My colleague Jed said today that journalists and PR people do the same job. This started some heated debate between Chris, Becca and I. We all totally disagreed with him and said the two professions were completely different.
Although they both utilise the same skills - writing, communication, relationships, storytelling - they are very different. Journalism is independent publishing with an aim to sell papers. PR is telling a story on behalf of a client in order to create a certain perception.
Wikipedia defines public relations as:
- Public relations is the practice of managing the flow of information between an organization and its publics.
And journalism as:
- Journalism is the craft of conveying news, descriptive material and comment via a widening spectrum of media.
I suppose it goes without saying that Jed’s statement has created some healthy debate on Twitter. What are your thoughts?
6 Comments
Certainly there is commonality in the skills required by PRs and journalists but there are many differences. As a journalist I mustn’t serve anyone’s interests but those of my magazine and my reader - as a PR exec, someone has the absolute duty to be biased in favour of their client.
That’s the nub of it. Clearly I’m writing about stuff in which I probably wouldn’t be interested were someone not throwing money at me, but beyond that I have to be even-handed, actively seek someone who disagrees with the opinion one commentator has just expressed.
Frankly it’s often my job to try and cut through the management of information flow and say what’s going on rather than what someone feels they want to announce. These are very often different things.
You make one off the cuff remark and look what happens…
Guy hits the nail on the head; while the motive is different the skills are very similar.
If someone in PR said this then it just proves that they know nothing about journalism - in which case they probably aren’t a very good PR.
Stupid argument.
I agree about the motive. Emma Griffiths made a good point on Twitter that PR is all about your client’s reputation - journalism doesn’t care about your client’s reputation.
PRs are all frustrated journalists at heart
(But I would say that, I’m a journo)
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