I need experience to get a job…I need a job to get experience This is the “Catch-22†of landing that first job or internship in PR. It’s where the “rubber meets the road,†and where students get red-faced and reticent. Frustration can boil over and apathy can set in. And, quite frankly, it’s understandable. How […]
Fact versus fiction: résumés and what employers don’t tell you
It’s hard to contain your dismay when you begin reviewing résumés of graduating college seniors. To me, most of the résumés are a train wreck caused by a lot of ill-advised, but good intentioned professors, counselors and, well, family and friends. Over the past 30 years, the thousands of résumés I’ve seen either don’t properly […]
Fact is much stranger than fiction
It’s hard to make this stuff up. Recent public relations happenings in the real world are better than really good fiction. For aspiring public relations professionals and students ready to jump into a practitioner role, we need look no further than former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s behavior and Olympic hero Michael Phelps’ bong hit to […]
Passive Versus Aggressive
No, this isn’t about personalities; we’ll leave that to the psychological set. But on second thought, this is about, well, in a way, personality. The personality of your writing. Today we are confronted with a massive, insidious disease that is killing off massive amounts of potentially good copy. That, my friend, is passive language. It […]
What you write may come back to haunt you
A recent blog posting on a public relations site suggested you need to be careful about what you put on your blog…or Twitter…or anywhere online. No kidding. The author recounted a public relations professional’s disaster of posting negative comments on Twitter about Fed Ex … who just happened to be a client of his. Oops. […]