With ever tightening deadlines, budgets and newsroom staff, today’s relationship between public relations practitioners and journalists is increasingly symbiotic. As this relationship grows and even overlaps as more public relations professionals blog or write guest columns, both parties have sought greater understanding and better communication.
The relationship between journalists and public relations professionals is increaingly dependent. Is it improving as well?
One study has shown that somewhere between 25 to 50 percent of news stories originate from public relations practitioners (Cameron, Sallot & Curtin, 1997). There is certainly potential, as both parties work toward mutual collaboration, for the general public to receive more timely, applicable and worthwhile news and information.
In 1975, a Texas-based study by Aronoff found that many journalists viewed public relations practitioners as obstructive or even manipulative.
My question is how much, if any, has this relationship improved since 1975? If so, in which ways? What are professionals doing differently to improve it?
Interconnectivity has expanded the journalist-PR relationship
My hypothesis is that this relationship has improved: boundaries have broken down, biases or misconceptions have been proven wrong, the communication has simply improved. Good public relations practitioners have begun to ask in earnest how they might deliver information better, faster, or better tailored to audiences. Great journalists have started brainstorming how they can ask for, sort through, or seek information that is best way for their readers. And we’ve all become better consumers of the news since 1975. We sort through junk, we wade through clutter, and we have begun to build mutually dependent realities into meaningful, beneficial relationships.
Do you agree? Which other ways are we improving the journalist-PR pro relationship?
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