One of the hardest things I have ever had to do...

So I don’t know if anyone read my blog from Friday about my time at the Shenton Park Dogs’ Refuge supervising a photo shoot for the corporate volunteering day… If you didn’t you might want to read it before I go on…because it’s amazing how much can change in 24 hours.

So on Friday I was relishing the fact that the story I wrote a media release for and supervised a photo shoot for, made page 3 of the The Post newspaper. When my supervisor told me this news I was absolutely thrilled and she sent me a copy of it, though because I was at university I just gave it a quick glance and moved on.

Because I was the one who wrote the media release for the story, I was also the person who contacted and did interviews with all those involved in the volunteering day, including the husband and wife who donated the $10,000 worth of turf for the refuge. This was all so that I could write up a media release to be sent to journalists who may want to write the story in their newspaper.

To my dismay however, on Saturday I received a text message from the wife who donated the turf saying she was disappointed because some of the facts of the story were wrong. I then told her to give me five minutes so that I could read over the story and then give her a call. I read it and realised that she was correct, a lot of the facts did actually get mixed up. It wasn’t anything too bad just a few simple errors but still it seemed to mean a lot to her so I gave her a call and said I would try and see what I could do.

I started to panic a little because I felt terrible and went over the media release I sent out to the journalists and realised that no, all of my facts were correct and the error was actually on behalf of the journalist who wrote the story- who was actually my second year journalism tutor.

The first thing I wanted to do was ring up my previous tutor David Cohen and say: “Remember all those times you told us to always check the facts and be accurate with whatever we are reporting? Well ha! You made errors in your story so there!”  Obviously my brain got the better of me and I didn’t, and decided to contact my supervisor to ask her what to do.

So I did this and she explained to me that the errors were only really minor and the story still put the husband and wife who donated the turf in a really positive light, and it was really great media coverage for the dogs’ home. She then went on to explain to me how the journalists and newspaper are actually doing us a favour by putting our story into the paper, and especially on page 3 because it really is free advertisement for both the refuge and also the turf company. She also said how asking for an apology might jeopardise the already really stable relationship our consultancy has with The Post newspaper and said if we were to criticize them they may not put our stories in at all in the future.

Because The Post comes out on Friday, all journalists must file their stories by 12:30pm on Thursday. As we did the photo shoot on Thursday at 11:30 the journalist only had little time to go back and file it and so this is where the errors must have occurred.

I thought about all of this and knew she was right. Although I felt terrible for the wife, at the end of the day it was a really great story and gave our client some really good media coverage. I now just had to ring the wife and try and explain this to her in the nicest possible way.

My supervisor Ruth helped me come up with some phrases because frankly I was a little bit scared of ‘getting my head bitten off’ in case the wife was still unhappy. I really wanted to say to my supervisor “No can’t you do it? She’ll listen to you more” but then I thought to myself “No, if I want to show to Ruth I can handle crisis situations and act calm then this is something I have to do myself”. And so I did.

I planned out everything I was going to say on a piece of paper and gave the wife a call. I told her I understood her and said it was really unfortunate but explained to her how well the story did by getting in a paper and on page three as well and how positive the article talked of her and her husband and that this was the most important thing to focus on here. At the end of the day, regardless of the few mistakes the article made, it publicised the refuge in a really positive way and also showed of the kind hearts of these generous people who I said are an inspiration to everyone.

This whole situation taught me that journalists are very time constrained, and although these situations aren’t our fault, there is nothing we can really do about them because yes, they are doing us public relations professionals a favour by helping us put our clients’ articles in their newspapers.

It also taught me of the important relationships public relations practitioners have with journalists. Without journalists there is essentially no media coverage for our clients and hence no publicity for their respective companies. Although journalists may at times get information and facts wrong it is always best to keep them on your good side because you never know when you will need them next. This was definitely a lesson learnt for me and even though it was unfortunate I am really glad it happened because I will know for next time what to do and how to calmly handle situations such as this. 

I am now in charge of YOU!

In case you are reading my blogs for the first time my practical placement is at Shine Communications in Marmion. It is a small consultancy with really only one member, Ruth Simpson who runs all operations. One our clients are the Shenton Park Dogs’ Home, whom Ruth does pro bono work for. It is a great organisation that takes in unwanted dogs and cares for them until they find their “forever” home.

Since starting at Shine a few weeks ago it has been my duty to find as many homes as possible for these gorgeous and loveable dogs by writing stories on each of them in the hope it gets in the local newspaper, creating awareness about the refuge and hopefully at the end of the day help get all those lonely dogs adopted.

So far I have written media releases for and supervised many photo shoots that have ended in stories being produced in the local paper, which is an absolute great feeling, for both the refuge and myself.

Over the past two weeks I have been working on a media release for the Home, which tells the story of a very generous couple donating $10,000 worth of turf for new exercise runs and grassed areas at the refuge, which if anyone has been to the refuge it’s desperately needed! A corporate volunteer day was put in place where many volunteers from Price WaterHouse Coopers and the community would go to the refuge and help lay out the turf. I wrote the media release for this and was very lucky when two local newspapers were interested and wanted to come down on the day for photos and further information. Being the one who wrote the release, my supervisor Ruth left me in charge of it all!

If there’s one thing I have learnt from this it’s that being in charge of a photo shoot is amazing! Especially when you get to be in charge of one of your old university tutors!

Yesterday when I went down to supervise the corporate volunteering day, I met the journalists and photographers and to my surprise my 2^nd year journalism tutor David Cohen was there reporting on the story. It was actually really funny because for once I was in charge of him and ordered him around telling him what he could and could not do – absolutely brilliant feeling! I jokingly said to him “Ha! I am now in charge of you, oh how the roles have reversed” and he laughed and just took it, which I’m not going to lie, it secretly felt good.

The thing about photo shoots is that you have to be prepared for absolutely everything, especially if there are dogs involved! It took many takes for the photographers to get a photo with the volunteers and dogs actually standing still but in the end some brilliant photos were taken. Everything went really smoothly which was really great and my story actually made page 3 of The Post newspaper today, which was such a good feeling! It’s always nice when you see something good come out of the hard work you put in. The manager of the refuge also sent my supervisor an email saying how confident I was and that I am a great ambassador for her company and for the refuge, which she forwarded onto me, and this made me feel even better!

So far my time at Shine Communications has been absolutely amazing and I couldn’t ask for a supervisor any better than the one and only Ruth Simpson! At times it does get hard and I do feel like I struggle with writing but Ruth is always there encouraging me to just keep practicing and the more I do the better I’ll get which is absolutely true. I find that every week my writing is improving and there is less and less for Ruth to correct!

I must say that everything we learnt in public relations at university is completely relevant in the industry we have today. There are times when I was doing assignments and would think to myself, when would I ever need this in the real world? But I can tell you pretty much all of my university work has popped up somewhere in my practical placement, whether it be media releases, writing key messages for clients, organizing events, contacting journalists, organizing photo shoots etc it’s all there! And so far - I love it. 

I am never going to graduate....

A few weeks ago I started my practical placement. Getting here was not an easy task however. Over the summer I kept thinking about my practical placements and where I would like to go. I had already done quite a bit of work experience for PR with the Fremantle Dockers last year and also over December and January working with PR goddess Rosita Stangl at the 2012/2013 Hyundai Hopman Cup Both were absolutely amazing experiences and ones I would never forget but of course both concerned sport and so I thought about doing something a little bit different. And so my journey began…

I probably sent out resumes and cover letters to about 10-15 different public relations consultancies and organisations around Perth. All of the people I spoke to either already had an intern or didn’t have the time for an intern at that stage. It got to the point where I thought to myself: Am I ever going to complete this unit and graduate? I didn’t care where I wanted to go at this point, I was just desperate for a placement and that experience! So I put looking off for a while and decided to let fate handle itself as it was still January and a lot of consultancies were still on holidays.

A couple of weeks passed and I still hadn’t heard anything. So I went on blackboard and saw a few positions posted on there and thought I would give Shine Communications a go.

That following week on the exact same day I heard back from three different placements saying they were interested and wanted me to come in for an interview. One was Shine Communications, and the others were Muse Bureau and Professional Public Relations. I decided to go to all of the interviews and then if successful pick which one suited me best. I did that and ended up being offered a placement at all three! I went from being really desperate and wanting anything to now being faced with having to decide between three! And they were all so different.

Muse Bureau is a real artsy consultancy whose clients mainly revolve around theatre, music, fashion and culture. I thought it would probably be interesting but the arts isn’t really something I want to focus my career on and I personally thought my strengths would be better elsewhere.

Professional Public Relations is a much larger consultancy whose clients range all over Australia and the world. I was really excited to be considered by them seeing as they are based not only in Perth but also in the eastern states, and because that had such a large and broad range of clients ranging from Emirates to Bunnings. They were only offering four weeks full time however and because of university this deemed pretty much impossible so to my regret I had to turn them down also.

This left Shine Communications, which so far has everything I have been looking for. Run by Ruth Simpson and Samantha Mills (who was actually a graduate of this unit just over a year ago), their clients include non-for-profit such as the Princess Margaret Hospital Foundation and the Motor Neurone Disease Association of Western Australia, but also more corporate ones such as BHP Billiton and Shell Development Australia. I’m very lucky Ruth took me on because she already had another student from Curtin working with her but said she’d be more than happy to have me on board as well, which was great. Being a very small consultancy Ruth runs things from her home where she has an office for herself and her interns. At first I was a bit scared about this because I wasn’t sure what it would be like to work from home or whether I would struggle as I thought I would be thrown in the deep end straight away.

Since starting a few weeks ago however I have to say that I wouldn’t have it any other way. Working in a smaller consultancy means there is more to do which means more experience, and I have definitely been gaining on experience! The very first week I was off to a meeting with the Motor Neuron Disease Association of WA then back to her house writing up a media release for her pro bono client – the Shenton Park Dogs’ Refuge Home.

Every week I go to the Refuge Home to supervise in a photo shoot and filming for one of the dogs of the home in the hope it gets them adopted. So far the majority of my work has been for the Dogs’ Home and I’ve had to chase up interviews and write media releases for them about three times a week. At first this was daunting but I’ve written so many I am now very used to it and Ruth has been absolutely fantastic and teaches me as I go making sure I’ve got everything down pat.  I’ve also written a few pregnancy blogs for client Mercy Care and think I can safely say I am now prepared for parenthood – though I’m not planning that anytime soon I can tell you!

The other great thing about working from a business from home is that Ruth is very flexible with my practical hours. Some days if I have a lot of study to do Ruth will send me work which I can work on from my own home. I have been doing that for the past two weeks and it’s been different but great – there is just something so satisying about not having to put on business pants or a business skirt to have to go to work, I can just work in my trackies! The hard part however is not getting distracted, but deadlines help me with that and it’s been good so far.

I now can confidently say I am pretty sure I will graduate! My posts from now on will be more about the work I do at Shine Communications but just thought I would share my experience with you about how I went about getting my practical placement and wondering if anyone else experienced difficulty (or frustration) when finding their placements.

For now, adios!