|
|
|||
|
|||
|
|
Bush Is the Victim of Bad PR Charles Morton Is George Bush's shrinkage in the polls the fault of his actions or is it a failure of poor public relations in the White House? Leonard Saffir, a pubic relations luminary who once served as chief of staff and press secretary for former U.S. States Sen. James L. Buckley, blames the president's top aides. "From a PR high with his, I can hear you, can you hear me' bull-horn comments, right after the terrorists attacks at the World Trade Center, Bush dropped to the PR pits, when he didn't go directly to the Gulf states after Hurricane Katrina and didn't meet with Gold Star mother Cindy Sheehan," Saffir says. "While Karl Rove is an expert in politics, there should be a savvy PR person in the office next door, also with ready access to the oval office." Saffir says. Saffir, who, as executive vice president, once helped run public relations giant Porter Novelli, has just written his third book on public relations: "PR on a Budget: Free, Cheap and Worth the Money Strategies for Getting Noticed." When Sheehan went to Crawford, Texas, where President Bush was vacationing, she wanted the president to come out and talk to her. "He should have talked to her for a couple of minutes within the first one or two days of her arrival," Saffir writes in his new book.
Story Continues Below
"Sure, he had met with her months earlier when she was in a group of other mothers who lost sons or daughters in Iraq but at that point, when Bush was on vacation, Sheehan was accompanied by only a handful of supporters. It would have been easy at the ranch to meet with her again. "She had no following at the time and was just a lone, grieving mother who would have gotten her 15 minutes of fame and slipped into oblivion. "Instead, someone gave President Bush the wrong advice, or he just acted on his own bad judgment. "Once the protest started growing, it was too late," Saffir opines. As a result she became a liberal news media phenomenon. Not only should public relations be a top priority at the White House, it should be uppermost in the minds of the top people in every corporation, organization, small business, and regional or national government agency much like marketing, finance, and human resources.
Public relations has certainly grown up. Once a kind of corporate office boy, relegated to odd jobs in the communications area, public relations is now a giant, with massive strength and wide versatility. Those who know how to handle it will profit. Those who ignore or mishandle it will get hurt. While public relations used to be confined to a limited number of fields, the new techniques are deployed in proxy battles, lawsuits, and campaigns for personal advancement. Professionals doctors, lawyers, financial advisors, and others who are limited in their freedom to advertise and promote are now able to use public relations techniques to create images that attract clients. Ambitious men and women are using public relations strategies to help shape successful careers. "PR's importance is undeniable," writes Saffir. "When the topic of public relations comes up, the reaction should not be, We can't afford it,' or What's public relations?' The reaction should be, 'Now how can I get the job done?'
"Public relations literacy is the answer. I'll always bet on the owner of a start-up business who is PR literate over the Harvard School of Business graduate who disregards PR," Saffir says. If you don't want to do it yourself, there are excellent people that will help on a budget. "Good public relations is no mystery," Saffir writes, "nor should it be a budget breaker." In the corporation of this still young century, public relations will rank higher than advertising. Executives in all disciplines will take it for granted that a grasp of the essential tools and principles of public relations is as important as computer literacy. Saffir discusses the importance of having a crisis plan ready for the time a disaster strikes. "Public relations isn't all leisurely planning and fun and games. If a crisis suddenly erupts, it's a big mistake not to be ready," he says. Crisis means victims, catastrophe, and explosive visibility. A crisis could be a natural disaster, a scandal, sabotage, or a terrorist attack. People at the top of a business or country need trusted advisors who can help them deal with a crisis situation." Saffir, who has been a reporter, columnist, and editor of newspapers, is high on being open and available to the media. Jack Anderson, the liberal columnist, wanted to have lunch with Buckley soon after the senator took office. Saffir scheduled a lunch, and word got around that Buckley was having lunch with Anderson. The senator's office was flooded with calls from his conservative friends to cancel the luncheon. They called Anderson the enemy and told Buckley he would bug the luncheon. Buckley and Anderson, along with Saffir, met for lunch. "It was a delightful two hours. Conversation went from talk of the environment to bird watching. "For his six year term in office, Anderson wrote glowingly, never negatively, of Buckley several dozen times," Saffir writes. Also at the beginning of his senate job, Saffir started a weekly press breakfast for Sen. Buckley. The media brought the donuts and Buckley supplied the coffee ... for six years. No senator from New York had ever been this accessible to the media. "The Tuesday-morning crowd talked to their colleagues in the press galleries and bars throughout Washington," Saffir wrote. "It would cause The Washington Post's David Broder, probably one of the best political reporters in the country to this day, and certainly not a conservative, to say that Buckley was one of the nicest and smartest men ever to serve in the Senate." Coincidentally, Buckley's second book "Gleanings from an Unplanned Life" and Saffir's book, were published within a couple of weeks apart. Both authors include material about each other in their books.
Editor's note:
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
Print Page 
Forward Page 
|
| All Rights Reserved © 2012 NewsMax.Com |