Forget the rubber duckie, pass me a Ziploc bag

I was looking out a restaurant window last Wednesday evening when an SUV pulled up and stopped in the parking lot. Mom was apparently letting her two daughters out to enter the restaurant while she parked the vehicle.

I could see one daughter, a high schooler I’d guess, opening the side door to help her younger sister out. They both came around the back of the SUV and crossed the parking lot in route to the front door of the restaurant.

Like ducks in a row, the older led the younger. The older girl, about 15 or 16, was texting like crazy as she walked unconcerned across the parking lot. Her little sister, who could not have been more than 4 years old, was doing the same thing on what I assume was a toy cell phone.

There’s the future, I thought. That is, if fortunately for them, no speeding vehicle shortens their days, because each was too absorbed in her texting to notice little things like oncoming traffic.

But it’s not just young people. A dear friend from Canada told me that at an early movie this past Saturday night, her party noticed a young man sitting alone using his Blackberry throughout the movie.

In Japan, 20 percent of high school girls have not only one, but two, cell phones, and some own even more. These teenagers stay on the phone “all the time” as one of them put it.

The Pew Research Center finds that 75 percent of Americans ages 12 to 17 own a cell phone, and the age at which kids  gettheir first phone is dropping. If what I saw at the restaurant is any gauge, it is dropping really low.

Pew reports that 66 percent of users use their phones for texting. It is sometimes carried to extremes, like the Japanese teenagers who use Ziploc bags to keep their phones waterproof while they use them in the bath.

Web 2.o technologies are extraordinary. We are able to communicate in ways we could not have imagined just a few years ago. But what does it all mean? Just because we can text in the shower, does that make it a desirable thing to do?

What concerns me most is how technology is used by my mostly Millennial Generation students now and in the future. Web 2.0 technologies are exciting and capable, but harnessing them to be useful in strategic communication/public relations is essential.

There is much to know about such topics as using social media to successfully support integrated marketing communication programs.

The conflict will accelerate: businesses believe Millennial Generation students are inherently tech-savvy and hire them expecting quick results. Not so. They are not.

And to be honest, college prep is lagging way behind. We must find more and better ways of preparing students for the real world of work they will face.

Innovative waterproofing to allow shower texting is funny, but not being able to deliver the requisite technological skills on the job isn’t.

Read Full Post »

Two blogs, no waiting! Even more with Les

A line from my favorite poem, To Lucasta, Going to the Wars, says, “true, a new mistress I now chase…” 

That fits me now. I have started a new blog as part of my doctoral studies in Instructional Technology at Towson University. My first love is and always will be More With Les, but the new blog allows me to focus on education and instructional technology in a more scholarly way.

But at times, there will be some correlation and overlap. Since I teach Mass Communication, PR Track, I will be writing about communication/PR/IMC on occasion. 

For example, I just posted some thoughts on technology standards in the comm/PR world. In it, I write about usage policies for social media, concentrating on corporate Weblog policies. Since that might be of interest to MWL readers, I wanted to tell you about it.

The new blog is named Les Potter on Education & Instructional Technology. Please visit and leave a comment at any time. I welcome your feedback.

Read Full Post »

Parallels: Media usage in education and communication/PR

Media are merely vehicles that deliver instruction but do not influence student achievement any more than the truck that delivers our groceries causes changes in our nutrition (Clark 1983).

 Take that, you teachers who use instructional technology in the classroom!

 For those of us who study the effective and efficient use of instructional technology, Clark’s words are startling. Is this true?

As an instructor in Mass Communication, PR Track, I see a parallel question with education’s use of media and media used in communication/PR.

 For trained communicators like me, one other name comes to mind — Marshall McLuhan. McLuhan is famous for saying, “the medium is the message.”  The focus is on the medium itself not so much the content of the message.

It’s Clark versus McLuhan in a steel cage grudge match.

If Clark is correct, then what matters in education? Perhaps it’s the teacher, the quality of instruction, the subject matter, what is presented, but not necessarily how it is presented. Clark argues that the media teachers use only conveys instruction without helping student achievement.

If McLuhan is correct, then the message content is less important than the medium conveying it. That seems to fit with today’s fascination with social media. The traditional media that communication/PR professionals have used for decades now seems to be foresaken for social media.

But are communication/PR professionals missing something? My best friend Communication Consultant Extraordinaire Robert J. Holland thinks so. Writing in his blog, Communication at Work, Robert says:

Communicators are still drooling over social media. We want to know everything about it — everything, it seems — and we want to figure it out fast so all our peers will be in awe of us. And before long, we’ll realize that social media are pretty much like all the other communication vehicles out there and we’ll move on to the next thing. For now, however, we’re still in the high hormone stage.

I think Robert nails it. The communication/PR profession’s fascination with social media as the newest and greatest may blind us to the importance of the message and to a proper media mix.

But what about Clark’s bold statement about media and instruction? For educators like me, especially Mass Communication instructors and anyone who wishes to use instructional technology effectively, is the media we use that unimportant?

I don’t think so. I think the media we use is important in helping students learn. But as Robert B. Kozma (2001) says, “whether or not a medium’s capabilities make a difference in learning depends on how they correspond to the particular learning situation — the tasks and learners involved — and the way the medium’s capabilities are used by the instructional design.”

Back to communication/PR, where the (social) media is the message. Holland says:

Too many of us have become obsessed with social media, treating them as if they’re the last cute girl (or guy) that will ever come our way. It’s clouding our judgment and we’re losing our grasp of the fundamentals. I get that social media have changed communication forever. I get that social media have caused a significant shift in how organizations engage and interact with their stakeholders. I get that it’s important for communicators to have a working knowledge of social media including some technical skill. I understand social media’s impact and importance. Last summer I told my public relations students that the change in communication brought about by social media was like that of the Gutenberg press.

To summarize, here is the situation:

• In education, some argue that media merely conveys information without helping students learn.
• In communication/PR, some argue that the media, especially social media, is all-important.

For a communication/PR instructor like me, I must find common ground. I think that common ground is captured in the following, which I will call “Lester’s Manifesto”:

I will use instructional technology that helps me create a two-way symmetrical dialogue with my students to help them learn. I will use all relevant media that helps me teach my students successfully. Media in all forms are a tool, whether used by an educator or a communication/PR practitioner. Each medium has its own characteristics. Each has a proper use. No one medium is better than all the rest. In fact, I firmly believe that a well-thought-out media mix is always better than heavy use of a single medium, whether the use is in education or communication/PR.

Read Full Post »

Speaks, tweets, and leaves: The IABC World Conference

As stated in my previous post, I attended the IABC World Conference June 5-10 in part to see old friends on the IABC staff and from the membership. In addition to professional development, one of the greatest aspects of my career-long IABC membership is the friendships I’ve made with people worldwide.

I treasure my conversations with these people, some of whom I only see once a year at conference. Although we stay in touch via various means during the year, nothing beats face-to-face interaction with people you respect and care about.

The main purpose of IABC’s World Conference is professional development. In that respect, this was an excellent conference with top programs and speakers. The program was substantive and balanced and provided something of value to all communication/PR practitioners who attended, no matter their level of experience or job description. IABC is a master of excellent and timely professional development programs. Without IABC, I could not have been as successful in my career as I have been. I have the highest respect and affection for IABC’s staff.

For most actively involved IABC members, the networking opportunities are a tremendous plus of the conference. So, did I find those fulfilling F2F experiences I so wanted to find?

Yes and no. What happened?

For one thing, attendance was way down perhaps due to the weak economy. My session on strategic communication planning and management was well-attended, as were the educational sessions I attended. But overall, the numbers simply weren’t there.

The presence of social media, as expected, was all-pervasive. I took time to observe what was happening around me. Conference attendees act very much like my Millennial students with their cell phones and PDAs, but my students are not allowed to use these devices in class. The moment students leave class, the cell phone/PDA goes into action. Conference attendees feel no such constraint; they sit in sessions and use cell phones, PDAs, and computers with impunity and wild abandon. When out of sessions, you see many people sitting alone using technology rather than talking with people.

The typical in-session scenario is this: a person attends and tweets a session for his/her followers. Or, an attendee blogs about the session while the session is being conducted. Then, there are the text messengers who carry on conversations while in a session. Countless others feel compelled to check for messages every few minutes or to surf the Web.

What is happening here? What does this all mean? 

Twitter is definitely the current darling of the social media glitterati. So many people tweet sessions that a presenter’s message is magnified perhaps a hundred or a thousand times or more. Session tweeters say they are “reporting” on the event for others out there in the Twittersphere who could not attend. Tweets are re-tweeted, and the word spreads exponentially at 140 characters a pop.

For example, I was part of an invitation-only think tank on social media, and during that half-day session, fully one-fourth of the 30 participants were using their computers or cell phones or PDAs the entire time. One participant who constantly reported on the event from his laptop was asked why he stayed on his computer talking about the session with people who were not invited rather than “being fully there.” He replied that he was there, but he felt responsible to share the event with so many others who weren’t.

Okay. If you say so. When it came time to report findings of their small group work, he totally missed the assignment and went off on so many unrelated tangents as to draw laughter from the other participants. Perhaps his followers in the Twittersphere got better from him.

Critics of the practice say, “But you are not listening. You are tweeting.” Defenders of the practice say they are listening and listening even more closely so as to be able to tweet salient points.

Whatever your viewpoint, Twitter changes the rules of engagement for speakers and conference attendees. Some savvy presenters encourage tweeting during the session and display the tweets as the session progresses. That way, you can see an underlying full, rich discussion happening in real time simultaneously. The essence of the session can be shared with a much wider audience. The presenter may become Twitterlebrity.

Twitter followers who are in less-than-interesting or relevant sessions can leave to attend one that is tweeted to be more lively and interesting. Twitter adds a bold new dimension to “session surfing.”

No doubt Twitter is the current force to be reckoned with. I am anxious to see if it will be the same at next year’s IABC World Conference in Toronto.

I’ll try to be in Toronto to roam the halls in search of meaningful conversation. But in the meantime, see you on Twitter. I’m at http://twitter.com/LesPotter

Read Full Post »

The unbearable lightness of being a sole proprietor

Three Dog Night nailed it: One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do.

Many who decide to leave employment to fly solo in communication/PR/IMC often find it lonely. One day you have the camaraderie of fellow workers; then you are on your own with no one to talk with or to share ideas and/or approaches.

I believe that the potential loneliness and feelings of isolation among independent consultants, sole proprietors, and/or solo practitioners should be considered before a person decides to pursue entrepreneurship. I have had many conversations over the years with friends and colleagues who feel the same way.

I left corporate America in 1998 to start Les Potter Incorporated, my consulting practice.  LP Inc. was chartered in the Commonwealth of Virginia as an S Corporation, or a sole proprietorship. That means I was it. If I did not attend my staff meeting, then 100 percent of my employees were absent.

As many who strike out on their own, I did not want the expense of an office at first. I worked from a well-appointed home office to save money. In so doing, I spent hours and hours alone. I am fine with that, a monk working alone in my cubicle with only classical music from my Bose Wave radio breaking the silence.

But others are not. There are many aspects of running a business successfully that entrepreneurs must deal with. But I believe that potential solo practitioners must take into consideration the lack of interpersonal contact that comes with the territory.

If you decide to go it alone, then allow me to offer some lessons learned to help you cope with the loneliness.

First, examine what you need to be fulfilled in your career. Are you mentally and emotionally prepared to go it alone? Can you truly stand to work alone away from day-to-day collegiality? If so, then proceed.

Some suggestions for those who decide to go it alone:

• If you have not already, join IABC and/or PRSA and attend monthly meetings. That not only gives you regular social interaction with fellow professionals, but also is valuable for networking and business development.
• Volunteer for IABC/PRSA committees, functions, etc., for the same reasons as above. Plus, it builds your credibility and expands your resume.
• Become active in civic groups for the same reasons that it is advisable to be active in professional associations.
• Volunteer for a nonprofit organization, a cause-related entity that is doing good in your community. Not only will you get the satisfaction of helping advance the human condition, but you will have social interaction, valuable networking, and possible business development.
• Find a place away from your home office at which you can work around people. For example, find a wired Starbucks or a pleasant restaurant and hang out there. Make it your remote office. Get to know the barristas, staff, and regular customers. You’ll have a sense of community that rivals any corporate atmosphere. But, coffee shops and restaurants are really in the real estate business — they sell space. If you hang out there taking up valuable space, be fair and support them with meaningful purchases.
• Social media is great for helping with loneliness and feelings of isolation. There are a zillion communication/PR/IMC blogs in which you can be part of a community, learning and giving and sharing all along.
• Social networks like PR Open Mic and MyRagan are ideal for building a sense of community. Plus, these networks are excellent for connecting with other communication/PR/IMC professionals and sharing knowledge for continuous professional development.
• Our little pal Facebook is great for keeping in touch, too. I love it for just that reason.
• And don’t forget email and telephone calls. Reach out to others when you feel lonely or isolated.

Reminds me of another song. Take us home, Carole King.

When you’re down and troubled
And you need some loving care
And nothing, nothing is going right
Close your eyes and think of me
And soon I will be there
To brighten up even your darkest night

You just call out my name
And you know wherever I am
I’ll come running to see you again
Winter, spring, summer or fall
All you have to do is call
And I’ll be there
You’ve got a friend

Read Full Post »

PR and the People’s Republic of China Olympics

As the 2008 Summer Olympics in China begin, brace yourselves for the zillions of references to “public relations”. I dread it.

True, this has begun already. An example is the Olympic Torch Relay that some call a “public relations disaster” for China.

China’s winning bid to host the 2008 Summer Olympics is incredibly important to the country. By hosting the Olympics, China plans to show that it is a major player on the world stage, a modern economic powerhouse, as if we didn’t know that.

But some fears of China as host have become reality. In submitting its winning bid to the IOC in 2001, China promised open access for journalists so that they could cover this Olympics as they would any other Olympics. Not so in reality, say early accounts. There appears to be a clash of what freedom of the press means to journalists and what it means to Chinese officials.

Internet access is tightly controlled, and many Websites are blocked. Also tightly controlled are what reporters can visit and who they are allowed to talk with. So much for promises of openness.

In terms of PR, China’s effort to be seen in the most favorable light possible is undermined by its efforts to control messages and images. What pains me is to have “public relations” applied to any of this. There are enough people in the world today who disrespect PR. Applying the term “PR” to any aspect of China’s efforts at controlled self-promotion is deeply troubling.

A free and open media is significant to the ethical and effective practice of public relations. The truth is that much of the news that appears in the media comes from public relations sources.

Publicity is uncontrolled information, meaning that once any information prepared by PR professionals leaves the hands of those professionals, that information is at the mercy of a free media’s decision makers. These folks choose what they do with the information — run it, ignore it, or edit it and run it.

But when the media uses information from PR professionals, in whole or in part, it runs as if the media outlet created it, thereby giving the message a much-valued status called “third party endorsement”. That simply means that media using the information gives it credibility and validity. Though great media coverage is hard to obtain, it is highly prized for this reason. Plus, it’s free. Some call this “earned media”.

When media is controlled by the state, and only approved messages and images are allowed, then that is not public relations, but propaganda. China may wish to persuade the world that it is what it wishes to be seen as, but its heavy-handed control of media is not helpful. Persuasion as a PR tool is acceptable when done ethically. Persuasion uses communication to win people over. Persuasion is used ethically in reputation management all the time.

But there is a distinct difference between persuasion and propaganda. Propagandists try to tell people what to think.

Any PR Principles class, professional association, or PR textbook will define PR as a management function that seeks to establish and maintain mutually beneficial relationships between an organization and its publics. That cannot be accomplished by manipulation, control, and coercion.

Truly effective public relations needs a free and open media. And a free and open media needs public relations as a source of worthwhile information. This is the truth that we must not forget in the coming weeks.

Read Full Post »

Top ten reasons why PR students say they don’t blog

10. I read David Murray’s blog Shades of Gray, got scared, and changed my major to Kinesiology.

9. I think blogging is a fad and will go away.

8. I kan’t type wurth a krap.

7. WordPress is too expensive.

6. I’m a effin dumb ass,  so why prove it to the world by blogging?

5. My mother might read it.

4. My mother might not read it, then I might not get any comments.

3. My instructor does not require me to blog for a grade.

2. I can’t ask my instructor “how long does this need to be?”

1. OMG! WTF! blogs like fkin gay, i’m like too busy texting my bff.

Read Full Post »

Why are PR students not blogging?

My fellow blogger and Facebook Friend Meg Roberts, a senior PR student at the University of South Florida, is currently blogging about why college students are not blogging. She cites four reasons why they aren’t, but makes the point that they should be.

I have been wondering the same thing about my students at Towson University. I have around 100 PR Track students in four classes. I asked each class how many read blogs regularly, and in all classes, only a very few said they did. When asked how many blog themselves, there were virtually no affirmative responses.  While this is not scientific research, it is disturbing.

I do not require my students to establish their own blogs in any of my classes. Some of my colleagues do. Valued colleague and Facebook Friend Stacy Spaulding, Ph.D., who teaches Journalism and New Media at Towson, is one of them. Such an assignment fits her syllabus.

Tiffany Derville, Ph.D., formerly of Towson and now teaching at the University of Oregon, also requires blogging for her PR writing classes. I read some of Stacy’s and Tiffany’s  students’ blogs when I can. It is always enlightening. I am a regular visitor to the few students of mine who blog. And I would not miss one of Meg Robert’s posts.

There are other professors out there who require student blogs for various classes. These are just a few examples of how professors are dealing with the all-important subject of social media for PR students. Like Meg Roberts, I wonder why more PR students are not voluntarily embracing blogging.

Each of my classes will have blog-related assignments, but not a requirement to set up a blog of their own. I approach the need to learn about and participate in social media in a different way. When the semester is finished, my students will have read and participated in numerous PR and IMC blogs. They will know the impact on and importance of the blogosphere to organizations and the impact it has on the PR profession.

But is that enough? Is regular reading of a wide variety of blogs plus commenting to them and discussing findings enough to help them learn what they need to know?

At present, I believe it fits the style of my classes not to require blogging personally but to instill in students a desire to participate in social media combined with the knowledge to do so. I strongly believe in learning by doing (see Why is Uncle Lester Blogging?), but it stops short of requiring a student to blog.

Am I wrong here? Your advice and counsel please.

Read Full Post »

More With Les names its Person of the Year – the Millennnial Student

Everyone else is doing it, so More With Les is jumping on the bandwagon. After what seemed like endless minutes of contemplation and deliberation, I am now ready to announce the More With Les blog’s Person of the Year for 2007.

The winner is the Millennial student.

The students in the generational group referred to as the “Millennials” were born beginning in 1982 and continuing to 20xx. Along with their five predecessor generations, the Millennials span nearly 120 birth years. But Millennials are unlike any of the youths of previous generations. They are more of them. They are better educated and more affluent. They are more ethnically diverse than previous generations, according to Strauss and Howe (2006) in Millennials and the Pop Culture. And most important, Millennials are already having a profound impact on society. I see it every day as a college instructor in classes filled with Millennials.

But beyond demographics, the Millennials are characterized by a focus on teamwork, achievement, modesty, and good conduct. The Millennial college students in my classes are engaged and upbeat and oh so technologically savvy. These students are:

• Close to their parents.
• Focused on grades and performance.
• Busy with extracurricular activities.
• Eager to volunteer for community service.
• Talented in technology.
• More interested in math and science, relative to the humanities.
• Insistent on a secure, regulated environment.
• Respectful of norms and institutions.
• Ethnically diverse, but less interested in questions of racial identity.
• Majority female, but less interested in questions of gender identity (Strauss and Howe, 2006, p. 54).

Among the most important impacts of Millennials is their redefining society’s relationship to technology, especially their unprecedented influence over pop culture delivery. Witness the success of online music stores. They demand that entertainment service and products be digital, media-free, and interactive. Millennials want their entertainment products and services transmitted through anything, stored anywhere, to be enjoyed at any time by anybody and with a wide variety of equipment.

Strauss and Howe call this “team tech” as manifested in Millennnials’ desire for portable, customized, shareable listening experiences.  The explosion of ringtones, ringbacks, and wallpaper for cell phones, with estimated sales of around $4 billion worldwide, is almost entirely driven by Millennials.

Millennials love the action-response of anything interactive, viewing that as making it fun. As with all of the characteristics discussed here, this has profound implications to the education of Millennials.

Among other characteristics of Millennials  is that they are optimistic, with nine out of ten describing themselves as “happy”, “confident”, and “positive”. They follow rules and trust and accept authority.  For example, Millennials favor more stringent rules against misbehaving in class and society at large.

Millennials gravitate to group activity, a manifestation of this being their tendency to engage in community service in greater numbers than previous generations.

Many of their collective characteristics must come from the fact that Millennials are the most watched-over generation in memory. They were brought up in closely-managed, highly structured environments by protective parents. Millennials were a wanted generation of kids by their parents. Millennials have been regarded as special since birth and have been obsessed over at every age. They were born into an era of falling divorce and abortion rates, an era characterized by that which harms children is intolerable (Strauss and Howe, 2006).

It amazes me how many of my Millennial students tell me that their parents are their “best friends”. It is common for many of these students to talk with their parents via mobile phone as many as five times day or more. Many of my Millennial Facebook friends list in their “Favorites” their “Fam”.

And Millennials are smart. In fact, eight in ten say it is “cool to be smart.”

To summarize, Millennials are oriented toward personal safety, family closeness, community action, applied technology, and long-term planning. Millennials opt for the good of the group, patience, conformity, and a focus on deeds over words. They value finding consensus more than being right. Millennials set their standards high, get organized, set up teams, and create community (Strauss and Howe, 2006). 

And so it is with great pleasure I present to the More With Les learning community my pick for Person of the Year 2007, the Millennial student. As an educator, this group is extremely important to me. They will, as Strauss and Howe say, rebel against the Gen-X (1961-1981) style and attitudes, correct for Baby Boomer (1943-1960) excesses, and fill the void vacated by the G.I. Generation (1901-1924).

One final note of great importance: regular readers of MWL know that this Boomer/blogger is an auto racing fan. News flash — IRL IndyCar racer Danica Patrick is a Millennial. She was born March 25, 1982. How cool is that!!

Read Full Post »

The Bimbo Princess revisited

Remember the Bimbo Princess blogger I introduced in my last post? I asked her why she blogs. Her simple reply speaks volumes about not only blogging, but communication/PR/IMC (whatever we call our jobs), education, and life in general.

She said she blogs “to learn to tell the truth.”

Wow!

The Princess is a senior Mass Comm. major in Towson’s PR Track. After writing for professors, or rather, regurgitating information for some profs, I understand what she means. After reading about, and experiencing, some of the phoniness that passes for “relationships” today, I see her point.

Her blog is her truth.

To me, her reason for blogging is a powerful lesson, whether we are educators, corporate bloggers, recreational bloggers, or communication/PR/IMC professionals.

To me, a huge part of the lesson is the responsibility it implies.

Read Full Post »