David Hill: " Never lie to media"

Yesterday we listened to David Hill, successor of Alastair Campbell, and former Director of Communications for Tony Blair. He held a lecture at University of Westminster, and honestly, it was slightly strange to observe not so many people shown up there.

Talking about effective communication, Hill thinks that it requires discipline, which is central to political communication success. He said there is a tendency on sensationalizing of media stories towards politics.

He outlined two main issues: strategy and delivery of the message. A clear strategy, he said, is a way to pursue clear sense of direction to goals and is very essential. Relationships between government and media are very important and should be equal and balanced.

Talking about national media, Hill mentioned its attitude to “the best news is bad news” and that a perception gap between individuals, services they have received and how it was delivered and reached. Indeed, it is enough to listen to any news program to be convinced: all is bad. He said that national media tries not to pay attention to any positive issues while emphasizing negative aspects. But he believes that change will come.

He mentioned “segmentation of communications” as a sign of changing processes within the society. Today more communication tools and channels than ever are needed to deliver the message.

Probably, future communicators will find a way to monitor the stories. He thinks that in the future political comments will become more personal.

I really liked his lecture; it was interesting, meaningful and very professional.

Ethical = Professional?

Having worked as a personal assistant to ambassador of my country to one of the far-eastern states I have been given various gifts, sometimes precious, and souvenirs from local companies who tried to call for a favor. On the one hand, this gesture of gaining goodwill was against ethics of my embassy, on the other hand there was a certain risk to offend very specific cultural characteristic and local business mentality by refusal. So, it was a hard task for me to deal with this very delicate diplomatic issue. I used to send expensive presents back to addressee with polite excuses. Sadly, some of them were offended considering my actions as impolite and even unprofessional.

“Right”, “true” and “fair” are ethical issues. They indicate an evaluation of person’s behavior which is considerable to be ethically good. The problem is in complication of barrier definition of what is right or wrong and what is profitable or not. Certainly, there is a certain relativism since moral and ethics are quite subjective and are constantly been changing, sometimes it is a matter of cultural difference as well.

Ethical dilemmas are crucial since they are representing a conflict between organization’s economical activity and social reflection of this activity.
There are various disputable moments in PR activity. Its attitude directly approaches the ethics. For instance, PR campaigns for tobacco corporations and manufacturers of alcoholic drinks are regarded differently.

PR practitioners are concerned with the effect that behavior can cause consequences on reputation. A company’s reputation can be seem as a sum of the public’s beliefs about it, which follow from their experience of communicating and using products and services, what they have read and heard. PR can apply this framework by consulting with publics and leading a dialogue. Practitioners’ ethical behavior is fundamental to the professionalism and credibility.