The Future of PR
In a recent study conducted by Vital Speeches of the Day, Public Relations are ranked among the top five fastest growing professions in the United States. In the article The Golden age of Public Relations; why demand for PR is about to Explode, Thomas Reid presents an obstacle that "Finding clients prepared to expand their PR budgets will not be a problem. The problem will be finding professionals to service those clients." (Reid. 1998) Public relations professionals are unanimous in predicting that new challenges will face practitioners in the future. Authors point to factors such as globalization, the emergence of new technologies, and new ways of doing business that they feel will affect the ways in which public relations is carried out in different sectors (Wilcox. 2000). A web study conducted in May 2001 showed a dramatic preference for the Internet as information for both personal and special interests and business information needs. For personal and special interests needs 63% of survey respondents choose the internet compared with just 18% who chose magazines; for work related information 48% selected the web as their favorite source, while only 7% preferred magazines." (Gage. 2001)
Arts organizations are also in the process of developing on-line ticket-ordering systems to facilitate sales to out-of-town and international customers. Organizations such as History Television, the Royal Ontario Museum, the Canadian Opera Company, and the Art Gallery of Ontario have all begun to use e-mail to advise members, subscribers, and interested people of special events. The extent to which globalization will affect public relations in the entertainment industry varies between different sectors. PromotionPromotion is a primary function of the public relations departments of each of the organizations we researched, and that is not likely to change. (Lesley, 176) CONCLUSIONIn an editorial written in 1976 for Public Relations Quarterly Philip Lesley predicts:"What we do today is likely to have been largely determined by the time we do it-determined by our heritage, our training, our position, our outlook on the world. Hamilton concurs and adds that there is a great need for people with a strategic vision: the ability to see where an organization should be in the future, and to know how to get the organization to that point (Goldman. The larger the world gets, the more important communication becomes. However, there has been and will continue to be differences in the impact that these trends have in various sectors of the entertainment field. Not only has the Internet made the mechanics of information dissemination easier, but also the Internet provides the opportunity to present unfiltered positions to customers and media, bypassing the traditional gatekeepers (FitzGerald. Moreover, they noted that the field is becoming more demanding. The Downhomer, for example, supports corporate events, attends trade shows, and promotes through relationships with boards of trade, chambers of commerce and various local and municipal groups. New TechnologiesThe Internet has had a profound impact on public relations generally, and on practitioners in the entertainment industry. Opportunities for Growth in the Public Relations IndustryEach of the interviewees identified opportunities for growth. Many traditional forms of communications have given way to electronic forms. At the Canadian Opera Company, the fundraising and public relations functions are separate but the two departments work closely together.
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Acceptance Essays
