Make PR Great Again

President-elect Donald Trump (Bloomberg)

There’s a simple underlying understanding of what went wrong with American politics during the 2016 election. Some may say it was the lack of real information, as basically, Trump’s overall office run has been characterized by the oh so famous fake news, and one of the main reason of information misunderstandings is that there is too little information about everything. The more informed citizens are, the more they think, the more attention they pay to the actual causes of what they see in the news. How did then the world’s top PR agencies tackle the risks posed by a new U.S. administration during President Trump’s first 100 days in office 

The biggest influencer in the world

In an article by Elina Erzikova and Shannon Bowen, called Missed opportunities to make PR great again: How public relations agencies responded to the Trump Presidency, it was discussed how PR agencies displayed in different ways President’s Donald Trump victory. It is common nowadays to comment on how PR feels like a different way to call the influencer industry. However, what most agencies did when preparing the rest of the organizations for the 2016 campaign, was giving tips and opportunities to tackle the possible issues for the election of the biggest influencer in the world. The first 100 days of any presidency is considered a critical time in which the new president and its administration are closely watched and monitored.

With Trump’s presidency more so than with any other.
Because of the President’s social media use, and its implications to both national and international affairs as well as the causes it represents for organizations, we can establish that issue and risk management played a key role in the daily work of PR practitioners, as a form of thought leadership. As Heath said, “Risks are by nature uncertainties”, and this whole presidential run felt, to most people, as one of the biggest uncertainties we have faced, as Trump’s unprecedented and unpredictable feelings could in the blink of an eye single out companies.

President's Donald Trump Twitter 

Elina Erzikova and Shannon Boweset set out to test a question that continuously puzzles researchers: how can issues management, risk response, and ethical leadership play a part in public relations agencies in reaction to the political sphere. How they view it, is that public relations should lead agencies to perform a leadership role in responding to the risks of the uncertainties of a crisis, an expected performance that most times looks better in a normative scenario than in practice. 

An interesting finding that should worry us, as part of the communication field, is that most agencies attempted to assist clients to overcome anxiety over the president who is “predictably unpredictable with his ability to drag companies into the spotlight”. If one thing is clear is that they did not prepare clients to handle President Trump’s victory. In other words, the industry did not live up to what it preaches in issues management. The first 100 days of this new administration were treated by the main U.S agencies with personal opinions complaining about the unpredictable nature of the new president rather than offering ethical counsel and leadership advice. Generally speaking, the public relations industry appeared to be out of touch with the populace, hostile toward the new administration and didn’t take into account the rich opportunities afforded by a social-media centered president, and instead of leading the change they focused on lamenting it. Once more we can see how in a two-way communication model listening is extremely important to build stronger relationships with clients, deal with issues management and crisis communication. 

How can PR learn from this? 

Well, we’ve all read a thousand theories on 

crisis response strategies, however, I think Erizkova and Bowen make a very valid point. In times of crisis, or unprecedented events a PR practitioner should always:

• Do research (really Research is key!)
• Know your audience
• Prepare for the worst
• ALWAYS have a backup plan

This tips weren't followed by the top 100 agencies in the states in the first stage of this new president, and it was only after the initial panic state that agencies started addressing the Trump presidency more rationally and professionally by framing the new era as a crisis which was not only a challenge but also an opportunity to learn and grow. 

About the author

Laia Soriano is currently a Masters student in Communication Science, where she is pursuing studies in the field of Corporate Communication. With a bachelor in Journalism from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (Spain), her main focus is in economics an politics.