What have I learned in my PR Campaigns course?

Okay...here we go. I'm going to vent a bit. I believe the MOST IMPORTANT thing I have learned in my campaigns course is...the team makeup is EVERYTHING. Some people just don't work well together. In my PR Management course we read a chapter from Essentials in Management by Andrew J. Durbin entitled "Teams, groups, and teamwork." I recommend EVERYONE read it. There is a section that talks about the "roles for team and group members." They are listed and described as such:

Knowledge contributor - technically proficient, provides useful and valid information.
Process observer - observes how the group is functioning.
People supporter - provides emotional support and resolves conflict.
Challenger - confront and challenge bad ideas (or any ideas)
Listener - helps to summarize discussion and progress for the team.
Mediator - helps when issues between members move past the point of reconciliation.
Gatekeeper - makes sure all team members contribute equally.

First off, I am a challenger. I have no problems admitting that. I feel that if everyone agrees all the time on every idea, you are going to run into problems. When it comes down to it, not all ideas are smart or well thought of. They are IDEAS...not set in stone. In this particular campaign I feel as if I am probably the knowledge contributor as well. Will I always be...of course not. I am the knowledge contributor because of my background in music. I am in a group where I am the only one with a SERIOUS musical background. Some of the other members have played instruments through middle school and maybe through high school, but I have a bachelor's degree in Music Performance so I feel more comfortable. In our group we don't have someone that is purely a gatekeeper and that is something we needed more of. I'll just say that work was not given out evenly and there were plenty of solid reasons why that had to happen.

Campaigns has been a VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY frustrating course, but it has probably been my best and most realistic public relations course. To be honest, if PR is like this all the time...I probably won't retire being a practitioner. I take things pretty personally and I get super angry when people don't seem like they are pulling their weight or doing their job properly. To give you an example...I'm kind of "over" school. I just really want to get out. I am probably not putting as much effort into some of my classes as I should, but I do put all of my effort and more into these group projects...mainly because I don't want to screw someone else because of me. That's not fair to anyone. Anyway...we are going to make a C on our campaign, but it has been an amazing, honest, and educational experience. Until next time...

Update on the University of Toledo points-shaving scandal

I recently had a post about a point-shaving scandal that was going on at the University of Toledo. Just a day or two ago, ESPN reported that the case had been dropped. HOWEVER, it has been dropped only so that the government attorneys will have more time to gather information and put together a stronger case. In my opinion, this doesn't look good for Toledo and their running back "Scooter" McDougle. The government seems to be really going after McDougle which probably means they have some information and they think they can find a whole lot more. From a PR perspective, I think Toledo needs to release another statement about the whole thing. I'm not sure if they should banish McDougle because when it comes down to it, McDougle was doing this WHILE in school. Right under Toledo's noses. That looks really bad on Toledo. Therefore, I'd probably release a statement saying that I would cooperate in any way I could and we are very upset that it made it this far. You would think that would cover all of their bases. Tell me what you think. Until next time...

Athletic Success leads to Academic Integrity/Enrollment

(Dr. Sweetser you are going to LOVE this post...haha) I have stated many times that I felt that success in collegiate sports would help a university boost its academic enrollment. According to the University of Florida (it is the next to last bullet under the "extra points" section), after winning the National Championship in football the freshman applications rose 8% which was a record. I really feel as if you could see that kind of response from almost any school who is receiving a lot of press for something positive like that. Any type of big victory in a major sport (Football, Basketball, Baseball, Softball, etc) would probably get the same results. I would love to see the number of applications sent to UGA in 1978 vs. 1980-81-82. I really think you would probably see a greater number for those glory years of Georgia Football. Thinking about it, I'm sure UGA gets a ton of applications nevertheless because it is the states largest and most prominent university (Georgia Tech doesn't count because it is a tech school, not because I hate them...haha). Florida has UF, FSU, Miami, UCF, Florida International, USF, Florida Atlantic, and I'm sure other huge universities so that could play a factor. Anyway, I believe winning in sports is a HUGE boost for academic integrity for a school. The more people who want to go to your school, the more competition you have for spots, which means the higher quality of student you will admit. Until next time...

Saban isn't starting well at Bama

I'm back to my sports now. Anyway, Nick Saban is obviously a well respected coach. He took a pretty good LSU team and made them a national championship team. Left for the pros and did respectable (better than Spurrier at least). Anyway, now he is back at probably the second most revered college football school of all time, Alabama. Saban is also known as kind of a overly serious coach. He does things his own way and really doesn't care much about the media or anyone else. He just wants to win, and he does. Well, he hasn't had a chance to win at Bama yet and he is already making the media angry. As a PR student I would have to say that is a terrible idea. The media is already going to be all over you because you coach at Bama, and you are the highest paid coach in college football. Obviously, if he wins the media will back off. However, if the trend continues with Bama and they don't live up to the expectations (National Championship every other year, SEC Championship every year, you get the drift) the media is going to make his life miserable which will in turn hurt recruiting and put his job on the line. Needless to say, I'd be careful. I would say that the University of Georgia's football team has a pretty stiff media policy as well. If I'm not mistaken, the media can only be at practices for a little while and they can only talk to players/coaches on Tuesday. That's pretty stiff I'd say. I just don't think Saban is handling it very well. Let me know what you think. Until next time...

Is Ford Motor Company trying to go bankrupt?

So this recent post isn't about sports. I thought I would change things up. Anyway, Ford's new CEO, Alan Mulally, got paid 28$ Million dollars for 4 months work. Ordinarily I wouldn't be surprised at such a large sum, but from a company which posted a gaudy $12.7 billion loss in 2006 and cut some 30,000 jobs it just doesn't make much business sense or PR sense. Lets do a little math here: Mulally's salary is worth about $933.33 per person that Ford laid off. That seems pretty ridiculous to me. They are willing to sacrifice ONE person for 30,000 people who actually build the product. Maybe Mulally will turn Ford around, but the more people that know he made $28 million while sacrificing 30,000 jobs, the more people who are going to HATE Ford anyway. It just seems a bit ridiculous to me I suppose. Also, at the bottom of that article you'll read that "Ford executives' use of corporate jets for personal travel cost the company almost $1 million in 2006, as Ford, Mulally and Jim Padilla, who retired as president and chief operating officer on July 1, were required to use the jets for all of their business and personal travel 'for security reasons.'" WOW!!! Does the company want to fail? I'm seriously confused. Once again, they will sacrifice $1 Million on three people instead of using that money to keep jobs alive? From a PR perspective, I feel like that are seriously damaging their image. They need to do something to show that they actually care about the "little people" or employees, owners, and perspective buyers are going to NOT want to defend the company or buy from the company. At least that is how I feel. Tell me what you think. Until next time...

Betting on Collegiate Sports

ESPN ran an article recently about a University of Toledo football player who has been betting on his team. Now obviously this is a HUGE deal. This is essentially what banned Pete Rose, the MLB's most distinguished hitter, from baseball and the Hall of Fame. As you can see from my posts I have a deep love and respect for sports so this really gets on my nerves. Athletes who are given every opportunity in the world to live the dream of about 100 MILLION other people and they use their time to do illegal things that get not only themselves in trouble and probably kicked out of the sport, their team in massive trouble, but all their teammates that did nothing wrong also get punished. Classless. On the PR side of this, it will obviously make the university look bad, hurt their sports recruiting, and most likely hurt them in their academic recruiting. I fully believe that sports has a huge affect on the academic environment and recruiting. For example, as much as I HATE the University of Florida, you have to say that what they have done over the past 12 months is pretty incredible. They have won a football championship and two basketball championships. That school is getting so much press it is unbelievable. Now, their recruiting is like a machine. They don't have to do anything, people (student/athletes, and just plain students like myself) want to go there. Now the University of Toledo administrators are making statements about the allegations. I believe they are doing a great job of talking about how big of a deal it is and how serious they are taking it. Obviously, they can't do much until there are charges filed and so on. After reading these articles, I'm not sure they could do much more. They can't say too much or that would probably tick off the lawyers. So kudos to the University of Toledo and hopefully this will teach student-athletes a lesson. However, we all know that won't happen. Until next time...

Steroids and Professional Sports

As you may already know, I am a HUGE sports fan. Mainly I am a college sports fan, but I do love sports in general. However, my dislike for professional sports keeps growing and growing based on the reports of steroid use. So someone gets paid millions and millions of dollars to cheat? MLB's home run record holder has been accused of taking 'roids. Now, all kind of professional athletes have been accused of taking steroids. I bet there will be some of these professional athletes that make it into their prospective hall of fame's, but MLB's all time hits leader Pete Rose, will not be allowed into the baseball hall of fame, because he bet on baseball. If I remember correctly, he didn't even bet on his own team. Kind of strange isn't it? You may be asking yourself what this has to do with PR. Well, I believe it has EVERYTHING to do with PR. What if everything you believed was one big lie? You watch pro sports because you are amazed at what the athletes can do. They can jump 5 feet high to catch a ball, they can run over 3 defenders, they can run the length of the field in 12 seconds...you want to be mesmerized by them. Now what if I told you that they were not truly human like the rest of us, that they were taking drugs that make them more than human, have more advantages than the normal person. You would feel betrayed, just like I would. How would you react to that? That is the problem that the pro sports world is looking at. The more these athletes are found guilty of steroid use (or accused of it), the more I see pro sports taking a hit. People will become angry that a cheater is getting paid millions. The only way to alleviate this problem is for the professional sports administrators take charge of the situation and eliminate illegal substance abuse. I suppose almost like a "witch hunt." I believe the MLB is somewhat already doing this, but it needs to be shown that they are NOT taking it lightly. I believe that is the only way to secure the history of professional sports. Tell me what you think. Until next time...