about it. But they don’t know what.

It’s my view that it is this type of scenario James Grunig had in mind when talking about the symmetrical model of communication:

‘With the two-way symmetrical model, practitioners use research and dialogue to bring about symbiotic changes in the ideas, attitudes and behaviors of both their organizations and publics.’

And that means ‘the public relations professional sometimes must persuade the management and at others must persuade a public’.

Wilcox et al offered another definition of PR that seems written with this task in mind: ‘The rationale for any public relations activity is to serve the public interest, and not simply to achieve benefits for the organization.’

GREEN IS THE NEW BLACK

So academic definitions can be found that talk about the public interest, but what will your future employer want?

Large numbers of PRs work in the public or not for profit sector. Five of the major Government departments have got together to lead the Climate Change Communication Initiative which will be spending six million pounds communicating about sustainability over the next three years, and that roll-out has begun with the current ACT ON CO2 campaign.

(And if you don’t get a job communicating to individuals what to do about climate change you may well be communicating to the public what other practical steps the Government is taking as part of a range of promises set out in the recent Climate Change Bill.)

As well as ramping up its own behaviour change work, the Government is urging both local government and communities to do more. Alongside a list of climate change tasks set out in the recent Local Government White Paper a specific study is promised to look into the role of local
authorities and community groups in mobilising individuals to make a difference on climate change.

People working for community organizations are also being invited to get involved in communicating about climate change. The Climate Challenge Fund is currently handing out another six million pounds to community communications projects seeking to change attitudes to climate
change. When that money is spent it is anticipated there will be a further round of funding.

This story isn’t going to go away. The challenge will be to keep this story running and developing as people accept they need to act and become more informed about what they need to do. (Think tech journalists – they didn’t stop writing once people were aware of IT).

If none of this means anything to you because you’re heading for a traditional agency or in-house for a private sector business, then remember how the COI survey showed that 75% of people Think your future employer has a role in combating climate change.

The Companies Act which comes into force in 2008 will give directors responsibility to produce an annual report on the impact on the environment of their business. Consumer cynicism and internet savvy activists should ensure such reports are robust and defendable, rather than tending towards the ‘greenwash’ that Russ Brady and Anne Gregory are talking about.

So in the private sector, communicating accurately about what your client or company is doing to play its part in climate change is going to be a key part of your job. The public will expect it and the Government will demand it.

AGENTS OF CHANGE

By now I hope it’s clear I think PR professionals can help save the planet in a way that’s more productive than wandering to the recycling centre with empty champagne bottles.

A recent environmental behaviour report for Defra said that ‘agents of change’ should be ‘engaged and nurtured’.

But here’s the warning bell. They weren’t necessarily talking about PR people. The same report talks briefly about how ‘social marketing’ as a discipline might be potentially useful to achieve
behaviour change (half a page in a 154 page report). Along with many other Government-sponsored reports on this topic ‘public relations’ as a term is not used when talking about behaviour change.

Also missing is any sense of calling on established communications professionals (whatever their title) to undertake the work.

I’m at an early stage of investigating why this might be.

The task ahead in persuading people to change their behaviour to ensure long term sustainability
has the potential to demonstrate Grunig’s model of symmetrical communication at work.

To establish itself as a key part of this work would be to help confirm PR as a stand alone profession. Failure to do so would be to fail both the planet and the profession.



Sources:
1. Grunig, J. Two-Way Symmetrical Public Relations, Past, Present, and Future, in Handbook of Public Relations, Heath (Sage)
2. Public Relations Strategies and Tactics, Wilcox et al (HarperCollins)