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Unsung heroes of PR
By Bhawna Sharma on Dec 27, 2006 in PR2.0, PReducation, association, industry
Have you noticed, that a lot of tiny PR agencies are mushrooming all over Delhi and NCR, and their clientèle contain some unknown name of a furniture walla’ or kitchenware walla and the like. Young people either with a degree/diploma from obscure institutes or people who don’t have any degree or diploma in PR and are fascinated about this profession usually land up in these agencies.
But it’s not a cake-walk for them- they have to learn about PR on their own as in a small PR agency, there might be no one to teach them. They are given a client, they have to create angles, write stories, and pitch in media, then work on the client side too. Working hour and conditions, well, they can’t get any worse. They work for 9 to 10 hours a day, 6 days a week.
And imagine people coming all they way from Delhi to Gurgaon in buses, they don’t even get a cab when every other offices in Gurgaon provide cabs facilities. But these hero’s don’t let any stone unturned in order to make a mark for themselves, whereas people in big PR agencies get to work for eminent clients with just a reference of their names interesting journalists of all papers. Ever gave a thought on how hard an UNKNOWN PR professional from some UNKNOWN PR agency has to work to get a coverage for his UNKNOWN client in some big paper?
On Dec 27, 2006, Anonymous said:
Hi Bella
What you have written is a very tru thing, but belive me it happens in every field and profession. You will find unsung heroes everywhere. But I dont think its some thing to cry about. You know thats the way things start in most of the fields. You have to struggle and learn. Every bird learns flying like this and only hard work without any glory gives you the best lesson. This is the only route to take you towards glory… Every sung HERO has to be an unsung hero once in his life…and belive me wo kabhi is par roya nahi hoga… Be a brave fighter….
On Dec 27, 2006, hobbithob said:
Bella, the people who work in startup agencies are bold and need to be appreciated. Now the startup agencies should take care of the HR factor majorly if they want to retain these people. As such when we are talking about high attrition rate in big agencies today, we cannot expect the young PR professionals to sacrifice their learning and growth and restrict themselves to a one track PR grooming for long.
On Dec 28, 2006, bella said:
Hey Anonymous,
Thx, ur comments r very motivating.
Bella
On Dec 28, 2006, bella said:
HH, ya ur right. But u know such agencies hardly have any HR department…:-)
Bella
On Dec 31, 2006, Anonymous said:
It is true that such things are happenning in small time PR agencies, but we should not forget the big ones like PR. Who not very far back used to treat their so called PR professionals like a commodity. Working six days!!!!!!!!! their expectation has been seven days a week even national holidays and election days included. So lets not blame those small time ones. The biggies are behaving only because there is a dearth of PR professioanls.
Another point about unknown brands of furniture wallahs, well the big ones should look into their closets and see what they used to sell in their own times. So lets not raise fingures just like that. I am very sure all of us in our so called illustrious careers with PR biggies have managed some of the most obscure names or symbols, I’ll not call them brands, that were nothing and still deliver nothing, furniture wallhs included!!!!!!!!
On Jan 6, 2007, bella said:
hey anonymous,
thnx for ur time to go through the post and for the motivating reply..
cheers
bella
On Feb 14, 2007, advistas said:
There is nothing wrong in promoting an obsure furniture company or any company. One never know what will happen to these brands tomorrow. May be they will become a strong brands. Mainly because of the work of these young guys.
They should be encouraged to do so considering that they are the skill sets in the most toughest way and that is the way one has to learn them.
Also, I have worked in a world’s PR agency in Chennai. They work on brands nobody has heard about. The job of PR is to build brands and obscure and unknown brands are the best ones to handle.