Putting the Public Back into Public Relations

Yesterday, my fellow PR student's and I wrote an E-book in a day on 'Peer2Peer' PR.  This movement creates an innovation for PR using social media to engage key stakeholders of PR reaching PR agencies, CIPR professionals, Southampton Solent PR degree alumni and all other fellow PR lovers. Not to mention CIPR President Stephen Waddington, who was present and contributed in the writing of the book. Have a read of Stephen Waddington's blog to see what he had to say about the day. 
So this is how the day went. We started the day at 9am with enough snacks to feed a small army.  

Tip #1 for writing an E-book in a day: BRING SNACKS

Tip #2 never underestimate the power of the SELFIE

The book was split into eight sections and the section I was working on was: Co-Creation.

This involved collaborating with PR professionals and PR students to find out what they thought the #perfectintern or #perfectinternship was. We used social media platform twitter to get people to tweet in their opinions between 12 and 1. The response was great, we totalled 42 responses in 1 hour. 
Here are a few examples of what people tweeted in: 

             "The perfect intern should be full of fresh ideas and be media savvy"

  "The perfect intern should be proactive, motivated, interested, interesting. Show                                  your initiative and it will be rewarded!"

"The perfect internship has a mentor who the intern feels comfortable talking with about what their enjoying/need support with"

Here is a sneak peak of my contribution to the E-book:

The concept of co-creation is to create value, it is a collaborative exchange of conversation (Tussyadiah and Zach, 2014) and where better than to create conversation than social media. Social platform’s are key enablers (Lewis and Pea et al., 2014) that bring people together. Co-creation can ultimately drive business growth and enhance brand reputation (Glassman, 2014). Social media was effective in engaging with PR professionals and PR students to collect meaningful insights into what the perfect intern or internship was, it successfully reached a range of people and asked them a question which received instant feedback. 

What are your views on co-creation and social media?
Nikita

Glassman, N. 2014. How Co-Creation Can Spark Innovation and Build Your Brand [CONVO] | Social Media Today. [online] Available at: http://socialmediatoday.com/neilglassman/488907/how-co-creation-can-spark-innovation-and-build-your-brand-convo [Accessed: 26 Mar 2014].

Lewis, S., Pea, R. and Rosen, J. 2014. [online] Available at: http://www.stanford.edu/~roypea/RoyPDF%20folder/A169_Lewis-Pea-Rosen_SSI_2010.pdf [Accessed: 26 Mar 2014].

Tussyadiah, L. and Zach, F. 2014. [online] Available at: http://www.tussyadiah.com/Publication/enter2013_tussyadiah_zach_co-creation.pdf [Accessed: 26 Mar 2014].

How to be successful: 3 golden rules every person must know about dealing with conflict in the business world

“The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.”

Theodore Roosevelt

We often look at successful people and think, they are really lucky to be where they are or it must have been the right place and the right time for them. In fact anyone can be successful it’s just takes some application.

Dealing with conflict doesn’t come easy for some people but it is an art that can easily be learnt and will get you far in life. Following these 3 simple steps will help you negotiate your way through any conflict and result in a WIN-WIN situation.   

1.      Listen actively

The art of being a good negotiator is being able to listen to other people’s ideas before expressing your own thoughts and opinions. Listening to someone actively will make them more likely to listen to your ideas after.

 To listen to someone actively you must show them that you understand:

That they feel strongly

What they feel strongly about

Why they feel strongly about it and PAUSE to let them respond.

2.     Win yourself a hearing

Now that you have shown that you have understood the other parties feelings you should now have the chance to explain your own feelings. While doing this you should refer back to their points and make your points firmly but stay friendly.

3.     Work to a joint solution

To come to a joint solution you must now seek their ideas and build on their ideas. Then you can and offer your ideas. It is important to remember to not remain focused on your own ideas and your own personal goal. From this you can construct a solution from everyone’s needs: WIN-WIN.

Next time a conflict occurs use these 3 golden rules for negotiation and let me know if you get the desired WIN-WIN.