Knowing what happens in the future is something nobody can really boast of. The reason for this is very simple – nothing is certain – for only change itself is constant. This reality of life’s uncertainty in itself creates the fear of what the future looks like. A ray of hope, however, radiates with the evolving communications landscaping, technology, trends, methodologies and innovations, suggesting a future that is bright and promising and assuring! This optimism became the rallying point for participants at the world’s largest public relations gathering consisting of practitioners, communicators, speakers, scholars, researchers, educators, exhibitors and business icons, when they converged on Washington DC, capital city of the United States of America, to the International Conference in Public Relations themed, “Leading the Way: A Fearless Future for PR.”
Welcoming the radiant-looking participants to the conference, organised by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), Joseph Cohen, PRSA’s 2014 Chair, said the well-attended forum was a unique opportunity for them to share ideas, network, “inspire and be inspired by the latest ideas and strategic approaches that are driving forward the most progressive work in our sector”, as the Duke Ellington School of the Arts Show Choir and the University of Maryland Army Reserved Officers’ Training Corps Colour Guard presented the solemn performance and official presentation of colours and the national anthem, respectively. Cohen appreciated those that had contributed immensely to the PRSA’s success story, as he highlighted the 10 major achievements of the association in the last one year.
Making the first keynote presentation, Walter Issacson, President of the Aspen Institute, shared some of the lessons he learnt while researching and writing his promising and upcoming book, “The Innovators: How A Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution”. Issacson, a former chief executive officer of the Cable News Network (CNN) and editor of TIME magazine, is reputed to have written hot bestsellers about charismatic innovators such as Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin and Steve Jobs, justified the imperative of combining humanities with technology while observing that creativity is a pure collaborative effort, noting that vision without execution is hallucination.
The second keynote presentation was given by Amy Robach, the News Anchor of the ABC’s celebrated programme, “Good Morning America”, who spoke about her early days as a reporter and news consumer and observed that “despite not having the Internet, and having pagers and pay phones, somehow the news still got delivered”, acknowledged that the “social media is like a virtual umbilical cord that can never be cut”. While encouraging women to develop self-esteem, she commended the outstanding courage of the 17-year-old, Malala Yousafzai (the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize), the Pakistani activist and blogger, for her contributions to education and women’s rights. This activist was fatally shot by the Taliban for speaking out for what she believed in. Malala and Amy (a breast cancer survivor), recently visited the Nigerian government together to intervene on the release of Chibok girls abducted by the Boko Haram sect. Malala had called on the Islamic extremists to free Nigerian schoolgirls as she marked her 17th birthday with the trip, where she met with President Goodluck Jonathan and the kidnapped girls’ families. She appealed to Boko Haram to free the 219 girls still missing ‘now and alive’, saying ‘you are misusing the name of Islam’, referred to the girls as her ‘sisters’ and called on Nigerian government to invest more in education for girls.
The professional development workshop series began afterwards that were structured into eight sets, which afforded participants diverse and rich platform to receive information on gaining an edge on the competitive methodologies using contemporary leadership tools, hearing from iconic entrepreneurs and dynamic communicators during the close to 100 learning sessions on the best international practice. On “The Seven Disciplines of the Trusted Strategic Adviser”, James Lukaszewski and Dr. Katherine Fleck, discussed the crucial career behaviours, objectives and goals strategies that are involved in becoming a good, trusted and respected adviser to great leaders. These include being visionary, honest, vigilant and advising constructively’.
The PD set two on “The Best of PRSA’s Public Relations Journal”: 2013 – 2014, afforded participants an opportunity to meet the authors of the ‘top five articles’ published in the journal within the period under review. The authors and their publications are: first, “Millennials’ Perceptions About Diversity in Their PR Agencies”, by Dr. Tiffany Gallicano, University of Oregon; second, “Profiling Public Relations Practitioners’ Work-Life Conflict: From A Diversity Lens”, by Dr. Hongmei Shen, San Diego State University and Dr. Hua Jiang, Syracuse University; third, “Perceptions of Wikipedia By Public Relations Professionals: A Comparison of 2012 and 2013 Surveys”, by Dr. Marcia DiStaso, Pennsylvania State University; fourth, “Towards the Establishment of Ethical Standardisation in Public Relations Research, Measurement and Evaluation”, by Professor Shannon Bowen, University of South Carolina and Professor Donald Stacks, University of Miami; and fifth, “Dictating the News: Understanding Newsworthiness From the Journalistic Perspective”, by Professor Lynn Zoch, Radford University and Dr. Dustin Supa, Boston University.
To be concluded
