PR advice for PRSA
Monday, June 2nd, 2008The problems in the response to Andrew Cohen at CBS
At the end of a Sunday, the last thing I expect to find in my inbox is an email labeled “urgent news” from the Public Relations Society of America. The exact subject line: “Urgent News from PRSA: Response to CBS Story Challenging Public Relations.”
Oh goody, I thought, PRSA is growing a pair. This should be fun.
Then I read the missive. First, it wasn’t a story as the subject line enticed us to believe. The beginning line of the email tells us that in fact PRSA fired off a letter in response to a CBS commentary, “in which legal analyst Andrew Cohen challenged the integrity of the public relations profession.”
Small problem, right away: We are the cogs of an industry that desperately needs challenging. We are our own best critics, ever ready not to say anything bad about one another. We don’t call one another out for unethical practices, spin-doctoring, spamming reporters, irrelevant story pitches or just plain ineptitude. (more…)
