I am not able to flesh out my thoughts yet on the Erisco discourse.
Just few things on my mind that we should think through:
1. You can run a successful business without the support of our industry – mostly PR.
2. We should rethink how we can be of strategic and integral value to businesses who are already successful without our support or have the tendency to be successful without our influence.
Think of the transport businesses in Benin that were successful then and still successful now without the input of our industry especially back then – Ohonba line, Edegbe Line, (there are more and some are perhaps not in operations now or have their operations reduced)
There are so many Nigerian businesses that are doing so well without the input of our industry.
Let’s not limit our industry and how we can support businesses to crisis management, media relations….
We should ask ourselves questions concerning their core of the core operations. Business is about profitability, we come from the none commercial lens mostly but not necessarily. We need to have a fusion of how we accommodate that profitability with purpose. Without profitability, no one will be in business to think of managing their reputation.
I don’t have answers to the things I have raised myself, but I am thinking through it.
Erisco, will suffer some impact as a result of this, but they are likely to survive and keep going. Their survival might not be a function of getting it right in terms of reputation management, it will be just the usual Nigerian thing of we move on after a while and the issue is never addressed.
As practioners of this discipline, we need to dig deeper and do some questioning of how we can be invaluable to organizations irrespective of their size, structure, management style…..
I am one person that’s quick to admit that if two people should start a career same day in the same organization and at the same work level, with one being a comms person and the other being a marketier or a finance resource. If both of them maintain same level of performance over a period of time and one is to be chosen as a CEO of the company, the chances of the comms person is either very low or not on the table at all.
The reason for this is not because the comms person cannot do the job, but because he or she hasn’t positioned for the role by way of strategic relevance to the organization. I advocate that comms people should start to take deliberate interest in everything about the organization they work. Depending on the size and diversity of the organization’s operations try and know beyond your immediate space.
You will never be an expert in all things, but having an idea of what the business is about in and out, and you bringing that to play in how you provide advisory, initiatives to the business will position the comms person beyond the traditional perception of who a comms person is and their role in the organization.
I might have digressed and gone off key in my views and I ask that you kindly pardon me for this. I am leaning not to be carried away by the things of the moments that make people to be reactive than strategic.
Our role is that of strategy to make invaluable impact to organizations.
Erisco might be impacted, but will likely survive and move on. Also to mention, that the owners of the business don’t understand the place of strategic reputation management, doesn’t mean they are not good at what they do. I think they are very good for them to have built such a business over time. They however need to do better in managing their reputation. That’s where they need everyone here. For those who can, please start to pitch for their business not for crisis management, but for strategic business support and advisory to make them stand the test of time.
Godfrey Adejumoh, A seasoned Public Relations Practitioner, Writes from Lagos
